Compiling the Kernel

[Duston, Hal]

Johathon,

After installing the new kernel sources, you can
see exactly what you need in the Documentation/Changes
file.  That lists what versions of what applications
you will need.  The main things to verify for 
compiling the kernel are `make', `gcc', and `binutils'.
The rest of the requirements generally refer to 
actually running the new kernel.

Generally, you only have to recompile the modules for 
a new kernel, or if you have changed your kernel config
between SMP and non-SMP.  Otherwise their is no need.
make modules will run through the entire tree and do 
nothing anyway, so it's not really a big loss.  I 
only do `make mrproper' and `make dep' after the 
initial tree install.  After that those things never 
change regardless of any config changes I might make.

Hal

Jonathan Hutchins [mailto:hutchins at opus1.com] wrote:
> 
> Having the right sources and libraries is one of 
> the big pains in compiling the kernel.  Most 
> sources of information on the subject assume that 
> you're a big time developer running slackware, and 
> you have every source and library ever written 
> already installed.  I don't think I've ever even 
> seen a checklist for what you need to install.
> 
> What if you had say a recent RedHat or Mandrake 
> distro, and you had chosen NONE of the 
> "Development" RPMs or source files?  What would 
> you need besides the "C" compiler to make a 
> customized kernel?  MUST you always recompile the
> "modules" if you recompile the kernel?
> 
> It occurred to me that it would be great to have 
> an RPM that did nothing but check the required 
> files and report a list of RPMs you needed to 
> install for a kernel compile.  (The compile 
> process reports specific files and
> libraries, not RPMs.)
> 
> That way you'd get out of the blasted "make - 
> error - find missing dependency - find RPM 
> containing missing item - install RPM - make -
> error..." loop.  The only times I tried to 
> compile, that loop ate all the time I had for 
> the project, so I just run the available binaries.