MAS kernel patch compilation

Most people can skip the explicit kernel compilation described here by using the automated MAS install package. See MAS OS setup.

This procedure is based on http://www.howtoforge.com/kernel_compilation_ubuntu .

Ubuntu 6.06

Get linux sources

We use vanilla 2.6.15.7, vanilla, from kernel.org.

Get bigphys patch

Patch is available here:

http://e-mode.phas.ubc.ca/~mhasse/mce/bigphysarea-2.6.15.7.patch

Get kernel compilation packages

apt-get update
apt-get install kernel-package libncurses5-dev fakeroot wget bzip2

Make sure bash is your default shell

sudo rm /bin/sh
sudo ln -s /bin/bash /bin/sh

Uncompress and patch

tar xjf linux-2.6.18.1.tar.bz2
ln -s linux-2.6.18.1 linux
cd /usr/src/linux

For uncompressed patches (like the bigphysarea patch), just redirect the file to the patch program:

patch -p1 --dry-run < bigphysarea-2.6.22-server.patch
patch -p1 < bigphysarea-2.6.22-server.patch

The first line (dry-run) will not make any changes to your source tree. If it says "fuzz" and "offset", that's fine. If you get errors, you have to go in by hand and figure out what's up. It's probably the line in the makefile that specifies the minor version of the kernel release.

Configure and compile

cp /boot/config-`uname -r` ./.config
make menuconfig

In the kernel configuration menu, go to "Processor type and features" and make sure that "Big Physical Area" is on.

make-kpkg clean
sudo make-kpkg --initrd kernel_image kernel_headers

(At one point there was a "--append-to-version=-bigphys" line, but we don't need that cause it's done in the patch already.)

(Can't use fakeroot in this last step, since the .deb are written to /usr/src.)

Binary kernel package installation

See MAS OS configuration .

The .deb's that come out of the compilation above are incomplete, be we install them anyway. They are missing arch/i386/Makefile.cpu, and Modules.symvers. They might be missing other things too, but MAS really misses those ones. These have been put into a patch; which must be applied at the end.

Patch creation

To generate a patch from a successful hack/patch/wobble-job, use, e.g.:

diff -urN linux-source-2.6.22 linux-source-2.6.22-bigphys > ~/bigphysarea-2.6.22-server.patch

Ubuntu 8.04

Bigphys kernel was successfully created for 8.04 both 32-bit and 64-bit machines. I don't know how to package it properly yet, so you just have to do it on each machine.

Blacklist snd_asihpi

The 8.04 kernel has a sound-card driver that lays claim to the Motorola DSP on the PCI card. Before trying to boot an 8.04 system with the PCI card installed, we must blacklist this module to prevent it from trying to configure the card as a sound card. Add the following to the bottom of /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist :

# Conflicts with Astro-cam PCI card!!
blacklist snd_asihpi

Preparation and patching

From fresh 8.04 install:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install build-essential subversion kernel-package linux-source libncurses5-dev

The linux-source package should put an archive in /usr/src, e.g. linux-source-2.6.24.tar.bz2. Extract it:

cd /usr/src
sudo tar -xjf linux-source-2.6.24.tar.bz2

Get the bigphys patch for 2.6.24 (a new version of this was created on Jan 6, 2009 that eliminates the Makefile patch problem...), and apply it to the source tree:

cd ~/install
wget http://e-mode.phas.ubc.ca/~mhasse/mce/bigphysarea/bigphysarea-2.6.24.patch
cd /usr/src/linux-source-2.6.24
patch -p1 --dry-run < ~/install/bigphysarea-2.6.24.patch
sudo patch -p1 < ~/install/bigphysarea-2.6.24.patch

Copy in your config file into the root of your source tree, and make menuconfig.

sudo cp /boot/config-2.6.24-16-generic .config
sudo make menuconfig

Under "Processor Type and Features", turn "Big Physical Area (NEW)" to ON. Then exit, exit, save.

Compilation

We have to be careful about architectures here:

on amd64 (64 bit machines), you can do

sudo make-kpkg clean
sudo make-kpkg --initrd kernel-image kernel-headers --append-to-version=-bigphys

on i386 (32 bit machines), do

sudo make-kpkg clean -arch i386
sudo make-kpkg --initrd kernel-image kernel-headers --append-to-version=-bigphys -arch i386

Installation

As usual, you'll get two kernel packages in /usr/src. Install them in the usual way:

dpkg -i /usr/src/*bigphys*deb

However, it is possible that the "initramfs" will fail to be created (particularly in the case of i386 architecture). To remedy this, run

sudo mkinitramfs -o /boot/initrd.img-2.6.24.3-bigphys 2.6.24.3-bigphys

(substituting version numbers where necessary).

Having completed these steps, check that GRUB knows about the kernel. If it doesn't, add an entry similar to these ones to your /boot/grub/menu.lst (be sure to copy the "root" disk references from an existing kernel entry in the file):

title           Big physical area kernel 2.6.24.3-bigphys
root            (hd0,0)
kernel          /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.24.3-bigphys root=UUID=<your UUID!!> ro quiet splash bigphysarea=8192
initrd          /boot/initrd.img-2.6.24.3-bigphys
quiet

title           Big physical area kernel 2.6.24.3-bigphys (recovery mode)
root            (hd0,0)
kernel          /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.24.3-bigphys root=UUID=<your UUID!!> ro single
initrd          /boot/initrd.img-2.6.24.3-bigphys

Ubuntu 8.10

The current deal with 8.10: the kernel API has changed slightly, and the bigphys patch requires less-trivial-than-usual modifications. These can likely be resolved; but until then please use 8.04 LTS.

Ubuntu 9.04

Follow the instructions for Ubuntu 8.04, with a few modifications. The kernel should be a 2.6.28 version. The bigphysarea patch is here:

 wget http://e-mode.phas.ubc.ca/~mhasse/mce/bigphysarea-2.6.28.patch

This Ubuntu is picky about permissions, so do things properly. Get kernel source, and helpers:

 sudo apt-get install linux-source-2.6.28 fakeroot kernel-package libncurses5-dev

Unzip the kernel to home folder or something -- we will compile as a non-superuser.

 tar -xjf /usr/src/linux-source-2.6.28.tar.bz2

Apply patch

 cd linux-source-2.6.28
 patch -p1 --dry-run < ../bigphysarea-2.6.28.patch
 patch -p1 < ../bigphysarea-2.6.28.patch

Update config

 cp /boot/config-2.6.28-11-generic .config

Enable BIGPHYSAREA (under Processor Type and Features, or whatever):

 make menuconfig

Compile kernel

 fakeroot make-kpkg clean
 fakeroot make-kpkg --initrd kernel-image kernel-headers --append-to-version=-bigphys

Ubuntu 10.04 LTS

The following outlines how to compile the bigphysarea'd kernel for Ubuntu 10.04 on the MCE Control Computer (MCC), which is a 32-bit machine, but it may work in general for 10.04. We'll roughly follow the 9.04 compilation procedure.

Preparation

You shouldn't have to blacklist anything. So, first apt-get some stuff:

$ sudo apt-get install linux-source-2.6.32 fakeroot kernel-package libncurses5-dev

On the MCC, it strongly recommended to compile the kernel in some scratch space on the SATA drive, as the CF card is slow as galaxies merging. You could do it in /data/tmp, but that will get purged on the next boot. So, it might be better to make a new directory:

$ sudo mkdir /data/src
$ sudo chown mce:mce /data/src
$ cd /data/src

otherwise, do it anywhere convenient. As with the 9.04 install above, we'll be compiling this as a normal user. Unpack the kernel, and apply the bigphysarea patch

$ tar -jxvf /usr/src/linux-source-2.6.32.tar.bz2
$ cd linux-source-2.6.32
$ wget http://e-mode.phas.ubc.ca/mce/pc_install/bigphys/bigphysarea-2.6.32.patch -O- | patch -p1 --verbose

Configuration and compilation

On the MCC, use the MCC kernel config:

$ wget http://ketiltrout.net/mcc/mcc-config-2.6.32 -O.config

otherwise, configure your kernel as usual, ensuring that bigphysarea is on. Now compile the kernel packages:

$ make-kpkg --rootcmd fakeroot clean
$ make-kpkg --rootcmd fakeroot --initrd kernel-image kernel-headers --append-to-version=-bigphys-mcc

(You may remove the -mcc part of the version suffix if you aren't on the MCC.)

Installation

A simple:

$ sudo dpkg -i ../linux-*.deb

should install things. On the MCC, don't worry about the lack of an initrd; it's not needed. The linux-image package you just created points the build symlink in /lib/modules/... to the place where you built the kernel, not where the linux-headers package was installed, so let's fix that:

$ cd /lib/modules/2.6.32*-bigphys-mcc
$ sudo rm build
$ sudo ln -s /usr/src/linux-headers-2.6.32*-bigphys-mcc build

To actually enable the bigphysarea in your new kernel, edit the grub menu to enable bigphysarea by modifying the value of GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT in /etc/default/grub to:

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash bigphysarea=8192"

and then re-generating the grub configuration:

$ sudo update-grub

Done!