1 Linux kernel release 3.x <http://kernel.org/> 2 3These are the release notes for Linux version 3. Read them carefully, 4as they tell you what this is all about, explain how to install the 5kernel, and what to do if something goes wrong. 6 7WHAT IS LINUX? 8 9 Linux is a clone of the operating system Unix, written from scratch by 10 Linus Torvalds with assistance from a loosely-knit team of hackers across 11 the Net. It aims towards POSIX and Single UNIX Specification compliance. 12 13 It has all the features you would expect in a modern fully-fledged Unix, 14 including true multitasking, virtual memory, shared libraries, demand 15 loading, shared copy-on-write executables, proper memory management, 16 and multistack networking including IPv4 and IPv6. 17 18 It is distributed under the GNU General Public License - see the 19 accompanying COPYING file for more details. 20 21ON WHAT HARDWARE DOES IT RUN? 22 23 Although originally developed first for 32-bit x86-based PCs (386 or higher), 24 today Linux also runs on (at least) the Compaq Alpha AXP, Sun SPARC and 25 UltraSPARC, Motorola 68000, PowerPC, PowerPC64, ARM, Hitachi SuperH, Cell, 26 IBM S/390, MIPS, HP PA-RISC, Intel IA-64, DEC VAX, AMD x86-64, AXIS CRIS, 27 Xtensa, Tilera TILE, AVR32 and Renesas M32R architectures. 28 29 Linux is easily portable to most general-purpose 32- or 64-bit architectures 30 as long as they have a paged memory management unit (PMMU) and a port of the 31 GNU C compiler (gcc) (part of The GNU Compiler Collection, GCC). Linux has 32 also been ported to a number of architectures without a PMMU, although 33 functionality is then obviously somewhat limited. 34 Linux has also been ported to itself. You can now run the kernel as a 35 userspace application - this is called UserMode Linux (UML). 36 37DOCUMENTATION: 38 39 - There is a lot of documentation available both in electronic form on 40 the Internet and in books, both Linux-specific and pertaining to 41 general UNIX questions. I'd recommend looking into the documentation 42 subdirectories on any Linux FTP site for the LDP (Linux Documentation 43 Project) books. This README is not meant to be documentation on the 44 system: there are much better sources available. 45 46 - There are various README files in the Documentation/ subdirectory: 47 these typically contain kernel-specific installation notes for some 48 drivers for example. See Documentation/00-INDEX for a list of what 49 is contained in each file. Please read the Changes file, as it 50 contains information about the problems, which may result by upgrading 51 your kernel. 52 53 - The Documentation/DocBook/ subdirectory contains several guides for 54 kernel developers and users. These guides can be rendered in a 55 number of formats: PostScript (.ps), PDF, HTML, & man-pages, among others. 56 After installation, "make psdocs", "make pdfdocs", "make htmldocs", 57 or "make mandocs" will render the documentation in the requested format. 58 59INSTALLING the kernel source: 60 61 - If you install the full sources, put the kernel tarball in a 62 directory where you have permissions (eg. your home directory) and 63 unpack it: 64 65 gzip -cd linux-3.X.tar.gz | tar xvf - 66 67 or 68 69 bzip2 -dc linux-3.X.tar.bz2 | tar xvf - 70 71 Replace "X" with the version number of the latest kernel. 72 73 Do NOT use the /usr/src/linux area! This area has a (usually 74 incomplete) set of kernel headers that are used by the library header 75 files. They should match the library, and not get messed up by 76 whatever the kernel-du-jour happens to be. 77 78 - You can also upgrade between 3.x releases by patching. Patches are 79 distributed in the traditional gzip and the newer bzip2 format. To 80 install by patching, get all the newer patch files, enter the 81 top level directory of the kernel source (linux-3.X) and execute: 82 83 gzip -cd ../patch-3.x.gz | patch -p1 84 85 or 86 87 bzip2 -dc ../patch-3.x.bz2 | patch -p1 88 89 Replace "x" for all versions bigger than the version "X" of your current 90 source tree, _in_order_, and you should be ok. You may want to remove 91 the backup files (some-file-name~ or some-file-name.orig), and make sure 92 that there are no failed patches (some-file-name# or some-file-name.rej). 93 If there are, either you or I have made a mistake. 94 95 Unlike patches for the 3.x kernels, patches for the 3.x.y kernels 96 (also known as the -stable kernels) are not incremental but instead apply 97 directly to the base 3.x kernel. For example, if your base kernel is 3.0 98 and you want to apply the 3.0.3 patch, you must not first apply the 3.0.1 99 and 3.0.2 patches. Similarly, if you are running kernel version 3.0.2 and 100 want to jump to 3.0.3, you must first reverse the 3.0.2 patch (that is, 101 patch -R) _before_ applying the 3.0.3 patch. You can read more on this in 102 Documentation/applying-patches.txt 103 104 Alternatively, the script patch-kernel can be used to automate this 105 process. It determines the current kernel version and applies any 106 patches found. 107 108 linux/scripts/patch-kernel linux 109 110 The first argument in the command above is the location of the 111 kernel source. Patches are applied from the current directory, but 112 an alternative directory can be specified as the second argument. 113 114 - Make sure you have no stale .o files and dependencies lying around: 115 116 cd linux 117 make mrproper 118 119 You should now have the sources correctly installed. 120 121SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS 122 123 Compiling and running the 3.x kernels requires up-to-date 124 versions of various software packages. Consult 125 Documentation/Changes for the minimum version numbers required 126 and how to get updates for these packages. Beware that using 127 excessively old versions of these packages can cause indirect 128 errors that are very difficult to track down, so don't assume that 129 you can just update packages when obvious problems arise during 130 build or operation. 131 132BUILD directory for the kernel: 133 134 When compiling the kernel, all output files will per default be 135 stored together with the kernel source code. 136 Using the option "make O=output/dir" allow you to specify an alternate 137 place for the output files (including .config). 138 Example: 139 140 kernel source code: /usr/src/linux-3.X 141 build directory: /home/name/build/kernel 142 143 To configure and build the kernel, use: 144 145 cd /usr/src/linux-3.X 146 make O=/home/name/build/kernel menuconfig 147 make O=/home/name/build/kernel 148 sudo make O=/home/name/build/kernel modules_install install 149 150 Please note: If the 'O=output/dir' option is used, then it must be 151 used for all invocations of make. 152 153CONFIGURING the kernel: 154 155 Do not skip this step even if you are only upgrading one minor 156 version. New configuration options are added in each release, and 157 odd problems will turn up if the configuration files are not set up 158 as expected. If you want to carry your existing configuration to a 159 new version with minimal work, use "make oldconfig", which will 160 only ask you for the answers to new questions. 161 162 - Alternative configuration commands are: 163 164 "make config" Plain text interface. 165 166 "make menuconfig" Text based color menus, radiolists & dialogs. 167 168 "make nconfig" Enhanced text based color menus. 169 170 "make xconfig" X windows (Qt) based configuration tool. 171 172 "make gconfig" X windows (Gtk) based configuration tool. 173 174 "make oldconfig" Default all questions based on the contents of 175 your existing ./.config file and asking about 176 new config symbols. 177 178 "make silentoldconfig" 179 Like above, but avoids cluttering the screen 180 with questions already answered. 181 Additionally updates the dependencies. 182 183 "make olddefconfig" 184 Like above, but sets new symbols to their default 185 values without prompting. 186 187 "make defconfig" Create a ./.config file by using the default 188 symbol values from either arch/$ARCH/defconfig 189 or arch/$ARCH/configs/${PLATFORM}_defconfig, 190 depending on the architecture. 191 192 "make ${PLATFORM}_defconfig" 193 Create a ./.config file by using the default 194 symbol values from 195 arch/$ARCH/configs/${PLATFORM}_defconfig. 196 Use "make help" to get a list of all available 197 platforms of your architecture. 198 199 "make allyesconfig" 200 Create a ./.config file by setting symbol 201 values to 'y' as much as possible. 202 203 "make allmodconfig" 204 Create a ./.config file by setting symbol 205 values to 'm' as much as possible. 206 207 "make allnoconfig" Create a ./.config file by setting symbol 208 values to 'n' as much as possible. 209 210 "make randconfig" Create a ./.config file by setting symbol 211 values to random values. 212 213 You can find more information on using the Linux kernel config tools 214 in Documentation/kbuild/kconfig.txt. 215 216 - NOTES on "make config": 217 218 - Having unnecessary drivers will make the kernel bigger, and can 219 under some circumstances lead to problems: probing for a 220 nonexistent controller card may confuse your other controllers 221 222 - Compiling the kernel with "Processor type" set higher than 386 223 will result in a kernel that does NOT work on a 386. The 224 kernel will detect this on bootup, and give up. 225 226 - A kernel with math-emulation compiled in will still use the 227 coprocessor if one is present: the math emulation will just 228 never get used in that case. The kernel will be slightly larger, 229 but will work on different machines regardless of whether they 230 have a math coprocessor or not. 231 232 - The "kernel hacking" configuration details usually result in a 233 bigger or slower kernel (or both), and can even make the kernel 234 less stable by configuring some routines to actively try to 235 break bad code to find kernel problems (kmalloc()). Thus you 236 should probably answer 'n' to the questions for "development", 237 "experimental", or "debugging" features. 238 239COMPILING the kernel: 240 241 - Make sure you have at least gcc 3.2 available. 242 For more information, refer to Documentation/Changes. 243 244 Please note that you can still run a.out user programs with this kernel. 245 246 - Do a "make" to create a compressed kernel image. It is also 247 possible to do "make install" if you have lilo installed to suit the 248 kernel makefiles, but you may want to check your particular lilo setup first. 249 250 To do the actual install, you have to be root, but none of the normal 251 build should require that. Don't take the name of root in vain. 252 253 - If you configured any of the parts of the kernel as `modules', you 254 will also have to do "make modules_install". 255 256 - Verbose kernel compile/build output: 257 258 Normally, the kernel build system runs in a fairly quiet mode (but not 259 totally silent). However, sometimes you or other kernel developers need 260 to see compile, link, or other commands exactly as they are executed. 261 For this, use "verbose" build mode. This is done by inserting 262 "V=1" in the "make" command. E.g.: 263 264 make V=1 all 265 266 To have the build system also tell the reason for the rebuild of each 267 target, use "V=2". The default is "V=0". 268 269 - Keep a backup kernel handy in case something goes wrong. This is 270 especially true for the development releases, since each new release 271 contains new code which has not been debugged. Make sure you keep a 272 backup of the modules corresponding to that kernel, as well. If you 273 are installing a new kernel with the same version number as your 274 working kernel, make a backup of your modules directory before you 275 do a "make modules_install". 276 277 Alternatively, before compiling, use the kernel config option 278 "LOCALVERSION" to append a unique suffix to the regular kernel version. 279 LOCALVERSION can be set in the "General Setup" menu. 280 281 - In order to boot your new kernel, you'll need to copy the kernel 282 image (e.g. .../linux/arch/i386/boot/bzImage after compilation) 283 to the place where your regular bootable kernel is found. 284 285 - Booting a kernel directly from a floppy without the assistance of a 286 bootloader such as LILO, is no longer supported. 287 288 If you boot Linux from the hard drive, chances are you use LILO, which 289 uses the kernel image as specified in the file /etc/lilo.conf. The 290 kernel image file is usually /vmlinuz, /boot/vmlinuz, /bzImage or 291 /boot/bzImage. To use the new kernel, save a copy of the old image 292 and copy the new image over the old one. Then, you MUST RERUN LILO 293 to update the loading map!! If you don't, you won't be able to boot 294 the new kernel image. 295 296 Reinstalling LILO is usually a matter of running /sbin/lilo. 297 You may wish to edit /etc/lilo.conf to specify an entry for your 298 old kernel image (say, /vmlinux.old) in case the new one does not 299 work. See the LILO docs for more information. 300 301 After reinstalling LILO, you should be all set. Shutdown the system, 302 reboot, and enjoy! 303 304 If you ever need to change the default root device, video mode, 305 ramdisk size, etc. in the kernel image, use the 'rdev' program (or 306 alternatively the LILO boot options when appropriate). No need to 307 recompile the kernel to change these parameters. 308 309 - Reboot with the new kernel and enjoy. 310 311IF SOMETHING GOES WRONG: 312 313 - If you have problems that seem to be due to kernel bugs, please check 314 the file MAINTAINERS to see if there is a particular person associated 315 with the part of the kernel that you are having trouble with. If there 316 isn't anyone listed there, then the second best thing is to mail 317 them to me (torvalds@linux-foundation.org), and possibly to any other 318 relevant mailing-list or to the newsgroup. 319 320 - In all bug-reports, *please* tell what kernel you are talking about, 321 how to duplicate the problem, and what your setup is (use your common 322 sense). If the problem is new, tell me so, and if the problem is 323 old, please try to tell me when you first noticed it. 324 325 - If the bug results in a message like 326 327 unable to handle kernel paging request at address C0000010 328 Oops: 0002 329 EIP: 0010:XXXXXXXX 330 eax: xxxxxxxx ebx: xxxxxxxx ecx: xxxxxxxx edx: xxxxxxxx 331 esi: xxxxxxxx edi: xxxxxxxx ebp: xxxxxxxx 332 ds: xxxx es: xxxx fs: xxxx gs: xxxx 333 Pid: xx, process nr: xx 334 xx xx xx xx xx xx xx xx xx xx 335 336 or similar kernel debugging information on your screen or in your 337 system log, please duplicate it *exactly*. The dump may look 338 incomprehensible to you, but it does contain information that may 339 help debugging the problem. The text above the dump is also 340 important: it tells something about why the kernel dumped code (in 341 the above example, it's due to a bad kernel pointer). More information 342 on making sense of the dump is in Documentation/oops-tracing.txt 343 344 - If you compiled the kernel with CONFIG_KALLSYMS you can send the dump 345 as is, otherwise you will have to use the "ksymoops" program to make 346 sense of the dump (but compiling with CONFIG_KALLSYMS is usually preferred). 347 This utility can be downloaded from 348 ftp://ftp.<country>.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/ksymoops/ . 349 Alternatively, you can do the dump lookup by hand: 350 351 - In debugging dumps like the above, it helps enormously if you can 352 look up what the EIP value means. The hex value as such doesn't help 353 me or anybody else very much: it will depend on your particular 354 kernel setup. What you should do is take the hex value from the EIP 355 line (ignore the "0010:"), and look it up in the kernel namelist to 356 see which kernel function contains the offending address. 357 358 To find out the kernel function name, you'll need to find the system 359 binary associated with the kernel that exhibited the symptom. This is 360 the file 'linux/vmlinux'. To extract the namelist and match it against 361 the EIP from the kernel crash, do: 362 363 nm vmlinux | sort | less 364 365 This will give you a list of kernel addresses sorted in ascending 366 order, from which it is simple to find the function that contains the 367 offending address. Note that the address given by the kernel 368 debugging messages will not necessarily match exactly with the 369 function addresses (in fact, that is very unlikely), so you can't 370 just 'grep' the list: the list will, however, give you the starting 371 point of each kernel function, so by looking for the function that 372 has a starting address lower than the one you are searching for but 373 is followed by a function with a higher address you will find the one 374 you want. In fact, it may be a good idea to include a bit of 375 "context" in your problem report, giving a few lines around the 376 interesting one. 377 378 If you for some reason cannot do the above (you have a pre-compiled 379 kernel image or similar), telling me as much about your setup as 380 possible will help. Please read the REPORTING-BUGS document for details. 381 382 - Alternatively, you can use gdb on a running kernel. (read-only; i.e. you 383 cannot change values or set break points.) To do this, first compile the 384 kernel with -g; edit arch/i386/Makefile appropriately, then do a "make 385 clean". You'll also need to enable CONFIG_PROC_FS (via "make config"). 386 387 After you've rebooted with the new kernel, do "gdb vmlinux /proc/kcore". 388 You can now use all the usual gdb commands. The command to look up the 389 point where your system crashed is "l *0xXXXXXXXX". (Replace the XXXes 390 with the EIP value.) 391 392 gdb'ing a non-running kernel currently fails because gdb (wrongly) 393 disregards the starting offset for which the kernel is compiled. 394 395