Re: Synopsis

[dumas patrice <dumas@rip.ens-cachan.fr>]

JF Martinez wrote:
> > 
> Partitionning is not difficult in RedHat/indy but carving a hole for
> Linux is since FIPS cannot be named user friendly.
> 
Yes, that was exactly a replacement of FIPS I was looking for, but not
because it isn't user friendly; I read the code, it is object oriented
and it should have been possible to work around. But the real problem
was that it resizes only fat systems that are empty in the end.

> Does parted allow the growing/shrinking of Linux or Windows partitions?

Yes. And also it creates filesystems.
<off-topic>
I tried to put a dos partition at the end of all my linux partitions, in
a disk where there is a windows partition too. Windows has still
problems with that partition, but it is with parted (instead of dos/win
or fdisk/mkdosfs) that there are less problems.
</off-topic>

Parted can be used in two ways, there is a C library that does all the
stuff, and a "front-end" command line oriented, interactive or not.
So it is possible to use the library (its API is documented) or the
whole stuff in scripts.

[I told here about a windows app that automates setup programs with
windos]
> 
> Yes, very interesting.
>
So, what to do with ?
 
> > Last thing, I can recompile kernels, I allready tried to do a kernel
> > which could turn on the most different computers, modularised for anything
> > possible. I had problems for strange hardware, but I should dig and ask in
> > relevant places, if needed.
> >
> 
> Do you have a fast box?  I have found that recompiling a kernel when
> you really compile everything (be it in modules or in the main body)
> takes over an hour on a PII 400.  And then you need to rebuild for
> Pentiums, and still a third time for PentiumPros.  In 2.2 a single
> universal kernel means too much performance loss.
>
Sure. But this was not for the real kernel, but a kernel used for
booting the install.

I haven't a fast box (celeron 400), but the compilation could be made 
automatic.

> My personal method is go to the RedHAt ftp site, download the SRPM
> they did from the last kernel, do an rpm -U of it then go to where the
> sources got installed (/usr/src/redhat/SOURCES) and edit the files
> describing what has to be compiled and how.  Then "rpm -ba" They have
> Alan Cox in their team so I don't thinbk we can improve much on them.
> But we can add features they considered unimportant like NTFS support
> (it is presently read only)


I think the NTFS read-write is still buggy (but I am not sure).
 
Well, I think a good approach to kernel stuff would be that a first
kernel is used to boot and to install, recognizing as much hardware as
it is possible. And then another kernel is set up, optimized for the
machine. (that you can create as you explained above)
Am I right ?


> > Well, last thing, but only to think about, I am aware of some systems that
> > only install the very basic system, so perhaps it could be useful to use
> > this as tool to save some work. But I think it is not a priority at all.

Well, in the projects I talk about, there was such ideas, to recompilate
for a peculiar hardware. It goes further as it recompilate everything.
It is still a project, but if they go further, it could save us a lot of
work. I keep watching.

Pat