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Re: why is kernel recompilation necessary?



Hello there,

On Fri, 28 Jul 2000, Preben Randhol wrote:

> Krzys Majewski <majewski@cs.ubc.ca> wrote on 28/07/2000 (00:29) :
> > Why is it that under Windows or whatever I don't have to recompile
> > the kernel just to add a new driver? Is it a protection thing? 
> > Or an optimization thing? Or something else? -chris
> 
> Usually you don't have to recompile your kernel under Linux. Just use
> the kernel-package that contains the kernel with all the modules you
> need. 

You don't HAVE to, but if you want a really fast, memory saving kernel,
you SHOULD do it and exclude everything, you don't need. (Installation
kernel was almost twice as large as the kernel I compiled by myself, as I
could exclude SCSI-support and a few other things). Sure not a point of
much interest on those beasts with 128 Mb RAM sold today, but on a
computer with 8 Mb RAM, a large kernel eats up your vital memory.
So in some way, really an optimization thing.

> I guess you could recompile your Windows kernel too _if_ you have
> access to the Windows source files and own a compiler.

Right.

Regards,
Daniel




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