XPost: comp.os.linux.development.system
In comp.os.linux.development.system Aragorn
wrote:
| Disabling the ability to load a module would automatically forfeit the use
| of the machine as a workstation, given that most video adapter
| manufacturers provide their drivers as modules, and particularly so for the
| proprietary ones.
But this doesn't necessarily need to happen. One can build a kernel with
all the drivers that come in the main source tree, or as source patches,
statically linked.
| *[1]* A monolithic kernel is not the same thing as a kernel with all drivers
| it needs compiled in-line with the kernel. Even if Linux is built
| modularly, then it is still a monolithic kernel, because that's how it was
| designed.
|
| A monolithic kernel is a kernel in which virtually all drivers run in
| kernelspace, whether they were loaded as modules or built into the kernel
| image itself, as opposed to a microkernel, where the kernel only takes care
| of memory management and process scheduling and only has hardware support
| for the underlying processor(s), memory controller(s) and chipset, or an
| exokernel, in which the kernel only supports the processor(s), memory
| controller and some of the chips, but leaves memory management and all
| other hardware access to userspace.
This is the term multiple people have used for designating a kernel which has
all the drivers it needs compiled in. What would be a better name to work on
getting people to use, instead? Static kernel (as opposed to dynamic kernel)?
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