OSNews: http://www.osnews.com/story/20096/Anatomy_of_Linux_Loadable_Kernel_Modules Exploring the Future of Computing en-us Copyright 2001-2009, David Adams adam+nospam@osnews.com Tue, 10 Nov 2009 03:46:20 GMT http://www.osnews.com/images/osnews.gif OSNews.com http://www.osnews.com "Innovations"? http://osnews.com/thread?324076 http://osnews.com/thread?324076 Didn't System V R4.2 introduce loadable kernel modules two or three years before Linux (~1992)? Tue, 22 Jul 2008 16:15:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (danieldk) Comments RE: "Innovations"? http://osnews.com/thread?324079 http://osnews.com/thread?324079 Well even AmigaOS could load kernel modules of some sort ;)
BeOS, AFAICR, had kernel modules as well, but in a much cleaner fashion than what linux does.

> how these independent objects dynamically become part of the Linux kernel.
And participate in the global mess...

Linux finally got hierarchically organized modules (BeOS had those 10 years ago), but they still explicitely link to each other making it a pain to have them loaded in correct order, and insmod is still required, even if it's hidden by udev.
In BeOS (and Haiku) modules only link to the kernel, and access other modules via a clean API where they ask which module the need and get given a list of functions then can call.
This makes the whole much cleaner and stable than the driver framework in linux, or rather the absence thereof. Tue, 22 Jul 2008 16:53:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (mmu_man) Comments RE: "Innovations"? http://osnews.com/thread?324080 http://osnews.com/thread?324080 I think they mean innovations in the sense restricted to Linux only, not as innovations in general. Tue, 22 Jul 2008 17:06:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (asgard) Comments RE[2]: "Innovations"? http://osnews.com/thread?324103 http://osnews.com/thread?324103 These days Linux is actually unusual in not having some sort of proper driver API and stable ABI. They have their reasons, even if you don't agree with them. Tue, 22 Jul 2008 19:00:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Vanders) Comments RE[3]: "Innovations"? http://osnews.com/thread?324126 http://osnews.com/thread?324126 Yes, the reason they give is that all drivers are in the source tree anyway, and it allows for faster development.
The first one is wrong, there are things like OSSv4 which (tries to) support Linux by requiring an ugly glue full of #ifdefs on the kernel version. Of course some integrists just discard it saying all driver must be in the source tree or just not be at all. That's a bit pathetic but eh.
As for faster dev, well, maybe, but sometimes it's better to take the time to see where one is going before running to it. Tue, 22 Jul 2008 21:00:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (mmu_man) Comments Linux modules = Windows services http://osnews.com/thread?324165 http://osnews.com/thread?324165 Linux modules = Windows services Wed, 23 Jul 2008 07:37:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (casuto) Comments RE: Linux modules = Windows services http://osnews.com/thread?324171 http://osnews.com/thread?324171
Linux modules = Windows services


They're nothing of the sort. Linux loadable modules are nothing more than drivers. The equivalence of Windows Services would be daemons. Wed, 23 Jul 2008 08:13:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (kaiwai) Comments RE: "Innovations"? http://osnews.com/thread?324192 http://osnews.com/thread?324192 From the article linked:


Linux is not the only monolithic kernel that can be dynamically altered (and it wasn't the first). You'll find loadable module support in Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD) variants, Sun Solaris, in older kernels such as OpenVMS, and other popular operating systems such as Microsoft® Windows® and Apple Mac OS X.


So yes, you're right, it wasn't the first one. ;) Wed, 23 Jul 2008 14:42:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (rob_mx) Comments Very Useful http://osnews.com/thread?324199 http://osnews.com/thread?324199 Disagreements aside about how innovative Linux is, this is a very nice, and exceptionally clear article on how to get started with kernel modules. Wed, 23 Jul 2008 15:54:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (computrius) Comments