[gentoo-dev] SuSE Kernel Sources

[Paul Varner]

All:

It was suggested to me that I post this here so that all of you nice
developers could take a look if interested.  Anyhow, I posted this earlier
to the gentoo-user email list as well as the Other things Gentoo forum.
What follows is my original message.

Regards,
Paul

> Being a big fan of SuSE before coming to Gentoo, I was interested to
> note that gentoo had RedHat kernel sources, but not SuSE sources.
> Since I have always preferred the stability of the SuSE kernel over
> RedHat's [I know it's a subjective opinion, so no comments please :)
> ] I decided to rectify the situation and create an ebuild for the
> SuSE kernel sources.
>
> I have installed the kernel on my desktops at work and at home and
> they have been running solid with the SuSE kernel for about two weeks
> now, with no issues arising concerning the kernel.
>
> Some features of the SuSE kernel  that are not present in the
> gentoo-2.4.20-r7 sources are ALSA support built in, and more extensive
> support for Video for Linux support to include support for the
> Hauppauge WinTV cards.
>
> The gotcha's that I have noticed with using the SuSE kernel are:
>
> 1. The kernel sources are distributed by SuSE as an RPM.  The RPM
> data is compressed with bzip instead of gzip.  I discovered that
> rpm2targz doesn't understand bzipped RPM files and would not
> correctly process the rpm. Because of this, an explicit dependency
> for the kernel is the rpm ebuild. The only thing that is used from
> rpm is the rpm2cpio command to unpack the sources into the ebuild
> sandbox.  I don't use rpm in any other way.  The second dependency is
> cpio.  This one really isn't an issue since it is part of the system,
> but to be safe, I included it anyway.
>
> 2. SuSE comes with ALSA ported into the kernel.  The ALSA version
> used by SuSE is 0.9.0, while the Gentoo stable release is 0.9.2.  I
> have configured the kernel to both use and not use the ALSA drivers
> bundled with the kernel and have not noticed a problem using either
> configuration.
>
> The following are the steps I took to install the kernel using
> genkernel. For those of you who completely roll your own kernel, I'm
> making the assumption, that you can figure it out from these
> instructions.  I am also assuming that you already have your system
> up and running with another kernel, and that you have some familarity
> with the kernel compiling process.
>
> 1. Get the ebuild from:
>
http://varnerfamily.org/pvarner/gentoo/suse-sources-2.4.20.100.ebuild.tar.bz2
> 2. mkdir /usr/local/portage
> 3. cd /usr/local/portage
> 4. tar xvjf suse-sources-2.4.20.100.ebuild.tar.bz2
> 5. Edit /etc/make.conf and uncomment the PORTDIR_OVERLAY variable and
> set it to PORTDIR_OVERLAY=/usr/local/portage
> 6. emerge suse-sources
> 7.cd /usr/src
> 8. rm linux
> 9. ln -s linux-2.4.20-SuSE-100 linux
> 10. cp /usr/src/linux-2.4.20-gentoo-r7/.config
> /etc/kernels/config-2.4.20-SuSE-100
> 11. genkernel --config
> 12. In the kernel configuration, Processor Type and Features, ensure
> that Local APIC Support on uniprocessors and IO-APIC support on
> uniprocessors is turned on or ACPI support will not compile.
> 13. In the file systems section, ensure that /dev file system support
> and Automatically mount at boot is turned on.  Turn off /dev/pts file
> system for Unix98 PTYs
> 14. Peruse through the rest of the configuration and set everything
> to match your hardware and desires.
> 15. Exit and save the config
> 16. Let genkernel do it's thing.
> 17. Modify the boot loader and add the entry for the new kernel and
> initrd
>
> Prior to rebooting, If I used built in ALSA support.
> 1. /etc/init.d/alsasound stop
> 2. emerge unmerge alsa-driver
> 3. emerge -i alsa-driver (inject the stub, so emerge -u won't try to
> reinstall alsa-driver)
> 4. reboot
> 5. login or su to root after the reboot and use lsmod to insure the
> sound modules loaded, use the alsamixer to make sure that the volume
> levels are set correctly.
>
> If I did not use the built in ALSA support.
> 1. /etc/init.d/alsasound stop
> 2. emerge alsa-driver
> 3. reboot
> 4. login or su to root after the reboot and use lsmod to insure the
> sound modules loaded, use the alsamixer to make sure that the volume
> levels are set correctly.
>
> Rebuild the other drivers that depend upon the kernel.  For me, I
> have an nvidia card and use vmware, so I also execute the following.
>
> emerge nvidia-kernel
> vmware-config.pl
>
> If I get enough interest in the ebuild, I will submit it to gentoo for
> possible inclusion in the portage tree.  At this point, besides
> determining possible interest, I'm also looking for problems with the
> ebuild as well as enhancements.
>
> One of the things that I would like to see, is an ebuild for creating
> only rpm2cpio.  I have figured out how to build and install only
> rpm2cpio manually from the rpm sources.  But I haven't decided the
> better method for creating and using such an ebuild.  Should it block
> the install of rpm, or should the rpm ebuild be modified to unmerge
> the rpm2cpio ebuild if it is installed.  Secondly, I'm not sure how I
> would specify in the suse-sources ebuild, the either the rpm or
> rpm2cpio ebuild would satisfy the dependency.
>
> Finally, as the SuSE /etc/motd would say "Have a Lot of Fun!"



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