Documentation/Changes

   1 Intro
   2 =====
   3
   4 This document is designed to provide a list of the minimum levels of
   5 software necessary to run the 3.0 kernels.
   6
   7 This document is originally based on my "Changes" file for 2.0.x kernels
   8 and therefore owes credit to the same people as that file (Jared Mauch,
   9 Axel Boldt, Alessandro Sigala, and countless other users all over the
  10 'net).
  11
  12 Current Minimal Requirements
  13 ============================
  14
  15 Upgrade to at *least* these software revisions before thinking you've
  16 encountered a bug!  If you're unsure what version you're currently
  17 running, the suggested command should tell you.
  18
  19 Again, keep in mind that this list assumes you are already functionally
  20 running a Linux kernel.  Also, not all tools are necessary on all
  21 systems; obviously, if you don't have any ISDN hardware, for example,
  22 you probably needn't concern yourself with isdn4k-utils.
  23
  24 o  Gnu C                  3.2                     # gcc --version
  25 o  Gnu make               3.80                    # make --version
  26 o  binutils               2.12                    # ld -v
  27 o  util-linux             2.10o                   # fdformat --version
  28 o  module-init-tools      0.9.10                  # depmod -V
  29 o  e2fsprogs              1.41.4                  # e2fsck -V
  30 o  jfsutils               1.1.3                   # fsck.jfs -V
  31 o  reiserfsprogs          3.6.3                   # reiserfsck -V
  32 o  xfsprogs               2.6.0                   # xfs_db -V
  33 o  squashfs-tools         4.0                     # mksquashfs -version
  34 o  btrfs-progs            0.18                    # btrfsck
  35 o  pcmciautils            004                     # pccardctl -V
  36 o  quota-tools            3.09                    # quota -V
  37 o  PPP                    2.4.0                   # pppd --version
  38 o  isdn4k-utils           3.1pre1                 # isdnctrl 2>&1|grep version
  39 o  nfs-utils              1.0.5                   # showmount --version
  40 o  procps                 3.2.0                   # ps --version
  41 o  oprofile               0.9                     # oprofiled --version
  42 o  udev                   081                     # udevd --version
  43 o  grub                   0.93                    # grub --version || grub-install --version
  44 o  mcelog                 0.6                     # mcelog --version
  45 o  iptables               1.4.2                   # iptables -V
  46
  47
  48 Kernel compilation
  49 ==================
  50
  51 GCC
  52 ---
  53
  54 The gcc version requirements may vary depending on the type of CPU in your
  55 computer.
  56
  57 Make
  58 ----
  59
  60 You will need Gnu make 3.80 or later to build the kernel.
  61
  62 Binutils
  63 --------
  64
  65 Linux on IA-32 has recently switched from using as86 to using gas for
  66 assembling the 16-bit boot code, removing the need for as86 to compile
  67 your kernel.  This change does, however, mean that you need a recent
  68 release of binutils.
  69
  70 Perl
  71 ----
  72
  73 You will need perl 5 and the following modules: Getopt::Long, Getopt::Std,
  74 File::Basename, and File::Find to build the kernel.
  75
  76 BC
  77 --
  78
  79 You will need bc to build kernels 3.10 and higher
  80
  81
  82 System utilities
  83 ================
  84
  85 Architectural changes
  86 ---------------------
  87
  88 DevFS has been obsoleted in favour of udev
  89 (http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/hotplug/)
  90
  91 32-bit UID support is now in place.  Have fun!
  92
  93 Linux documentation for functions is transitioning to inline
  94 documentation via specially-formatted comments near their
  95 definitions in the source.  These comments can be combined with the
  96 SGML templates in the Documentation/DocBook directory to make DocBook
  97 files, which can then be converted by DocBook stylesheets to PostScript,
  98 HTML, PDF files, and several other formats.  In order to convert from
  99 DocBook format to a format of your choice, you'll need to install Jade as
 100 well as the desired DocBook stylesheets.
 101
 102 Util-linux
 103 ----------
 104
 105 New versions of util-linux provide *fdisk support for larger disks,
 106 support new options to mount, recognize more supported partition
 107 types, have a fdformat which works with 2.4 kernels, and similar goodies.
 108 You'll probably want to upgrade.
 109
 110 Ksymoops
 111 --------
 112
 113 If the unthinkable happens and your kernel oopses, you may need the
 114 ksymoops tool to decode it, but in most cases you don't.
 115 It is generally preferred to build the kernel with CONFIG_KALLSYMS so
 116 that it produces readable dumps that can be used as-is (this also
 117 produces better output than ksymoops).  If for some reason your kernel
 118 is not build with CONFIG_KALLSYMS and you have no way to rebuild and
 119 reproduce the Oops with that option, then you can still decode that Oops
 120 with ksymoops.
 121
 122 Module-Init-Tools
 123 -----------------
 124
 125 A new module loader is now in the kernel that requires module-init-tools
 126 to use.  It is backward compatible with the 2.4.x series kernels.
 127
 128 Mkinitrd
 129 --------
 130
 131 These changes to the /lib/modules file tree layout also require that
 132 mkinitrd be upgraded.
 133
 134 E2fsprogs
 135 ---------
 136
 137 The latest version of e2fsprogs fixes several bugs in fsck and
 138 debugfs.  Obviously, it's a good idea to upgrade.
 139
 140 JFSutils
 141 --------
 142
 143 The jfsutils package contains the utilities for the file system.
 144 The following utilities are available:
 145 o fsck.jfs - initiate replay of the transaction log, and check
 146   and repair a JFS formatted partition.
 147 o mkfs.jfs - create a JFS formatted partition.
 148 o other file system utilities are also available in this package.
 149
 150 Reiserfsprogs
 151 -------------
 152
 153 The reiserfsprogs package should be used for reiserfs-3.6.x
 154 (Linux kernels 2.4.x). It is a combined package and contains working
 155 versions of mkreiserfs, resize_reiserfs, debugreiserfs and
 156 reiserfsck. These utils work on both i386 and alpha platforms.
 157
 158 Xfsprogs
 159 --------
 160
 161 The latest version of xfsprogs contains mkfs.xfs, xfs_db, and the
 162 xfs_repair utilities, among others, for the XFS filesystem.  It is
 163 architecture independent and any version from 2.0.0 onward should
 164 work correctly with this version of the XFS kernel code (2.6.0 or
 165 later is recommended, due to some significant improvements).
 166
 167 PCMCIAutils
 168 -----------
 169
 170 PCMCIAutils replaces pcmcia-cs (see below). It properly sets up
 171 PCMCIA sockets at system startup and loads the appropriate modules
 172 for 16-bit PCMCIA devices if the kernel is modularized and the hotplug
 173 subsystem is used.
 174
 175 Pcmcia-cs
 176 ---------
 177
 178 PCMCIA (PC Card) support is now partially implemented in the main
 179 kernel source. The "pcmciautils" package (see above) replaces pcmcia-cs
 180 for newest kernels.
 181
 182 Quota-tools
 183 -----------
 184
 185 Support for 32 bit uid's and gid's is required if you want to use
 186 the newer version 2 quota format.  Quota-tools version 3.07 and
 187 newer has this support.  Use the recommended version or newer
 188 from the table above.
 189
 190 Intel IA32 microcode
 191 --------------------
 192
 193 A driver has been added to allow updating of Intel IA32 microcode,
 194 accessible as a normal (misc) character device.  If you are not using
 195 udev you may need to:
 196
 197 mkdir /dev/cpu
 198 mknod /dev/cpu/microcode c 10 184
 199 chmod 0644 /dev/cpu/microcode
 200
 201 as root before you can use this.  You'll probably also want to
 202 get the user-space microcode_ctl utility to use with this.
 203
 204 udev
 205 ----
 206 udev is a userspace application for populating /dev dynamically with
 207 only entries for devices actually present.  udev replaces the basic
 208 functionality of devfs, while allowing persistent device naming for
 209 devices.
 210
 211 FUSE
 212 ----
 213
 214 Needs libfuse 2.4.0 or later.  Absolute minimum is 2.3.0 but mount
 215 options 'direct_io' and 'kernel_cache' won't work.
 216
 217 Networking
 218 ==========
 219
 220 General changes
 221 ---------------
 222
 223 If you have advanced network configuration needs, you should probably
 224 consider using the network tools from ip-route2.
 225
 226 Packet Filter / NAT
 227 -------------------
 228 The packet filtering and NAT code uses the same tools like the previous 2.4.x
 229 kernel series (iptables).  It still includes backwards-compatibility modules
 230 for 2.2.x-style ipchains and 2.0.x-style ipfwadm.
 231
 232 PPP
 233 ---
 234
 235 The PPP driver has been restructured to support multilink and to
 236 enable it to operate over diverse media layers.  If you use PPP,
 237 upgrade pppd to at least 2.4.0.
 238
 239 If you are not using udev, you must have the device file /dev/ppp
 240 which can be made by:
 241
 242 mknod /dev/ppp c 108 0
 243
 244 as root.
 245
 246 Isdn4k-utils
 247 ------------
 248
 249 Due to changes in the length of the phone number field, isdn4k-utils
 250 needs to be recompiled or (preferably) upgraded.
 251
 252 NFS-utils
 253 ---------
 254
 255 In ancient (2.4 and earlier) kernels, the nfs server needed to know
 256 about any client that expected to be able to access files via NFS.  This
 257 information would be given to the kernel by "mountd" when the client
 258 mounted the filesystem, or by "exportfs" at system startup.  exportfs
 259 would take information about active clients from /var/lib/nfs/rmtab.
 260
 261 This approach is quite fragile as it depends on rmtab being correct
 262 which is not always easy, particularly when trying to implement
 263 fail-over.  Even when the system is working well, rmtab suffers from
 264 getting lots of old entries that never get removed.
 265
 266 With modern kernels we have the option of having the kernel tell mountd
 267 when it gets a request from an unknown host, and mountd can give
 268 appropriate export information to the kernel.  This removes the
 269 dependency on rmtab and means that the kernel only needs to know about
 270 currently active clients.
 271
 272 To enable this new functionality, you need to:
 273
 274   mount -t nfsd nfsd /proc/fs/nfsd
 275
 276 before running exportfs or mountd.  It is recommended that all NFS
 277 services be protected from the internet-at-large by a firewall where
 278 that is possible.
 279
 280 mcelog
 281 ------
 282
 283 On x86 kernels the mcelog utility is needed to process and log machine check
 284 events when CONFIG_X86_MCE is enabled. Machine check events are errors reported
 285 by the CPU. Processing them is strongly encouraged.
 286
 287 Getting updated software
 288 ========================
 289
 290 Kernel compilation
 291 ******************
 292
 293 gcc
 294 ---
 295 o  <ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gcc/>
 296
 297 Make
 298 ----
 299 o  <ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/make/>
 300
 301 Binutils
 302 --------
 303 o  <ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/devel/binutils/>
 304
 305 System utilities
 306 ****************
 307
 308 Util-linux
 309 ----------
 310 o  <ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/>
 311
 312 Ksymoops
 313 --------
 314 o  <ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/ksymoops/v2.4/>
 315
 316 Module-Init-Tools
 317 -----------------
 318 o  <ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/rusty/modules/>
 319
 320 Mkinitrd
 321 --------
 322 o  <https://code.launchpad.net/initrd-tools/main>
 323
 324 E2fsprogs
 325 ---------
 326 o  <http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/e2fsprogs/e2fsprogs-1.29.tar.gz>
 327
 328 JFSutils
 329 --------
 330 o  <http://jfs.sourceforge.net/>
 331
 332 Reiserfsprogs
 333 -------------
 334 o  <http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/fs/reiserfs/>
 335
 336 Xfsprogs
 337 --------
 338 o  <ftp://oss.sgi.com/projects/xfs/>
 339
 340 Pcmciautils
 341 -----------
 342 o  <ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/pcmcia/>
 343
 344 Pcmcia-cs
 345 ---------
 346 o  <http://pcmcia-cs.sourceforge.net/>
 347
 348 Quota-tools
 349 ----------
 350 o  <http://sourceforge.net/projects/linuxquota/>
 351
 352 DocBook Stylesheets
 353 -------------------
 354 o  <http://nwalsh.com/docbook/dsssl/>
 355
 356 XMLTO XSLT Frontend
 357 -------------------
 358 o  <http://cyberelk.net/tim/xmlto/>
 359
 360 Intel P6 microcode
 361 ------------------
 362 o  <http://www.urbanmyth.org/microcode/>
 363
 364 udev
 365 ----
 366 o <http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/hotplug/udev.html>
 367
 368 FUSE
 369 ----
 370 o <http://sourceforge.net/projects/fuse>
 371
 372 mcelog
 373 ------
 374 o <ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/cpu/mce/>
 375
 376 Networking
 377 **********
 378
 379 PPP
 380 ---
 381 o  <ftp://ftp.samba.org/pub/ppp/>
 382
 383 Isdn4k-utils
 384 ------------
 385 o  <ftp://ftp.isdn4linux.de/pub/isdn4linux/utils/>
 386
 387 NFS-utils
 388 ---------
 389 o  <http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=14>
 390
 391 Iptables
 392 --------
 393 o  <http://www.iptables.org/downloads.html>
 394
 395 Ip-route2
 396 ---------
 397 o  <ftp://ftp.tux.org/pub/net/ip-routing/iproute2-2.2.4-now-ss991023.tar.gz>
 398
 399 OProfile
 400 --------
 401 o  <http://oprofile.sf.net/download/>
 402
 403 NFS-Utils
 404 ---------
 405 o  <http://nfs.sourceforge.net/>
 406