[OLPC-devel] Re: suggested requirement for new kernels and initrds: must boot under qemu and/or kexec as kernel and initrd before release as a stream

[Jordan Crouse]

On 04/07/06 18:09 -0400, Ivan Krstic wrote:
> Ronald G Minnich wrote:
> > Is there any reason NOT to just
> > go with an initramfs-based boot approach for OLPC?
> 
> I've been meaning to ask the same thing -- initramfs is usually much
> nicer than initrds, and most everyone is moving to initramfs.

I would say that the process for building an initramfs into the kernel was
designed for very small binaries that are intended to load a few modules and
move on, and that it doesn't scale very well when adding what is essentially
a complete root filesystem.

We are using the same file (format cpio + gzip) in our build process too, 
so we're not short changing ourselves technologically.  Furthermore, we can
build the filesystem without worrying about how we're going to tie it into
the kernel build process.   Finally, we need mkelfImage to build the
elf image for the ROM, so the end result is going to be a single binary any
way you look at it.

So my personal opinion is that that all of this overrides the annoyance of two
binary files - at least for now.

Jordan

-- 
Jordan Crouse
Senior Linux Engineer
Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
<www.amd.com/embeddedprocessors>