Re: Patches for REALLY TINY 386 kernels

[Adrian Bunk]

On Wed, Jul 18, 2007 at 08:55:50AM -0700, H. Peter Anvin wrote:
> Andi Kleen wrote:
> > 
> >> Already with these patches I can compile a zImage kernel that is 450kb
> >> large (890kb decompressed)
> > 
> > The important part is not how big the vmlinux is, but how much
> > memory is actually used after boot. 
> > 
> > I expect concentrating some of the dynamic data structures would
> > be more fruitful in fact.
> > 
> 
> Well, how big the vmlinux file is matters if it doesn't fit in memory
> with enough time to get to the phase where it is dumping the init
> sections.  *If that is not the issue*, then axing stuff like CPUID is a
> major lose in terms of code maintainability for zero gain.

If this is an issue, then changing i386 back to discarding __exit code 
and data at linktime instead of runtime might make a bigger difference.

> 	-hpa

cu
Adrian

-- 

       "Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
        of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
       "Only a promise," Lao Er said.
                                       Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

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