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Re: kernel 2.4.7 doesn't work



Am 29. Jul, 2001 schwäzte Tao Liu so:

> Yes! The problem is resolved!
> I am using 2.4.7 now.
> Thank you!
> 
> But what does initrd mean?
> Is it new for 2.4?

The initial-ramdisk ( initrd ) is a way for Linux to cheat. It needs to
because x86 architecture sucks :).

There's a very small amount of adressable memory for the kernel to load
from. If the kernel is too big, you can't load all of it. The initrd is a
way of pulling a secondary chunk of kernel off disk after the main chunk of
kernel has been loaded. I don't know the particulars of how it it works.

> On Sunday 29 July 2001 22:50, you wrote:
> > have you got the line
> >
> > initrd=/boot/initrd-2.4.7-686

Instead of this, put initrd=/boot/initrd and if linux.OLD uses and initrd,
then put initrd=/boot/initrd.old in the stanza for it.

In /boot soft link from the initrd-<version> to initrd for the kernel you're
trying to use and from initrd-<version> to initrd.old for the old kernel.

This is better than specifying initrd-<version> in lilo.conf because the
upgrade tools seem to recognize the soft links and update them you you
install new kernel-image packages. In other words, when you install
kernel-image-<newversion> everything will automagically point at the right
thing and continue working.

It seems that starting with 2.4.x the kernel image packages are depending on
initrds. I've had to fix the soft links and lilo.conf on every box I've
updated to 2.4.x via packages, though. Don't know why that's borken and
haven't researched it enough to file a bug report. Maybe I should anyway as
it keeps coming up on this list...

ciao,

der.hans
-- 
# der.hans@LuftHans.com home.pages.de/~lufthans/ www.DevelopOnline.com
#  "... the social skills of a cow on acid." - der.hans



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