On 7/8/07, Michael Fisher <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
I have run various live Linux CD distributions (Knoppix, DSL, Ubuntu, etc.) under QEMU and was wondering if there is really a need to run the various hardware detection scripts in the live CDs? Obviously, a script for getting an IP address is needed but if I know I am running the distro under QEMU, do I need to check for USB, SCSI, AGP, PCI and the other detection scripts?
in short: no, you don't need so much hardware detection.
If QEMU is already doing that, can't I just tweak the live distro to match QEMU and then let QEMU do the work when it is placed on various host computers?
if you're targetting a specific version of qemu, on which hardware's list is specified/frozen, then yes, it's best to custom each of your linux guest to speed up the boot sequence. I see 3 ways: 1) by command line: you can add parameters like noacpi, tweak the ide probes, etc... slax and dsl give you quite a good list to start with... 2) by customizing the /etc/init.d/* scripts, and re-authorizing the iso If you do this, you've to keep in mind the new iso is for your guests only... 3) use DetaolB. It's one of the many reasons why I created it. :) Seriously, you create your own distro. The trick is in getting the init scripts to as little as possible, and putting all needed hardware modules *only* in your vmlinux, thus removing modprobing, which actually takes quite a lot of time when inside qemu.
Currently, most of my testing is done using Win XP as the host but in the future I will be looking at Linux and Macs as hosts also.
I'm in the same situation. -- Christian -- http://detaolb.sourceforge.net/, a linux distribution for Qemu
