Proper way to install new kernel 2.6.11.7 into Fedora Core 3

[Rick Stevens]

Temlakos wrote:
> Rick Stevens wrote:
> 
>> Antonio Olivares wrote:
>>
>>> Dear all,
>>>    I was afraid to update to a newer kernel with all
>>> the messages that the system won't boot but I am
>>> taking a risk.  I have downloaded 2.6.11.7.tar.bz2 and
>>> extracted it.  I read the README and have done the
>>> following:
>>> make mrproper
>>> make xconfig
>>> make dep
>>> make clean
>>> make bzImage
>>>
>>> What else do i need to do?  I am still running
>>> 2.6.9-1.667.  I need to manually edit /boot/grub.conf
>>> to put the new kernel. What advice can you give me?
>>>
>>> Do I need to do a modules install? or something like
>>> that.
>>>
>>> I appreciate all the help that you can provide.
>>
>>
>>
>> You don't need the "make dep" or "make clean" steps with 2.6 kernels.
>> Simply:
>>
>>     make mproper
>>     make xconfig
>>     make bzImage
>>     make modules
>>     make modules_install
>>     make install
>>
>> That should do it all for you.  Double check your /boot/grub/grub.conf
>> file to verify that the new kernel got installed.
>>
>> Of course, why don't you just "yum update kernel" and use the
>> precompiled binary 2.6.11 kernel for FC3 from the official repositories?
> 
> 
> I can't speak for Antonio; maybe he has plunged into Fedora and hasn't 
> mastered the rpm and yum commands. (/I/ still have trouble with them, 
> sometimes.) But I have heard that compiling from source gives you an 
> application, or a kernel, optimized for your machine in a way no binary 
> can match. Is that true? If it is, then those instructions will prove 
> very valuable.

It's true that you can tweak the living kapok out of the kernel by
building your own, and the steps above are the way you do it.  Of
course, if you get the official Fedora patched kernel source by
installing the source RPM, you have to:

	cd /usr/src/redhat/SPECS
	rpmbuild -bp --target=i686 kernel-2.6.spec
	cd ../BUILD/kernel-2.6
	mv linux-2.6 /usr/src/linux-2.6.whatever

Those steps create the same stuff as the old kernel-source RPMs from
Red Hat Linux and FC1/FC2.  Then:

	cd /usr/src/linux-2.6.whatever
	make mrproper
	make xconfig
	make bzImage
	make modules
	make modules_install
	make install

> Then, too, there's the matter of wanting to load into the kernel certain 
> non-standard modules, and even to run the kernel in four-stack mode for 
> some purposes. (NDISwrapper springs to mind.) I'd like a quick how-to on 
> that alone, or at least a link to some clear instructions.

Providing that the modules you want were indeed compiled as modules, you
can insmod them at any time.

The bigger kernel stack for ndiswrappers is certainly a valid point.
I'm lucky in that my Broadcom drivers work happily under a 4K stack.
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- Rick Stevens, Senior Systems Engineer     rstevens at vitalstream.com -
- VitalStream, Inc.                       http://www.vitalstream.com -
-                                                                    -
-                   To err is human, to moo bovine.                  -
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