compiling kernels
 

well i don't know if this is entirely the right place to post, but i notice that there are one hell of a lot of people here, so here goes...

i'm trying to compile a 2.4.18-14 kernel (the one that is packaged with redhat 8.0 psyche)... really just for the fun of it, in order to learn a little more about how linux works....
later i plan to try and make the kernel load dv1394 drivers automatically, but for now i need to overcome a few basic hurdles.

have read a great deal on the subject, and get a reasonable way through the process...
1. installed source (easy from distro cd rpm)
2. found source on HD and ran make xconfig (easy to set my options)
3. ran make dep as told to by many "how-to"'s
4. as 3 for make clean
5. ran make bzImage

now the problems start.... takes about 5 minutes (fast athlon XP processor), and gets to what I believe is the last(ish) step, command which starts with ld ... (the actual object code linking ??) and is several lines long.

here is error message:

fs/fs.o: In function 'proc_pid_stat':

fs/fs.o(.text+0x1d86b): Undefined reference to '__udivdi3'

make [1]: *** [kallsyms] Error 1

.. blah blah leaving dir... blah blah... Error 2.

so... i have deduced that the error lies in the filesystem module code, but that's about it...

what do 'proc_pid_stat' and '__udivdi3' relate to??

any ideas as to how i fix this and make it work?

Any comments will be welcome on this..

Thanks,

Doug.

by the way... having spent the afternoon searching the web, there seems to be 101 different (and 1000001 links to) various documents, all of which basically say:

"make mrproper xconfig dep clean bZImage modules modules_install

...do this and it'll work and you have a bootable kernel.

if it doesn't work, try again"

but sweet f* all on what to do is a step fails, or how to go about rooting out the problem. I have tried the above method numerous times with different configuration optinos enabled and disabled (esp. in the filesystem section), all to no avail.

Please, if anyone here has ever successfully compiled the 2.4.18-14 kernel can you please let me know how you did it.

[BTW, i've now downloaded some newer versions and am gonna try compiling them this evening to see if they work instead.... ]

just thought i'd pass my thoughts on.

Doug.

Re: compiling kernels
 

Doug: welcome to the world of kernel compilation.

One of the RedHat CD's has a complete document about doing exactly what you are doing featuring a step by step walk through. Did you have a look at that.

BTW, did you use the stock .config file?

Cheers--
Charles

yeah i've read most of the docs that are both included and available on the www, however none of them really tell you what to do when something doesn't work..

anyway, have abandoned trying to compile 2.4.x, since downloaded 2.5.62 earlier today.... compiles like a dream, but can't get it to boot at the mo.... i'll keep tinkering.

also got hold of 2.4.20 in case the newest one fails me totally.

i'll keep my progress posted...

Doug.

Unless you want to be doing some debugging or testing, the 2.5.x series are unstable kernel's under development. You might want to just go ahead and use the 2.4.20 which is the latest stable kernel.

Odd's 2.5.x = unstable, even numbers 2.4.x = stable kernels