Timeline for Why is the Linux kernel 15+ million lines of code?
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
14 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Jun 9, 2020 at 15:31 | comment | added | Ayberk Özgür | @TypeIA totally agree, downvoting because of this | |
| Jun 7, 2020 at 21:08 | comment | added | 15 Volts | $ find /lib/modules/$(uname -r)/ -iname '*.ko' | wc -l # 0 for Linux version 5.7.0-arch1-1 (linux@archlinux) (gcc version 10.1.0 (GCC), GNU ld (GNU Binutils) 2.34.0) #1 SMP PREEMPT Mon, 01 Jun 2020 22:54:03 +0000 | |
| Apr 24, 2018 at 20:01 | comment | added | TypeIA | This otherwise good/valuable answer suffers from a distinctly angry and combative tone. -1. | |
| Aug 19, 2015 at 8:27 | history | edited | Oli | CC BY-SA 3.0 | added 412 characters in body |
| Aug 18, 2015 at 22:32 | comment | added | Oli | You could even package modules as you say, I just don't think it would be desirable for a distribution or its users. Explanations also in the edit. | |
| Aug 18, 2015 at 22:30 | comment | added | Oli | @JonathanLeaders without wanting to sound rude, it seems like you missed or otherwise didn't understand the very first bullet. If you want a tiny Linux kernel with just the things you need, you can have that. I've edited to re-explain this and the other things you mention. | |
| Aug 18, 2015 at 22:27 | history | edited | Oli | CC BY-SA 3.0 | added 854 characters in body |
| Aug 18, 2015 at 21:21 | comment | added | user4443 | @JonathanLeaders you would never run a kernel configured for a desktop on an embedded system. Our embedded system has 13 modules and has removed all the hardware support we don't need (along with plenty of other customizations). Stop comparing Desktops to embedded systems. Linux works well because it supports everything and can be customized to only include what you care about. And those 4k modules are really great on desktop systems: when my last laptop died I just put the hard drive in a much newer laptop and everything just worked. | |
| Aug 18, 2015 at 21:08 | comment | added | Jonathan | The other concern I see, is 50 years later, will the Linux kernel code be 100million lines of code? Does it by necessity grow as hardware is made? I would think package libraries would grow, not the core kernel | |
| Aug 18, 2015 at 21:02 | comment | added | Jonathan | Yes, exactly. I still remain surprised by assumptions like "you could plug in an USB device at any time therefore we need 15m lines of code" are written in at the kernel level, and not at the distro level, seeing as Linux is used in phone ands various embedded devices. Well, I guess the distro does cull the list on it's own. I would just think support for pluggability should be additive and not subtractive, I.E. a distro would kind of 'opt-in' to it by adding package sources, as opposed to embedded ARM configurations telling the kernel to be one percent of it's current size | |
| Aug 18, 2015 at 20:47 | comment | added | Didier A. | @JonathanLeaders I think you can safely delete them. On a desktop install, they are there in case you suddenly plug in something in a usb port, or change some hardware configuration, etc. | |
| Aug 18, 2015 at 17:54 | comment | added | Jonathan | The concern is mainly for embedded systems. As you show, you have 4,000 modules not in use on your own system. In some small robotics or aerospace applications, (READ: not general purpose computing) this would be unacceptable waste. | |
| Aug 18, 2015 at 10:04 | history | edited | Oli | CC BY-SA 3.0 | added 146 characters in body |
| Aug 18, 2015 at 9:55 | history | answered | Oli | CC BY-SA 3.0 |