[SWLUG] Hi all + final year uni project

[justin at discordia.org.uk]

On  4 Oct, Timothy J Shapcott wrote:
> My name is Tim and I am a Linux-aholic.
everyone chants "Hello Tim..."  :)


> The basic idea is that you would be able to create a custom kernel for a
> large number of identical machines (e.g. in a computing lab or cyber cafe,
> or wherever) and that a lot of the choices would be done automatically.
> The system would get the output from lspci (probably) to determine what
> kernel options are needed.

Sorry if i sound a bit negative, but wasnt this made pretty much
redundant by kernel modules a long time ago? Its a pretty rare thing to
want or need to do a custom kernel compile, especially for general
purpose machines like a cybercafe or comuter lab.

With a modern distro the kernel comes with all of the
drivers compiled as modules, and which ones to load are determined
(usually automatically) at runtime.

Recompiling kernels i feel is now just for the specialist areas like
embedded systems where you need to optimise on size as much as possible,
and for the rare cases where you just cant get a specific driver or mod
as part of the standard kernel and it needs kernel patches that cant
just be compiled as extra modules, in which case the auto tool wouldnt
really help anyway as it wouldnt know about the non-standard stuff.