Re: [gentoo-project] Council meeting: Tuesday 3 April 2012, 19:00 UTC

[Pandu Poluan]

On Mar 28, 2012 6:23 AM, "Joshua Kinard" <kumba@g.o> wrote:
>
> On 03/27/2012 12:23, Zac Medico wrote:
>
> >> 2b) If one does not want to use an initramfs, one must use mdev
> >
> > I'd leave option 2b undocumented. It's fragile and it will only work up
> > until something else breaks, and then we'll have another big "OMG
they're
> > forcing us to use an initramfs" discussion and have to update the
> > documentation again.
>
>
> Not undocumented, but with a link to this Wiki entry:
> https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Mdev
>
> And a BIG FAT WARNING that it's risky, and only suitable for extremely
> simple system builds.  It works fine for me on my main dev box and a VM.
> I'll know how it works on MIPS when I get that machine properly updated.
>
> Doesn't mean it'll work for everyone, but we're about choice, and we
should
> at least put a mention in, even if it's a choice that will be rarely
taken.
>

"Simple" is relative. I tend to say "non-exotic".

mdev is perfectly usable on my virtualized servers, whose devices are both
non-exotic (from the VM's point of view) and static.

Just recently, I polled the server mailing list, and while there's no clear
consensus, there are responders don't like option 2a because it involves an
initramfs.

But the essence is exactly what Joshua wrote in his last paragraph: it's
about choice. The user's (or sysadmin's) choice.

Rgds,