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2 <!DOCTYPE sect1 PUBLIC "-//OASIS//DTD DocBook XML V4.5//EN"
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4 <!ENTITY % general-entities SYSTEM "../general.ent">
8 <sect1 id="ch-bootable-kernel" role="wrap">
9 <?dbhtml filename="kernel.html"?>
11 <sect1info condition="script">
12 <productname>kernel</productname>
13 <productnumber>&linux-version;</productnumber>
14 <address>&linux-url;</address>
17 <title>Linux-&linux-version;</title>
19 <indexterm zone="ch-bootable-kernel">
20 <primary sortas="a-Linux">Linux</primary>
23 <sect2 role="package">
26 <para>The Linux package contains the Linux kernel.</para>
29 <segtitle>&buildtime;</segtitle>
30 <segtitle>&diskspace;</segtitle>
33 <seg>&linux-knl-sbu;</seg>
34 <seg>&linux-knl-du;</seg>
40 <sect2 role="installation">
41 <title>Installation of the kernel</title>
43 <para>Building the kernel involves a few steps—configuration,
44 compilation, and installation. Read the <filename>README</filename> file
45 in the kernel source tree for alternative methods to the way this book
46 configures the kernel.</para>
48 <para>Prepare for compilation by running the following command:</para>
50 <screen><userinput remap="pre">make mrproper</userinput></screen>
52 <para>This ensures that the kernel tree is absolutely clean. The
53 kernel team recommends that this command be issued prior to each
54 kernel compilation. Do not rely on the source tree being clean after
57 <para>There are several ways to configure the kernel options. Usually,
58 This is done through a menu-driven interface, for example:</para>
60 <screen role="nodump"><userinput>make menuconfig</userinput></screen>
63 <title>The meaning of optional make environment variables:</title>
66 <term><parameter>LANG=<host_LANG_value> LC_ALL=</parameter></term>
68 <para>This establishes the locale setting to the one used on the
69 host. This may be needed for a proper menuconfig ncurses interface
70 line drawing on a UTF-8 linux text console.</para>
72 <para>If used, be sure to replace
73 <replaceable><host_LANG_value></replaceable> by the value of
74 the <envar>$LANG</envar> variable from your host. You can
75 alternatively use instead the host's value of <envar>$LC_ALL</envar>
76 or <envar>$LC_CTYPE</envar>.</para>
81 <term><command>make menuconfig</command></term>
83 <para>This launches an ncurses menu-driven interface. For other
84 (graphical) interfaces, type <command>make help</command>.</para>
89 <!-- Support for compiling a keymap into the kernel is deliberately removed -->
91 <para>For general information on kernel configuration see <ulink
92 url="&hints-root;kernel-configuration.txt"/>. BLFS has some information
93 regarding particular kernel configuration requirements of packages outside
95 url="&blfs-book;longindex.html#kernel-config-index"/>. Additional
96 information about configuring and building the kernel can be found at
97 <ulink url="http://www.kroah.com/lkn/"/> </para>
101 <para>A good starting place for setting up the kernel configuration is to
102 run <command>make defconfig</command>. This will set the base
103 configuration to a good state that takes your current system architecture
106 <para>Be sure to enable/disable/set the following features or the system might
107 not work correctly or boot at all:</para>
109 <screen role="nodump" revision="sysv">Device Drivers --->
110 Generic Driver Options --->
111 [ ] Support for uevent helper [CONFIG_UEVENT_HELPER]
112 [*] Maintain a devtmpfs filesystem to mount at /dev [CONFIG_DEVTMPFS]</screen>
114 <screen role="nodump" revision="systemd">General setup -->
115 [ ] Auditing Support [CONFIG_AUDIT]
116 [*] Control Group support [CONFIG_CGROUPS]
117 [ ] Enable deprecated sysfs features to support old userspace tools [CONFIG_SYSFS_DEPRECATED]
118 [*] Configure standard kernel features (expert users) [CONFIG_EXPERT] --->
119 [*] open by fhandle syscalls [CONFIG_FHANDLE]
120 Processor type and features --->
121 [*] Enable seccomp to safely compute untrusted bytecode [CONFIG_SECCOMP]
122 Firmware Drivers --->
123 [*] Export DMI identification via sysfs to userspace [CONFIG_DMIID]
124 Networking support --->
125 Networking options --->
126 <*> The IPv6 protocol [CONFIG_IPV6]
127 Device Drivers --->
128 Generic Driver Options --->
129 [ ] Support for uevent helper [CONFIG_UEVENT_HELPER]
130 [*] Maintain a devtmpfs filesystem to mount at /dev [CONFIG_DEVTMPFS]
131 Firmware Loader --->
132 [ ] Enable the firmware sysfs fallback mechanism [CONFIG_FW_LOADER_USER_HELPER]
134 [*] Inotify support for userspace [CONFIG_INOTIFY_USER]
135 Pseudo filesystems --->
136 [*] Tmpfs POSIX Access Control Lists [CONFIG_TMPFS_POSIX_ACL]
137 [*] Tmpfs extended attributes [CONFIG_TMPFS_XATTR]</screen>
140 <note revision="systemd">
141 <para>While "The IPv6 Protocol" is not strictly
142 required, it is highly recommended by the systemd developers.</para>
145 <para revision="sysv">There are several other options that may be desired
146 depending on the requirements for the system. For a list of options needed
147 for BLFS packages, see the <ulink
148 url="&lfs-root;blfs/view/&short-version;/longindex.html#kernel-config-index">BLFS
149 Index of Kernel Settings</ulink>
150 (&lfs-root;blfs/view/&short-version;/longindex.html#kernel-config-index).</para>
153 <para>If your host hardware is using UEFI, then the 'make defconfig'
154 above should automatically add in some EFI-related kernel options.</para>
156 <para>In order to allow your LFS kernel to be booted from within your
157 host's UEFI boot environment, your kernel must have this option
160 <screen role="nodump">Processor type and features --->
161 [*] EFI stub support [CONFIG_EFI_STUB]</screen>
163 <para>A fuller description of managing UEFI environments from within LFS
164 is covered by the lfs-uefi.txt hint at
166 url="&hints-root;lfs-uefi.txt"/>.
171 <title>The rationale for the above configuration items:</title>
174 <term><parameter>Support for uevent helper</parameter></term>
176 <para>Having this option set may interfere with device
177 management when using Udev/Eudev. </para>
182 <term><parameter>Maintain a devtmpfs</parameter></term>
184 <para>This will create automated device nodes which are populated by the
185 kernel, even without Udev running. Udev then runs on top of this,
186 managing permissions and adding symlinks. This configuration
187 item is required for all users of Udev/Eudev.</para>
193 <para>Alternatively, <command>make oldconfig</command> may be more
194 appropriate in some situations. See the <filename>README</filename>
195 file for more information.</para>
197 <para>If desired, skip kernel configuration by copying the kernel
198 config file, <filename>.config</filename>, from the host system
199 (assuming it is available) to the unpacked <filename
200 class="directory">linux-&linux-version;</filename> directory. However,
201 we do not recommend this option. It is often better to explore all the
202 configuration menus and create the kernel configuration from
205 <para>Compile the kernel image and modules:</para>
207 <screen><userinput remap="make">make</userinput></screen>
209 <para>If using kernel modules, module configuration in <filename
210 class="directory">/etc/modprobe.d</filename> may be required.
211 Information pertaining to modules and kernel configuration is
212 located in <xref linkend="ch-config-udev"/> and in the kernel
213 documentation in the <filename
214 class="directory">linux-&linux-version;/Documentation</filename> directory.
215 Also, <filename>modprobe.d(5)</filename> may be of interest.</para>
217 <para>Unless module support has been disabled in the kernel configuration,
218 install the modules with:</para>
220 <screen><userinput remap="install">make modules_install</userinput></screen>
222 <para>After kernel compilation is complete, additional steps are
223 required to complete the installation. Some files need to be copied to
224 the <filename class="directory">/boot</filename> directory.</para>
227 <para>If the host system has a separate /boot partition, the files copied
228 below should go there. The easiest way to do that is to bind /boot on the
229 host (outside chroot) to /mnt/lfs/boot before proceeding. As the root
230 user in the <emphasis>host system</emphasis>:</para>
232 <screen role="nodump"><userinput>mount --bind /boot /mnt/lfs/boot</userinput></screen>
235 <para>The path to the kernel image may vary depending on the platform being
236 used. The filename below can be changed to suit your taste, but the stem of
237 the filename should be <emphasis>vmlinuz</emphasis> to be compatible with
238 the automatic setup of the boot process described in the next section. The
239 following command assumes an x86 architecture:</para>
241 <screen revision="sysv"><userinput remap="install">cp -iv arch/x86/boot/bzImage /boot/vmlinuz-&linux-version;-lfs-&version;</userinput></screen>
243 <screen revision="systemd"><userinput remap="install">cp -iv arch/x86/boot/bzImage /boot/vmlinuz-&linux-version;-lfs-&versiond;</userinput></screen>
245 <para><filename>System.map</filename> is a symbol file for the kernel.
246 It maps the function entry points of every function in the kernel API,
247 as well as the addresses of the kernel data structures for the running
248 kernel. It is used as a resource when investigating kernel problems.
249 Issue the following command to install the map file:</para>
251 <screen><userinput remap="install">cp -iv System.map /boot/System.map-&linux-version;</userinput></screen>
253 <para>The kernel configuration file <filename>.config</filename>
254 produced by the <command>make menuconfig</command> step
255 above contains all the configuration selections for the kernel
256 that was just compiled. It is a good idea to keep this file for future
259 <screen><userinput remap="install">cp -iv .config /boot/config-&linux-version;</userinput></screen>
261 <para>Install the documentation for the Linux kernel:</para>
263 <screen><userinput remap="install">install -d /usr/share/doc/linux-&linux-version;
264 cp -r Documentation/* /usr/share/doc/linux-&linux-version;</userinput></screen>
266 <para>It is important to note that the files in the kernel source
267 directory are not owned by <emphasis>root</emphasis>. Whenever a
268 package is unpacked as user <emphasis>root</emphasis> (like we did
269 inside chroot), the files have the user and group IDs of whatever
270 they were on the packager's computer. This is usually not a problem
271 for any other package to be installed because the source tree is
272 removed after the installation. However, the Linux source tree is
273 often retained for a long time. Because of this, there is a chance
274 that whatever user ID the packager used will be assigned to somebody
275 on the machine. That person would then have write access to the kernel
279 <para>In many cases, the configuration of the kernel will need to be
280 updated for packages that will be installed later in BLFS. Unlike
281 other packages, it is not necessary to remove the kernel source tree
282 after the newly built kernel is installed.</para>
284 <para>If the kernel source tree is going to be retained, run
285 <command>chown -R 0:0</command> on the <filename
286 class="directory">linux-&linux-version;</filename> directory to ensure
287 all files are owned by user <emphasis>root</emphasis>.</para>
291 <para>Some kernel documentation recommends creating a symlink from
292 <filename class="symlink">/usr/src/linux</filename> pointing to the kernel
293 source directory. This is specific to kernels prior to the 2.6 series and
294 <emphasis>must not</emphasis> be created on an LFS system as it can cause
295 problems for packages you may wish to build once your base LFS system is
300 <para>The headers in the system's <filename
301 class="directory">include</filename> directory (<filename
302 class="directory">/usr/include</filename>) should
303 <emphasis>always</emphasis> be the ones against which Glibc was compiled,
304 that is, the sanitised headers installed in <xref
305 linkend="ch-tools-linux-headers"/>. Therefore, they should
306 <emphasis>never</emphasis> be replaced by either the raw kernel headers
307 or any other kernel sanitized headers.</para>
312 <sect2 id="conf-modprobe" role="configuration">
313 <title>Configuring Linux Module Load Order</title>
315 <indexterm zone="conf-modprobe">
316 <primary sortas="e-/etc/modprobe.d/usb.conf">/etc/modprobe.d/usb.conf</primary>
319 <para>Most of the time Linux modules are loaded automatically, but
320 sometimes it needs some specific direction. The program that loads
321 modules, <command>modprobe</command> or <command>insmod</command>, uses
322 <filename>/etc/modprobe.d/usb.conf</filename> for this purpose. This file
323 needs to be created so that if the USB drivers (ehci_hcd, ohci_hcd and
324 uhci_hcd) have been built as modules, they will be loaded in the correct
325 order; ehci_hcd needs to be loaded prior to ohci_hcd and uhci_hcd in order
326 to avoid a warning being output at boot time.</para>
328 <para>Create a new file <filename>/etc/modprobe.d/usb.conf</filename> by running
329 the following:</para>
331 <screen><userinput>install -v -m755 -d /etc/modprobe.d
332 cat > /etc/modprobe.d/usb.conf << "EOF"
333 <literal># Begin /etc/modprobe.d/usb.conf
335 install ohci_hcd /sbin/modprobe ehci_hcd ; /sbin/modprobe -i ohci_hcd ; true
336 install uhci_hcd /sbin/modprobe ehci_hcd ; /sbin/modprobe -i uhci_hcd ; true
338 # End /etc/modprobe.d/usb.conf</literal>
339 EOF</userinput></screen>
343 <sect2 id="contents-kernel" role="content">
344 <title>Contents of Linux</title>
347 <segtitle>Installed files</segtitle>
348 <segtitle>Installed directories</segtitle>
351 <seg>config-&linux-version;,
352 <phrase revision="sysv">vmlinuz-&linux-version;-lfs-&version;,</phrase>
353 <phrase revision="systemd">vmlinuz-&linux-version;-lfs-&versiond;,</phrase>
354 and System.map-&linux-version;</seg>
355 <seg>/lib/modules, /usr/share/doc/linux-&linux-version;</seg>
360 <bridgehead renderas="sect3">Short Descriptions</bridgehead>
361 <?dbfo list-presentation="list"?>
362 <?dbhtml list-presentation="table"?>
364 <varlistentry id="config">
365 <term><filename>config-&linux-version;</filename></term>
367 <para>Contains all the configuration selections for the kernel</para>
368 <indexterm zone="ch-bootable-kernel config">
369 <primary sortas="e-/boot/config">/boot/config-&linux-version;</primary>
374 <varlistentry id="lfskernel">
375 <term revision="sysv"><filename>vmlinuz-&linux-version;-lfs-&version;</filename></term>
376 <term revision="systemd"><filename>vmlinuz-&linux-version;-lfs-&versiond;</filename></term>
378 <para>The engine of the Linux system. When turning on the computer,
379 the kernel is the first part of the operating system that gets loaded.
380 It detects and initializes all components of the computer's hardware,
381 then makes these components available as a tree of files to the
382 software and turns a single CPU into a multitasking machine capable
383 of running scores of programs seemingly at the same time</para>
384 <indexterm zone="ch-bootable-kernel lfskernel">
385 <primary sortas="b-lfskernel">lfskernel-&linux-version;</primary>
390 <varlistentry id="System.map">
391 <term><filename>System.map-&linux-version;</filename></term>
393 <para>A list of addresses and symbols; it maps the entry points and
394 addresses of all the functions and data structures in the
396 <indexterm zone="ch-bootable-kernel System.map">
397 <primary sortas="e-/boot/System.map">/boot/System.map-&linux-version;</primary>