Re: autoconfiguring kernel ?

Andrew E. Mileski (aem@nic.ott.hookup.net)
Thu, 25 Apr 1996 09:59:04 -0400 (EDT)


I think this is in the realm of the Plug-and-Play project.
Though the immediate objective is to support PnP hardware,
the ultimate goal is a system capable of self configuration
(with user overrides of course).

See URL http://www.redhat.com/pnp/

Note that this will require a _TREMENDOUS_ amount of effort.

> 1. How difficult would it be to have a self-configuring kernel as an
> option? What I imagine is that one runs a program to probe the existing
> hardware, load the appropriate drivers, configure the appropriate
> modules, etc., give the developer a report of the proposed configuration
> with options to change things, and then make an appropriate kernel. It
> may be, e.g. that certain configurations of drivers work better together
> than others. At present, each system administrator has to try this or
> that to tune his or her system. This should always be one of the
> options, but some people might like to get the benefit of others
> experience with auto-configuring kernels.
>
> 2. An extension of the above would be autoconfiguring installations and
> upgrades. Again, only as an option. One of the problems with other
> attempts to automate is that they take control away from the
> systems-administrator. I don't think that this should not be done
> without very good reasons.
>
> I would be interested in follow-ups to these ideas.
>
> Thanks,
>

-- Andrew E. Mileski --
mailto:aem@ott.hookup.net
http://www.redhat.com/~aem/