1Intro 2===== 3 4This document is designed to provide a list of the minimum levels of 5software necessary to run the 2.6 kernels, as well as provide brief 6instructions regarding any other "Gotchas" users may encounter when 7trying life on the Bleeding Edge. If upgrading from a pre-2.4.x 8kernel, please consult the Changes file included with 2.4.x kernels for 9additional information; most of that information will not be repeated 10here. Basically, this document assumes that your system is already 11functional and running at least 2.4.x kernels. 12 13This document is originally based on my "Changes" file for 2.0.x kernels 14and therefore owes credit to the same people as that file (Jared Mauch, 15Axel Boldt, Alessandro Sigala, and countless other users all over the 16'net). 17 18The latest revision of this document, in various formats, can always 19be found at <http://cyberbuzz.gatech.edu/kaboom/linux/Changes-2.4/>. 20 21Feel free to translate this document. If you do so, please send me a 22URL to your translation for inclusion in future revisions of this 23document. 24 25Smotrite file <http://oblom.rnc.ru/linux/kernel/Changes.ru>, yavlyaushisya 26russkim perevodom dannogo documenta. 27 28Visite <http://www2.adi.uam.es/~ender/tecnico/> para obtener la traducción 29al español de este documento en varios formatos. 30 31Eine deutsche Version dieser Datei finden Sie unter 32<http://www.stefan-winter.de/Changes-2.4.0.txt>. 33 34Last updated: October 29th, 2002 35 36Chris Ricker (kaboom@gatech.edu or chris.ricker@genetics.utah.edu). 37 38Current Minimal Requirements 39============================ 40 41Upgrade to at *least* these software revisions before thinking you've 42encountered a bug! If you're unsure what version you're currently 43running, the suggested command should tell you. 44 45Again, keep in mind that this list assumes you are already 46functionally running a Linux 2.4 kernel. Also, not all tools are 47necessary on all systems; obviously, if you don't have any PCMCIA (PC 48Card) hardware, for example, you probably needn't concern yourself 49with pcmcia-cs. 50 51o Gnu C 2.95.3 # gcc --version 52o Gnu make 3.78 # make --version 53o binutils 2.12 # ld -v 54o util-linux 2.10o # fdformat --version 55o module-init-tools 0.9.10 # depmod -V 56o e2fsprogs 1.29 # tune2fs 57o jfsutils 1.1.3 # fsck.jfs -V 58o reiserfsprogs 3.6.3 # reiserfsck -V 2>&1|grep reiserfsprogs 59o xfsprogs 2.6.0 # xfs_db -V 60o pcmcia-cs 3.1.21 # cardmgr -V 61o quota-tools 3.09 # quota -V 62o PPP 2.4.0 # pppd --version 63o isdn4k-utils 3.1pre1 # isdnctrl 2>&1|grep version 64o nfs-utils 1.0.5 # showmount --version 65o procps 3.1.13 # ps --version 66o oprofile 0.5.3 # oprofiled --version 67 68Kernel compilation 69================== 70 71GCC 72--- 73 74The gcc version requirements may vary depending on the type of CPU in your 75computer. The next paragraph applies to users of x86 CPUs, but not 76necessarily to users of other CPUs. Users of other CPUs should obtain 77information about their gcc version requirements from another source. 78 79The recommended compiler for the kernel is gcc 2.95.x (x >= 3), and it 80should be used when you need absolute stability. You may use gcc 3.0.x 81instead if you wish, although it may cause problems. Later versions of gcc 82have not received much testing for Linux kernel compilation, and there are 83almost certainly bugs (mainly, but not exclusively, in the kernel) that 84will need to be fixed in order to use these compilers. In any case, using 85pgcc instead of plain gcc is just asking for trouble. 86 87The Red Hat gcc 2.96 compiler subtree can also be used to build this tree. 88You should ensure you use gcc-2.96-74 or later. gcc-2.96-54 will not build 89the kernel correctly. 90 91In addition, please pay attention to compiler optimization. Anything 92greater than -O2 may not be wise. Similarly, if you choose to use gcc-2.95.x 93or derivatives, be sure not to use -fstrict-aliasing (which, depending on 94your version of gcc 2.95.x, may necessitate using -fno-strict-aliasing). 95 96Make 97---- 98 99You will need Gnu make 3.78 or later to build the kernel. 100 101Binutils 102-------- 103 104Linux on IA-32 has recently switched from using as86 to using gas for 105assembling the 16-bit boot code, removing the need for as86 to compile 106your kernel. This change does, however, mean that you need a recent 107release of binutils. 108 109System utilities 110================ 111 112Architectural changes 113--------------------- 114 115DevFS is now in the kernel. See Documentation/filesystems/devfs/* in 116the kernel source tree for all the gory details. 117 11832-bit UID support is now in place. Have fun! 119 120Linux documentation for functions is transitioning to inline 121documentation via specially-formatted comments near their 122definitions in the source. These comments can be combined with the 123SGML templates in the Documentation/DocBook directory to make DocBook 124files, which can then be converted by DocBook stylesheets to PostScript, 125HTML, PDF files, and several other formats. In order to convert from 126DocBook format to a format of your choice, you'll need to install Jade as 127well as the desired DocBook stylesheets. 128 129Util-linux 130---------- 131 132New versions of util-linux provide *fdisk support for larger disks, 133support new options to mount, recognize more supported partition 134types, have a fdformat which works with 2.4 kernels, and similar goodies. 135You'll probably want to upgrade. 136 137Ksymoops 138-------- 139 140If the unthinkable happens and your kernel oopses, you'll need a 2.4 141version of ksymoops to decode the report; see REPORTING-BUGS in the 142root of the Linux source for more information. 143 144Module-Init-Tools 145----------------- 146 147A new module loader is now in the kernel that requires module-init-tools 148to use. It is backward compatible with the 2.4.x series kernels. 149 150Mkinitrd 151-------- 152 153These changes to the /lib/modules file tree layout also require that 154mkinitrd be upgraded. 155 156E2fsprogs 157--------- 158 159The latest version of e2fsprogs fixes several bugs in fsck and 160debugfs. Obviously, it's a good idea to upgrade. 161 162JFSutils 163-------- 164 165The jfsutils package contains the utilities for the file system. 166The following utilities are available: 167o fsck.jfs - initiate replay of the transaction log, and check 168 and repair a JFS formatted partition. 169o mkfs.jfs - create a JFS formatted partition. 170o other file system utilities are also available in this package. 171 172Reiserfsprogs 173------------- 174 175The reiserfsprogs package should be used for reiserfs-3.6.x 176(Linux kernels 2.4.x). It is a combined package and contains working 177versions of mkreiserfs, resize_reiserfs, debugreiserfs and 178reiserfsck. These utils work on both i386 and alpha platforms. 179 180Xfsprogs 181-------- 182 183The latest version of xfsprogs contains mkfs.xfs, xfs_db, and the 184xfs_repair utilities, among others, for the XFS filesystem. It is 185architecture independent and any version from 2.0.0 onward should 186work correctly with this version of the XFS kernel code (2.6.0 or 187later is recommended, due to some significant improvements). 188 189 190Pcmcia-cs 191--------- 192 193PCMCIA (PC Card) support is now partially implemented in the main 194kernel source. Pay attention when you recompile your kernel ;-). 195Also, be sure to upgrade to the latest pcmcia-cs release. 196 197Quota-tools 198----------- 199 200Support for 32 bit uid's and gid's is required if you want to use 201the newer version 2 quota format. Quota-tools version 3.07 and 202newer has this support. Use the recommended version or newer 203from the table above. 204 205Intel IA32 microcode 206-------------------- 207 208A driver has been added to allow updating of Intel IA32 microcode, 209accessible as both a devfs regular file and as a normal (misc) 210character device. If you are not using devfs you may need to: 211 212mkdir /dev/cpu 213mknod /dev/cpu/microcode c 10 184 214chmod 0644 /dev/cpu/microcode 215 216as root before you can use this. You'll probably also want to 217get the user-space microcode_ctl utility to use with this. 218 219If you have compiled the driver as a module you may need to add 220the following line: 221 222alias char-major-10-184 microcode 223 224to your /etc/modules.conf file. 225 226Powertweak 227---------- 228 229If you are running v0.1.17 or earlier, you should upgrade to 230version v0.99.0 or higher. Running old versions may cause problems 231with programs using shared memory. 232 233Networking 234========== 235 236General changes 237--------------- 238 239The IP firewalling and NAT code has been replaced again. The new 240netfilter software (including ipfwadm and ipchains backwards- 241compatible modules) is currently distributed separately. 242 243If you have advanced network configuration needs, you should probably 244consider using the network tools from ip-route2. 245 246PPP 247--- 248 249The PPP driver has been restructured to support multilink and to 250enable it to operate over diverse media layers. If you use PPP, 251upgrade pppd to at least 2.4.0. 252 253If you are not using devfs, you must have the device file /dev/ppp 254which can be made by: 255 256mknod /dev/ppp c 108 0 257 258as root. 259 260If you build ppp support as modules, you will need the following in 261your /etc/modules.conf file: 262 263alias char-major-108 ppp_generic 264alias /dev/ppp ppp_generic 265alias tty-ldisc-3 ppp_async 266alias tty-ldisc-14 ppp_synctty 267alias ppp-compress-21 bsd_comp 268alias ppp-compress-24 ppp_deflate 269alias ppp-compress-26 ppp_deflate 270 271If you use devfsd and build ppp support as modules, you will need 272the following in your /etc/devfsd.conf file: 273 274LOOKUP PPP MODLOAD 275 276Isdn4k-utils 277------------ 278 279Due to changes in the length of the phone number field, isdn4k-utils 280needs to be recompiled or (preferably) upgraded. 281 282NFS-utils 283--------- 284 285In 2.4 and earlier kernels, the nfs server needed to know about any 286client that expected to be able to access files via NFS. This 287information would be given to the kernel by "mountd" when the client 288mounted the filesystem, or by "exportfs" at system startup. exportfs 289would take information about active clients from /var/lib/nfs/rmtab. 290 291This approach is quite fragile as it depends on rmtab being correct 292which is not always easy, particularly when trying to implement 293fail-over. Even when the system is working well, rmtab suffers from 294getting lots of old entries that never get removed. 295 296With 2.6 we have the option of having the kernel tell mountd when it 297gets a request from an unknown host, and mountd can give appropriate 298export information to the kernel. This removes the dependency on 299rmtab and means that the kernel only needs to know about currently 300active clients. 301 302To enable this new functionality, you need to: 303 304 mount -t nfsd nfsd /proc/fs/nfs 305 306before running exportfs or mountd. It is recommended that all NFS 307services be protected from the internet-at-large by a firewall where 308that is possible. 309 310Getting updated software 311======================== 312 313Kernel compilation 314****************** 315 316gcc 2.95.3 317---------- 318o <ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gcc/gcc-2.95.3.tar.gz> 319 320Make 3.78 321--------- 322o <ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/make/make-3.78.1.tar.gz> 323 324Binutils 325-------- 326o <ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/devel/binutils/> 327 328System utilities 329**************** 330 331Util-linux 332---------- 333o <ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/> 334 335Ksymoops 336-------- 337o <ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/ksymoops/v2.4/> 338 339Module-Init-Tools 340----------------- 341o <ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/rusty/modules/> 342 343Mkinitrd 344-------- 345o <ftp://rawhide.redhat.com/pub/rawhide/SRPMS/SRPMS/> 346 347E2fsprogs 348--------- 349o <http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/e2fsprogs/e2fsprogs-1.29.tar.gz> 350 351JFSutils 352-------- 353o <http://oss.software.ibm.com/jfs> 354 355Reiserfsprogs 356------------- 357o <http://www.namesys.com/pub/reiserfsprogs/reiserfsprogs-3.6.3.tar.gz> 358 359Xfsprogs 360-------- 361o <ftp://oss.sgi.com/projects/xfs/download/> 362 363Pcmcia-cs 364--------- 365o <ftp://pcmcia-cs.sourceforge.net/pub/pcmcia-cs/pcmcia-cs-3.1.21.tar.gz> 366 367Quota-tools 368---------- 369o <http://sourceforge.net/projects/linuxquota/> 370 371Jade 372---- 373o <ftp://ftp.jclark.com/pub/jade/jade-1.2.1.tar.gz> 374 375DocBook Stylesheets 376------------------- 377o <http://nwalsh.com/docbook/dsssl/> 378 379Intel P6 microcode 380------------------ 381o <http://www.urbanmyth.org/microcode/> 382 383Powertweak 384---------- 385o <http://powertweak.sourceforge.net/> 386 387Networking 388********** 389 390PPP 391--- 392o <ftp://ftp.samba.org/pub/ppp/ppp-2.4.0.tar.gz> 393 394Isdn4k-utils 395------------ 396o <ftp://ftp.isdn4linux.de/pub/isdn4linux/utils/isdn4k-utils.v3.1pre1.tar.gz> 397 398NFS-utils 399--------- 400o <http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=14> 401 402Netfilter 403--------- 404o <http://netfilter.filewatcher.org/iptables-1.2.tar.bz2> 405o <http://netfilter.samba.org/iptables-1.2.tar.bz2> 406o <http://netfilter.kernelnotes.org/iptables-1.2.tar.bz2> 407 408Ip-route2 409--------- 410o <ftp://ftp.inr.ac.ru/ip-routing/iproute2-2.2.4-now-ss991023.tar.gz> 411 412OProfile 413-------- 414o <http://oprofile.sf.net/download/> 415 416NFS-Utils 417--------- 418o <http://nfs.sourceforge.net/> 419 420 421Suggestions and corrections 422=========================== 423 424Please feel free to submit changes, corrections, gripes, flames, 425money, etc. to me <chris.ricker@genetics.utah.edu>. Happy Linuxing! 426