[ILUG] Kernel Question

[Gareth Eason]

    No - this is a new 2.6 feature. There has been significant wah 
(heated discussion) about this feature being missing from previous 
kernels - as it IS a complet PITA trying to rebuild a kernel for a 
machine when you've lost the .config file and you just want to add one 
module / make some small change / upgrade by one minor version / whatever.

    "make oldconfig xconfig" will pull in all the settings from a 
.config file in the same directory and preset all the parameters that it 
finds. Then it will happily dump you in an X interface to configure the 
rest of them (or change the previous settings of course.) It's a good 
way to do things between minor releases / where you've already built a 
kernel for a machine.

    I tend to start afresh for new major releases of kernels to be 
honest - so much tends to change between them and certain combinations 
of settings are sometimes no longer advisable / available / a good idea ;-)

    Best regards,
    -->Gar


Timothy Murphy wrote:

>On Thursday 12 August 2004 11:39, Dermot Daly wrote:
>  
>
>>Isn't there a "make oldconfig" option?  I thought there was.  This
>>builds a .config file from your current kernel
>>    
>>
>
>I agree.
>In linux-2.6.7, at least (and I assume for ever)
>scripts/extract-ikconfig
>"# extracts .config info from a [b]zImage file
># uses: binoffset (new), dd, zcat, strings, grep
># $arg1 is [b]zImage filename"
>
>I think this script is run if you say "make oldconfig".
>I always say "make oldconfig xconfig"
>though I'm not sure why.
>I don't think it can do any harm, and it may do some good.
>
>  
>