[wplug] I'm a Linux whimp (need kernel help)

Poyner, Brandon bpoyner at ccac.edu
Mon Aug 15 10:03:31 EDT 2005


> You did bring up a good point, though -- it's a great (!) idea to
> enable /proc/config[.gz] while configuring your kernel. If you end up
> losing the configuration for a bootable kernel, you can still retrieve
> it later if needed. I believe that there's even a script to 
> extract this
> information from a non-running kernel if you built it with 
> /proc/config
> support.

RedHat thinks it's "stupid" [1] to put the config inside of the kernel,
and has it turned off by default.  Their argument is that there is no
advantage over a file in /boot, and the disadvantage is increased memory
usage.  Hah, RedHat against bloat?  Yes, I use many RedHat products, but
I wouldn't say bloat is a big concern of theirs.

As for extracting the config from a non-running kernel, use
scripts/extract-ikconfig from the kernel source directory.  This only
works if IKCONFIG was enabled, and /proc/config.gz only exists if
IKCONFIG_PROC was enabled.

[1] "its done this way because the other way is _stupid_"  Dave Jones
<davej @ redhat . com>

Brandon Poyner
Network Engineer III
CCAC - College Office
412-237-3086




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