-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Please put plank lines between the quoted text and repies, it makes things easier to find
On Sun, 17 Oct 1999, John wrote: > I've now discovered that my Debian CD-ROM contains kernel-source- > 2.2.1 under the devel directory. Can I not use this? I'd like to avoid > a long download (approx 70mins I believe) until I have some experience. > If this is safe perhaps I can gain experience by then patching to 2.2.7 > or 2.2.12. You can. The reason to use a later version is just that later versions have fixes for bugs, and some minor improvements. (However, don't get 2.2.9 (IIRC), that one added some bugs while removing them ;) Feel free to use it if you want to. And when patching, remember that to go from 2.2.1 to 2.2.7 you have to apply the patches 2.2.2, 2.2.3, 2.2.4, 2.2.5, 2.2.6, and 2.2.7 in that order. ;) > >> According to the Howto the kernel should be in /usr/src/linux - it > >> seems to be in /usr/include/linux/2.0.36 on my box. > > > >Odd... What i'd recommend is to put the kernel into /usr/src/linux-version > >(where version is the version number, e.g. 2.2.7), and symlink > >/usr/src/linux to that directory. > > > I've rechecked and it is in /usr/include with many .h files and some > directories for example dpkg. Should the symlink be to /usr/include? Are you sure you're not confusing the kernel headers in /usr/include/linux with the actual kernel source tree that is usually placed in /usr/src/linux? > >This is one of the parts it's hard for us to help you with, because it > >depends on what hardware you have in your computer and what you plan on > >doing with it. For example, if you have no SCSI, disable SCSI support > >(except in a few cases). If you have no IDE drives, disable all that. > > > >Look at which modules you use (in modconf, probably) as a good indication > >of some of the features you should keep. And, on the other hand, you can > >probably remove the modules that you never use from the kernel. And whan > >in doubt, go with what you have in your present kernel. > > > I should be alright on this when I'm sure how to remove unwanted modules, > do I just use the rm command - i.e. are the kernel files just ordinary files > for this purpose? When you configure the kernel using "make config", "make menuconfig", or "make xconfig", you'll have the option to include (compiled in or as modules) or exclude many features. You probably shouldn't use rm in the /lib/modules directories... > >> As I have CD-ROMS for RedHat and SuSE, could I use one of these? > > > >you probably could, but i'm not sure you'd want to... > > > Is this to preserve the philosophical purity of Debian? If so I agree > and understand, but feel a short cut might be acceptable in the > early stages of learning. I could also bring over Pine and Netscape > which I badly need on Debian for surfing, mail etc. If you bring over RedHat packages, you'll have to use alien to convert them to debs that you can install. And even then, you can't be sure that all the config files will be in their right places, or that the default RedHat configuration will work on Debian. i don't know which package format SuSE uses, or if it just uses plain tgz. But you'd probably have the same risk as with RedHat. If you use the sources from the RedHat or SuSE CDs (if available on the CD set), you'd still need to install thee various development file debs and such to compile, and you'd have to deal with the hassles of installing things in /usr/local. It's not impossible, but it can be a pain. Debianized Pine binaries can't be distributed, but there are Pine source packages that you can compile yourself (look in section non-free/mail, priority Optional). Slink has a Netscape installer package, but you still need to get the tarball from netscape.com. i don't know if the netscape packages (as opposed to the installer package just mentioned) are available in slink, but you can get them from ftp.netgod.net IIRC > >As a final note, check out the kernel-package package. It'll make a deb > >that you can install with dpkg, that will properly install the modules, > >help you a little with lilo, and various other random things it's easy to > >forget. > > > I've been unable to locate kernel-package so far. Incidentally, as I have > the three Linux distributions on the disk at the moment, I boot from > floppies - I presume there will be the option to make a new disk during > the install/config when I do start. Section misc, optional priority. If it's not on your CD for some reason, you can get it from /debian/dists/stable/main/binary-$ARCH/misc/kernel-package_6.05.deb on your favorite Debian mirror. It's a 120k download. (Of course, replace $ARCH with your actual archetecture, e.g. i386, m68k, whatever. `dpkg --print-architecture` should tell you what it is if you don't know.) - -- finger for PGP public key. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.3ia Charset: noconv iQCVAwUBOAo5Zb7M/9WKZLW5AQE5bwP9GzedkKl3pSPFHV+jGwdlXt/1rtb9ByBU YlYlD9VTHcQlMfLvS0IFs8UbO0tG7JJq7bGQm951wg3ipmizbyV1UGZPUlwLUGhx S421YYyKriM3KzJF3SZy/BXR4crKrDFtg7RAHdfPP/XyjU6h4wEHlFLGrDyK/xGG 7MuP+2bZnmc= =5wnC -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
