From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1755880AbYIORPS (ORCPT ); Mon, 15 Sep 2008 13:15:18 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S1753334AbYIORPH (ORCPT ); Mon, 15 Sep 2008 13:15:07 -0400 Received: from mail.tmr.com ([64.65.253.246]:56009 "EHLO partygirl.tmr.com" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1752496AbYIORPF (ORCPT ); Mon, 15 Sep 2008 13:15:05 -0400 Message-ID: <48CE97BA.1060901@tmr.com> Date: Mon, 15 Sep 2008 13:13:30 -0400 From: Bill Davidsen User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.8.1.16) Gecko/20080716 Fedora/1.1.11-1.fc9 SeaMonkey/1.1.11 MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Frans Meulenbroeks CC: Rob Landley , Willy Tarreau , Alain Knaff , torvalds@linux-foundation.org, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Subject: Re: [PATCH] init: bzip2 or lzma -compressed kernels and initrds References: <200809062119.m86LJ5Of026101@hitchhiker.org.lu> <20080907054831.GA2244@1wt.eu> <200809142037.48204.rob@landley.net> In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Frans Meulenbroeks wrote: > 2008/9/15 Rob Landley : >> On Sunday 07 September 2008 00:48:31 Willy Tarreau wrote: >>> Hi Alain, >>>> +config KERNEL_LZMA >>>> + bool "LZMA" >>>> + help >>>> + The most recent compression algorithm. >>>> + Its ratio is best, decompression speed is between the other >>>> + 2. Compression is slowest. >>>> + The kernel size is about 33 per cent smaller with lzma, >>>> + in comparison to gzip. >>> isn't memory usage in the same range as bzip2 ? >> Last I checked it was more. (I very vaguely recall somebody saying 16 megs >> working space back when this was first submitted to busybox, but that was a >> few years ago...) >> >> A quick Google found a page that benchmarks them. Apparently it depends >> heavily on which compression option you use: >> >> http://tukaani.org/lzma/benchmarks >> > > [...] > > Apologies if I'm sidetracking the discussion, but I'd like to coin a remark. > > For kernel/ramfsimage etc the best choice is the one that has the > fastest decompression (info on tukaani.org says gzip). > Rationale: as it uncompresses faster the system will boot faster. > > Of course this only holds if the background memory can hold that > image. For disk based systems, I assume this is not a problem at all, > but for embedded systems with all software in flash a higher > compression ration (e.g. lzma) can just make the difference between > fit and not fit (so in those cases lzma could just make your day). > Given the larger memory needed to decompress, it becomes a very interesting calculation in really small memory machines. -- Bill Davidsen "We have more to fear from the bungling of the incompetent than from the machinations of the wicked." - from Slashdot