HELP: Installing, patching and building linux kernel sources...

[mott@mathworks.com (Peter Mott)]

After many hours of collecting information on how to do this, and many 
hours of trying to build 2.0.34 (found on the debian 2.0 beta cd I got 
from lsl) and then 2.0.35 downloaded, I have questions about what I think 
I know and don't know. I sense, from net noise that this happens enough 
that there might be some guidelines, which I have missed, already in 
place. I have read the kernel HOWTO, did I miss something?

-- What do I need to start?

  I know I need a kernel source package.
	ftp://ftp.debian.org/debian/dists/unstable/main/binary-
i386/devel/kernel-source-2.0.35_2.0.35-2.deb 

  I believe I need an Alpha kernel patch package.
	ftp://ftp.debian.org/debian/dists/unstable/main/binary-
i386/devel/kernel-patch-2.0.35-alpha_2.0.35-3.deb

  I think I need a kernel header package.
	ftp://ftp.debian.org/debian/dists/unstable/main/binary-
i386/devel/kernel-headers-2.0.35_2.0.35-2.deb

  I'm also trying /pub/DEC/Linux-Alpha/Kernels alpha-sources-2.0.35-
0.2.tar.gz and alpha-patches-2.0.35-0.2.gz. Are they equivalent to the 
debian packages?

-- Is the above set of sources a proper and good set to start with? If 
not, recommendations please.

-- How do I install them?

  Can I use 'dpkg -I ...'? My dselect environment isn't working well. 
When I tried to install these packages using dselect, it didn't complete, 
complaining about 'too many errors'.

  I can unpack the tar '.gz' and tar install it, but I don't know what  
to do with the patch '.gz'

-- Do I need to 'apply' the patches with a 'make' or some other set of 
commands after installing them? How is this done?

-- What causes the failure I am seeing? Is it because I don't have the 
kernel headers?

  I have tried to build after installing the kernel source and patched 
with dpkg. 
  I had to edit linux/Makefile to change ARCH=i386 to ARCH=alpha. 
  I had to modify linux/arch/alpha/Makefile to place uses of $(shell...) 
on the right hand side of a macro assignment, '$(shell...) => 
bogus=$(shell...)'.
  I didn't have the header package when I tried this.
  The 'make' errorred out after trying to compile 
linux/drivers/char/misc.o. The error seemed to be about missing 
'con_blitc', which I could not find a declaration for or any other 
reference to in the entire kernel source tree, except for the reference 
in drivers/char/selections.h, which is included by misc.c.