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Sindi wrote:

Steven objects to using any 2.4 kernel with BL3, presumably because it is 
larger, so I did some measurements.

BL3 ext2 with kernels:
zimage.p1  2.2.26 - 430K
zimage.p2  the same

Modular support for cdroms, usb, and I think vfat and sound.  No math 
emulation.

My bzimagla.431 2.4.31 - 603K Modular support for cdroms, builtin vfat and 
joliet (I forget why), usb, zip drives, lockd nfsd nfs-fs, scsi.  No sound 
support.  Hotplug support (why!?) in kernel.  586 (P1), no math emulation.

I have not tried compiling a 2.4.31 kernel that does exactly what the BL3 
kernels do.  This one was designed to use with our Pentium 100-233MHz 
laptops, with serial and parallel and CD-ROM and USB but no sound.
I included modular scsi support because we had a scsi pcmcia card (but I 
gave that away since I don't need to scan from a laptop).

Boot, no modules, type free, look for 'used' (amount of memory used by the 
kernel before running any programs):

p1 kernel - 7,500K
p2 kernel - 7,500K
la kernel - 5,604K

I could shrink this kernel somewhat for use on a laptop with no USB 
or CD-ROM  -- remove hotplug and joliet and NLS support, and choose 
serial or PS/2 mouse rather than both built-in.  This might bring it down 
to using 5MB RAM.

The BL3 2.2 kernels are clearly better for use on floppy disk because they 
are 170K smaller, but my laptop 2.4.31 kernel takes up 1.9MB less RAM so 
is fine for ext2 use.  I cannot compare them in loop because the 2.4 
kernels don't work there - is there some way to change the file system to 
read-write in the initfs.gz?

The p2 kernel used 7.2MB RAM when booted to loop, so loop linux is not the 
best for a low-ram computer.

Maybe the 2.4 modules are larger?

Module sizes:           2.2.26          2.4.31

pcmcia_core             54K             56K
i82365                  39K             39K
ds                      11K             11K

No significant difference.

The standard 2.4 kernel may be larger because it does things that the 2.2 
kernel does not do.  bare-i from SW10.2 is about 1.2MB.

Steven, what other objection do you have to the 2.4 kernel?
I can see why you cannot use 2.4 or glibc on floppy disk.