Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 14:42:25 -0700 From: Xin LI <delphij@delphij.net> To: Daniel Eischen <deischen@freebsd.org> Cc: Scott Long <scottl@samsco.org>, d@delphij.net, Julian Elischer <julian@elischer.org>, freebsd-arch@freebsd.org Subject: Re: [PATCH] Utilize i686, SSE and MMX by default on FreeBSD/i386 Message-ID: <4BA3EFC1.60504@delphij.net> In-Reply-To: <Pine.GSO.4.64.1003191721371.25775@sea.ntplx.net> References: <4BA2CE17.2050105@delphij.net> <201003190751.26767.jhb@freebsd.org> <4BA3C41F.3000404@elischer.org> <5BED0721-442C-44B3-8B23-3D94BE5354A9@samsco.org> <Pine.GSO.4.64.1003191609030.25775@sea.ntplx.net> <4BA3E9DF.2050303@delphij.net> <Pine.GSO.4.64.1003191721371.25775@sea.ntplx.net>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On 2010/03/19 14:24, Daniel Eischen wrote: > On Fri, 19 Mar 2010, Xin LI wrote: > >> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- >> Hash: SHA1 >> >> On 2010/03/19 13:15, Daniel Eischen wrote: >> [...] >>> Well, we have nanobsd, but having a suitable install tool >>> for small flash-based systems where you want a nanobsd-like >>> setup (readonly filesystems) would be very nice. I try >>> to write procedures for our embedded systems so others >>> (neophytes) can create and burn them, but it might be >>> easier for someone to get started with embedded systems >>> if they could do it from a release using an install tool. >> >> Some computation intense tasks would benefit from enabling certain >> optimizations which is not suitable for older processors. >> >> However, just like John said servers tends to use 64-bit platform more >> than 32-bit ones, so perhaps we can just dismiss the idea of enabling >> these optimizations on FreeBSD/i386 platform and focus on >> FreeBSD/amd64... > > Perhaps I was wrong, but I thought Scott's question was more > general: is there a desire for a special installation suitable > to small appliances (usually flash-based)? At $work we have plans on providing a Flash based images that is specifically built for some need, as a continuation of the FreeNAS project. My understanding is that we want to provide images for more "general" purpose. I knew that there is still a lot of people using i386+PAE kernels on their Linux servers although they have > 4GB of RAM barely because they can "see" the memory in top(1) output. I personally don't think it's a very attrative idea. Perhaps, we can have a separate, FreeBSD based x86 embedded platform SDK, like what Windows CE has offered as their "Platform Builder", that can give one a menu to choose which part the engineer does not want/etc and just build an Flash image for burn into the boot media (ideally it would use pre-built binaries for some common-case platforms) by using src/tools/build/options? Sounds like a SoC 2010 proposal to me :) Cheers, - -- Xin LI <delphij@delphij.net> http://www.delphij.net/ FreeBSD - The Power to Serve! Live free or die -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.14 (FreeBSD) iQEcBAEBAgAGBQJLo+/BAAoJEATO+BI/yjfB46EH/A9BkztAH5s6zxX+hbsfyQfr fMHPnx4KAPVy1ItWTWikUOvGw3eoSSfX1UH8hOXbzEZnwSWIJAPsLNWrOy7Usprx 4aSwvu3UsEsma5xBJeGjkhh+Bvird47T4OfEBMzsutvxEV/PJZvOE/TTpkIq+5sQ vlG+HPi2fuMm026zgfb52dtHoH+6KMPbYUU61Cp9XprgCif6eH1mNAWEPCxeoviE E71vOc1I8kS0xz5DvKsT2HG9Xcrrl8PMwboow62CBt/xZrwPYRYioh9a/hdZ6nzp fBb+ISxf3G7mSf7txpvdXJfPklqdL/8rxPrFyAQPqGWnBe5G/JoUT9yUbHyPjbQ= =PkRA -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?4BA3EFC1.60504>