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Path: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au!newshost.carno.net.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!munnari.OZ.AU!news.ecn.uoknor.edu!news.wildstar.net!news.ececs.uc.edu!news.kei.com!newsfeed.internetmci.com!CTCnet!info.ucla.edu!nnrp.info.ucla.edu!news.cs.ucla.edu!taliesin.cs.ucla.edu!scottm From: scottm@taliesin.cs.ucla.edu (Scott Michel) Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc Subject: Re: Embedded FreeBSD Date: 19 Dec 1996 19:57:08 GMT Organization: UCLA CS Dept Lines: 33 Message-ID: <59c6mk$1jq@delphi.cs.ucla.edu> References: <32B744C0.2DA9@wdc.net> <597m7n$abh@fridge-nf0.shore.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: taliesin.cs.ucla.edu X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.2 PL2] Xref: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc:32816 Nathan V. Patwardhan (nvp@shore.net) wrote: : Darren Bordelon (darren@wdc.net) wrote: : : First, we would like to have about 4megs of ram. What are the best : : methods of minimizing kernel usage? Of course, we will not be using : With 4 megs of ram, you'll likely be brought to your knees, particularly : since you're not using swap. Forget about running X. Before I got : 16M ram, I ran with 8 and that was torture. Let's keep in mind that the original poster said "embedded" system. At my employer, The Aerospace Corporation (yes, it's a real company, and it's a FFRDC), an "embedded" system goes up on a Titan IV payload. So you don't need X. You don't need a lot of the other trivia that you brought up. The requirements for an embedded system are a lot different from an interactive one. I shudder to think about FreeBSD being used to run a 777. OTOH, I could see FreeBSD being used to run an ATM switch. The question was: Can FreeBSD, appropriately stripped down and a new file system driver installed, be comfortably run in 4M? I'd like to say "yes", since I remember running a pretty stripped down SCO a few years ago in 4M. FreeBSD can't be much worse. You'd really have to mess with the configuration of the kernel. It (probably) can be done. It might be a little tricky to run w/o a swap area, since that's the real core of the VM. Good luck. -scottm