Arch Linux

mattopenstack

Member

Registered: 2011-08-08

Posts: 4

Powertop and CONFIG_INOTIFY

I ran powertop today and it suggests enable CONFIG_INOTIFY on the kernel.

I would of thought this would have been enabled by  default, is there any reason it wasnt built with this option?

Secondly, given I use a few programs that do monitor the filesystem (dropbox and guard - a dsl for performing actions based on file changes) would I benefit from compiling the kernel myself and enabling said option?

I use a laptop frequently so I presume this has a impact on battery? is it negligible?

ngoonee

Forum Fellow

From: Between Thailand and Singapore

Registered: 2009-03-17

Posts: 7,358

Re: Powertop and CONFIG_INOTIFY

I ran powertop today and it suggests enable CONFIG_INOTIFY on the kernel.

I would of thought this would have been enabled by  default, is there any reason it wasnt built with this option?

Probably just because. Search the bug-tracker to see if its been requested before.

Secondly, given I use a few programs that do monitor the filesystem (dropbox and guard - a dsl for performing actions based on file changes) would I benefit from compiling the kernel myself and enabling said option?

I use a laptop frequently so I presume this has a impact on battery? is it negligible?

I've been using custom kernels with CONFIG_INOTIFY for a while, and while I didn't do serious comparative testing I can't say I've noticed much if any impact. Stuff like display brightness and minimizing CPU usage has a much bigger effect.

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David Batson

Member

Registered: 2011-10-13

Posts: 640

Re: Powertop and CONFIG_INOTIFY

I don't know about that particular option, but usually powertop shows a letter to type to let powertop make the change for you.

Army

Member

Registered: 2007-12-07

Posts: 1,784

Re: Powertop and CONFIG_INOTIFY

I don't know about that particular option, but usually powertop shows a letter to type to let powertop make the change for you.

In this case it doesn't. A kernel option cannot be activated at runtime (at least this one can't)

Pierre

Developer

From: Bonn

Registered: 2004-07-05

Posts: 1,964

Website

Re: Powertop and CONFIG_INOTIFY

Afaik inotify is deprecated. There are other interfaces like DNOTIFY or FSNOTIFY enabled in our kernel. Note that powertop hasn't been updated for a long time and does no longer work correctly  on recent systems.

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zenlord

Member

From: Belgium

Registered: 2006-05-24

Posts: 1,223

Website

Re: Powertop and CONFIG_INOTIFY

Note that powertop hasn't been updated for a long time and does no longer work correctly  on recent systems.

Is there an alternative then? I was just about to unleash powertop on my laptop...

Army

Member

Registered: 2007-12-07

Posts: 1,784

Re: Powertop and CONFIG_INOTIFY

There's powertop2 in the AUR. Works fine and has nice features.

David Batson

Member

Registered: 2011-10-13

Posts: 640

Re: Powertop and CONFIG_INOTIFY

I see on another forum that someone is using powertop 1.97.
http://i.imgur.com/LBtdg.png
http://forum.notebookreview.com/lenovo- … 20-29.html

This is what I see in arch, and it's a lot more spartan than what I see above:
# pacman -Ss powertop
community/powertop 1.13-2