<story><title>No more boot loader: Please use the kernel instead</title><url>https://pretalx.com/devconf-cz-2024/talk/W3AVCT/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ta8645</author><text>The Linux kernel does not require an initramfs.  You can build a kernel with everything compiled in; with no modules needed at all.  Initramfs is used for generic kernels where you don&amp;#x27;t know beforehand which features will be required.  This allows you to avoid wasting RAM on features you don&amp;#x27;t use.  But it is optional.</text></item><item><author>drewg123</author><text>I personally think they&amp;#x27;re moving in the wrong direction.  I&amp;#x27;d rather have &amp;quot;NMIRFS&amp;quot; (no more initramfs).  Eg, a smarter bootloader that understands all bootable filesystems and cooperates with the kernel to pre-load modules needed for boot and obviates the need for initramfs.&lt;p&gt;FreeBSD&amp;#x27;s loader does this, and its so much easier to deal with.  Eg, it understands ZFS, and can pre-load storage driver modules and zfs.ko for the kernel, so that the kernel has everything it needs to boot up.  It also understands module dependencies, and will preload all modules that are needed for a module you specify (similar to modprobe).</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>drewg123</author><text>I realize that.  But every distro I&amp;#x27;ve used uses an initramfs, so unless you want to build your own kernels, you&amp;#x27;re stuck with it, and the painfully slow initramfs updates when you update packages, and dkms (or similar) updates the initramfs with the newer version of your out-of-tree modules.</text></comment>
<story><title>No more boot loader: Please use the kernel instead</title><url>https://pretalx.com/devconf-cz-2024/talk/W3AVCT/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ta8645</author><text>The Linux kernel does not require an initramfs.  You can build a kernel with everything compiled in; with no modules needed at all.  Initramfs is used for generic kernels where you don&amp;#x27;t know beforehand which features will be required.  This allows you to avoid wasting RAM on features you don&amp;#x27;t use.  But it is optional.</text></item><item><author>drewg123</author><text>I personally think they&amp;#x27;re moving in the wrong direction.  I&amp;#x27;d rather have &amp;quot;NMIRFS&amp;quot; (no more initramfs).  Eg, a smarter bootloader that understands all bootable filesystems and cooperates with the kernel to pre-load modules needed for boot and obviates the need for initramfs.&lt;p&gt;FreeBSD&amp;#x27;s loader does this, and its so much easier to deal with.  Eg, it understands ZFS, and can pre-load storage driver modules and zfs.ko for the kernel, so that the kernel has everything it needs to boot up.  It also understands module dependencies, and will preload all modules that are needed for a module you specify (similar to modprobe).</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>linsomniac</author><text>Is anyone really wanting to get back into the business of building their own kernels?  I started using Linux heavily in &amp;#x27;92, and I&amp;#x27;ve built a lot of kernels, and am quite happy to not be building them anymore.</text></comment>