Is there any advantage/disadvantage to using kernel moduls vs. staticly linking stuff in the kernel? I would like to eliminate everything from my kernel config that can be loaded as a module, then load them at boot using loader.conf. Is there any reason I would not want to do that? It seems to me that it would make things much easier.
I would guess there are a number of reasons ... First would be historical. BSD is historically a monolithic kernel. The more you rely on modules, the more the kernel acts like a microkernel. I suspect that some day, FreeBSD will be a microkernel, but I don't expect that to be for many, many releases. The change involves a lot. For now, though, FreeBSD is still a monolithic kernel, and people treat it that way even when need does not require it. The other reason I've heard is that KLDs don't run as fast and use more memory than the same functionality compiled into the kernel. I've never tested this, but I'm guessing that the difference is negligible on modern hardware.
Why does FreeBSD not do this by default for the GENERIC kernel?
Not sure.
-- Bill Moran Potential Technologies http://www.potentialtech.com
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