On 2008 Jun 06 (Fri) at 22:35:29 -0400 (-0400), Geoff Steckel wrote:
:>The people reading the faq are not the people who need custom kernels.
:>Those people *know* what they need and are not deterred. But as
:>always, when we try to help the userbase by offering the advice they
:>need, someone needs to chime in and muddy the waters. So now some dude
:>is going to read your email and conclude that he can get better mysql
:>speed on his 1gb box by shaving a driver. You're not doing anyone any
:>favors.
:
:>And no, we cannot assume that people correctly self identify when they
:>are special. Ignorant people don't know they are ignorant. But at
:>least some of them read the faq. So at least let them get the best
:>answer for them.
:
:I agree that a user without a good reason shouldn't mess
:with kernel modification. The default settings as provided
:are very usable in -almost- every situation.
:
:A factual essay with some detail about better approaches
:to improving system performance might be the following.
:Of course, it should be edited appropriately if it were
:to be used, examples added or deleted, and any good
:warnings added to the "what not to do" section.
:(this is cc: to tech@ as a possible extension of the FAQ, etc,
:if deemed useful)
Almost. This is a bit more useful:
<p>
Some reasons why you should not build a custom kernel:
<ul>
<li>You do not need to, normally.
<li>You will not get a faster system.
<li>You are likely to make a less reliable machine.
<li>You will not get any support from developers.
<li>You will be expected to reproduce any problem with a
<tt>GENERIC</tt>
kernel before developers take any problem report seriously.
<li>Users and developers will laugh at you when you break your system.
<li>Custom compiler options usually do a better job of exposing
compiler problems than improving system performance.
</ul>
<p>
Removing device drivers may speed the boot process on your system, but
can complicate recovery should you have a hardware problem, and is
very often done wrong.
Removing device drivers <i>will not</i> make your system run faster by
any noticeable amount, though can produce a smaller kernel.
Removing debugging and error checking can result in a measurable
performance gain, but will make it impossible to troubleshoot a system
if something goes wrong.
<p>
Again, developers will
usually ignore bug reports dealing with custom kernels, unless the
problem can be reproduced in a <tt>GENERIC</tt> kernel as well.
You have been warned.
(taken from a random web page, when 'random' is
http://openbsd.org/faq/faq5.html#Why )
--
God is real, unless declared integer.
