Re: Catch-22 with modules/backups
Lo, on Saturday, December 23, JoshNarins@aol.com did write:
> I am eager to try making a debian kernel, to make sure only the drivers I
> need are there, but first I need to make a backup !!!
While backups never hurt, a kernel rebuild shouldn't require backups. If
you leave out some necessary drivers, you won't be able to boot, but all of
your files will still be there and more or less intact. If you save a
copy of your previous kernel (always a good idea), then reboot under that
image and try another rebuild, including all of the necessary drivers.
> The module I am missing is sr_mod, which I am told is loadable. dselect
> knows nothing about scsi or sr_mod, apt-get knows the same.
> www.google.com has no links to any sources that I can find. If you look
> for "sr_mod" in the debian packages area, you get nothing, becuase it
> treats the _ as a space.
>
> Two or three people have tried to give me help, but one said "good luck"
> and the other main one began "Start with a clean .config file" (um, what
> .config file?)
>
> I am using 2.2.17-pre6 and all I want to do is get and load a "loadable
> device driver".
>
> I know I could have gotten this module off of my installation CDs in the
> first place.
Loadable modules (or ``loadable device drivers,'' as you call them) are not
in separate debian packages; they're all part of the kernel and are thus
contained in the kernel-image package, which (I think) should have been
installed during your Debian install. Therefore, dselect, apt, and the
Debian package list aren't going to know anything about them.
The first step is to figure out exactly which drivers you need. Is your
CD-RW an ATAPI or a SCSI device? See the table in section 2.1 of the
CD-Writing HOWTO for a discussion of the drivers you'll need.
Now, my understanding (i.e., educated guess) is that the necessary drivers
were installed on your machine, but those modules weren't loaded by
default. Type "modprobe <foo>" as root to load module <foo> and any
dependencies. If that works, you're good to go.
(If you use the ide-scsi module, you'll need to hide your CD-RW drive from
the IDE driver. Run `cat /proc/modules'. If you see ``ide-cd'' in the
first column, then you're cool. Become root, then create a file called
/etc/modutils/local which contains this stuff from the HOWTO:
options ide-cd ignore=hdb # tell the ide-cd module to ignore hdb
alias scd0 sr_mod # load sr_mod upon access of scd0
pre-install sg modprobe ide-scsi # load ide-scsi before sg
pre-install sr_mod modprobe ide-scsi # load ide-scsi before sr_mod
pre-install ide-scsi modprobe ide-cd # load ide-cd before ide-scsi
then run the commands
update-modules
# umount any CDs
rmmod ide-cd
modprobe ide-cd
modprobe ide-scsi
If, however, ``ide-cd'' is NOT in /proc/modules, then you'll have to adjust
lilo.conf, as in the HOWTO, and reboot before you can load ide-scsi.)
Otherwise, you'll need to rebuild your kernel, including support for the
necessary drivers. See section 8.5 of the Debian installation manual for
details on how to do this. (The .config file you refer to is your *kernel*
compilation configuration file.)
> PS I don't want to install debian on my swap partition, and
> then try to move the sr_mod module, but I bet it might work.
Unnecessary. I think the sr_mod module is installed on your system
(somewhere under /lib/modules), just not loaded.
Hope this helps,
Richard
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