Difference between revisions of "Linux Tiny"
(→Introduction: Updated - No more patch releases) |
(→Status: Removed the entire section (out of date)) |
||
Line 65: | Line 65: | ||
measure kernel size, and how to use the kernel patches and configuration items provided by Linux-tiny. | measure kernel size, and how to use the kernel patches and configuration items provided by Linux-tiny. | ||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
== Test Project and Results == | == Test Project and Results == |
Revision as of 02:50, 9 February 2009
Contents
Introduction
The goal of the linux-tiny project is to reduce the memory and disk footprint of the mainstream Linux kernel, as well as to add features to aid working on small systems. Target users are developers of embedded system and users of small or legacy machines such as 386s and handheld devices.
Patch releases against the mainstream Linux kernel have been discontinued. Instead of spending a valuable amount of time carrying patches forward from one kernel version to the next, we chose to focus on a few patches and spend our time trying to get them merged into the mainline kernel.
Resources
- Project mailing list: Mailing List, archives
- Linux-tiny presentation by Thomas Petazzoni (Free Electrons) at Embedded Linux Conference in April 2008.
- Linux-tiny presentation by Michael Opdenacker (Free Electrons) at Embedded Linux Conference Europe in November 2007.
- https://elinux.org/images//8/83/Pdf.gif Linux-tiny revival https://elinux.org/images/d/da/Info_circle.png presentation given by Tim Bird at the Japan Technical Jamboree #16 in August 2007
- Linux-tiny Presentation by Matt Mackall, delivered at CELF's Technical Conference in April 2005.
- Original project home page: Linux Tiny
News
- A new LWN.net article is at: LWN Article (Sep 2007), By Jake Edge
- Michael Opdenacker was announced as the new maintainer.
- A Linux Weekly News article (2003) about the project is at: LWN Article
Download
Last release (for 2.6.23)
A recent Linux-tiny patchset release is available here: Media:Tiny-quilt-2.6.23-0.tar.bz2
Installation Instructions
These instructions were for the Linux-tiny release for 2.6.23. Adjust accordingly for a different kernel version.
To apply the above patches, you need the referenced kernel (2.6.23) and quilt (overview). Follow these steps:
$ wget http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.6/linux-2.6.23.tar.bz2 $ tar -xjf linux-2.6.23.tar.bz2 $ wget http://elinux.org/images/3/3c/Tiny-quilt-2.6.23-0.tar.bz2 $ cd linux-2.6.23 $ tar -xjf ../Tiny-quilt-2.6.23-0.tar.bz2 $ quilt push -a $ cd .. $ mv linux-2.6.23 linux-2.6.23-tiny1
Auxiliary tools (for Linux-tiny developers)
Here is a short shell script for making a tiny-quilt release: Media:release-tiny
Older releases
- Linux 2.6.22.5:
- Linux 2.6.22.1:
- Linux 2.6.16.19
- broken-out patchset: 2.6.16.19-tiny1-broken-out
- Porting notes: notes
- Linux 2.6.0 to 2.6.14:
- Older Linux-tiny patchsets can be downloaded from: Linux Tiny Patchset
How to use
In the Kernel Size Tuning Guide, there is a lot of information about how to measure kernel size, and how to use the kernel patches and configuration items provided by Linux-tiny.
Test Project and Results
There is an test for Linux-tiny (and kernel configuration option results, in general). Some test results from this test are available from the CE Linux Forum test lab, at: http://testlab.celinuxforum.org/otlwiki/ConfigSizeTestResults
The CELF System Size working group has worked extensively with the Linux-tiny patch set. There is a script to produce a report of size reductions for the individual patches in the patchset, and results from various vendors about their use of Linux-tiny. See Linux Tiny Test Project
Old usage notes
There are some miscellaneous usage notes at: Linux Tiny Notes
Ideas and patch candidates
License
The Linux-tiny patches apply against the Linux kernel, and are provided under the GNU General Public License (GPL), version 2 only [1]. (This is the same license as the Linux kernel.)
Original Announcements and e-mail
The original (Dec 11, 2003) announcement about the patchset, to the kernel mailing list, is available here:
Here are some other announcements from Matt Mackall to LKML:
Recent discussion thread on lkml is summarized at: LKML Thread Summary. The thread is available at here.
Note that currently, the smallest kernel that is reported in this thread is 197K compressed.