[plug] 2nd Post Debian Kernel Compile - Sorry for the HTML

[Bill Kenworthy]

And the point I am making is I like my sleep - if you want to compile a
debian kernel, the original post implies that the "debian way" mandates
that it be done at 1:00am - no other distro has that restriction :)

Totally optimized, how?  I am running a kernel I compiled myself - not
to "optimise" but to add a couple of features I wanted - I do have a
everything and the kitchen sink mentality, so its nearly 800k, (200
something k less than orig tho), but size is really a useless comparison
unless it wont sit on a floppy (you boot from a floppy? - I last booted
from hd 2 days ago, and 29 days before that when the kernel was
recompiled - so a fraction of a second gained in booting a smaller
kernel over this time span is an infinestimal gain), its features that
matter for me: the system must do what I ask of it.  Speed? - never
noted a speed increase between 586 or athlon optimised kernel (386 and
586 is a different matter though the gain is slight unless you go to
extreems - like the whole distro: debian is 386 I think so the potential
gain is probably a lot more than Mandrake), but I think glibc and other
main libraries will need doing before any real world benefit is seen. 
Reliabilty - yes, I do think careful choices and then compile for your
architecture does make a difference here, and this is probably the
reason I recompile a new kernel soon after I install the standard
binaries.  Optimised is a very rubbery term without qualification and
justification!  

gentoo is an interesting concept and there has been some discussion
about this on the mandrake lists about the production of scripts to
recompile everthing in situ (after install), but nothing came of it that
I know.  Also "texstar" has apparently done a whole mandrake distro in
athlon guise which I first heard about a couple of daya ago.

BillK

On Wed, 2002-04-10 at 20:18, Chris McCormick wrote:
> On 10 Apr 2002 19:26:37 +0800
> Bill Kenworthy <billk at iinet.net.au> wrote:
> 
> > Well, I can only say that I am glad I mainly use RH and Mandrake. 
> > Imagine having to always compile debian kernels at 1:00 am. - the debian
> > way ...
> 
> Not to start a flame war or anything, but this doing it the debian way (which isn't so hard) means that my kernel is optimized EXACTLY for my hardware. I'm looking at switching to gentoo linux at the moment (a distribution where everything is meant to be compiled from scratch) becuase apparently the speed increase (read this on slashdot) you get from compiling everything for your particular hardware is significant. Show me an out of the box Mandrake kernel that comes in at under 300kb and is totally optimized for your hardware.
> 
> Chris.
> 
> -- 
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