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Linus Says No To Annoying Boot Messages
Pants Ripper writes: "In a victory for all Linux users, Linus Torvalds declared jihad
on annoying 'informational' kernel boot messages. I'm sure we'll all miss the inspirational 'spewtron driver 0.09 installed (C)2000 by Wardwick Extrusion' messages in our dmesgs." I've always thought those messages looked pretty interestingly verbose, but people want pretty boot-ups. And this Linus guy seems to know a lot about this "Lee-nuks," too.
FreeBSD has an option (although it is disabled by default.) to display a boot screen (similar to windows). IIRC, the boot screen can be dumped for the regular boot message by a flag to the loader, or by simply pressing escape during the boot (unless your error is: atkbd0: Error failed to initalize keyboard...
Really, what Linus seems to be annoyed at here are the excessivly verbose messages that some drivers like to print out (like I need to see the algorigthm benchmark each time I boot) that might drown out an important message by scrolling it off of the screen before you see it (although it should still be available through dmesg, just like the FreeBSD boot messages are still are even when you have the "graphical" boot.). The Linux boot sequence is getting a bit heavy on the pointless informational messages these days, so a bit of a pruning won't hurt too much.
Down that path lies madness. On the other hand, the road to hell is paved with melting snowballs.
I read the internet for the articles.
Attention, We-Want-Linux-On-The-Desktop crowd: Support this and help out, it is a big step in the right direction. To a consumer, diagnostic messages are confusing and pointless. Admit that Apple did something right, for once (interpret that as you will): the Mac OS, up to and including X, will never show cryptic messages or break out of the GUI unless you give it a direct order to do so (launch Terminal or Console, hold down key sequences during boot) or a fatal error occurs. This is a good thing, it makes the experience seamless and friendly. Remember that consumers don't care about what drivers got loaded when (and isn't improving the drivers themselves a much more important goal than improving the error messages?) and similar arcane knowledge of the computer's internals, and saying "learn it anyway because it's good for you" will not win you any friends or customers.
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As a longtime UNIX admin who's used many UNIX systems, I think this is a good thing. I don't mind text printing on startup, but Linux prints so much ABSOLUTE USELESS CRAP to screen.
90% of them are ego-boosting messages by the authors of each chunk of the kernel. These are in particular what Linus seems to have an issue with.
I don't think boot messages should be completely gotten rid of, but they should be put on a rigorous diet. Let's look at the way other Unices do it. FreeBSD, for example, prints stuff, but it's terse and professional looking. Same with Solaris.
On Linux, the messages scroll so damn fast, especially on a speedy modern system, that you can't even read them. That's bad, folks. I can't even tell if the kernel is printing any error messages, because the credits messages scroll it so quick.
Yes, I don't mind a kernel component telling me it's there and the hardware's functional, but don't be so verbose about it!
You ought to pass that book on to the MS Access developers. Does this sound familiar?
"You are about to modify 0 records. This action cannot be undone."
The Outlook people could use some help, too:
"This graphic does not do anything. For Help on an option, click tho question mark [?], and then click the option."
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"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
This way, there would be several modes, selected by kernel parameters in the lilo.conf file or LILO prompt.
Meldroc, Waster of Electrons
"Unnecessary messages are pure evil."
- Everett N. McKay, page 367
Developing User Interfaces for Microsoft Windows
(c) Copyright 1999
What's your damage, Heather?
So, he's just talking about copyright notices and that sort of garbage. He's actually keeping the good stuff in. So, this makes sense. Must be a slow newsday, what with no Micro-Soft FUD to report.
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
Relying on dmesg to configure a kernel (like the person you replied to) is kinda like relying on the author/editor blurb at the top of a Slashdot story to give an accurate impression of the news (like the person you replied to).
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
Linus specifically said that the important kind of messages are the ones that are displayed when something isn't working properly,
/var/log/messages and I happen to notice that you're running the 2yr old ReiserFS code with the security hole, I'll tell you and you will be happy. But because there isn't a problem, ReiserFS doesn't ever say anything and you get cracked.
You see, the problem is that software often doesn't KNOW when something isn't working properly. The software cannot know unless the developer either:
1)predicts every possible failure case or,
2)checks the inputs at every function call (which will slow your 1000GHz Fitztanium to 8086 speeds)
Version numbers are also important. If you show me your
Bootup messages are a very important standard that has become an invaluable troubleshooting tool. Even know that something DOES work is good information when troubleshooting. Linus should leave it alone. If I don't wanna see "ReiserFS is brought to you by MP3.com", I'll either modify it (I do have the source), or I'll use IBM's JFS.
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
We need the messages printed at boot time to be classified. You can have success messages, failure messages, credits, etc. Then you could configure the system to display the kinds of messages you want to see.
I don't know much about the innards of the kernel, but I suspect something like this already exists. Could it be used for boot messages? Perhaps it could be extended?
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Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
Linus specifically said that the important kind of messages are the ones that are displayed when something isn't working properly, so no more whining that you think those messages are going to disappear, okay?
Moreso, some people seem to be under the delusion that the linked Slashdot article with the "pretty bootup" is related to what Linus said. No. Linux isn't saying anything at all about a graphical boot, and that graphical boot system is still hugely experimental anyway.
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Win dain a lotica, en vai tu ri silota
That what's being said is that the modules shouldn't be spitting out this information as part of their code, as modprobe could handle that function. It could then be turned on and off as needed. Makes sense to me, why does every kernel module need to have code in it to print out information when the software loading the modules could do it, it would then only be written once, could be configurable. (verbose level = X, or modprobe -v, modprobe -vv, modprobe -vvv, etc.)
If it fails, print out a message "Module X failed to load. Noncritical error, continuing to load linux. Fix me if you dare."
I'm going to go back in my box and will think within the limits of my box: MS Sucks Linux Good I read too much Slashdot.
Everyone knows we never have reboot our Linux boxen anyway. ('cept to add new hardware of course.)
'Same speed C but faster'
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welcome marcus brody
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words speak a thousand pictures. so much so, we often take the information they contain for granted.
what does some flying windows or clouds tell you exactly??
well... if they freeze you know your computer has crashed.
Linus: "Let's make it policy that we _never_ print out annoying messages that have no useful purpose for debugging or running the system, ok?"
Dont worry - Linus isnt going all Mac on us! As ever he is making more sense than your average hacker. I know what OS I'm running - and which kernel version, and even what modules im using. but yes some of this information is occasionly useful, and these are the bits that should be left. Maybe then they might not scroll off the screen so fast that we never read them anyhow.