[luau] kernel advice

Charles Lockhart lockhart at jeans.ifa.hawaii.edu
Thu Nov 13 11:07:00 PST 2003


I've fallen into something of a tough bind,

I've been able to get our Linux (redhat) based system to meet 
performance requirements using the rml preemptive kernel patch.  I've 
seen really good improvements in responsiveness, and with our newest 
hardware, a compaq dl360 g3 running dual xeon p4's, the system actually 
exceeds performance requirements.

Like I said, this is using a vanilla kernel patched with the rml pek patch.

Unfortunately, it seems that the system is flaky when running the 
vanilla kernel (patched or not).  It runs fine and goes for extended 
periods of time running the rh kernel, but if you run the vanilla 
kernel, sometimes you'll come back after 30 minutes and find the machine 
is locked up (screen frozen, unreachable over the network, doesn't seem 
to be doing anything).

I've thought about just waiting for the 2.6 kernel and dealing with it 
then.  I figured RH would release some sort of 2.6 kernel that would be 
stable, and it includes the preemptive kernel patch.

But, we have a certain amount of driver code for specialised devices 
that won't be available for the 2.6 kernel for another year or so.

Options seem to be running the system knowing it's unstable and just 
living with it, which doesn't seem to make anybody happy (and makes me 
look really bad), adapting the driver code for the 2.6 kernel (which is 
probably reasonable, just costly in time) and hoping the 2.6 kernel ends 
up being all that it's cracked up to be, or patching the redhat 2.4 
kernel by hand (again, seems somewhat reasonable though risky, and 
costly in time).

Any ideas or advice?

-Charles




More information about the LUAU mailing list