I Have Something To Share.........:): How to compile a Kernel and upgrade the kernel version for PC

How to compile a Kernel

Downloading and configuring

Step1: Downloading :

Download a kernel, unpack it into

any
path

and create the “linux” link so that the commands are a little more generic. File name would be linux-x.y.z.tar.bz2, where x.y.z is actual version number.

For example I am taking a file inux-2.6.37.6.tar.bz2 which represents 2.6.37.6 kernel version. Use wget command to download kernel source code. It is common to let the ”linux” link point to the kernel you are currently working with.

Step2:

Now, get a kernel config file by following these steps.

Step3: configuring

It's a good idea to use the configuration of our current working kernel as a basis for the kernel. Therefore we copy the existing configuration to /usr/src/linux:

Step4:

:/usr/src/linux#

Which brings up the kernel configuration menu. Go to Load an Alternate Configuration File and choose .config (which contains the configuration of your current working kernel) as the configuration file:

Then we need to browse through the kernel configuration menu and make our choices. When we finished and select Exit, answer the following question (Do you wish to save your new kernel configuration?) with Yes:

Step 5: Build The Kernel

To build the kernel, execute these two commands:

After --append-to-version= you can write any string that helps you identify the kernel, but it must begin with a minus (-) and must not contain whitespace.

Now be patient, the kernel compilation can take some hours, depending on our kernel configuration and our processor speed.

Step 6: Install The New Kernel

After the successful kernel build, we can find two .deb packages in the /usr/src directory.

They were called linux-image-2.6.37.6-custom_2.6.37.6-custom-10.00.Custom_i386.deb (which contains the actual kernel) and linux-headers-2.6.37.6-custom_2.6.37.6-custom-10.00.Custom_i386.deb (which contains files needed if you want to compile additional kernel modules later on). I install them like this:

(We can now even transfer the two .deb files to other Ubuntu systems and install them there exactly the same way, which means you don't have to compile the kernel there again.)

That's it. We can check /boot/grub/menu.lst now, we should find two stanzas for our new kernel there:

Now we can see these two stanzas;

title Ubuntu, kernel 2.6.37.6-custom

root (hd0,0)

kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.37.6-custom root=/dev/sda1 ro quiet splash

initrd /boot/initrd.img-2.6.37.6-custom

savedefault

boot

title Ubuntu, kernel 2.6.37.6-custom (recovery mode)

root (hd0,0)

kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.37.6-custom root=/dev/sda1 ro single

initrd /boot/initrd.img-2.6.37.6-custom

boot

Step 7: update-grub

Step 8: Reboot

Step 9:

If everything goes well, it should come up with the kernel. We can check this by running

This will display something like 2.6.37.6-custom

TO UNISTSLL THE OLDER KERNEL:

This will show you how to find out your current running kernel and how to remove older ones that are not being used by your system. This will help you free up some space and may also improve your system’s performance.

Objectives:

· Find out your current running kernel

· Remove older kernels

Step 1: To get started, press Ctrl – Alt – T to open Terminal. When it opens, run the commands below to view your current running kernel.

uname -r