DISCUSSION: Slackware - Easy 2.6 kernel from Install disc #2

This thread is to discuss the article titled: Slackware - Easy 2.6 kernel from Install disc #2

hi there..
months ago I installed 2.6.10 kernel in my slack 10.1 following your recipe, and every was fine, so I "close the chapter" of the kernel upgrade.
But now I'm wondering: what are the advantages and disvantages between compiling and not-compiling the kernel, like I did?
the advantages maybe are obvious, but what's about the disvantages?
regards.

disadvantages might be that your kernel doesn't work a.k.a kernel panic

sorry, I don't get it..
what's that "kernel panic" stuff about?

"kernel panic" is basically when your computer poops in its pants and can't boot up. I ran into this while following the instructions to upgrade to the 2.6 kernel. My lilo was on a floppy, so I could not change it. Then I put lilo on MBR and my new shiny 2.6 kernel booted. So, if you run into kernel panic, make sure your lilo.conf is working and it's on MBR.

George

Two questions(SLACK 10.2, test26.s):
1) In the README.initrd file, there is also a mention of installpkg mkinitrd
I do not see an mkinitrd.tgz, at least not in the second CD
Do we really need to install it?

2) I have a SCSI system and all fs s are reiser except boot which is ext2
How do I find out how to make an initrd for such a system?
I mean throughout the installation I specified twice I want test26.s,
and uname -r says 2.6.13
Are the SCSI modules already installed and in any case, how do I really make a proper initrd?
Actually, I want to be able to decide at lilo time whether to boot the 2;.6 or 2.4.31 kernels. How do I do that?
I'm really confused with the installation that does ot really install 2.6.13
and it's not clear to me if it installed the SCSI and reiser modules or not.
But it does not look like it installed 2.4.31 either because uname says 2.6.13!

what happened to this discussion/tutorial?

Originally Posted by svar Two questions(SLACK 10.2, test26.s): 1) In the README.initrd file, there is also a mention of installpkg mkinitrd I do not see an mkinitrd.tgz, at least not in the second CD Do we really need to install it?

you probably have it installed already -- it is part of the main install so if you originally did a full install then you'll have it. that's why it's not included with the new kernel.

Originally Posted by svar 2) I have a SCSI system and all fs s are reiser except boot which is ext2 How do I find out how to make an initrd for such a system?

first off, you ONLY need to worry about your root partition. the point of initrd is to load modules that are required before the root partition is mounted -- anything that is not needed to mount root can be loaded later on. so you only need support for ext2, which according to README.initrd is already in the kernel, so nothing needs to be added.

as for scsi, i'm not sure about that i'm afraid, although the main 2.6 kernel option includes scsi support so it might be worth giving it a shot and seeing what happens -- ie you might not need an initrd at all.

Originally Posted by svar I mean throughout the installation I specified twice I want test26.s, and uname -r says 2.6.13 Are the SCSI modules already installed and in any case, how do I really make a proper initrd? Actually, I want to be able to decide at lilo time whether to boot the 2;.6 or 2.4.31 kernels. How do I do that?

the README.initrd file explains how to add another entry to /etc/lilo.conf so that you can have both 2.4 and 2.6 options at boot time. after you've added the extra 2.6 entry you have to run lilo to update the changes. you can probably almost copy-paste this entry from the example Patrick includes in README.initrd, although you probably need to change the root partition.

pretty good

but I can't find the package alsa-drivers-*.tgz in the linux-2.6.* directory.

I just installed slackware.
Maybe this needs a little update.

Greetings