shutdown does not work under suse 9.1 2426

addressed the mbuttes incomp.os.linux.miscas follows...:

Not really. ;-)

Well, your mileage and that of others may vary, but it is my experience thatvanillaflavored kernels - i.e. compiled from sources supplied bykernel.org- are generally far more stable than distribution stock kernels.

Distributions take thevanillakernel which is "actual" at the time they start developing the distribution and stick with that kernel version from there on all throughout the distribution development. Severe stability bugs will be patched with backports from a latervanillakernel patchset, but in general, all they do is add their own set of patches which should add extra functionality to their kernel, depending on what they believe their "customers" would like.

In addition, distribution stock kernels are configured as a generic "one size fits all" kernel: typically for a Pentium MMX or even an oldi386,with some genericx86code in it to cover for the differences between AMD and Intel, for instance, and compiled in a very modular fashion.

The above all said, quite often, proprietary kernel modules - such as certain video drivers and wireless LAN drivers - are also a cause for instability. Considering that it's proprietary, the code may only be maintained by its developers, which leads to a higher degree of bug contention.

You can only patch a kernel's sources, so you would still need to recompile the sources tree afterwards. This said, I have no real experience with SuSE or any of its tools.

Even Intel isn't safe from this bug, considering that it's a bug in the VIA chipset. Some other CPU-chipset combinations also have this issue. Your mileage will vary on this one, depending on what's in the system hardwarewise.

-- With kind regards,

*Aragorn* (registered GNU-Linux user #223157)