From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1751836AbWG0RZh (ORCPT ); Thu, 27 Jul 2006 13:25:37 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S1751842AbWG0RZh (ORCPT ); Thu, 27 Jul 2006 13:25:37 -0400 Received: from [212.33.185.90] ([212.33.185.90]:41483 "EHLO raad.intranet") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1751836AbWG0RZh (ORCPT ); Thu, 27 Jul 2006 13:25:37 -0400 From: Al Boldi To: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Subject: Re: patch for Documentation/initrd.txt? Date: Thu, 27 Jul 2006 20:26:57 +0300 User-Agent: KMail/1.5 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline Message-Id: <200607272026.57695.a1426z@gawab.com> Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Tom Horsley wrote: > > I spend hours the other day trying to examine a fedora core 5 > initrd file in the mistaken belief that the Documentation/initrd.txt > file might contain relevant information :-). It didn't, but > many web searches later I finally discovered the new key > to decrypting initrd files. Would it be possible to add the > attached patch (or a better one if someone can explain things > in more detail) to the initrd.txt file to avoid future > confusion? Thanks. > > ["initrd-doc-patch" (initrd-doc-patch)] > > --- linux-2.6.17.7/Documentation/initrd.txt 2006-07-27 > 08:49:30.000000000 -0400 +++ linux-2.6.17.7/Documentation/initrd.txt > 2006-07-27 09:02:04.000000000 -0400 @@ -73,6 +73,22 @@ > initrd is mounted as root, and the normal boot procedure is followed, > with the RAM disk still mounted as root. > > +Compressed cpio images > +---------------------- > + > +Recent kernels have support for populating a ramdisk from a compressed > cpio +archive, on such systems, the creation of a ramdisk image doesn't > need to +involve special block devices or loopbacks, you merely create a > directory on +disk with the desired initrd content, cd to that directory, > and run (as an +example): > + > +find . | cpio --quiet -c -o | gzip -9 -n > /boot/imagefile.img > + > +Examining the contents of an existing image file is just as simple: > + > +mkdir /tmp/imagefile > +cd /tmp/imagefile > +gzip -cd /boot/imagefile.img | cpio -imd --quiet > > Installation > ------------ Thanks for your very useful docPatch! OT, but your docPatch made me think of another way to init the kernel; via tmpfs, i.e. initTmpFS. Can anybody see how that could be useful? Thanks! -- Al