understanding gunzip

[dhammika]

hi,

i tried 2.4.0 kernel with rmk and np patches in my brutus board. (Brutus
is a StrongArm based development environment)

my patched kernel is 2.4.0-rmk1-np1

the kernel uncompresses fine. but uncompressing the ramdisk fails. In
this  instance my uncompressed ramdisk is about 3.5mb.

i looked in to gunzip() routine. in inflate() (inflate.c)
i found following,

  do {
    hufts = 0;
    gzip_mark(&ptr);
    if ((r = inflate_block(&e)) != 0) {
      gzip_release(&ptr);
      return r;
    }
    gzip_release(&ptr);
    if (hufts > h)
      h = hufts;
  } while (!e);

and gzip_mark() and gzip_release() are defined in rd.c as,

static void __init gzip_mark(void **ptr)
{
}

static void __init gzip_release(void **ptr)
{
}

now if i comment these gzip_mark and gzip_release lines then the kernel
would complain,

Out of memory

 -- System halted

then i tried to see where ptr is poinitng to, according to the
System.map it points to a variable called insize,

it's defined as

./arch/arm/boot/compressed/misc.c     :     static unsigned insize = 0;
/* valid bytes in inbuf */

i don't understand what is happening here!! or did i miss anything??

tia

dhammika