3 ms·
I don't think it makes sense to run Linux on most nommu hardware anymore. It'd make more sense to have a tiny unikernel for running a single application, becaus
by JoshTriplett 1y ago
I don't think it makes sense to run Linux on most nommu hardware anymore. It'd make more sense to have a tiny unikernel for running a single application, because on nommu, you don't typically have any application isolation.
- duskwuff 1y ago> on nommu, you don't have any application isolation That isn't necessarily the case. You can have memory protection without a MMU - for instance, most ARM Cortex-M parts have a MPU which can be used to restrict a thread's access to memory ranges or to hardware. What it doesn't get you is memory remapping, which is necessary for features like virtual memory.
- rasz 1y agovirtual memory as in swap is one, but imo bigger one is memory-mapped files
- tombl 1y agoYeah, nommu absolutely doesn't imply zero memory isolation. I have a kernel port to an architecture with a nonstandard way of doing memory isolation and the existing nommu infrastructure is the only reason it can exist.