Wichert Akkerman wrote:
Previously Eric Richardson wrote:Okay. I guess modules.conf will provide everything that a person could use. I personally think that this is way harder than other things in Debian.Personally I happen to disagree with you there.
I don't particularly want to argue but for the standard user without a lot of sysadmin type requirements such as web servers, NFS etc. when you install a program and follow any setup configuration, it just works and to me this a professional feature that makes me want to use and support and recommend Debian.
Normally the modconf program lets you install modules with options if needed and it just works. This doesn't work across vastly different kernels such as a Woody 2.2.x to 2.4.x upgrade or custom kernels that have different module requirements perhap because some are build in if you want to boot to different kernels.Different module requirements should not be a problem. Information for modules that are not build or used is simply ignored.
Modules are ignored with an error message. I have a 2.4.7 kernel and it has several things different than the 2.4.18 and complains with error messages which is only asthethic. Second, Woody comes with 2.2.x and if you use a laptop the module requirements are much different. I must have answered about 10 questions on Debian user and laptop about using yenta_socket and the standard ethernet module like tulip versus the tulip_cb module. Without some special rules in modules.conf above then you can't boot 2.2 and 2.4 on the same laptop and get networking.
Is it possible that this should be changed somehow since the kernels are so modular or is kernel experimentation just for people who want to hand tweak the modules.conf file?I change kernels frequently but I haven't modified modules.conf in over a year..
I can see how this could be true. I looked at this situation logically. If every other piece of the kernel is used in a versioned fashioned and called from lilo as such(or via symlinks from a generic name) then it makes sense that the /etc/modules and modules.conf should be versioned as well. Of course if I can't convince you then how could I convince everyone that a possible change is in order. I did think based on some of the other threads on this list about improving Debian made this a viable idea at this time. Don't take this as whining as it is not meant to be. I very much appreciate the interaction and thoughtfulness of your responses as I'm new to the Debian Dev list and just trying to help out if even in a small way.
Thanks, Eric