Date: Fri, 16 Mar 2007 19:40:34 -0500 From: Jeffrey Goldberg <jeffrey@goldmark.org> To: Jerry McAllister <jerrymc@msu.edu> Cc: Danny Pansters <danny@ricin.com>, freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Optimizationn questions? Message-ID: <195E8F06-0D3F-48FB-A4E2-0C22EEC9246C@goldmark.org> In-Reply-To: <20070316150014.GG75446@gizmo.acns.msu.edu> References: <Pine.LNX.4.43.0703142023180.6819@hymn03.u.washington.edu> <45F9C6ED.2010306@wcborstel.com> <707D1CE0-F7E3-4D29-A755-3AB7495FB66C@goldmark.org> <200703160219.25929.danny@ricin.com> <20070316150014.GG75446@gizmo.acns.msu.edu>
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On Mar 16, 2007, at 10:00 AM, Jerry McAllister wrote: > On Fri, Mar 16, 2007 at 02:19:25AM +0100, Danny Pansters wrote: > >> On Friday 16 March 2007 01:04:51 Jeffrey Goldberg wrote: >>> me, too. >> >> Of course it will speed up booting but then again how much time >> does one spend >> booting, compared to using the puter: not much (at least I hope so >> for them!) Ah but some of us boot frequently. We have to after each kernel rebuild. >> If I do build my own kernel, for example to switch schedulers, I >> tend to toss >> out a heap of devices that I don't have anyway. But other than a >> bit more >> memory usage (which compared to the software that's run will >> typically be >> minor anyhow unless you're talking embedded system or maybe not-so- >> embedded >> but still of low spec special purpose boxes, like a satellite >> receiver box) >> you're not going to have a slower system because your kernel >> happens to have >> some built-in drivers that it doesn't use. The exception is a >> debug kernel of >> course that will impact performance because it increases runtime >> tasks/load. >> >> On a server I'd strip down the kernel, but for other reasons >> (avoiding any >> unneeded complexity). On a desktop I don't care as long as thingie >> works. >> YMMV of course. > > I think what he was saying is that if you already need to build a > kernel for some other reason, then go ahead and strip out the > unused stuff. But, if you don't have any other reason to do it, > it is not worth the bother to build another kernel just to strip > it of unused stuff - that it won't make THAT much difference. > > I'd agree with that. me, too. I've got some linux workstations for which I've never felt the need to compile my own kernel. But my FreeBSD box is a headless ITX-mini board that will run as a public server. Because there was so much of GENERIC that I could discard for my box, it seemed to make sense. But I suppose the single most important factor in my decision to compile my own kernel is "Building a custom kernel is one of the most important rites of passage nearly every BSD user must endure." From: http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/ kernelconfig-custom-kernel.html Also I have m0n0wall running on a Soekris box, and someday I may want to customize that, so this is a good learning experience. It's really -j -- Jeffrey Goldberg http://www.goldmark.org/jeff/
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