On Tue, Sep 22, 2009 at 6:48 AM, Eric Van Hensbergen <eri...@gmail.com>wrote:
> On Sep 21, 2009, at 9:33 PM, erik quanstrom wrote: > > "We're getting bloated and huge. Yes, it's a problem," said Torvalds." >>>> >>> >>> So may be Tanenbaum was right, after all, there's a reason we make >>> things modular. >>> >> >> rob, presotto, ken and phil did not agree with tanenbaum's >> ideas about modular kernels. >> >> this was a direct response to ast many years ago. it was >> hard to dig up when i did so in 2006. perhaps someone >> has a better link: >> >> - Microkernels are the way to go >> False unless your only goal is to get papers published. >> Plan 9's kernel is a fraction of the size of any microkernel >> we know and offers more functionality and comparable >> or often better performance. >> >> > IMHO, that statement applies to existing microkernel implementations (at > the time? perhaps still?) -- its not clear to me that they inherently must > be that way. > Likely their use as "fuel for papers and PhD's" contributed to their bloat. > > -eric > > > At that time, and even today, microkernels are "academically bloated". However some of the more practical academics (yeah I know it's like jumbo shrimp or military intelligence) have spun very interesting things off like OKL4, which is running in several cellular telephones, and on Qualcomm equipment, possibly with a Linux personality ported to it.
