Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-21 Thread Christopher Brown
2009/1/20 Kyle McMartin k...@infradead.org:
 On Tue, Jan 20, 2009 at 11:06:17AM +0200, Avi Kivity wrote:
 Eric Paris wrote:
 I've got a P3 (Coppermine) with 256M memory running F10.  My significant
 other took it with her to Antarctica (Well F9 has been to Antarctica but
 it'll be F10 in Antarctica next month).  You can only run one app at a
 time and have to be patient, but it's perfectly usable (and noone cares
 if this laptop is lost, stolen or destroyed [aside from her being pissed
 she lost all her research data]).  I wouldn't/couldn't to use it as a
 daily machine, so while I'm in favor of -PAE default, F10 is usable on
 such small machines.  I don't care if old machines need some bit
 twiddling to get to work, but we aren't dead yet   :)


 By F12 you'll be down to zero apps at the same time, and slow...

 We can keep the non-PAE kernel, but as non-default in recognition that
 technology has moved on.


 Look, I'm sorry if I'm just not thinking big picture enough here, but
 what exactly is the use case for a PAE kernel these days? The compat
 code in x86_64 should be more than good enough for the apps that require
 an i686 chroot.

 I just don't see the status quo as doing any real harm, as the only
 generations of CPU that benefit are really P4 (which aren't worth the
 electricity used to power them) or Core (One) Duo (which didn't exist
 for a particularly long time...) Neither of which actually supported
 more than 3GB of RAM on their northbridges except for the Xeon chipsets
 anyway.

 I have no idea what the installer and livecd do, but to me, it would
 seem to be a waste of space to carry two sets of installable kernels on
 the discs, when one would do. That said again, I'm suprised we aren't
 installing i586 kernels by default... Odd.

 I think the ideal solution here is to support x86_64 kernel, i686
 userspace more actively.

 What, honestly, are the odds of someone with a bunch of P4 Xeons these
 days with 32GB of ram running Fedora? Are there really enough of them
 that it's worth caring? ;-)

 Of course, take what I say with a grain of salt. I don't particularly
 care at all, I'm just trying to play the pragmatist.

 Another question is what's the perf penalty of going to PAE on a
 2GB of ram machine versus the vanilla HIGHMEM4G config?

 The only argument I really buy into is the NX one, honestly...

 What about a yum plugin that recommends a kernel that the user could
 override? I'll poke at it this afternoon (hey, I've always wanted to
 learn python...)

May I point out that those that care enough to want PAE usually know
how to go about getting it enabled whereas those that have install
failure because they're running non-PAE hardware probably wont know
how to go about getting it disabled.

The fall-out from this going onto the livecd makes me shudder.

The original argument that many machines have 4GB of memory is simply
false. Manufacturers aren't shipping anything more than 2GB on
desktops at most unless you have oodles of money to throw at a
Alienware box or something. Sure, servers come with more but Fedora is
not really a reality for a long term server O.S.

-- 
Christopher Brown

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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-21 Thread Avi Kivity

Christopher Brown wrote:

May I point out that those that care enough to want PAE usually know
how to go about getting it enabled whereas those that have install
failure because they're running non-PAE hardware probably wont know
how to go about getting it disabled.
  


You mean, ordinary users don't care about security?  Because that's one 
of the advantages that PAE brings.


You're right, they don't care, we have to care for them.


The fall-out from this going onto the livecd makes me shudder.
  


You're pushing out a development problem to the users.


The original argument that many machines have 4GB of memory is simply
false. 


My ~3yo home box has 4GB.  I'm not an ordinary user (or it would be a 
computer, not a box), but I don't think you can claim 4GB is rare.



Manufacturers aren't shipping anything more than 2GB on
desktops at most unless you have oodles of money to throw at a
Alienware box or something. Sure, servers come with more but Fedora is
not really a reality for a long term server O.S


Servers should use x86_64 anyway.  But I strongly disagree about 
penalizing the future to cater for the past.


--
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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-21 Thread Josh Boyer
On Wed, Jan 21, 2009 at 09:15:24AM +, Christopher Brown wrote:
The original argument that many machines have 4GB of memory is simply
false. Manufacturers aren't shipping anything more than 2GB on
desktops at most unless you have oodles of money to throw at a
Alienware box or something. Sure, servers come with more but Fedora is
not really a reality for a long term server O.S.

Actually, it works fine.  I have a server that has only ever run Fedora.

josh

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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-21 Thread Josh Boyer
On Wed, Jan 21, 2009 at 11:41:04AM +0200, Avi Kivity wrote:
 Servers should use x86_64 anyway.  But I strongly disagree about  

No they shouldn't.  They should use PowerPC.  Then this whole stupid
argument wouldn't even matter.

/me stops antagonizing people now.

josh

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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-21 Thread Jeremy Katz
On Wednesday, January 21 2009, Kyle McMartin said:
 On Wed, Jan 21, 2009 at 09:15:24AM +, Christopher Brown wrote:
  The fall-out from this going onto the livecd makes me shudder.
 
 Jesse explained this to me,
 
 To clarify: the anaconda installer is i586, and all 3 kernel flavours
 are shipped on the disc. I would imagine the livecd is i586 and will
 remain that way.

No, the livecd is i686.  Because due to other things about the livecd,
you have to have more ram than most i586s would support.

The number of i586 users we have is minimal.  The number of non-pae i686
users we have is much more significant.

Jeremy

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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-20 Thread Avi Kivity

Jeremy Katz wrote:

On Monday, January 19 2009, Avi Kivity said:
  

Jeremy Katz wrote:


That said, we currently do install the PAE kernel if you have 4 GB+ of
RAM[1].  Switching to it by default is problematic because then we're
back to using different kernels for different cases 
  
You have that now, don't you?  One case for 4GB and one for =4GB.   
Worse, if you install more memory, the kernel doesn't see it.


Downgrading your CPU to one which does not support PAE should be rare.



Yes, but at least the running a different kernel case is currently the
relatively rare one.
  


It will become more and more frequent as machines get beefier.  If we 
switch to PAE, it will be the non-PAE case which is rare.


btw, what's wrong with running a different kernel?  So long as the 
configs match, there shouldn't be a difference in reliability.




and it also makes
the 'what do you with the live image' case a lot more complex.
  

I'd just go with PAE here.



Can't do so -- the live image is definitely used on a lot of hardware
that isn't PAE capable.  Many/most Pentium M's didn't support it, the OLPC 
doesn't[1].  And those are common hardware targets for the live image
  


So either put both kernels there, or the non-PAE kernel.


The _real_ fix here is to get PAE runtime much like was finally done
with SMP :-)
  
Patches, as they say, are welcome.  



Low-level x86 setup code isn't quite my forte...  Hence I go for
goading others into doing it ;-)
  


I meant, this requires a monumental amount of work.

  
But you could install both kernels  
and have the bootloaded choose (sticks wax balls into ears).



Want to write code for syslinux and grub to do the auto-choosing?  


Not really.  I don't see it as particularly difficult.

With grub, you could use multiboot to add a module to select the correct 
kernel, maybe.


I think Windows works this way, with the /PAE switch on the kernel 
command line causing a different kernel to be loaded.



Then
we also have to figure out a way to shoe-horn another 50 MB of stuff
into the already full live image


Cut away the drivers for Infiniband and similarly useless hardware (for 
livecds, that is).  Put them in a separate subpackage or use 
steam-powered rm -rf.


--
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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-20 Thread Avi Kivity

Eric Paris wrote:

I've got a P3 (Coppermine) with 256M memory running F10.  My significant
other took it with her to Antarctica (Well F9 has been to Antarctica but
it'll be F10 in Antarctica next month).  You can only run one app at a
time and have to be patient, but it's perfectly usable (and noone cares
if this laptop is lost, stolen or destroyed [aside from her being pissed
she lost all her research data]).  I wouldn't/couldn't to use it as a
daily machine, so while I'm in favor of -PAE default, F10 is usable on
such small machines.  I don't care if old machines need some bit
twiddling to get to work, but we aren't dead yet   :)
  


By F12 you'll be down to zero apps at the same time, and slow...

We can keep the non-PAE kernel, but as non-default in recognition that 
technology has moved on.


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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-20 Thread Conrad Meyer
On Tuesday 20 January 2009 01:06:17 am Avi Kivity wrote:
 Eric Paris wrote:
  I've got a P3 (Coppermine) with 256M memory running F10.  My significant
  other took it with her to Antarctica (Well F9 has been to Antarctica but
  it'll be F10 in Antarctica next month).  You can only run one app at a
  time and have to be patient, but it's perfectly usable (and noone cares
  if this laptop is lost, stolen or destroyed [aside from her being pissed
  she lost all her research data]).  I wouldn't/couldn't to use it as a
  daily machine, so while I'm in favor of -PAE default, F10 is usable on
  such small machines.  I don't care if old machines need some bit
  twiddling to get to work, but we aren't dead yet   :)

 By F12 you'll be down to zero apps at the same time, and slow...

 We can keep the non-PAE kernel, but as non-default in recognition that
 technology has moved on.

I have a P1 with 128M of memory running F9 just fine, I just keep it at 
runlevel 3. It works great.

-- 
Conrad Meyer kon...@tylerc.org


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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-20 Thread Kyle McMartin
On Tue, Jan 20, 2009 at 11:06:17AM +0200, Avi Kivity wrote:
 Eric Paris wrote:
 I've got a P3 (Coppermine) with 256M memory running F10.  My significant
 other took it with her to Antarctica (Well F9 has been to Antarctica but
 it'll be F10 in Antarctica next month).  You can only run one app at a
 time and have to be patient, but it's perfectly usable (and noone cares
 if this laptop is lost, stolen or destroyed [aside from her being pissed
 she lost all her research data]).  I wouldn't/couldn't to use it as a
 daily machine, so while I'm in favor of -PAE default, F10 is usable on
 such small machines.  I don't care if old machines need some bit
 twiddling to get to work, but we aren't dead yet   :)
   

 By F12 you'll be down to zero apps at the same time, and slow...

 We can keep the non-PAE kernel, but as non-default in recognition that  
 technology has moved on.


Look, I'm sorry if I'm just not thinking big picture enough here, but
what exactly is the use case for a PAE kernel these days? The compat
code in x86_64 should be more than good enough for the apps that require
an i686 chroot.

I just don't see the status quo as doing any real harm, as the only
generations of CPU that benefit are really P4 (which aren't worth the
electricity used to power them) or Core (One) Duo (which didn't exist
for a particularly long time...) Neither of which actually supported
more than 3GB of RAM on their northbridges except for the Xeon chipsets
anyway.

I have no idea what the installer and livecd do, but to me, it would
seem to be a waste of space to carry two sets of installable kernels on
the discs, when one would do. That said again, I'm suprised we aren't
installing i586 kernels by default... Odd.

I think the ideal solution here is to support x86_64 kernel, i686
userspace more actively.

What, honestly, are the odds of someone with a bunch of P4 Xeons these
days with 32GB of ram running Fedora? Are there really enough of them
that it's worth caring? ;-)

Of course, take what I say with a grain of salt. I don't particularly
care at all, I'm just trying to play the pragmatist.

Another question is what's the perf penalty of going to PAE on a
2GB of ram machine versus the vanilla HIGHMEM4G config?

The only argument I really buy into is the NX one, honestly...

What about a yum plugin that recommends a kernel that the user could
override? I'll poke at it this afternoon (hey, I've always wanted to
learn python...)

cheers, Kyle

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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-20 Thread Gerd Hoffmann
Avi Kivity wrote:
 Kyle McMartin wrote:
 Unless we keep the non-PAE i586 kernel around as a fallback, we're not
 going to be able to boot on a whole raft of crappy i386 chips (original
 Pentium M most notably...)
 
 I'm not suggesting dropping non-PAE.  Simply defaulting to PAE where
 possible.
 
 Are Pentium Ms (really the memory that comes with them) actually capable
 of running recent Fedoras?

Well, we can switch the default for F11, then watch the smolt statistics
to figure ;)

cheers,
  Gerd

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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-20 Thread Avi Kivity

Kyle McMartin wrote:

Look, I'm sorry if I'm just not thinking big picture enough here, but
what exactly is the use case for a PAE kernel these days? The compat
code in x86_64 should be more than good enough for the apps that require
an i686 chroot.
  


It's certainly very good.  I converted my i386 install to an x86_64 one, 
and the intermediate step of running the i386 userspace on x86_64 kernel 
worked well.



I just don't see the status quo as doing any real harm, as the only
generations of CPU that benefit are really P4 (which aren't worth the
electricity used to power them) or Core (One) Duo (which didn't exist
for a particularly long time...) Neither of which actually supported
more than 3GB of RAM on their northbridges except for the Xeon chipsets
anyway.

I have no idea what the installer and livecd do, but to me, it would
seem to be a waste of space to carry two sets of installable kernels on
the discs, when one would do. That said again, I'm suprised we aren't
installing i586 kernels by default... Odd.

I think the ideal solution here is to support x86_64 kernel, i686
userspace more actively.
  


I'm all in favor of pushing x86_64.  But I think currently most installs 
are i386.



What, honestly, are the odds of someone with a bunch of P4 Xeons these
days with 32GB of ram running Fedora? Are there really enough of them
that it's worth caring? ;-)

Of course, take what I say with a grain of salt. I don't particularly
care at all, I'm just trying to play the pragmatist.

Another question is what's the perf penalty of going to PAE on a
2GB of ram machine versus the vanilla HIGHMEM4G config?
  


I'm guessing, pretty low.


The only argument I really buy into is the NX one, honestly...

What about a yum plugin that recommends a kernel that the user could
override? I'll poke at it this afternoon (hey, I've always wanted to
learn python...)
  


Users won't be running yum.  They're running that applet thing.

--
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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-20 Thread Kyle McMartin
On Tue, Jan 20, 2009 at 07:28:10PM +0200, Avi Kivity wrote:
 Users won't be running yum.  They're running that applet thing.


Which just shells out to yum... ;-)

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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-20 Thread Avi Kivity

Kyle McMartin wrote:

On Tue, Jan 20, 2009 at 07:28:10PM +0200, Avi Kivity wrote:
  

Users won't be running yum.  They're running that applet thing.




Which just shells out to yum... ;-)
  


Great, but any 'suggestions' need to find their way to the user.

I'd prefer to do the right thing in the first place rather than offer 
suggestions about the kernel.  What's a kernel anyway?


--
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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-19 Thread Dave Jones
On Mon, Jan 19, 2009 at 03:49:20PM +0200, Avi Kivity wrote:
  This probably comes up once in a while, thought I'd raise it again.
  
  I'd like to suggest switching the default kernel to -PAE on machines 
  that support it, for the following reasons:
  
  - many machines have 4GB+ these days, even desktops
  - NX is only available with -PAE, improves security
  - kvm is significantly faster on AMD when PAE is selected (since we 
  don't support NPT on non-PAE)

What's needed to set this by default is changes in anaconda.
They have their own list at anaconda-l...@redhat.com

Dave

-- 
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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-19 Thread Bill Nottingham
Dave Jones (da...@redhat.com) said: 
 On Mon, Jan 19, 2009 at 03:49:20PM +0200, Avi Kivity wrote:
   This probably comes up once in a while, thought I'd raise it again.
   
   I'd like to suggest switching the default kernel to -PAE on machines 
   that support it, for the following reasons:
   
   - many machines have 4GB+ these days, even desktops
   - NX is only available with -PAE, improves security
   - kvm is significantly faster on AMD when PAE is selected (since we 
   don't support NPT on non-PAE)
 
 What's needed to set this by default is changes in anaconda.
 They have their own list at anaconda-l...@redhat.com

anaconda-devel-list, actually. But I could have sworn we already did this.

Bill

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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-19 Thread Kyle McMartin
On Mon, Jan 19, 2009 at 11:23:26AM -0500, Bill Nottingham wrote:
 Dave Jones (da...@redhat.com) said: 
  On Mon, Jan 19, 2009 at 03:49:20PM +0200, Avi Kivity wrote:
This probably comes up once in a while, thought I'd raise it again.

I'd like to suggest switching the default kernel to -PAE on machines 
that support it, for the following reasons:

- many machines have 4GB+ these days, even desktops
- NX is only available with -PAE, improves security
- kvm is significantly faster on AMD when PAE is selected (since we 
don't support NPT on non-PAE)
  
  What's needed to set this by default is changes in anaconda.
  They have their own list at anaconda-l...@redhat.com
 
 anaconda-devel-list, actually. But I could have sworn we already did this.
 

Unless we keep the non-PAE i586 kernel around as a fallback, we're not
going to be able to boot on a whole raft of crappy i386 chips (original
Pentium M most notably...)

regards, Kyle

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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-19 Thread Avi Kivity

Bill Nottingham wrote:
Dave Jones (da...@redhat.com) said: 
  

On Mon, Jan 19, 2009 at 03:49:20PM +0200, Avi Kivity wrote:
  This probably comes up once in a while, thought I'd raise it again.
  
  I'd like to suggest switching the default kernel to -PAE on machines 
  that support it, for the following reasons:
  
  - many machines have 4GB+ these days, even desktops

  - NX is only available with -PAE, improves security
  - kvm is significantly faster on AMD when PAE is selected (since we 
  don't support NPT on non-PAE)


What's needed to set this by default is changes in anaconda.
They have their own list at anaconda-l...@redhat.com



anaconda-devel-list, actually. But I could have sworn we already did this.
  


Just tested; F10 i386 still installs a non-PAE kernel.

--
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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-19 Thread Avi Kivity

Jeremy Katz wrote:

That said, we currently do install the PAE kernel if you have 4 GB+ of
RAM[1].  Switching to it by default is problematic because then we're
back to using different kernels for different cases 


You have that now, don't you?  One case for 4GB and one for =4GB.  
Worse, if you install more memory, the kernel doesn't see it.


Downgrading your CPU to one which does not support PAE should be rare.


and it also makes
the 'what do you with the live image' case a lot more complex.


I'd just go with PAE here.


The _real_ fix here is to get PAE runtime much like was finally done
with SMP :-)
  


Patches, as they say, are welcome.  But you could install both kernels 
and have the bootloaded choose (sticks wax balls into ears).


--
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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-19 Thread Avi Kivity

Kyle McMartin wrote:

On Mon, Jan 19, 2009 at 11:23:26AM -0500, Bill Nottingham wrote:
  
Dave Jones (da...@redhat.com) said: 


On Mon, Jan 19, 2009 at 03:49:20PM +0200, Avi Kivity wrote:
  This probably comes up once in a while, thought I'd raise it again.
  
  I'd like to suggest switching the default kernel to -PAE on machines 
  that support it, for the following reasons:
  
  - many machines have 4GB+ these days, even desktops

  - NX is only available with -PAE, improves security
  - kvm is significantly faster on AMD when PAE is selected (since we 
  don't support NPT on non-PAE)


What's needed to set this by default is changes in anaconda.
They have their own list at anaconda-l...@redhat.com
  

Unless we keep the non-PAE i586 kernel around as a fallback, we're not
going to be able to boot on a whole raft of crappy i386 chips (original
Pentium M most notably...)


I'm not suggesting dropping non-PAE.  Simply defaulting to PAE where 
possible.


Are Pentium Ms (really the memory that comes with them) actually capable 
of running recent Fedoras?  I'm talking desktop, not 
I'm-using-my-laptop-as-a-firewall-just-because-I-can.


--
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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-19 Thread Jeremy Katz
On Monday, January 19 2009, Avi Kivity said:
 Jeremy Katz wrote:
 That said, we currently do install the PAE kernel if you have 4 GB+ of
 RAM[1].  Switching to it by default is problematic because then we're
 back to using different kernels for different cases 

 You have that now, don't you?  One case for 4GB and one for =4GB.   
 Worse, if you install more memory, the kernel doesn't see it.

 Downgrading your CPU to one which does not support PAE should be rare.

Yes, but at least the running a different kernel case is currently the
relatively rare one.

 and it also makes
 the 'what do you with the live image' case a lot more complex.

 I'd just go with PAE here.

Can't do so -- the live image is definitely used on a lot of hardware
that isn't PAE capable.  Many/most Pentium M's didn't support it, the OLPC 
doesn't[1].  And those are common hardware targets for the live image

 The _real_ fix here is to get PAE runtime much like was finally done
 with SMP :-)

 Patches, as they say, are welcome.  

Low-level x86 setup code isn't quite my forte...  Hence I go for
goading others into doing it ;-)

 But you could install both kernels  
 and have the bootloaded choose (sticks wax balls into ears).

Want to write code for syslinux and grub to do the auto-choosing?  Then
we also have to figure out a way to shoe-horn another 50 MB of stuff
into the already full live image

Jeremy

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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-19 Thread Eric Paris
On Mon, 2009-01-19 at 19:31 +0200, Avi Kivity wrote:
 Kyle McMartin wrote:
  On Mon, Jan 19, 2009 at 11:23:26AM -0500, Bill Nottingham wrote:

  Dave Jones (da...@redhat.com) said: 
  
  On Mon, Jan 19, 2009 at 03:49:20PM +0200, Avi Kivity wrote:
This probably comes up once in a while, thought I'd raise it again.

I'd like to suggest switching the default kernel to -PAE on machines 
that support it, for the following reasons:

- many machines have 4GB+ these days, even desktops
- NX is only available with -PAE, improves security
- kvm is significantly faster on AMD when PAE is selected (since we 
don't support NPT on non-PAE)
 
  What's needed to set this by default is changes in anaconda.
  They have their own list at anaconda-l...@redhat.com

  Unless we keep the non-PAE i586 kernel around as a fallback, we're not
  going to be able to boot on a whole raft of crappy i386 chips (original
  Pentium M most notably...)
 
 I'm not suggesting dropping non-PAE.  Simply defaulting to PAE where 
 possible.
 
 Are Pentium Ms (really the memory that comes with them) actually capable 
 of running recent Fedoras?  I'm talking desktop, not 
 I'm-using-my-laptop-as-a-firewall-just-because-I-can.

I've got a P3 (Coppermine) with 256M memory running F10.  My significant
other took it with her to Antarctica (Well F9 has been to Antarctica but
it'll be F10 in Antarctica next month).  You can only run one app at a
time and have to be patient, but it's perfectly usable (and noone cares
if this laptop is lost, stolen or destroyed [aside from her being pissed
she lost all her research data]).  I wouldn't/couldn't to use it as a
daily machine, so while I'm in favor of -PAE default, F10 is usable on
such small machines.  I don't care if old machines need some bit
twiddling to get to work, but we aren't dead yet   :)

-Eric

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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-19 Thread Bill Nottingham
Avi Kivity (a...@redhat.com) said: 
 Are Pentium Ms (really the memory that comes with them) actually capable  
 of running recent Fedoras?  I'm talking desktop, not  
 I'm-using-my-laptop-as-a-firewall-just-because-I-can.

Sure, I had a T40 that had 1.5GB of memory in it, and it could have
taken more.

Bill

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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-19 Thread Pete Zaitcev
On Mon, 19 Jan 2009 19:31:12 +0200, Avi Kivity a...@redhat.com wrote:

 Are Pentium Ms (really the memory that comes with them) actually capable 
 of running recent Fedoras?  I'm talking desktop, not 
 I'm-using-my-laptop-as-a-firewall-just-because-I-can.

If only it were laptops. I think they still sell systems like this:

[zait...@mallorn ~]$ more /proc/cpuinfo 
processor   : 0
vendor_id   : CentaurHauls
cpu family  : 6
model   : 7
model name  : VIA Samuel 2
stepping: 3
cpu MHz : 800.065
cache size  : 64 KB
fdiv_bug: no
hlt_bug : no
f00f_bug: no
coma_bug: no
fpu : yes
fpu_exception   : yes
cpuid level : 1
wp  : yes
flags   : fpu de tsc msr cx8 mtrr pge mmx 3dnow
bogomips: 1601.64
clflush size: 32

[zait...@mallorn ~]$ 

You point about non-default kernel is well taken though. I'm not
against making PAE default as long as some king of alternative
is provided.

BTW, does anyone know if the Geode in OLPC XO has PAE?

-- Pete

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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-19 Thread Dave Jones
On Mon, Jan 19, 2009 at 11:24:14AM -0700, Pete Zaitcev wrote:
  On Mon, 19 Jan 2009 19:31:12 +0200, Avi Kivity a...@redhat.com wrote:
  
   Are Pentium Ms (really the memory that comes with them) actually capable 
   of running recent Fedoras?  I'm talking desktop, not 
   I'm-using-my-laptop-as-a-firewall-just-because-I-can.
  
  If only it were laptops. I think they still sell systems like this:
  
  [zait...@mallorn ~]$ more /proc/cpuinfo 
  processor: 0
  vendor_id: CentaurHauls
  cpu family   : 6
  model: 7
  model name   : VIA Samuel 2

The samuel 2 stopped being made ~5 years ago.
VIA have been PAE capable since the Nehemiah generation.

Dave

-- 
http://www.codemonkey.org.uk

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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-19 Thread Kyle McMartin
On Mon, Jan 19, 2009 at 11:24:14AM -0700, Pete Zaitcev wrote:
 BTW, does anyone know if the Geode in OLPC XO has PAE?
 

The PAE bit in %cr4 is listed as reserved in the geode databook
the olpc site links to, so my guess is no. :\

regards, Kyle

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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-19 Thread Neil Horman
On Mon, Jan 19, 2009 at 07:31:12PM +0200, Avi Kivity wrote:
 Kyle McMartin wrote:
 On Mon, Jan 19, 2009 at 11:23:26AM -0500, Bill Nottingham wrote:
   
 Dave Jones (da...@redhat.com) said: 
 On Mon, Jan 19, 2009 at 03:49:20PM +0200, Avi Kivity wrote:
   This probably comes up once in a while, thought I'd raise it again.
 I'd like to suggest switching the default kernel to -PAE on 
 machines   that support it, for the following reasons:
 - many machines have 4GB+ these days, even desktops
   - NX is only available with -PAE, improves security
   - kvm is significantly faster on AMD when PAE is selected (since 
 we   don't support NPT on non-PAE)

 What's needed to set this by default is changes in anaconda.
 They have their own list at anaconda-l...@redhat.com
   
 Unless we keep the non-PAE i586 kernel around as a fallback, we're not
 going to be able to boot on a whole raft of crappy i386 chips (original
 Pentium M most notably...)

 I'm not suggesting dropping non-PAE.  Simply defaulting to PAE where  
 possible.

 Are Pentium Ms (really the memory that comes with them) actually capable  
 of running recent Fedoras?  I'm talking desktop, not  
 I'm-using-my-laptop-as-a-firewall-just-because-I-can.

Absolutely, I've got a Thinkpad T42 here that does just fine on fedora 10.
Unless of course, I try to load a PAE enabled kernel on it.

I've not looked into it at all, but this thread got me thinking, is there any
particular reason that we can't merge the pae and non-pae kernels using the same
alternatives approach we used to merge smp  up?

Neil

/*
 *Neil Horman nhor...@redhat.com
 *919-754-4323
 /

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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-19 Thread Kyle McMartin
On Mon, Jan 19, 2009 at 01:36:08PM -0500, Neil Horman wrote:
 Absolutely, I've got a Thinkpad T42 here that does just fine on fedora 10.
 Unless of course, I try to load a PAE enabled kernel on it.
 
 I've not looked into it at all, but this thread got me thinking, is there any
 particular reason that we can't merge the pae and non-pae kernels using the 
 same
 alternatives approach we used to merge smp  up?
 

I looked into this several years ago, it's actually fairly gnarly since
depending on PAE we set up the swapper page tables differently, and
other ugly differences.

I should resurrect the patch set, though I think rationalizing it with the
Xen merge might be more pain than it's worth... last time I looked at it
there was a ridiculous amount of rejects.

It was pretty close to booting (though I had to hack the bootloader to
get a PAE enable bit so people without the bit could turn it off.)

regards, Kyle

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Re: Switching Fedora to pae kernel by default?

2009-01-19 Thread Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams
On Mon, 2009-01-19 at 11:24 -0700, Pete Zaitcev wrote:
 BTW, does anyone know if the Geode in OLPC XO has PAE?

This is off a C2:

[o...@xo-10-dd-46 ~]$ cat /proc/cpuinfo 
processor   : 0
vendor_id   : AuthenticAMD
cpu family  : 5
model   : 10
model name  : Geode(TM) Integrated Processor by AMD PCS
stepping: 2
cpu MHz : 430.931
cache size  : 128 KB
fdiv_bug: no
hlt_bug : no
f00f_bug: no
coma_bug: no
fpu : yes
fpu_exception   : yes
cpuid level : 1
wp  : yes
flags   : fpu de pse tsc msr cx8 sep pge cmov clflush mmx mmxext
3dnowext 3dnow
bogomips: 863.19
clflush size: 32

-- 
Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams ivazquez...@gmail.com

PLEASE don't CC me; I'm already subscribed
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