Linux 5.13 To Allow Zstd Compressed Modules, Zstd Update Pending With Faster Performance

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Linux 5.13 To Allow Zstd Compressed Modules, Zstd Update Pending With Faster Performance

Adding to the variety of places where the Linux kernel supports making use of Zstd compression, kernel modules moving forward can now enjoy size reductions with Zstd...

https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Linux-5.13-Zstd-Modules

[timofonic]

Zstd is becoming more interesting these days. I hope some crazy geniuses are able to optimize it even more than currently is.

[peterdk]

Nice, great to see it used more.

[gigi]

Linux already supports optional Gzip and XZ compression of kernel modules

only two
is there any particular reason?

[Joe2021]

What is the situation of compression ratio? Is it yet maxed out or can we hope for an increased compression ratio yield in the future?

[ms178]

What is the situation of compression ratio? Is it yet maxed out or can we hope for an increased compression ratio yield in the future?

Zstd is actively developed by Facebook. I expect future updates to improve all metrics, including compression efficiency.

[birdie]

Zstd is actively developed by Facebook. I expect future updates to improve all metrics, including compression efficiency.

I really doubt that but you seem to know better.

[ms178]

I really doubt that but you seem to know better.

Not with certainty, but if you've read the introduction of the newest patch set, it gives you an overview of the changes from the version used in the Kernel to the updated version and it shows significant improvements in the stated scenarios. It is an educated guess that similar improvements will materialize in future updates as well. Not necessarily specific to the compression ratio, but this could see further improvements, too.

What makes you so doubtful? It is an active project and the devs seem to improve upon all metrics each release.

[jabl]

Do any distros actually make use of module compression? gz and xz have apprently been there a while, and at least ubuntu seems to ship them uncompressed (of course the .deb package itself is compressed, so this just wastes a bit of disk space).

Same for firmwares, FWIW.

[julemand101]

Do any distros actually make use of module compression? gz and xz have apprently been there a while, and at least ubuntu seems to ship them uncompressed (of course the .deb package itself is compressed, so this just wastes a bit of disk space).

Same for firmwares, FWIW.

Arch Linux uses xz compression of modules. You can see the list of files in the "linux" package here:

https://archlinux.org/packages/core/x86_64/linux/

Where module files ends with ko.xz.