Mailing List Archive: Default kernel options seem a bit odd

Default kernel options seem a bit odd

Oct 23, 2004, 9:26 PM

Post #1 of 5 (190 views)

I was just examining a stock kernel config (rather than 'make oldconfig'). I
find it peculiar that there are certain settings enabled by default and
others not. It makes me concerned that I need to go through EVERY single
menu to make sure things are kosher. Not very friendly.

For example, why is 'Ethernet 10000 Gb -> S210' enabled?! Who the hell has
one of those even? Can the average system bus even handle 10,000
Gigabits/sec?

Conversely, it seems strange that the orinoco driver is not enabled, when
that pretty much works for both orinoco cards and prism cards. Seems that
would be more useful for the first time kernel builder to have.

Another strange one is that power-management has an option for the default
resume partition. Couldn't that be pre-populated as most people will only
have a single swap partition, and that's what is asked for there.

Then there are just weird 'GUI' anomalies. Like, why are there some menu
items that are just basically text, such as '--- VGA text console'. You
can't select them. You can't do anything with them. And then others like
'VESA driver type' make you go into another page to choose between two
options, why not just list them there like other options do?

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Re: Default kernel options seem a bit odd [ In reply to ]

edward.guldemond at gmail

Oct 24, 2004, 2:02 PM

Post #2 of 5 (196 views)

Permalink

On Sat, 23 Oct 2004 21:26:35 -0700, Daevid Vincent <daevid@daevid.com> wrote:
> I was just examining a stock kernel config (rather than 'make oldconfig'). I
> find it peculiar that there are certain settings enabled by default and
> others not. It makes me concerned that I need to go through EVERY single
> menu to make sure things are kosher. Not very friendly.
>
> For example, why is 'Ethernet 10000 Gb -> S210' enabled?! Who the hell has
> one of those even? Can the average system bus even handle 10,000
> Gigabits/sec?
>
> Conversely, it seems strange that the orinoco driver is not enabled, when
> that pretty much works for both orinoco cards and prism cards. Seems that
> would be more useful for the first time kernel builder to have.
>
> Another strange one is that power-management has an option for the default
> resume partition. Couldn't that be pre-populated as most people will only
> have a single swap partition, and that's what is asked for there.
>
> Then there are just weird 'GUI' anomalies. Like, why are there some menu
> items that are just basically text, such as '--- VGA text console'. You
> can't select them. You can't do anything with them. And then others like
> 'VESA driver type' make you go into another page to choose between two
> options, why not just list them there like other options do?

I suppose the kernel developers believe that if you're smart enough to
know that you need to custom compile a kernel (instead of using your
distro's default), then you're smart enough to read the help and step
through all of the parts of the config.

--
Ed

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Re: Default kernel options seem a bit odd [ In reply to ]

animatus at cogeco

Oct 24, 2004, 6:12 PM

Post #3 of 5 (198 views)

Permalink

Edward Guldemond wrote:

>On Sat, 23 Oct 2004 21:26:35 -0700, Daevid Vincent <daevid@daevid.com> wrote:
>
>
>>I was just examining a stock kernel config (rather than 'make oldconfig'). I
>>find it peculiar that there are certain settings enabled by default and
>>others not. It makes me concerned that I need to go through EVERY single
>>menu to make sure things are kosher. Not very friendly.
>>
>>For example, why is 'Ethernet 10000 Gb -> S210' enabled?! Who the hell has
>>one of those even? Can the average system bus even handle 10,000
>>Gigabits/sec?
>>
>>Conversely, it seems strange that the orinoco driver is not enabled, when
>>that pretty much works for both orinoco cards and prism cards. Seems that
>>would be more useful for the first time kernel builder to have.
>>
>>Another strange one is that power-management has an option for the default
>>resume partition. Couldn't that be pre-populated as most people will only
>>have a single swap partition, and that's what is asked for there.
>>
>>Then there are just weird 'GUI' anomalies. Like, why are there some menu
>>items that are just basically text, such as '--- VGA text console'. You
>>can't select them. You can't do anything with them. And then others like
>>'VESA driver type' make you go into another page to choose between two
>>options, why not just list them there like other options do?
>>
>>
>
>I suppose the kernel developers believe that if you're smart enough to
>know that you need to custom compile a kernel (instead of using your
>distro's default), then you're smart enough to read the help and step
>through all of the parts of the config.
>
>
>
Where is the help to step through all the parts of the kernel config?

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Re: Default kernel options seem a bit odd [ In reply to ]

motub at planet

Oct 24, 2004, 7:39 PM

Post #4 of 5 (198 views)

Permalink

David Wells wrote:
> Where is the help to step through all the parts of the kernel config?
>

In the kernel. If you do a make menuconfig, make xconfig or make
gconfig, you will see that there is a 'help' item next to 'select' and
'exit' (I usually use make menuconfig). If you have any option
highlighted, and you arrow/mouse over to help, it will tell you about
that option, including the name of it, what the module will be called if
it is modularizable, and often advise whether a 'normal' user should
select it or not.

There are very very few options that will say 'no help available for
this option' (I think I've seen maybe two such), and frankly, everyone
should go through a manual kernel config at least once, just to read
every option's help-- it's really quite good, and makes the kernel's
interaction with your system much clearer.

Holly

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Re: Default kernel options seem a bit odd [ In reply to ]

lists at halffull

Oct 25, 2004, 7:50 AM

Post #5 of 5 (191 views)

Permalink

On Sat, Oct 23, 2004 at 09:26:35PM -0700, Daevid Vincent wrote:
> It makes me concerned that I need to go through EVERY single
> menu to make sure things are kosher. Not very friendly.

You should do this at least once, it's very informative. After that, you can use your old .configs as a starting point.

> For example, why is 'Ethernet 10000 Gb -> S210' enabled?! Who the hell has
> one of those even? Can the average system bus even handle 10,000
> Gigabits/sec?

Can't say anything about some of the strange options in there - I agree with you ;) Maybe they're just trying to get people to actually read through their kernel config, which isn't a bad thing.

> Like, why are there some menu
> items that are just basically text, such as '--- VGA text console'. You
> can't select them. You can't do anything with them.

I believe I know what these are. They seem to be options that used to be optional, but now are so common that they're the default. Also, some kernel patchsets turn on this status so you know you need that option.
Tom