User's Guide?

[Kal]

As far as I can tell from the Google Code site, superhai.com, and voodooprojects.org, there is no user's guide, and insufficient explanatory notes.

Here are two questions that need to be answered:

• How does one install the kernel extension into /System/Library/Extensions/? Just drag-and-dropping it in Finder is (usually) not enough. Nobody said anything about changing ownership and permissions, and removing the com.apple.quarantine extended attribute.
• Is any user control possible once the kernel extension is properly installed? xnu-speedstep is an older kernel extension project with functions similar to VoodooPower. It documents well the user control that can be achieved through the sysctl command-line utility, however little control there actually was. The VoodooPower kext project, in contrast, only mentions that explicit throttling is not possible. The xnu-speedstep kext also does not allow explicit throttling if you ask me; nevertheless they documented the very little bit of control achieved through sysctl.

[Lord Anubis]

To answer your first question.

Every kext installed should undergo the following commands as administrator or root

How to Install a Kext in General.

( KextName.kext is your kext that you wan to install )

if you want to replace an existing kext, this command will rename the kext and back it up.
cd to your /S/L/E

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cd /System/Library/Extensions
mv KextName.kext KextName.old

cd to your kext witch you want to install

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cd /path/to/new/kext
cp -R KextName.kext /System/Library/Extensions

fix permissions (the root/system is using this kext, not you as user ), and use -R option because the kext is a bundle and got things inside that should be corrected as well.

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cd /System/Library/Extensions
chmod -R 755 KextName.kext
chown -R 0:0 KextName.kext  or chown -R root:wheel KextName.kext

( Edited to make it more clear )
Depending on your os version, you need to search and remove the kext cache. You can check which one exists.
Search inside /System/Library/ or inside /System/Library/Caches/com.apple.kext.caches/Startup/ for Extensions.mkext.

Use to remove the kext cache;

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rm /System/Library/Extensions.mkextor with 10.6

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rm /System/Library/Caches/com.apple.kext.caches/Startup/Extensions.mkext
Be sure to be an administrator or root.

HTH

[Kal]

Thank you, Lord Anubis, for clearing things up. 

However...

depending on your os version, You can check which one exists, use

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rm /System/Library/Extensions.mkext or with 10.6

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rm /System/Library/Caches/com.apple.kext.caches/Startup/Extensions.mkext

The part in bold looks a bit strange to me. Is there a part of the sentence missing? From the looks of it, the commands serve to clean up Mac OS X's kext cache.

By the way, here are two more questions that I would like to bring up:

• What is the difference between the Mini and the ACPI versions? Superhai only says "use the one that works", but it begs the question: "how does the user know whether it works or not?" (The next point touches on this.)
• How does VoodooPower improve power management, really? A high level description of the algorithm/logic used in the kext would be nice. If the user doesn't even have a high level understanding of the working mechanism, how is he supposed to know if the kext is working correctly?

Cheers.

[Lord Anubis]

Thank you, Lord Anubis, for clearing things up. 

However...

depending on your os version, You can check which one exists, use

Code: [Select]

rm /System/Library/Extensions.mkext or with 10.6

Code: [Select]

rm /System/Library/Caches/com.apple.kext.caches/Startup/Extensions.mkext

The part in bold looks a bit strange to me. Is there a part of the sentence missing? From the looks of it, the commands serve to clean up Mac OS X's kext cache.

Yes, your right, it reads strange and there should indeed a sentence be there.
Actualy, I did meant to write.

You can check which one exists.
Use

Code: [Select]

rm /System/Library/Extensions.mkext or with 10.6

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rm /System/Library/Caches/com.apple.kext.caches/Startup/Extensions.mkextto remove the old kext cache.

But even that isn't very clear.

So I did update my former post.
Thanks for the correction.