Discussion on building Linux kernels

Feel free to comment on this Wiki page. Do you have suggestions to make it better? Critical remarks? Leave them here.

— Eric

Are you sure merging the xauth is neccesary? I tried it and had to step out for a minute. Gnome locked the screen automatically and since then X hasn't worked, and I get an error saying “error in locking authority file /home/name/.Xauthority” Not sure if this is a result of merging the .Xauthority file or not. But I have also never seen those commands used in any other FAQ I have used.

~David

Hi David - I guess you did the merge while you were in X, then? The safe way would have been to do this in a console… before starting X.
The fact that it is not mentioned in other manuals and faqs does not mean it does not work
As for your problem - look at the /home/name/.Xauthority file's ownership and permissions. It should be owned by your account, not by root, and it should have 0600 permissions (readable/writable only by you).
— Eric

Found typo: '… a X terminal…' / Should be: '… an X terminal…'

But did it really need six revisions of your feedback line to tell me this That is what the [Preview] button is for…
— Eric

So sorry about that. When it comes to editing: can't help meself, mate :)

Spotted a formatting typo. Look under Modifying lilo.conf

The first code block in the section says:

label = linux read-only # Non-UMSDOS filesystems should be mounted read-only for checking

It should be two lines:

label = linux
read-only     # Non-UMSDOS filesystems should be mounted read-only for checking

Perhaps a rogue Return key didn't show up? It was probably taking some unwarranted holiday somewhere or other. It might even be slacking somewhere else on this site for all we know. Hey, in the ChangeLog recently Pat lost a '['. “It had fallen off my desk and ended up under a table”. That's always a pain.

Nice guide Eric. Thanks for the rest of your good work too. I appreciate you highlighting the point Linus made (the infamous /usr/src 'zombie' instructions), and the fact that it's a 'non-issue' with Slackware.

However I still think Linus has a point. If nothing else, juggling chainsaws when you're tired, and you've done it a million times before, could be hazardous to your health

- mjc -

Thanks for spotting this mjc, I fixed it. The kernel sources location is a hot topic on LQ nowadays.
— Eric