1Intro
2=====
3
4This document is designed to provide a list of the minimum levels of
5software necessary to run the 3.0 kernels.
6
7This document is originally based on my "Changes" file for 2.0.x kernels
8and therefore owes credit to the same people as that file (Jared Mauch,
9Axel Boldt, Alessandro Sigala, and countless other users all over the
10'net).
11
12Current Minimal Requirements
13============================
14
15Upgrade to at *least* these software revisions before thinking you've
16encountered a bug!  If you're unsure what version you're currently
17running, the suggested command should tell you.
18
19Again, keep in mind that this list assumes you are already functionally
20running a Linux kernel.  Also, not all tools are necessary on all
21systems; obviously, if you don't have any ISDN hardware, for example,
22you probably needn't concern yourself with isdn4k-utils.
23
24o  GNU C                  3.2                     # gcc --version
25o  GNU make               3.80                    # make --version
26o  binutils               2.12                    # ld -v
27o  util-linux             2.10o                   # fdformat --version
28o  module-init-tools      0.9.10                  # depmod -V
29o  e2fsprogs              1.41.4                  # e2fsck -V
30o  jfsutils               1.1.3                   # fsck.jfs -V
31o  reiserfsprogs          3.6.3                   # reiserfsck -V
32o  xfsprogs               2.6.0                   # xfs_db -V
33o  squashfs-tools         4.0                     # mksquashfs -version
34o  btrfs-progs            0.18                    # btrfsck
35o  pcmciautils            004                     # pccardctl -V
36o  quota-tools            3.09                    # quota -V
37o  PPP                    2.4.0                   # pppd --version
38o  isdn4k-utils           3.1pre1                 # isdnctrl 2>&1|grep version
39o  nfs-utils              1.0.5                   # showmount --version
40o  procps                 3.2.0                   # ps --version
41o  oprofile               0.9                     # oprofiled --version
42o  udev                   081                     # udevd --version
43o  grub                   0.93                    # grub --version || grub-install --version
44o  mcelog                 0.6                     # mcelog --version
45o  iptables               1.4.2                   # iptables -V
46o  openssl & libcrypto    1.0.0                   # openssl version
47o  bc                     1.06.95                 # bc --version
48
49
50Kernel compilation
51==================
52
53GCC
54---
55
56The gcc version requirements may vary depending on the type of CPU in your
57computer.
58
59Make
60----
61
62You will need GNU make 3.80 or later to build the kernel.
63
64Binutils
65--------
66
67Linux on IA-32 has recently switched from using as86 to using gas for
68assembling the 16-bit boot code, removing the need for as86 to compile
69your kernel.  This change does, however, mean that you need a recent
70release of binutils.
71
72Perl
73----
74
75You will need perl 5 and the following modules: Getopt::Long, Getopt::Std,
76File::Basename, and File::Find to build the kernel.
77
78BC
79--
80
81You will need bc to build kernels 3.10 and higher
82
83
84OpenSSL
85-------
86
87Module signing and external certificate handling use the OpenSSL program and
88crypto library to do key creation and signature generation.
89
90You will need openssl to build kernels 3.7 and higher if module signing is
91enabled.  You will also need openssl development packages to build kernels 4.3
92and higher.
93
94
95System utilities
96================
97
98Architectural changes
99---------------------
100
101DevFS has been obsoleted in favour of udev
102(http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/hotplug/)
103
10432-bit UID support is now in place.  Have fun!
105
106Linux documentation for functions is transitioning to inline
107documentation via specially-formatted comments near their
108definitions in the source.  These comments can be combined with the
109SGML templates in the Documentation/DocBook directory to make DocBook
110files, which can then be converted by DocBook stylesheets to PostScript,
111HTML, PDF files, and several other formats.  In order to convert from
112DocBook format to a format of your choice, you'll need to install Jade as
113well as the desired DocBook stylesheets.
114
115Util-linux
116----------
117
118New versions of util-linux provide *fdisk support for larger disks,
119support new options to mount, recognize more supported partition
120types, have a fdformat which works with 2.4 kernels, and similar goodies.
121You'll probably want to upgrade.
122
123Ksymoops
124--------
125
126If the unthinkable happens and your kernel oopses, you may need the
127ksymoops tool to decode it, but in most cases you don't.
128It is generally preferred to build the kernel with CONFIG_KALLSYMS so
129that it produces readable dumps that can be used as-is (this also
130produces better output than ksymoops).  If for some reason your kernel
131is not build with CONFIG_KALLSYMS and you have no way to rebuild and
132reproduce the Oops with that option, then you can still decode that Oops
133with ksymoops.
134
135Module-Init-Tools
136-----------------
137
138A new module loader is now in the kernel that requires module-init-tools
139to use.  It is backward compatible with the 2.4.x series kernels.
140
141Mkinitrd
142--------
143
144These changes to the /lib/modules file tree layout also require that
145mkinitrd be upgraded.
146
147E2fsprogs
148---------
149
150The latest version of e2fsprogs fixes several bugs in fsck and
151debugfs.  Obviously, it's a good idea to upgrade.
152
153JFSutils
154--------
155
156The jfsutils package contains the utilities for the file system.
157The following utilities are available:
158o fsck.jfs - initiate replay of the transaction log, and check
159  and repair a JFS formatted partition.
160o mkfs.jfs - create a JFS formatted partition.
161o other file system utilities are also available in this package.
162
163Reiserfsprogs
164-------------
165
166The reiserfsprogs package should be used for reiserfs-3.6.x
167(Linux kernels 2.4.x). It is a combined package and contains working
168versions of mkreiserfs, resize_reiserfs, debugreiserfs and
169reiserfsck. These utils work on both i386 and alpha platforms.
170
171Xfsprogs
172--------
173
174The latest version of xfsprogs contains mkfs.xfs, xfs_db, and the
175xfs_repair utilities, among others, for the XFS filesystem.  It is
176architecture independent and any version from 2.0.0 onward should
177work correctly with this version of the XFS kernel code (2.6.0 or
178later is recommended, due to some significant improvements).
179
180PCMCIAutils
181-----------
182
183PCMCIAutils replaces pcmcia-cs. It properly sets up
184PCMCIA sockets at system startup and loads the appropriate modules
185for 16-bit PCMCIA devices if the kernel is modularized and the hotplug
186subsystem is used.
187
188Quota-tools
189-----------
190
191Support for 32 bit uid's and gid's is required if you want to use
192the newer version 2 quota format.  Quota-tools version 3.07 and
193newer has this support.  Use the recommended version or newer
194from the table above.
195
196Intel IA32 microcode
197--------------------
198
199A driver has been added to allow updating of Intel IA32 microcode,
200accessible as a normal (misc) character device.  If you are not using
201udev you may need to:
202
203mkdir /dev/cpu
204mknod /dev/cpu/microcode c 10 184
205chmod 0644 /dev/cpu/microcode
206
207as root before you can use this.  You'll probably also want to
208get the user-space microcode_ctl utility to use with this.
209
210udev
211----
212udev is a userspace application for populating /dev dynamically with
213only entries for devices actually present.  udev replaces the basic
214functionality of devfs, while allowing persistent device naming for
215devices.
216
217FUSE
218----
219
220Needs libfuse 2.4.0 or later.  Absolute minimum is 2.3.0 but mount
221options 'direct_io' and 'kernel_cache' won't work.
222
223Networking
224==========
225
226General changes
227---------------
228
229If you have advanced network configuration needs, you should probably
230consider using the network tools from ip-route2.
231
232Packet Filter / NAT
233-------------------
234The packet filtering and NAT code uses the same tools like the previous 2.4.x
235kernel series (iptables).  It still includes backwards-compatibility modules
236for 2.2.x-style ipchains and 2.0.x-style ipfwadm.
237
238PPP
239---
240
241The PPP driver has been restructured to support multilink and to
242enable it to operate over diverse media layers.  If you use PPP,
243upgrade pppd to at least 2.4.0.
244
245If you are not using udev, you must have the device file /dev/ppp
246which can be made by:
247
248mknod /dev/ppp c 108 0
249
250as root.
251
252Isdn4k-utils
253------------
254
255Due to changes in the length of the phone number field, isdn4k-utils
256needs to be recompiled or (preferably) upgraded.
257
258NFS-utils
259---------
260
261In ancient (2.4 and earlier) kernels, the nfs server needed to know
262about any client that expected to be able to access files via NFS.  This
263information would be given to the kernel by "mountd" when the client
264mounted the filesystem, or by "exportfs" at system startup.  exportfs
265would take information about active clients from /var/lib/nfs/rmtab.
266
267This approach is quite fragile as it depends on rmtab being correct
268which is not always easy, particularly when trying to implement
269fail-over.  Even when the system is working well, rmtab suffers from
270getting lots of old entries that never get removed.
271
272With modern kernels we have the option of having the kernel tell mountd
273when it gets a request from an unknown host, and mountd can give
274appropriate export information to the kernel.  This removes the
275dependency on rmtab and means that the kernel only needs to know about
276currently active clients.
277
278To enable this new functionality, you need to:
279
280  mount -t nfsd nfsd /proc/fs/nfsd
281
282before running exportfs or mountd.  It is recommended that all NFS
283services be protected from the internet-at-large by a firewall where
284that is possible.
285
286mcelog
287------
288
289On x86 kernels the mcelog utility is needed to process and log machine check
290events when CONFIG_X86_MCE is enabled. Machine check events are errors reported
291by the CPU. Processing them is strongly encouraged.
292
293Getting updated software
294========================
295
296Kernel compilation
297******************
298
299gcc
300---
301o  <ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gcc/>
302
303Make
304----
305o  <ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/make/>
306
307Binutils
308--------
309o  <ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/devel/binutils/>
310
311OpenSSL
312-------
313o  <https://www.openssl.org/>
314
315System utilities
316****************
317
318Util-linux
319----------
320o  <ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/>
321
322Ksymoops
323--------
324o  <ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/ksymoops/v2.4/>
325
326Module-Init-Tools
327-----------------
328o  <ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/rusty/modules/>
329
330Mkinitrd
331--------
332o  <https://code.launchpad.net/initrd-tools/main>
333
334E2fsprogs
335---------
336o  <http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/e2fsprogs/e2fsprogs-1.29.tar.gz>
337
338JFSutils
339--------
340o  <http://jfs.sourceforge.net/>
341
342Reiserfsprogs
343-------------
344o  <http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/fs/reiserfs/>
345
346Xfsprogs
347--------
348o  <ftp://oss.sgi.com/projects/xfs/>
349
350Pcmciautils
351-----------
352o  <ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/pcmcia/>
353
354Quota-tools
355----------
356o  <http://sourceforge.net/projects/linuxquota/>
357
358DocBook Stylesheets
359-------------------
360o  <http://sourceforge.net/projects/docbook/files/docbook-dsssl/>
361
362XMLTO XSLT Frontend
363-------------------
364o  <http://cyberelk.net/tim/xmlto/>
365
366Intel P6 microcode
367------------------
368o  <https://downloadcenter.intel.com/>
369
370udev
371----
372o <http://www.freedesktop.org/software/systemd/man/udev.html>
373
374FUSE
375----
376o <http://sourceforge.net/projects/fuse>
377
378mcelog
379------
380o <http://www.mcelog.org/>
381
382Networking
383**********
384
385PPP
386---
387o  <ftp://ftp.samba.org/pub/ppp/>
388
389Isdn4k-utils
390------------
391o  <ftp://ftp.isdn4linux.de/pub/isdn4linux/utils/>
392
393NFS-utils
394---------
395o  <http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=14>
396
397Iptables
398--------
399o  <http://www.iptables.org/downloads.html>
400
401Ip-route2
402---------
403o  <https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/net/iproute2/>
404
405OProfile
406--------
407o  <http://oprofile.sf.net/download/>
408
409NFS-Utils
410---------
411o  <http://nfs.sourceforge.net/>
412