New 2.0.35 kernel packages and status report
Hi,
I finally got around to properly packaging a kernel for the NetWinder.
I used the 2.0.35 kernel that Andrew Coulthurst <andyc@svarog.demon.co.uk>
had put together. I've been using it here for a few days, and I haven't
noticed any instability.
It isn't a very clean patch against Russell King's 2.0.35 (about
10MB), so it's quite difficult to figure out what the Corel-specific
patches are. If I get some time, I'm going to try to clean it up a
bit.
I did the packaging of the kernel like the other Debian ports. In
order to use the source package, you need two bits:
kernel-source-2.0.35 - this is the same generic kernel source
that all the distributions use
kernel-patch-2.0.35-netwinder - this contains the NetWinder patch
You'll also need a patched kernel-package. I just filed a bug report
with the patch in it, so hopefully Manoj will incorporate it soon.
Read /usr/doc/kernel-package/Multi-Arch.gz
To build it, you unpack /usr/src/kernel-source-2.0.35.tar.gz, copy
your config file there, do a "export PATCH_THE_KERNEL=YES", and do:
make-kpkg --revision your.revision.here.1 kernel_image
If you first want to configure the kernel (ie. not use a pre-existing
.config file), you'll want to make a debian/ directory, and run
/usr/src/kernel-patches/arm/apply/0netwinder .
I know what you are thinking: it's all a bit complex - but that's what
the other ports have settled on doing.
One note about the new kernel image package - it makes a /vmlinux
symlink, like the other Debian ports. If you have your Nettrom set up
to boot from /boot/vmlinux, you may want to change that.
I'm going to upload an updated binutils and gcc tonight as well.
Then I'm going to take a stab at glibc 2.0.100 (with versioning). The
Debian packaging has already been done for it, and theoretically it
has most of the ARM stuff in there. Rod Stewart <stewart@nexus.carleton.ca>
has got it working in RPM format, so maybe there is hope. :-)
After that, I'm going to see if I can get egcs to function as our g++.
I'll build libstc++ from there as well. I think we should stick with
gcc 2.8.1 as our C compiler for the time being. With a functioning
g++ and libstdc++, we can rebuild dpkg and get apt working.
And then, I'm going to try to backport the FPU invalid instruction
trap from Russell King's 2.1.x kernel. I actually tried doing this
before, but I was unsuccessful. I need to learn some more ARM/GNU
assembly.
I'll put together a binary-only package containing the Acorn/ARM FPU
emulator module, the a.out insmod, and some init scripts.
Hopefully, this will enable us to get booted with the emulator running
with zero changes to any of the user-space packages. Right now, the
image is using a bash 1.something binary from Corel's image as a
workaround. (yuck)
This will get me to the stage where we can put together a really good
disk image. I'd like to get that loaded onto Alan DeKok's machine
and/or the one Corel is going to set up.
Bdale Garbee <bdale@gag.com> is looking at the X stuff.
Then we can look at getting some automated compilation going (using
the tools James Troup and Roman Hodek are putting together).
Lots to do. :-)
Cheers,
- Jim
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