On Mon, August 19, 2013 23:24, Alan McKinnon wrote: > On 19/08/2013 16:33, pk wrote: >> Using an initramfs means you duplicate parts of your OS and copy them >> into the kernel or using a tool (like dracut or genkernel). If you need >> it from a technical point of view (bluetooth keyboard), that's fine but >> if I don't have any hardware that requires it then why use an initramfs? >> I guess it's a matter of taste (or "philosophy" if you will)... An >> initramfs seems like bandaid to me (and it is). > > > I snipped most of the thread as I don't want to revisit yet again and > old horse that is much flogged already :-) > > We're not too different, you and I, if I may dare say it when we differ > it's you tend a little more towards idealism and I towards realism. > > Yes, bluetooth sucks, but it was designed by what was available at the > time and it's what we have. For that matter USB, spinning disks and lack > of fibre into my house also suck, but we have to work with what we have > and what we certainly will have soon.
I could have had fibre into my house, but the rest of the neighbourhood didn't want to sign a petition to have it installed. The petition only stated the intent to subscribe. It didn't specify that signatories would be required to actually subscribe. And that is with quite a few IT-people in the area. But that is a different rant ;) > Which brings me to what I am really trying to say - giving specific > examples to highlight general problems is always a nasty road to > navigate. Like bluetooth keyboards, there's always a non-trivial number > who can claim that the example does not apply to *them*. One can go > round and round in circles with that, and skirt the actual issue: What happened to wireless USB? Bluetooth is nice for mobile phones and in-car audio/handsfree systems. I also don't see the point of using it for keyboards. How would I enter the pincode to link the keyboard to the computer if the keyboard has not been linked yet? ;) > Software exists in the context of something bigger and for us that often > means "maximally useful for the maximum number of folks inclined to use > such a package" and that sweet spot includes compromises; some things > just have to be laid in stone so that everything else works at all - > sometimes we just have to accept that. > > Let's look at /usr by comparing it to /opt. I like /opt - all the crap > from Oracle, IBM, Sybase and Sun my managers shove on me goes in there > where I can at least corral it. I can agree with that setup. You can scratch Sun from that list, it's Oracle now... They do have some interesting software, part of it pays for the bills. I agree with putting that in /opt, wouldn't want to mess up the base OS with that stuff. Some admins install that into /home/.../, btw. > Like I said earlier, software exists in the context of something bigger, > and Gentoo exists in the context of the FOSS community. We consume much > more code than we produce and sometimes we have to back down and go with > what the world is doing or be prepared to fork. > > Incidentally, I don't see that anyone has ever proposed the obvious > sword to cut this knot - have the kernel automount /usr. it already does > / and we have root= ... it wouldn't be hard to add /usr= ... > > Yes, I know I'm being stupid and Linus would reply with two words, the > first starting with an f. He'd tell us to solve it the right way even if > that's the hard way. I believe separate /usr without initramfs is > rapidly becoming white elephant material, and we are faced with a > decision to do it the hard way. If Linus would go for that, how long till there would be a /var, /home, /... in there? Maybe an "fstab=/path/to/fstab" would be a better option? And then make sure that file is on the root-partition? -- Joost
