Debian Kernel Compiling

[GhostDawg]

I'm using Debian 3.0r0 with default kernel 2.4.18-bf24. Now I would like to recompile it using the 2.4.20 kernel the 'Debian Way'.

What does it exactly mean when it starts off with 'apt-get install kernel-image' and 'apt-get install kernel-package'?

What if I already downloaded the 2.4.20 stock kernel already?

Last time I did this I manually compiled the kernel and it worked without problems, this time I would like to try the Deb way.

[demian]

[quote author=GhostDawg link=board=2;threadid=6285;start=0#59326 date=1044436743]
I'm using Debian 3.0r0 with default kernel 2.4.18-bf24. Now I would like to recompile it using the 2.4.20 kernel the 'Debian Way'.

What does it exactly mean when it starts off with 'apt-get install kernel-image' and 'apt-get install kernel-package'?

What if I already downloaded the 2.4.20 stock kernel already?

Last time I did this I manually compiled the kernel and it worked without problems, this time I would like to try the Deb way.

[/quote]

If you want to compile a kernel yourself then you don't want to do apt-get install kernel-image-<version> cause that would fetch a precompiled kernel image and install it.

The debian way of compiling a kernel goes like this: You grab the stock kernel (or apt-get install a kernel source package),

apt-get install kernel-package

(this is just a helper tool that wraps the compilation process and the building of a deb package). Then you unpack the source and configure it as you'd usually do (make menuconfig or whatever you prefer) and run

make-kpkg --revision <revision_number> kernel-image,

in the dir where the kernel source is. revision_number is the minor version string that will be appended to the name of the debian package that's being built. I usually use somthing like custom.X. This command will compile the kernel and the modules and produce a debian package in /usr/src named kernel-image-<version>_<revision_number>_<arch&g t;.deb which you can then install using

dpkg -i kernel-image-<version>_<revision_number>_<arch&g t;.deb

This will take care of the rest. It even runs /sbin/lilo for you if you want, though you should double check lilo.conf before you just say yes to every quetion it asks. Don't know how it handles grub as I don't use that....

[praetorian]

http://www.linuxjunior.org/cgi-bin/p...play&id=12

Same process works flawlessly on Woody. I tried it.

[GhostDawg]

Thnx for the replies...Ok now I'm trying to recompile and getting this error when I type this command, make-kpkg -rev Custom.01 kernel_image.

I note that you are using the --revision flag with the value Custom.01.
However, the ./debian/changelog file exists, and has a different value
rev.01. I am confused by this discrepancy, and am halting.

I tried changing the Custom.01 to Custom.02 and got the same message.

I tried earlier recompiling and got a different error at the end of the dpkg command and decided to try compiling again.

Any ideas? I didn't have this much trouble compiling the manual way!


**UPDATE**
I just recompiled the kernel again. I mv'ed the last one I did and started new again...everything seems to go fine and when it's done compiling, I don't have the kernel-source.deb file. I don't see it anyplace and when I type 'dpkg -i kernel-image*.deb' I get this error:

dpkg: error processing kernel-image*.deb (--install):
cannot access archive: No such file or directory
Errors were encountered while processing:
kernel-image*.deb

I've searched for the .deb file and can't find it!

[quandary]

It's usually placed in the parent directory of the kernel source. For instance, if the kernel source is in /usr/src/linux-2.4.20, then the .deb should be in /usr/src.

[praetorian]

You issued the make-kpkg command in /usr/src/linux. The *.deb should be in /usr/src.

[GhostDawg]

That's what I did and it's not in the /usr/src directory...It seems as if it wasn't created or something.

[demian]

[quote author=GhostDawg link=board=2;threadid=6285;start=0#59380 date=1044481847]
Thnx for the replies...Ok now I'm trying to recompile and getting this error when I type this command, make-kpkg -rev Custom.01 kernel_image.

I note that you are using the --revision flag with the value Custom.01.
However, the ./debian/changelog file exists, and has a different value
rev.01. I am confused by this discrepancy, and am halting.

I tried changing the Custom.01 to Custom.02 and got the same message.
[/quote]
In this case run make-kpkg clean and then the make-kpkg -rev Custom.01 kernel_image command again. (You're right, it's an underscore and not a dash as I wrote in my first post in kernel_image). However, changing the revision number should prevent this type of error ??? What confuses me even more: There's no deb file in /usr/src ? None at all???

[praetorian]

Where are you compiling your kernel? It should be in the kernels parent directory.

For my revision numbers, I use the kernel release. You might want to try giving that shot.

[GhostDawg]

It seems that something must be wrong with my hard disk or partitioning scheme setup.

I tried to manually install the 2.4.20 kernel and got some error messages about can't read the partiton. I didn't write down the exact message, but what makes me think something is wrong, I reinstalled Slackware 8.0 and recompiled the kernel and got the same error message. It seems the new kernel won't work with Slackware & Debian but the default kernels work fine.

I wonder could it be the 2.4.20 kernel causing the problem? Can I download the 2.4.19 kernel and use it?

Before re-partitioning my hard disk and reinstalling those distros, I didn't have this problem but I was using the 2.4.19 kernel.

This is HD setup:
Disk /dev/hda: 255 heads, 63 sectors, 4867 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/hda1 * 1 957 7687071 b Win95 FAT32
/dev/hda2 958 4233 26314470 f Win95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/hda3 4234 4867 5092605 a5 FreeBSD
/dev/hda5 958 1659 5638783+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/hda6 1660 2310 5229126 83 Linux = Slackware
/dev/hda7 2311 3010 5622718+ 83 Linux = Debian
/dev/hda8 3011 3710 5622718+ 83 Linux
/dev/hda9 3711 3744 273073+ 82 Linux swap
/dev/hda10 3745 4233 3927861 83 Linux

Command (m for help):

Any ideas/suggestions?

Thnx.