Re: Building kernel modules for stock kernels is a hell of a job!
On Sun, 24 Aug 2003 17:16:25 +0200
Eduard Bloch <edi@gmx.de> wrote:
> #include <hallo.h>
> * Manuel Bilderbeek [Sun, Aug 24 2003, 04:32:45PM]:
>
> > The procedure I'm going through is as follows (being root all the
> > time)
> >
> > 1) install the kernel source for the kernel, e.g. kernel-source-2.4.21
> >
> > 2) go to /usr/src and tar xjvf kernel-source-2.4.21.tar.bz2
>
> Why don't you use the kernel-headers packages and use them as partial
> kernel source? They provide header files (including the complete kernel
> version) and the .config that belongs to them.
>
> > Notes:
> > - If you have just installed a new kernel-image package (i.e. a new
> > stock kernel), you need to do everything from the start *after*
> > booting this new kernel
>
<snip>
> > NVIDIA packages at the time I installed them. This caused a lot of
> > mental suffering for me. (Which brings us to another thing: WHY oh
> > WHY, isn't the procedure to get and install the NVIDIA drivers more
> > automated!?)
>
> I fail to see your problem.
I don't. He certainly has a point, and I wanted to post a message about
this, only he was faster. I recently installed debian for a friend,
installed alsa and was completely helpless as to where to obtain them. I
tried looking for alsa-modules, or kernel source for the stock kernel so I
could compile them myself... This kind of trouble isn't something I'm used
to, since I always replace the stock kernels with my own (accepting to
deal with troubles that might result), but since the chap was a complete
newbie, I wanted to give him a standard system. I failed, he has a
standard kernel, but no sound. Now, since you say the package's name is
kernel-headers, it'd go allright, but I (quite an experienced GNU/Linux
user, but only using Debian for about half a year) didn't manage to find
that out. <justification> The most trouble you get when you're convinced
you know what you're doing, and don't RTFM as you should - I knew that I
can compile kernel modules because I have the kernel source, so it didn't
occur to me that the package might contain the headers only.
</justification>
This is my view: the kernel headers and the configuration used when
compiling a stock kernel are to be viewed as an *integral part of that
kernel*. The headers should be installed by default, at the very most
leaving the user the option to have them not installed, albeit dissuading
from doing so. It would also be nice if an installation script would read
lilo.conf and make a /usr/src/linux symlink to the default kernel headers.
This way, even a newbie who's been told that he has to compile drivers for
his exotic hardware could download the sources, compile and install them
with little assistance, and with no knowledge of the magic that enabled
him to do so. I'm a member of several newbie-help lists, and I dare say
that most failures to install drivers are due to a missing kernel source.
By no means should the headers be a non-intuitively named package you read
about in the 27th howto or in a newsgroup months later. Don't get me wrong
- I'm not trying to shove off the responsibility for my disgraceful
performance to Debian, that was my fault. Only, seeing that virtually all
driver packages require kernel headers, it appears to me so essentially
common sense to install them that I have to wonder why virtually no distro
does so. Meanwhile, I see no negative effects to this - most people have
enough space to accomodate them; the installation proces wouldn't be much
more complicated (after all, while installing Debian I'm asked, say,
whether I want to install gnuplot with the setuid bit set - which I don't
use and don't care about - so why can't a nice screen ask me whether I
want to install kernel headers and call me a fool if I select "no"?)
Again: BINARY KERNEL WITHOUT HEADERS IS A CRIPPLED KERNEL. Please, whoever
has the power to do so, let no crippled kernels be installed by default.
Cheers
P.S: I just joined. Hi, everybody.
--
Horror Vacui
Registered Linux user #257714
Go get yourself... counted: http://counter.li.org/
- and keep following the GNU.
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