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Pre-built kernels!


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  • Funtoo Linux BDFL

Hi All,

 

For a long while, the most time-consuming and potentially error-prone part of installing Funtoo Linux has been building a kernel. I worded to make this better by creating the debian-sources kernel, when combined with the "binary" USE flag will build you a kernel that just works. The problem: the compile time is excessive -- it can take an hour or more even on relatively modern hardware.

 

To make installing Funtoo Linux even easier, stage3's are now including debian-sources pre-built! We're using the Funtoo compute power made available by Funtoo supporters to save you time and hassle when installing Funtoo :) All you need to do is configure a boot loader and you're ready to go :)

 

I enabled this yesterday on our build servers, so it will take a few days before all stage3's are updated to include debian-sources. If they have a date of 2015-05-11 or later, they should have a kernel and initramfs included.

 

If you still want to build your own custom kernel, it is easy enough to unmerge, remove kernel and initramfs, and build your own.

 

Enjoy!

 

-Daniel

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@drobbins

 

Thank you and the team for working on all these exciting changes, I think it is great! 

 

I do have questions about at which step of the install process a user should "unmerge, remove kernel and initramfs" if they want to build their own kernel?

I assume a user should do this right after chrooting into new system for the first time because the kernel included in the stage3 is part of the world set correct?

 

I am asking because of the advice given in this thread http://forums.funtoo.org/topic/477-prevent-debian-sources-from-merged/?do=findComment&comment=2632

 

I use either gentoo-sources or hardened-sources and just want to make sure I understand any new changes to my process that I need to make during an new install.

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im going to ??? at the implementation as its raising the size of the stage3.  would it be possible to build the kernel & have debian-bin fetch the specific subarch pre-rolled kernel?  is this a general arch kernel that can be used with all the sub arches?  (is this what happened?)  i haven't even seen the stages yet so im more so asking what's going on.  are we still serving the stage3's with out kernels since i make my own vanillas?

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  • Funtoo Linux BDFL

This might give you some idea of the amount of upstream bugs I am encountering while building a full build of GNOME. Many of these build failures are due to use of binary packages, which it doesn't appear that Gentoo actively tests:

 

https://bugs.funtoo.org/browse/QA-24

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It would be cool if the pre-built kernels/initramfs images included virtio and btrfs modules. I tried mine as a KVM/Qemu guest and got nowhere with it.

 

What I do is use genkernel-next; with vanilla sources. It provides a --virtio and --btrfs options and injects those modules into the initramfs image. 

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This is definally great news for qemu users like myself who need rapid deployment. That mitigates the time constraints to serve clients needs. Now all that's needed now is quarterly ebuilds. :) Thanks to everyone who made this happen.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I read the funtoo install instructions again.  I followed exactly the instructions for installing funtoo using debian-sources. 

 

It worked!

 

I now have my Toshiba laptop up and running.  I have been trying, unsuccessfully, to do a manual kernel configuration for the past 5 days and could not get the Toshiba to boot.

 

Thanks,

 

Don James

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