linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH] x86/kconfig/32: Make CONFIG

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Message-ID: <21918.52899.989624.140180@quad.stoffel.home>
Date:	Thu, 9 Jul 2015 15:42:27 -0400
From:	"John Stoffel" <john@...ffel.org>
To:	Linus Torvalds <torvalds@...ux-foundation.org>
Cc:	Arjan van de Ven <arjan@...ux.intel.com>,
	Andy Lutomirski <luto@...nel.org>,
	"the arch\/x86 maintainers" <x86@...nel.org>,
	Linux Kernel Mailing List <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>,
	Oleg Nesterov <oleg@...hat.com>,
	Kees Cook <keescook@...omium.org>,
	Peter Zijlstra <peterz@...radead.org>,
	Borislav Petkov <bp@...en8.de>,
	Austin S Hemmelgarn <ahferroin7@...il.com>,
	Brian Gerst <brgerst@...il.com>,
	Matthew Garrett <mjg59@...f.ucam.org>
Subject: Re: [PATCH] x86/kconfig/32: Make CONFIG_VM86 default to n and remove
 EXPERT

>>>>> "Linus" == Linus Torvalds <torvalds@...ux-foundation.org> writes:

Linus> On Thu, Jul 9, 2015 at 11:51 AM, Arjan van de Ven <arjan@...ux.intel.com> wrote:
>> 
>> I would rather do BOTH the default n AND the EXPERT

Linus> That basically makes it impossible for "normal people" to test it. You
Linus> have to mark yourself as expert, and then get the rest of the
Linus> configuration right. Not a good idea.

Linus> The kernel config is probably our biggest problem for getting
Linus> people to test. Building the kernel? Easy. Installing it? "make
Linus> install; make modules_install". Not that hard, unless your
Linus> distro has screwed it up (which has happened, I'm looking at
Linus> you, Ubuntu).

The big problem with the kernel config is the piles and piles of crap
which makes finding the common cases really really hard, and I've been
following this list and building kernels off and on now for 12+
years.  

It would be nice if we could come up with a plan to organize the
configuration tree, and make it easier to use, with a little bit more
thought in how it's laid out.  

For example, under Device Drivers -> PPS Support ->  ??? 

What the hell is this?  Expand and use your acronyms the first time
you use them like "Parallel Port Support (PPS)"  so people have a
clue of figuring what you're talking about.

Maybe we could add a 'quick system' menu, where you select common
configurations at the top level, such as x86_64 home PC, which would
turn on all the options you'd pretty much expect for a home PC:

     - x86_64 cpu
          - max CPUs of 16
	  - ....
     - Device drivers:
          - SATA, PATA, AHCI, SCSI, USB, RAID, LVM
	  - AMD/NVidia/Intel video drivers.

We could have the same for:

   ARM boards, PPC, Sparc, etc.... 

I know this is a hard problem space, esp since I'm sure people will
scream if you move their baby down/up/sideways in the config
hierarchy.  But cleaning it up and maybe even just sorting
alphabetically would be a big help!

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