On Monday 14 April 2003 10:43 am, Frederick Bruckman wrote:
> On Mon, 14 Apr 2003, Julio Merino wrote:
> > as kernel files can contain embedded configuration files (with options
> > INCLUDE_CONFIG_FILE or INCLUDE_JUST_CONFIG), I think it could be good
> > if config(8) could automatically extract them and configure a new
> > kernel based on that information.
>
> Clearly, we need something like that. Otherwise, what's the point of
> embedding the file? I'd find it more useful if it could recover the
> original file, to update it for newer sources or to tweak it, than to
> configure with the live kernel directly, though. 

There's a common patch against the Linux kernel, included in several of the 
mainstream distributions, that stores the configuration in the kernel just as 
INCLUDE_CONFIG_FILE does (although compressed).  The patch also makes the 
configuration file available in as /proc/config.gz when the kernel is 
running.  There's a certain elegance to that (e.g., no guessing about whether 
somebody has a string starting "_CFG_" that isn't config data, etc.), 
although it doesn't help in the not-running case.  

I know Linux examples often aren't well-regarded, but in this case it looks 
like they've got a good one to offer.  Perhaps NetBSD should have a 
/kern/config that can just be read to get the current configuration?
-- 
Ross A. Patterson
Chief Technology Officer
CatchFIRE Systems, Inc.
5885 Trinity Parkway, Suite 220
Centreville, VA  20120
(703) 563-4164