Details on this package are located in Section 6.11.2, “Contents of Binutils.”
Copyright © 1999–2007 Gerard Beekmans
Copyright (c) 1999–2007, Gerard Beekmans
All rights reserved.
Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are met:
Redistributions in any form must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer
Neither the name of “Linux From Scratch” nor the names of its contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this material without specific prior written permission
Any material derived from Linux From Scratch must contain a reference to the “Linux From Scratch” project
THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS “AS IS” AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.
My adventures in Linux began in 1998 when I downloaded and installed my first distribution. After working with it for a while, I discovered issues I definitely would have liked to see improved upon. For example, I didn't like the arrangement of the bootscripts or the way programs were configured by default. I tried a number of alternative distributions to address these issues, yet each had its pros and cons. Finally, I realized that if I wanted full satisfaction from my Linux system, I would have to build my own from scratch.
What does this mean? I resolved not to use pre-compiled packages of any kind, nor CD-ROMs or boot disks that would install basic utilities. I would use my current Linux system to develop my own customized system. This “perfect” Linux system would then have the strengths of various systems without their associated weaknesses. In the beginning, the idea was rather daunting, but I remained committed to the idea that a system could be built that would conform to my needs and desires rather than to a standard that just did not fit what I was looking for.
After sorting through issues such as circular dependencies and compile-time errors, I created a custom-built Linux system that was fully operational and suitable to individual needs. This process also allowed me to create compact and streamlined Linux systems which are faster and take up less space than traditional operating systems. I called this system a Linux From Scratch system, or an LFS system for short.
As I shared my goals and experiences with other members of the Linux community, it became apparent that there was sustained interest in the ideas set forth in my Linux adventures. Such custom-built LFS systems serve not only to meet user specifications and requirements, but also serve as an ideal learning opportunity for programmers and system administrators to enhance their Linux skills. Out of this broadened interest, the Linux From Scratch Project was born.
This Linux From Scratch book provides readers with the background and instruction to design and build custom Linux systems. This book highlights the Linux from Scratch project and the benefits of using this system. Users can dictate all aspects of their system, including directory layout, script setup, and security. The resulting system will be compiled completely from the source code, and the user will be able to specify where, why, and how programs are installed. This book allows readers to fully customize Linux systems to their own needs and allows users more control over their system.
I hope you will have a great time working on your own LFS system, and enjoy the numerous benefits of having a system that is truly your own.
--
Gerard Beekmans
gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
There are many reasons why somebody would want to read this book. The principal reason is to install a Linux system from the source code. A question many people raise is, “why go through all the hassle of manually building a Linux system from scratch when you can just download and install an existing one?” That is a good question and is the impetus for this section of the book.
One important reason for LFS's existence is to help people learn how a Linux system works from the inside out. Building an LFS system helps demonstrate what makes Linux tick, and how things work together and depend on each other. One of the best things that this learning experience provides is the ability to customize Linux to your own tastes and needs.
A key benefit of LFS is that it allows users to have more control over the system without relying on someone else's Linux implementation. With LFS, you are in the driver's seat and dictate every aspect of the system, such as the directory layout and bootscript setup. You also dictate where, why, and how programs are installed.
Another benefit of LFS is the ability to create a very compact Linux system. When installing a regular distribution, one is often forced to include several programs which are probably never used. These programs waste disk space, or worse, CPU cycles. It is not difficult to build an LFS system of less than 100 megabytes (MB), which is substantially smaller than the majority of existing installations. Does this still sound like a lot of space? A few of us have been working on creating a very small embedded LFS system. We successfully built a system that was specialized to run the Apache web server with approximately 8MB of disk space used. Further stripping could bring this down to 5 MB or less. Try that with a regular distribution! This is only one of the many benefits of designing your own Linux implementation.
We could compare Linux distributions to a hamburger purchased at a fast-food restaurant—you have no idea what might be in what you are eating. LFS, on the other hand, does not give you a hamburger. Rather, LFS provides the recipe to make the exact hamburger desired. This allows users to review the recipe, omit unwanted ingredients, and add your own ingredients to enhance the flavor of the burger. When you are satisfied with the recipe, move on to preparing it. It can be made to exact specifications—broil it, bake it, deep-fry it, or barbecue it.
Another analogy that we can use is that of comparing LFS with a finished house. LFS provides the skeletal plan of a house, but it is up to you to build it. LFS maintains the freedom to adjust plans throughout the process, customizing it to the user's needs and preferences.
An additional advantage of a custom built Linux system is security. By compiling the entire system from source code, you are empowered to audit everything and apply all the security patches desired. It is no longer necessary to wait for somebody else to compile binary packages that fix a security hole. Unless you examine the patch and implement it yourself, you have no guarantee that the new binary package was built correctly and adequately fixes the problem.
The goal of Linux From Scratch is to build a complete and usable foundation-level system. Readers who do not wish to build their own Linux system from scratch may not benefit from the information in this book. If you only want to know what happens while the computer boots, we recommend the “From Power Up To Bash Prompt” HOWTO located at http://axiom.anu.edu.au/~okeefe/p2b/ or on The Linux Documentation Project's (TLDP) website at http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/From-PowerUp-To-Bash-Prompt-HOWTO.html. The HOWTO builds a system which is similar to that of this book, but it focuses strictly on creating a system capable of booting to a BASH prompt. Consider your objective. If you wish to build a Linux system while learning along the way, then this book is your best choice.
There are too many good reasons to build your own LFS system to list them all here. This section is only the tip of the iceberg. As you continue in your LFS experience, you will find the power that information and knowledge truly bring.
Building an LFS system is not a simple task. It requires a certain level of existing knowledge of Unix system administration in order to resolve problems, and correctly execute the commands listed. In particular, as an absolute minimum, the reader should already have the ability to use the command line (shell) to copy or move files and directories, list directory and file contents, and change the current directory. It is also expected that the reader has a reasonable knowledge of using and installing Linux software.
Because the LFS book assumes at least this basic level of skill, the various LFS support forums are unlikely to be able to provide you with much assistance; you will find that your questions regarding such basic knowledge will likely go unanswered, or you will simply be referred to the LFS essential pre-reading list.
Before building an LFS system, we recommend reading the following HOWTOs:
Software-Building-HOWTO http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Software-Building-HOWTO.html
This is a comprehensive guide to building and installing “generic” Unix software packages under Linux.
The Linux Users' Guide http://www.linuxhq.com/guides/LUG/guide.html
This guide covers the usage of assorted Linux software.
The Essential Pre-Reading Hint http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/essential_prereading.txt
This is an LFS Hint written specifically for users new to Linux. It includes a list of links to excellent sources of information on a wide range of topics. Anyone attempting to install LFS should have an understanding of many of the topics in this hint.
Your host system should have the following software with the minimum versions indicated. This should not be an issue for most modern Linux distributions. Also note that many distributions will place software headers into separate packages, often in the form of “<package-name>-devel” or “<package-name>-dev”. Be sure to install those if your distribution provides them.
Bash-2.05a
Binutils-2.12 (Versions greater than 2.17 are not recommended as they have not been tested)
Bison-1.875
Bzip2-1.0.2
Coreutils-5.0 (or Sh-Utils-2.0, Textutils-2.0, and Fileutils-4.1)
Diffutils-2.8
Findutils-4.1.20
Gawk-3.0
Gcc-3.0.1 (Versions greater than 4.1.2 are not recommended as they have not been tested)
Glibc-2.2.5 (Versions greater than 2.5.1 are not recommended as they have not been tested)
Grep-2.5
Gzip-1.2.4
Linux Kernel-2.6.x (having been compiled with GCC-3.0 or greater)
The reason for the kernel version requirement is that thread-local storage support in Binutils will not be built and the Native POSIX Threading Library (NPTL) test suite will segfault if the host's kernel isn't at least a 2.6.x version compiled with a 3.0 or later release of GCC.
If the host kernel is either earlier than 2.6.x, or it was not compiled using a GCC-3.0 (or later) compiler, you will have to replace the kernel with one adhering to the specifications. There are two methods you can take to solve this. First, see if your Linux vendor provides a 2.6 kernel package. If so, you may wish to install it. If your vendor doesn't offer a 2.6 kernel package, or you would prefer not to install it, then you can compile a 2.6 kernel yourself. Instructions for compiling the kernel and configuring the boot loader (assuming the host uses GRUB) are located in Chapter 8.
Make-3.79.1
Patch-2.5.4
Sed-3.0.2
Tar-1.14
To see whether your host system has all the appropriate versions, run the following:
cat > version-check.sh << "EOF"
#!/bin/bash
# Simple script to list version numbers of critical development tools
bash --version | head -n1 | cut -d" " -f2-4
echo -n "Binutils: "; ld --version | head -n1 | cut -d" " -f3-4
bison --version | head -n1
bzip2 --version 2>&1 < /dev/null | head -n1 | cut -d" " -f1,6-
echo -n "Coreutils: "; chown --version | head -n1 | cut -d")" -f2
diff --version | head -n1
find --version | head -n1
gawk --version | head -n1
gcc --version | head -n1
/lib/libc.so.6 | head -n1 | cut -d" " -f1-7
grep --version | head -n1
gzip --version | head -n1
cat /proc/version
make --version | head -n1
patch --version | head -n1
sed --version | head -n1
tar --version | head -n1
EOF
bash version-check.sh
To make things easier to follow, there are a few typographical conventions used throughout this book. This section contains some examples of the typographical format found throughout Linux From Scratch.
./configure --prefix=/usr
This form of text is designed to be typed exactly as seen unless otherwise noted in the surrounding text. It is also used in the explanation sections to identify which of the commands is being referenced.
install-info: unknown option '--dir-file=/mnt/lfs/usr/info/dir'
This form of text (fixed-width text) shows screen output,
probably as the result of commands issued. This format is also
used to show filenames, such as /etc/ld.so.conf.
Emphasis
This form of text is used for several purposes in the book. Its main purpose is to emphasize important points or items.
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/
This format is used for hyperlinks both within the LFS community and to external pages. It includes HOWTOs, download locations, and websites.
cat > $LFS/etc/group << "EOF"
root:x:0:
bin:x:1:
......
EOF
This format is used when creating configuration files. The first
command tells the system to create the file $LFS/etc/group from whatever is typed on the
following lines until the sequence end of file (EOF) is
encountered. Therefore, this entire section is generally typed as
seen.
<REPLACED TEXT>
This format is used to encapsulate text that is not to be typed as seen or for copy-and-paste operations.
[OPTIONAL TEXT]
This format is used to encapsulate text that is optional.
passwd(5)
This format is used to refer to a specific manual page
(hereinafter referred to simply as a “man” page). The number inside parentheses
indicates a specific section inside of man. For example, passwd has two man pages. Per
LFS installation instructions, those two man pages will be
located at /usr/share/man/man1/passwd.1 and /usr/share/man/man5/passwd.5. Both man pages
have different information in them. When the book uses
passwd(5) it is specifically
referring to /usr/share/man/man5/passwd.5. man passwd will print the first
man page it finds that matches “passwd”, which will be /usr/share/man/man1/passwd.1. For this example,
you will need to run man 5
passwd in order to read the specific page being
referred to. It should be noted that most man pages do not have
duplicate page names in different sections. Therefore,
man <program
name> is generally sufficient.
This book is divided into the following parts.
Part I explains a few important notes on how to proceed with the LFS installation. This section also provides meta-information about the book.
Part II describes how to prepare for the building process—making a partition, downloading the packages, and compiling temporary tools.
Part III guides the reader through the building of the LFS system—compiling and installing all the packages one by one, setting up the boot scripts, and installing the kernel. The resulting Linux system is the foundation on which other software can be built to expand the system as desired. At the end of this book, there is an easy to use reference listing all of the programs, libraries, and important files that have been installed.
The software used to create an LFS system is constantly being updated and enhanced. Security warnings and bug fixes may become available after the LFS book has been released. To check whether the package versions or instructions in this release of LFS need any modifications to accommodate security vulnerabilities or other bug fixes, please visit http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/errata/6.3/ before proceeding with your build. You should note any changes shown and apply them to the relevant section of the book as you progress with building the LFS system.
The LFS system will be built by using a previously installed Linux distribution (such as Debian, Mandriva, Red Hat, or SUSE). This existing Linux system (the host) will be used as a starting point to provide necessary programs, including a compiler, linker, and shell, to build the new system. Select the “development” option during the distribution installation to be able to access these tools.
As an alternative to installing a separate distribution onto your machine, you may wish to use the Linux From Scratch LiveCD. The CD works well as a host system, providing all the tools you need to successfully follow the instructions in this book. Additionally, it contains all the source packages, patches and a copy of this book. So once you have the CD, no network connection or additional downloads are necessary. For more information about the LFS LiveCD or to download a copy, visit http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/livecd/.
The LFS LiveCD might not work on newer hardware configurations, failing to boot or failing to detect some devices, like SATA hard drives.
The LFS LiveCD team is working to fix these issues, but they need your help testing it, reporting found problems, and collaborating on the LiveCD development.
Please, send your LFS LiveCD reports or development help collaborations to the LFS LiveCD mailing list.
Chapter 2 of this book describes how to create a new Linux native partition and file system, the place where the new LFS system will be compiled and installed. Chapter 3 explains which packages and patches need to be downloaded to build an LFS system and how to store them on the new file system. Chapter 4 discusses the setup of an appropriate working environment. Please read Chapter 4 carefully as it explains several important issues the reader should be aware of before beginning to work through Chapter 5 and beyond.
Chapter 5 explains the installation of a number of packages that will form the basic development suite (or toolchain) which is used to build the actual system in Chapter 6. Some of these packages are needed to resolve circular dependencies—for example, to compile a compiler, you need a compiler.
Chapter 5 also shows the user how to build a first pass of the toolchain, including Binutils and GCC (first pass basically means these two core packages will be reinstalled). The next step is to build Glibc, the C library. Glibc will be compiled by the toolchain programs built in the first pass. Then, a second pass of the toolchain will be built. This time, the toolchain will be dynamically linked against the newly built Glibc. The remaining Chapter 5 packages are built using this second pass toolchain. When this is done, the LFS installation process will no longer depend on the host distribution, with the exception of the running kernel.
This effort to isolate the new system from the host distribution may seem excessive, but a full technical explanation is provided in Section 5.2, “Toolchain Technical Notes”.
In Chapter 6, the full LFS system is built. The chroot (change root) program is used to enter a virtual environment and start a new shell whose root directory will be set to the LFS partition. This is very similar to rebooting and instructing the kernel to mount the LFS partition as the root partition. The system does not actually reboot, but instead chroot's because creating a bootable system requires additional work which is not necessary just yet. The major advantage is that “chrooting” allows the builder to continue using the host while LFS is being built. While waiting for package compilation to complete, a user can switch to a different virtual console (VC) or X desktop and continue using the computer as normal.
To finish the installation, the LFS-Bootscripts are set up in Chapter 7, and the kernel and boot loader are set up in Chapter 8. Chapter 9 contains information on furthering the LFS experience beyond this book. After the steps in this book have been implemented, the computer will be ready to reboot into the new LFS system.
This is the process in a nutshell. Detailed information on each step is discussed in the following chapters and package descriptions. Items that may seem complicated will be clarified, and everything will fall into place as the reader embarks on the LFS adventure.
Below is a list of package updates made since the previous release of the book.
Upgraded to:
Autoconf 2.61
Automake 1.10
Bash 3.2
Berkeley DB 4.5.20
Binutils 2.17
Bison 2.3
Bzip2 1.0.4
Coreutils 6.9
E2fsprogs 1.40.2
File 4.21
Findutils 4.2.31
GCC 4.1.2
Gettext 0.16.1
Glibc 2.5.1
Groff 1.18.1.4
Gzip 1.3.12
IANA-Etc 2.20
Inetutils 1.5
IPRoute2 2.6.20-070313
Less 406
LFS-Bootscripts 6.3
Libtool 1.5.24
Linux 2.6.22.5
M4 1.4.10
Make 3.81
Man-pages 2.63
Ncurses 5.6
Procps 3.2.7
Psmisc 22.5
Readline 5.2
Shadow 4.0.18.1
Tar 1.18
TCL 8.4.15
Texinfo 4.9
Udev 113
udev-config-6.3
Vim 7.1
Added:
bash-3.2-fixes-5.patch
db-4.5.20-fixes-1.patch
inetutils-1.5-no_server_man_pages-2.patch
ncurses-5.6-coverity_fixes-1.patch
readline-5.2-fixes-3.patch
util-linux-2.12r-lseek-1.patch
vim-7.1-fixes-1.patch
Removed:
bash-3.1-fixes-8.patch
db-4.4.20-fixes-1.patch
glibc-2.3.6-inotify-1.patch
glibc-2.3.6-linux_types-1.patch
gzip-1.3.5-security_fixes-1.patch
inetutils-gcc4_fixes-3.patch
inetutils-no_server_man_pages-1.patch
less-394-signal_fix-1.patch
linux-2.6.17.13-utf8_input-1.patch
Linux-libc-headers 2.6.12.0
ncurses-5.5-fixes-1.patch
readline-5.1-fixes-3.patch
tar-1.15.1-gcc4_fix_tests-1.patch
tar-1.15.1-security_fixes-1.patch
tar-1.15.1-sparse_fix-1.patch
vim-7.0-fixes-7.patch
This is version 6.3 of the Linux From Scratch book, dated August 28, 2007. If this book is more than six months old, a newer and better version is probably already available. To find out, please check one of the mirrors via http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/mirrors.html.
Below is a list of changes made since the previous release of the book.
Changelog Entries:
2007-08-28
[bdubbs] - LFS-6.3 released.
2007-08-27
[dnicholson] - Changed the Shadow download URL to a more stable location.
[dnicholson] - Updated the acknowledgements page again.
[bdubbs] - Upgrade to Linux-2.6.22.5. Fixes #2065.
2007-08-21
[bdubbs] - Upgrade to Linux-2.6.22.4. Fixes #2064.
2007-08-20
[bdubbs] - Add man-db fixes patch.
2007-08-19
[bdubbs] - Upgrade to Linux-2.6.22.3, fixes #2060.
[bdubbs] - Updated acknowledgements.
2007-08-13
[dnicholson] - Updated to LFS-Bootscripts-20070813.
2007-08-11
[dnicholson] - Changed the Bash testsuite standard input fix to only affect the necessary test script.
[bdubbs] - Created LFS 6.3-rc-2..
[bdubbs] - Upgrade to Linux-2.6.22.2, fixes #2059.
2007-08-08
[dnicholson] - Clarify the description of the Udev persistent network rules file.
[dnicholson] - Redirected /dev/tty to standard input when
running the Bash testsuite to prevent errors with
terminal permissions.
2007-08-07
[dnicholson] - Added the --disable-werror
parameter to Binutils Pass 1.
2007-08-06
[dnicholson] - Fixed a typo and clarified text on the Perl page. Reported by Shawn.
2007-07-31
[dnicholson] - Updated to glibc-2.5.1.
[dnicholson] - Updated udev-config rules to 20070731 to work with Linux-2.6.22.
2007-07-30
[dnicholson] - Updated LFS-Bootscripts to 20070730 and added the description for the new consolelog script.
2007-07-26
[bdubbs] - Adjust grep patteren in Ch. 6 gcc to only match desired output.
2007-07-24
[dnicholson] - Fix the Ncurses' library install to remove a symbolic link before writing a linker script to that location. Reported by Lieven De Keyzer.
[bdubbs] - Created LFS 6.3-rc-1.
[dnicholson] - Remove inconsistent uses of && from the book.
2007-07-23
[bdubbs] - Upgrade to Man-Pages-2.63, fixes #2050.
[dnicholson] - Added `echo' to the Essential Symlinks section as it is needed for the Glibc testsuite.
[dnicholson] - Added a known failing test to the Ch. 6 Glibc page.
2007-07-18
[dnicholson] - Described the configuration of the consolelog bootscript.
2007-07-17
[matthew] - Upgrade to Man-Pages-2.62, fixes #2049.
[matthew] - Upgrade to M4-1.4.10, fixes #2048.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Linux-2.6.22.1, fixes #2044.
[matthew] - Upgrade to E2fsprogs-1.40.2, fixes #2042. Remove the --disable-evms configure parameter as it is no longer recognised by the configure script.
2007-07-14
[dnicholson] - Updated the Glibc Branch Update patch to a new snapshot from upstream.
[dnicholson] - Made the Linux API Headers install safer by using an intermediate directory.
2007-07-06
[manuel] - Updated the stylesheets and Makefile to use the new XSL code and Fop-0.93.
2007-06-30
[matthew] - Add upstream patches for Vim.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Udev-113, fixes #2040.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Texinfo-4.9, fixes #2041.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Tar-1.18, fixes #2039.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Libtool-1.5.24, fixes #2038.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Less-406, fixes #2036.
[alexander] - Updated inetutils MD5 sum. Upstream has re-released the tarball with the only changes being relicensing under GPLv3 or later, and re-autotooling.
2007-06-29
[alexander] - Use stable download location for Man-Pages.
2007-06-28
[dnicholson] - Upgrade to Man-Pages-2.60, fixes #2035.
2007-06-17
2007-06-12
2007-06-10
2007-06-06
[manuel] - Adjusted locale settings for Bash testsuite run and kernel make menuconfig command. Fixes #1938.
2007-06-05
2007-05-13
2007-05-07
[dnicholson] - Fixed the toolchain sanity check after GCC to reference the /usr/local/include directory. Thanks to David Murphy for the report.
2007-05-05
[matthew] - Incorporate latest upstream patches for Vim.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Udev-110. Fixes #1992.
[matthew] - Incorporate latest upstream patches for Readline.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Psmisc-22.5. Fixes #1991.
[matthew] - Add a patch from upstream to fix issues in Ncurses found by the Coverity static code analysis tool. Fixes #1995.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Man-pages-2.46. Fixes #1994.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Linux-2.6.21.1. Fixes #1993.
[matthew] - Incorporate latest upstream patches for Bash.
2007-04-20
[dnicholson] - Upgrade to LFS-Bootscripts-20070420.
2007-04-16
[matthew] - Increase the version of Bison required on host systems to 1.875. Bash doesn't work correctly with versions less than that. Fixes #1977.
[matthew] - Change all references to /etc/adjtime in the Util-Linux
sources to /var/lib/hwclock/adjtime.
Previously, only hwclock/hwclock.c was changed,
which meant that man pages contained references to
the non-FHS compliant location. Fixes #1984.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Udev-108. Fixes #1976.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Man-pages-2.44. Fixes #1987.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Man-db-2.4.4. Fixes #1975.
[matthew] - Upgrade to M4-1.4.9. Fixes #1983.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Linux-2.6.20.7. Fixes #1986.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Gzip-1.3.12. Fixes #1989.
[matthew] - Remove File's reg_startend patch. It is not necessary on Glibc-based systems. Thanks to Greg Schafer for the report.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Coreutils-6.9. Fixes #1982.
2007-04-03
[jhuntwork] - Install su from coreutils in chapter 5 as su-tools. Use su-tools to run test suites from coreutils and bash as user nobody. Fixes #1877.
2007-04-01
[jhuntwork] - Upgraded to linux-2.6.20.4. Updated linux-headers instructions in chapter 5 to match instructions in chapter 6. The INSTALL_HDR_PATH is no longer forcibly removed.
2007-03-27
[dnicholson] - Fixed a typo in the readjusting section. Reported by Steve Crosby.
2007-03-24
[dnicholson] - Upgrade the Bash fixes patch to include the latest 011-015 patches from upstream.
[dnicholson] - Upgrade the Readline fixes patch to include the latest 002 patch from upstream.
2007-03-23
[dnicholson] - Don't install the kernel headers in
/usr/include/scsi as
the ones provided by Glibc are preferred.
[dnicholson] - Force ldd to use /bin/bash since it contains Bash-specific syntax.
[dnicholson] - When readjusting the GCC specs file, ensure that GCC will search for the system headers in /usr/include. An addition to the toolchain sanity checks has been made to test this. This fix originates from DIY Linux.
[dnicholson] - Included the branch update patch for the temporary Glibc in Chapter 5 to help minimize differences with the final Glibc.
2007-03-21
[manuel] - Updated book sources to use DocBook-XML DTD 4.5.
2007-03-19
[matthew] - Change the default home directory for
new users and do not create mail spool files for
them. Add a mail
group so that if Shadow is configured to create
mail spool files for new users, it can do so
without issuing a warning.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Shadow-4.0.18.1. Fixes #1850
[matthew] - Upgrade to Linux-2.6.20.3. Fixes #1971
[matthew] - Upgrade to IPRoute2-2.6.20-070313. Fixes #1974
[matthew] - Upgrade the Bash fixes patch to include the latest patch from upstream. Fixes #1973
2007-03-14
[dnicholson] - Force the host's linker to be used throughout Binutils-Pass1 and GCC-Pass1. This makes the build more robust since the host's compiler may not be compatible with the linker installed in Binutils-Pass1, such as on newer Fedora hosts. Fix originates from DIY Linux.
2007-03-04
[matthew] - Make mention of the Ncurses testsuite. Fixes #1954
[matthew] - Upgrade to Vim-7.0-fixes-15.patch which includes all upstream patches up to 206.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Udev-106 and udev-config-20070304. Fixes #1969
[matthew] - Upgrade to Findutils-4.2.30. Fixes #1967
[matthew] - Upgrade to File-4.20. Fixes #1968
2007-03-1
[jhuntwork] - Minor grammatical changes. Move some warnings and notices to appear before affected commands.
2007-02-25
[manuel] - Removed M4 build from Chapter05. No other packages builts before the build of M4 in chapter06 depends on M4.
2007-02-24
[manuel] - Removed obsolete warning about reinstalling Bzip2. Thanks to Chris Staub for the report and patch.
[manuel] - Removed chmod and chown commands from linux headers installation. The headers are now installed with the proper permissions. Fixes #1965
[matthew] - Upgrade to Linux-2.6.20.1. Fixes #1964
[matthew] - Add an upstream patch for Glibc. Fixes #1930
[matthew] - Upgrade to GCC-4.1.2. Fixes #1960
[matthew] - Add an upstream patch for Berkeley-DB. Fixes #1961
[dnicholson] - Added missing command descriptions for cpan and prove from the Perl package. Reported by Leonhard Landrock.
2007-02-23
[dnicholson] - Removed /usr/local/man lines from man_db.conf to prevent redundant results. Reported by Chris Staub.
[dnicholson] - Applied a patch from Chris Staub to fix some commands and text on the kernel file systems, E2fsprogs and Autoconf pages.
[dnicholson] - Dropped the -D switch from the Udev documentation install command since it is already created by udev-config. Reported by Chris Staub.
[dnicholson] - Corrected the text about Udev not installing any configuration files. Reported by Chris Staub.
[dnicholson] - Removed the text suggesting that you can edit the specs file by hand in the toolchain adjustment since it's only generated if you run the previous commands. Reported by Chris Staub.
2007-02-20
[bryan] - Add a comment about CD symlinks possibly not matching the host in section 7.12.2. Should fix the rest of #1963.
2007-02-18
[bryan] - Fix obsolete syntax used in the example Udev rules in section 7.12.2. Fixes the easy part of #1963. Also re-add the note about the backslash at the end of the udev rule lines.
2007-02-17
[bryan] - Use upstream's rule_generator rules exclusively for NIC naming, and generate the rules before configuring the network script, so the user knows what NIC names to use. Fixes the rest of #1912.
[bryan] - Change from writing CD symlink rules files directly to configuring the file installed by Udev's rule_generator. Fixes part of #1912.
[bryan] - Update contents of lfs-bootscripts.
2007-02-09
[matthew] - Move readlink to
/bin because
sysreadlink in Udev's
shell functions may call it before /usr has been mounted. Fixes
#1913
[matthew] - Remove some chmod and chown commands from DB, NCurses and Readline as they are no longer required with recent upstream versions. Fixes #1953
[matthew] - Upgrade to Udev-105. Fixes #1949
[matthew] - Upgrade to Gzip-1.3.11. Fixes #1951
2007-02-07
[ken] - Upgrade to Linux-2.6.20. Fixes #1950.
2007-02-03
[bryan] - Update to lfs-bootscripts-20070203. Fixes both #1948 and the udev_retry script.
2007-01-31
[matthew] - Add verbose flags when untarring the glibc-libidn and udev-config tarballs. Fixes #1932.
[matthew] - Do not set/export INPUTRC anymore, as it is not required after upgrading to Readline-5.2. Fixes #1942. Thanks to Alexander Patrakov for the report and fix.
[matthew] - Include a patch from the Readline maintainer to fix a multibyte-related issue. Fixes #1945
[matthew] - Include more upstream fixes from the Bash maintainer in bash-3.2-fixes-2.patch
[matthew] - Upgrade to Udev-104. Fixes #1941
[matthew] - Upgrade to Ncurses-5.6. Fixes #1940
[matthew] - Upgrade to Linux-2.6.19.2. Fixes #1928
[matthew] - Upgrade to Iproute2-2.6.19-061214. Fixes #1936
[matthew] - Upgrade to Gzip-1.3.10. Fixes #1924
[matthew] - Upgrade to Gettext-0.16.1. Fixes #1925
[matthew] - Upgrade to Findutils-4.2.29. Fixes #1923.
[matthew] - Upgrade to File-4.19. Fixes #1946.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Coreutils-6.7. Fixes #1934.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Bzip2-1.0.4. Fixes #1943.
2007-01-13
2006-12-09
[bryan] - Fix /etc/passwd entry for "nobody" user in chapter 6. Fixes #1931; thanks to Robert Connolly for the report.
2006-12-01
[matthew] - Fix an ICA breakage in E2fsprogs. Sed
needs to be built before E2fsprogs and a hardcoded
reference to /bin/rm
needs to be changed to point to /tools/bin/rm instead. Thanks to
Greg Schafer for the report and fix.
2006-11-25
[jhuntwork] - Add a cautionary note to the end of chapter 5. Archiving of the temporary tools for future use should take place before starting chapter 6. Fixes #1879
[matthew] - Move mv from
/usr/bin to
/bin again. The
upgrade to Coreutils-6.6 mistakenly removed it from
the list of files to be moved. Thanks to Chris
Staub for the report.
[matthew] - Prevent Inetutils from building and installing ifconfig as LFS uses ip to configure network interfaces. Thanks to Marty Jack for the report and the fix. Fixes #1914
[jhuntwork] - Fix potential corruption of the testsuite tools by forcing expect to always use /bin/stty and not /usr/local/bin/stty. Fixes #1892
[matthew] - Upgrade to Man-pages-2.42. Fixes #1922
[matthew] - Upgrade to Inetutils-no_server_man_pages-2.patch. This removes the last of the unwanted man pages (rexecd.8). Thanks to Joe Ciccone for the report and the updated patch. Fixes #1915
[jhuntwork] - Added 'make headers_install' to chapter 5 Linux Headers for the educational value and in preparation of changes in Linux-2.6.19. See this thread.
[matthew] - Upgrade to M4-1.4.8. Fixes 1920
[matthew] - Upgrade to Linux-2.6.18.3. Fixes #1911
[matthew] - chapter08/kernel.xml: Reworded the warning about overwriting sanitized kernel headers rather than raw headers, so as to avoid mentioning the now obsolete Linux-Libc-Headers package. Fixes #1917
[matthew] - Upgrade to IANA-Etc-2.20. Fixes #1916
[matthew] - Upgrade to File-4.18. Fixes #1910
[matthew] - Upgrade to Coreutils-6.6. Fixes #1919
[matthew] - Add Bison to the host requirements as it is required by bash-3.2-fixes-5.patch in chapter 5 (Fixes #1863).
[matthew] - Use all 5 of the patches currently supplied by the upstream maintainers of Bash.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Autoconf-2.61. Fixes #1918.
2006-11-24
[jhuntwork] - Simplified the installation of Linux Headers in Chapter 5.
2006-11-10
[bryan] - Use 70-persistent-*.rules for custom symlinks and NIC naming, and add ENV{GENERATED} to the CD symlink rule. Gets #1912 closer to really being fixed.
2006-11-05
[bryan] - Delete the persistent-net-generator rules file if bus-position-based persistence is going to be used. Fixes #1912.
2006-11-03
[matthew] - Use version entities from packages.ent rather than
hardcoded values in the note in chapter03/packages.xml. Remove
the warning about potential incompatibilities with
the bootscripts. Thanks to Rainer Wirtz for the
report.
2006-10-29
[matthew] - Add verbose flags to some commands in Util-Linux and Vim. Thanks to Robert Connolly for the report.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Vim-7.0-fixes-14.patch. Drop the "spellfile" fix as it was applied upstream as patch 076.
2006-10-28
[matthew] - Upgrade to TCL-8.4.14.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Tar-1.16, including dropping the now unnecessary "gcc4", "security", and "sparse" patches.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Readline-5.2, including dropping the now unnecessary "fixes" patch.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Man-Pages-2.41.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Linux-2.6.18.1.
[matthew] - Fix a bug in Less whereby the
sigset_t type is not
detected by the configure script,
which causes sigsetmask to be used instead of
the preferred sigprocmask function. Thanks to
Robert Connolly for the report and patch.
[matthew] - Upgrade to IPRoute2-2.6.18-20061002.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Inetutils-1.5, including dropping the now unnecessary "GCC 4 fixes" patch.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Groff-1.18.1.4.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Gettext-0.16.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Berkeley DB-4.5.20, including dropping the now unnecessary "fixes" patch.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Coreutils-6.4.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Bash-3.2, including dropping the current "fixes" patch and adding a patch from upstream that fixes a bug when parsing comments.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Automake-1.10.
2006-10-23
[bryan] - Add an explanation of how to discover PCI bus locations for network devices. Fixes #1904.
2006-10-21
[bryan] - Upgrade to udev-103.
[bryan] - Upgrade to udev-config-20061021, install its doc files.
[bryan] - Install common rules from udev package.
2006-10-15
[dnicholson] - Fixed console setup page to reference the correct location for the kbd data. Thanks to Norman Urs Baier for reporting the issue.
[bryan] - Upgrade to udev-102, remove patch.
[bryan] - Upgrade to udev-config-20061014.
2006-10-05
[bryan] - Add udev-101-fix-sas-path_id-1.patch.
[bryan] - Update udev-config for Linux-2.6.18. This version also contains the new doc/ subdirectory, with explanations of most of the rules.
2006-10-02
[matthew] - Upgrade to Texinfo-4.8a.
[matthew] - Updated the text regarding UTF-8 support in the latest version of Linux. Thanks to Alexander Patrakov for the patch.
[matthew] - Remove Linux-Libc-Headers, replacing it with the "make headers_install" target now available in the upstream kernel sources.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Udev-101.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Psmisc-22.3.
[matthew] - Upgrade to M4-1.4.7.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Linux-2.6.18.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Glibc-2.5.
[matthew] - Upgrade to Coreutils-6.3.
2006-09-23
[bryan] - Fixed typo in udev-100 instructions (extra/ should be extras/). Thanks to Balazs Parkanyi for the heads-up.
2006-09-22
[bryan] - Rewrote the notes in sections 7.12.1 and 7.13.1 to explicitly mention that the redirections rely on not quoting EOF. Fixes #1883.
2006-09-20
[bryan] - Updated udev-config for udev-098 and above.
[dnicholson] - Changed note about using newer Linux than in the book to reflect current versions.
2006-09-18
[dnicholson] - Added symlinks to the temporary libstdc++ in the Essential Symlinks section. These are needed by Glibc-2.4.
2006-09-17
[dnicholson] - Updated to Glibc-2.4. Added the iconv fix patch and removed the decprecated linux types and inotify syscall patches. Thanks to Matthew Burgess and Bryan Kadzban for textual suggestions.
2006-09-09
[matthew] - Fix non-POSIX syntax in gzexe's calls to tail. Fixes #1876. Thanks to Robert Connolly for the report.
[matthew] - Upgrade to linux-2.6.17.13.
[matthew] - Upgrade to m4-1.4.6.
2006-09-06
[bryan] - Change the sed applied to sysvinit, to hopefully be more clear (explicitly mention /etc/inittab).
2006-08-31
[matthew] - Remove spurious curly braces from the example /etc/resolv.conf. Fixes #1870.
2006-08-24
[matthew] - Remove the supposed fix for a buffer overflow in Coreutils, as it has been fixed upstream.
2006-08-17
[matthew] - Simplified the command that adjusts GCC's specs file. Fixes #1837. Thanks to Robery Connolly.
[matthew] - Noted devfs' removal from the kernel. Thanks to Peter Ennis.
[matthew] - Upgrade to linux-2.6.17.8.
[matthew] - Upgrade to udev-097.
[matthew] - Upgrade to findutils-4.2.28.
[matthew] - Upgrade to man-pages-2.39.
[matthew] - Fix autoconf's testsuite, which broke after upgrading to m4-1.4.5. Thanks to Greg Schafer for the report.
[matthew] - Fix a buffer overrun in m4-1.4.5 which causes two of its tests to fail. Thanks to Greg Schafer for the report.
2006-08-08
[dnicholson] - Minor text updates to the Vim page. Thanks to Peter Ennis for the report.
2006-08-05
[matthew] - Add a link to the location of Shadow's previous versions.
2006-08-03
[manuel] - Ported updates from 6.2 branch.
2006-07-31
[matthew] - Upgrade to shadow-4.0.17.
[matthew] - Upgrade to procps-3.2.7.
[matthew] - Upgrade to man-pages-2.36.
[matthew] - Upgrade to make-3.81.
[matthew] - Upgrade to m4-1.4.5.
[matthew] - Upgrade to gettext-0.15.
[matthew] - Upgrade to gcc-4.1.1.
[matthew] - Upgrade to coreutils-5.97.
[matthew] - Upgrade to bison-2.3.
[matthew] - Upgrade to binutils-2.17.
[matthew] - Upgrade to autoconf-2.60.
LFS 6.2 released August 3, 2006.
If during the building of the LFS system you encounter any errors, have any questions, or think there is a typo in the book, please start by consulting the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) that is located at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/faq/.
The linuxfromscratch.org server
hosts a number of mailing lists used for the development of
the LFS project. These lists include the main development and
support lists, among others. If the FAQ does not solve the
problem you are having, the next step would be to search the
mailing lists at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/search.html.
For information on the different lists, how to subscribe, archive locations, and additional information, visit http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/mail.html.
Several members of the LFS community offer assistance on our
community Internet Relay Chat (IRC) network. Before using
this support, please make sure that your question is not
already answered in the LFS FAQ or the mailing list archives.
You can find the IRC network at irc.linuxfromscratch.org. The support channel is
named #LFS-support.
For additional information on the packages, useful tips are available in the LFS Package Reference page located at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/~matthew/LFS-references.html.
The LFS project has a number of world-wide mirrors to make accessing the website and downloading the required packages more convenient. Please visit the LFS website at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/mirrors.html for a list of current mirrors.
If an issue or a question is encountered while working through this book, check the FAQ page at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/faq/#generalfaq. Questions are often already answered there. If your question is not answered on this page, try to find the source of the problem. The following hint will give you some guidance for troubleshooting: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/errors.txt.
If you cannot find your problem listed in the FAQ, search the mailing lists at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/search.html.
We also have a wonderful LFS community that is willing to offer assistance through the mailing lists and IRC (see the Section 1.4, “Resources” section of this book). However, we get several support questions every day and many of them can be easily answered by going to the FAQ and by searching the mailing lists first. So, for us to offer the best assistance possible, you need to do some research on your own first. That allows us to focus on the more unusual support needs. If your searches do not produce a solution, please include all relevant information (mentioned below) in your request for help.
Apart from a brief explanation of the problem being experienced, the essential things to include in any request for help are:
The version of the book being used (in this case 6.3)
The host distribution and version being used to create LFS
The package or section the problem was encountered in
The exact error message or symptom being received
Note whether you have deviated from the book at all
Deviating from this book does not mean that we will not help you. After all, LFS is about personal preference. Being upfront about any changes to the established procedure helps us evaluate and determine possible causes of your problem.
If something goes wrong while running the configure script, review
the config.log file. This file
may contain errors encountered during configure which were not
printed to the screen. Include the relevant lines if you need to ask
for help.
Both the screen output and the contents of various files are useful in determining the cause of compilation problems. The screen output from the configure script and the make run can be helpful. It is not necessary to include the entire output, but do include enough of the relevant information. Below is an example of the type of information to include from the screen output from make:
gcc -DALIASPATH=\"/mnt/lfs/usr/share/locale:.\"
-DLOCALEDIR=\"/mnt/lfs/usr/share/locale\"
-DLIBDIR=\"/mnt/lfs/usr/lib\"
-DINCLUDEDIR=\"/mnt/lfs/usr/include\" -DHAVE_CONFIG_H -I. -I.
-g -O2 -c getopt1.c
gcc -g -O2 -static -o make ar.o arscan.o commands.o dir.o
expand.o file.o function.o getopt.o implicit.o job.o main.o
misc.o read.o remake.o rule.o signame.o variable.o vpath.o
default.o remote-stub.o version.o opt1.o
-lutil job.o: In function `load_too_high':
/lfs/tmp/make-3.79.1/job.c:1565: undefined reference
to `getloadavg'
collect2: ld returned 1 exit status
make[2]: *** [make] Error 1
make[2]: Leaving directory `/lfs/tmp/make-3.79.1'
make[1]: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
make[1]: Leaving directory `/lfs/tmp/make-3.79.1'
make: *** [all-recursive-am] Error 2In this case, many people would just include the bottom section:
make [2]: *** [make] Error 1This is not enough information to properly diagnose the problem because it only notes that something went wrong, not what went wrong. The entire section, as in the example above, is what should be saved because it includes the command that was executed and the associated error message(s).
An excellent article about asking for help on the Internet is available online at http://catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html. Read and follow the hints in this document to increase the likelihood of getting the help you need.
In this chapter, the partition which will host the LFS system is prepared. We will create the partition itself, create a file system on it, and mount it.
Like most other operating systems, LFS is usually installed on a dedicated partition. The recommended approach to building an LFS system is to use an available empty partition or, if you have enough unpartitioned space, to create one. However, an LFS system (in fact even multiple LFS systems) may also be installed on a partition already occupied by another operating system and the different systems will co-exist peacefully. The document http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/lfs_next_to_existing_systems.txt explains how to implement this, whereas this book discusses the method of using a fresh partition for the installation.
A minimal system requires a partition of around 1.3 gigabytes (GB). This is enough to store all the source tarballs and compile the packages. However, if the LFS system is intended to be the primary Linux system, additional software will probably be installed which will require additional space (2-3 GB). The LFS system itself will not take up this much room. A large portion of this requirement is to provide sufficient free temporary storage. Compiling packages can require a lot of disk space which will be reclaimed after the package is installed.
Because there is not always enough Random Access Memory (RAM)
available for compilation processes, it is a good idea to use a
small disk partition as swap
space. This is used by the kernel to store seldom-used data and
leave more memory available for active processes. The
swap partition for an LFS
system can be the same as the one used by the host system, in
which case it is not necessary to create another one.
Start a disk partitioning program such as cfdisk or fdisk with a command line
option naming the hard disk on which the new partition will be
created—for example /dev/hda for the primary Integrated Drive
Electronics (IDE) disk. Create a Linux native partition and a
swap partition, if needed.
Please refer to cfdisk(8) or
fdisk(8) if you do not yet know
how to use the programs.
Remember the designation of the new partition (e.g.,
hda5). This book will refer to
this as the LFS partition. Also remember the designation of the
swap partition. These names
will be needed later for the /etc/fstab file.
Now that a blank partition has been set up, the file system can
be created. The most widely-used system in the Linux world is
the second extended file system (ext2), but with newer high-capacity hard
disks, journaling file systems are becoming increasingly
popular. The third extended filesystem (ext3) is a widely used enhancement to
ext2, which adds journalling
capabilities and is compatible with the E2fsprogs utilities. We
will create an ext3 file
system. Instructions for creating other file systems can be
found at
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/postlfs/filesystems.html.
To create an ext3 file system
on the LFS partition, run the following:
mke2fs -jv /dev/<xxx>
Replace <xxx>
with the name of the LFS partition (hda5 in our previous example).
Some host distributions use custom features in their filesystem creation tools (E2fsprogs). This can cause problems when booting into your new LFS in Chapter 9, as those features will not be supported by the LFS-installed E2fsprogs; you will get an error similar to “unsupported filesystem features, upgrade your e2fsprogs”. To check if your host system uses custom enhancements, run the following command:
debugfs -R feature /dev/<xxx>
If the output contains features other than has_journal, dir_index, filetype, large_file, resize_inode, sparse_super or needs_recovery, then your host system may
have custom enhancements. In that case, to avoid later
problems, you should compile the stock E2fsprogs package and
use the resulting binaries to re-create the filesystem on
your LFS partition:
cd /tmp
tar -xjvf /path/to/sources/e2fsprogs-1.40.2.tar.bz2
cd e2fsprogs-1.40.2
mkdir -v build
cd build
../configure
make #note that we intentionally don't 'make install' here!
./misc/mke2fs -jv /dev/<xxx>
cd /tmp
rm -rfv e2fsprogs-1.40.2
If you are using an existing swap partition, there is no need to format
it. If a new swap partition was
created, it will need to be initialized with this command:
mkswap /dev/<yyy>
Replace <yyy>
with the name of the swap
partition.
Now that a file system has been created, the partition needs to
be made accessible. In order to do this, the partition needs to
be mounted at a chosen mount point. For the purposes of this
book, it is assumed that the file system is mounted under
/mnt/lfs, but the directory
choice is up to you.
Choose a mount point and assign it to the LFS environment variable by running:
export LFS=/mnt/lfs
Next, create the mount point and mount the LFS file system by running:
mkdir -pv $LFS
mount -v -t ext3 /dev/<xxx> $LFS
Replace <xxx>
with the designation of the LFS partition.
If using multiple partitions for LFS (e.g., one for
/ and another for /usr), mount them using:
mkdir -pv $LFS mount -v -t ext3 /dev/<xxx>$LFS mkdir -v $LFS/usr mount -v -t ext3 /dev/<yyy>$LFS/usr
Replace <xxx>
and <yyy> with
the appropriate partition names.
Ensure that this new partition is not mounted with permissions
that are too restrictive (such as the nosuid, nodev, or
noatime options). Run the
mount command
without any parameters to see what options are set for the
mounted LFS partition. If nosuid,
nodev, and/or noatime are set, the partition will need to be
remounted.
If you are using a swap
partition, ensure that it is enabled using the swapon command:
/sbin/swapon -v /dev/<zzz>
Replace <zzz>
with the name of the swap
partition.
Now that there is an established place to work, it is time to download the packages.
This chapter includes a list of packages that need to be downloaded in order to build a basic Linux system. The listed version numbers correspond to versions of the software that are known to work, and this book is based on their use. We highly recommend against using newer versions because the build commands for one version may not work with a newer version. The newest package versions may also have problems that require work-arounds. These work-arounds will be developed and stabilized in the development version of the book.
Download locations may not always be accessible. If a download location has changed since this book was published, Google (http://www.google.com/) provides a useful search engine for most packages. If this search is unsuccessful, try one of the alternative means of downloading discussed at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/packages.html.
Downloaded packages and patches will need to be stored
somewhere that is conveniently available throughout the entire
build. A working directory is also required to unpack the
sources and build them. $LFS/sources can be used both as the place to
store the tarballs and patches and as a working directory. By
using this directory, the required elements will be located on
the LFS partition and will be available during all stages of
the building process.
To create this directory, execute the following command, as
user root, before starting the
download session:
mkdir -v $LFS/sources
Make this directory writable and sticky. “Sticky” means that even if multiple users have write permission on a directory, only the owner of a file can delete the file within a sticky directory. The following command will enable the write and sticky modes:
chmod -v a+wt $LFS/sources
Download or otherwise obtain the following packages:
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/autoconf/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/autoconf/autoconf-2.61.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: 36d3fe706ad0950f1be10c46a429efe0
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/automake/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/automake/automake-1.10.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: 0e2e0f757f9e1e89b66033905860fded
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/bash/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/bash/bash-3.2.tar.gz
MD5 sum: 00bfa16d58e034e3c2aa27f390390d30
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/bash/bash-doc-3.2.tar.gz
MD5 sum: 0e904cb46ca873fcfa65df19b024bec9
Home page: http://www.oracle.com/technology/software/products/berkeley-db/index.html
Download: http://download-east.oracle.com/berkeley-db/db-4.5.20.tar.gz
MD5 sum: b0f1c777708cb8e9d37fb47e7ed3312d
Home page: http://sources.redhat.com/binutils/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/binutils/binutils-2.17.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: e26e2e06b6e4bf3acf1dc8688a94c0d1
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/bison/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/bison/bison-2.3.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: c18640c6ec31a169d351e3117ecce3ec
Home page: http://www.bzip.org/
Download: http://www.bzip.org/1.0.4/bzip2-1.0.4.tar.gz
MD5 sum: fc310b254f6ba5fbb5da018f04533688
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/coreutils/coreutils-6.9.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: c9607d8495f16e98906e7ed2d9751a06
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/dejagnu/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/dejagnu/dejagnu-1.4.4.tar.gz
MD5 sum: 053f18fd5d00873de365413cab17a666
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/diffutils/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/diffutils/diffutils-2.8.1.tar.gz
MD5 sum: 71f9c5ae19b60608f6c7f162da86a428
Home page: http://e2fsprogs.sourceforge.net/
Download: http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/e2fsprogs/e2fsprogs-1.40.2.tar.gz
MD5 sum: 130ce559a0f311ea2bc04a47b4982d0a
Home page: http://expect.nist.gov/
Download: http://expect.nist.gov/src/expect-5.43.0.tar.gz
MD5 sum: 43e1dc0e0bc9492cf2e1a6f59f276bc3
Download: ftp://ftp.gw.com/mirrors/pub/unix/file/file-4.21.tar.gz
MD5 sum: 9e3503116f4269a1be70220ee2234b0e
File (4.21) may no longer be available at the listed location. The site administrators of the master download location occasionally remove older versions when new ones are released. An alternative download location that may have the correct version available can also be found at: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/download.html#ftp.
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/findutils/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/findutils/findutils-4.2.31.tar.gz
MD5 sum: a0e31a0f18a49709bf5a449867c8049a
Home page: http://flex.sourceforge.net
Download: http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/flex/flex-2.5.33.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: 343374a00b38d9e39d1158b71af37150
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/gawk/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gawk/gawk-3.1.5.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: 5703f72d0eea1d463f735aad8222655f
Home page: http://gcc.gnu.org/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gcc/gcc-4.1.2/gcc-4.1.2.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: a4a3eb15c96030906d8494959eeda23c
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/gettext/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gettext/gettext-0.16.1.tar.gz
MD5 sum: 3d9ad24301c6d6b17ec30704a13fe127
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/libc/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/glibc/glibc-2.5.1.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: 10ea72e2c4d56c6aa13dabb7c4f9b195
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/glibc/glibc-libidn-2.5.1.tar.gz
MD5 sum: 51b46f055908a5f8e409c4200d828093
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/grep/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/grep/grep-2.5.1a.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: 52202fe462770fa6be1bb667bd6cf30c
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/groff/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/groff/groff-1.18.1.4.tar.gz
MD5 sum: ceecb81533936d251ed015f40e5f7287
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/
Download: ftp://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/grub/grub-0.97.tar.gz
MD5 sum: cd3f3eb54446be6003156158d51f4884
Home page: http://www.gzip.org/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gzip/gzip-1.3.12.tar.gz
MD5 sum: b5bac2d21840ae077e0217bc5e4845b1
Home page: http://www.sethwklein.net/projects/iana-etc/
Download: http://www.sethwklein.net/projects/iana-etc/downloads/iana-etc-2.20.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: 51d584b7b6115528c21e8ea32250f2b1
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/inetutils/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/inetutils/inetutils-1.5.tar.gz
MD5 sum: aeacd11d19bf25c89d4eff38346bdfb9
Home page: http://linux-net.osdl.org/index.php/Iproute2
Download: http://developer.osdl.org/dev/iproute2/download/iproute2-2.6.20-070313.tar.gz
MD5 sum: 7bc5883aadf740761fa2dd70b661e8cc
Download: http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kbd/kbd-1.12.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: 069d1175b4891343b107a8ac2b4a39f6
Home page: http://www.greenwoodsoftware.com/less/
Download: http://www.greenwoodsoftware.com/less/less-406.tar.gz
MD5 sum: c6062663b5be92dfcdfd6300ba0811e4
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/downloads/6.3/lfs-bootscripts-6.3.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: 462bca5b42e9b7eb313857e14c366340
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/libtool/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/libtool/libtool-1.5.24.tar.gz
MD5 sum: d0071c890101fcf4f2be8934a37841b0
Home page: http://www.kernel.org/
Download: http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.6/linux-2.6.22.5.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: f36616d74f2fde72040bccf50db03522
The Linux kernel is updated relatively often, many times due to discoveries of security vulnerabilities. The latest available 2.6.22.x kernel version should be used, unless the errata page says otherwise.
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/m4/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/m4/m4-1.4.10.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: 0a35bab2f5d605e08083d7e3cbd4b8b0
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/make/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/make/make-3.81.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: 354853e0b2da90c527e35aabb8d6f1e6
Home page: http://www.nongnu.org/man-db/
Download: http://savannah.nongnu.org/download/man-db/man-db-2.4.4.tar.gz
MD5 sum: 9d7952de1aeb9121497a8204c59c56d7
Download: http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/docs/manpages/Archive/man-pages-2.63.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: aeddbf93dbb0aeac1c8ad950e80aad54
Home page: http://www.mktemp.org/
Download: ftp://ftp.mktemp.org/pub/mktemp/mktemp-1.5.tar.gz
MD5 sum: 9a35c59502a228c6ce2be025fc6e3ff2
Home page: http://www.kerneltools.org/
Download: http://www.kerneltools.org/pub/downloads/module-init-tools/module-init-tools-3.2.2.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: a1ad0a09d3231673f70d631f3f5040e9
Home page: http://dickey.his.com/ncurses/
Download: ftp://invisible-island.net/ncurses/ncurses-5.6.tar.gz
MD5 sum: b6593abe1089d6aab1551c105c9300e3
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/patch/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/patch/patch-2.5.4.tar.gz
MD5 sum: ee5ae84d115f051d87fcaaef3b4ae782
Home page: http://www.perl.com/
Download: http://ftp.funet.fi/pub/CPAN/src/perl-5.8.8.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: a377c0c67ab43fd96eeec29ce19e8382
Home page: http://procps.sourceforge.net/
Download: http://procps.sourceforge.net/procps-3.2.7.tar.gz
MD5 sum: f490bca772b16472962c7b9f23b1e97d
Home page: http://psmisc.sourceforge.net/
Download: http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/psmisc/psmisc-22.5.tar.gz
MD5 sum: 09c20fd899c2c1bd2dce02a510f99fab
Home page: http://cnswww.cns.cwru.edu/php/chet/readline/rltop.html
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/readline/readline-5.2.tar.gz
MD5 sum: e39331f32ad14009b9ff49cc10c5e751
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/sed/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/sed/sed-4.1.5.tar.gz
MD5 sum: 7a1cbbbb3341287308e140bd4834c3ba
Download: http://anduin.linuxfromscratch.org/sources/LFS/lfs-packages/6.3/shadow-4.0.18.1.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: e7751d46ecf219c07ae0b028ab3335c6
Home page: http://www.infodrom.org/projects/sysklogd/
Download: http://www.infodrom.org/projects/sysklogd/download/sysklogd-1.4.1.tar.gz
MD5 sum: d214aa40beabf7bdb0c9b3c64432c774
Download: ftp://ftp.cistron.nl/pub/people/miquels/sysvinit/sysvinit-2.86.tar.gz
MD5 sum: 7d5d61c026122ab791ac04c8a84db967
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/tar/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/tar/tar-1.18.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: 70170208d7c1bb9ab40120579434b6a3
Home page: http://tcl.sourceforge.net/
Download: http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/tcl/tcl8.4.15-src.tar.gz
MD5 sum: 5e1b71eef1f75a294072aa3218f62b66
Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/texinfo/
Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/texinfo/texinfo-4.9.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: f4458e4b81e5469fa0815c35654141ab
Home page: http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/hotplug/udev.html
Download: http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/hotplug/udev-113.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: cb9a227206b9d85ae8cfc88fc51c1710
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/downloads/6.3/udev-config-6.3.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: d12ea80a5068df0e50306d787d197c62
Download: http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/util-linux-2.12r.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: af9d9e03038481fbf79ea3ac33f116f9
Home page: http://www.vim.org
Download: ftp://ftp.vim.org/pub/vim/unix/vim-7.1.tar.bz2
MD5 sum: 44c6b4914f38d6f9aa959640b89da329
Home page: http://www.vim.org
Download: ftp://ftp.vim.org/pub/vim/extra/vim-7.1-lang.tar.gz
MD5 sum: 144aa049ba70621acf4247f0459f3ee7
Home page: http://www.zlib.net/
Download: http://www.zlib.net/zlib-1.2.3.tar.gz
MD5 sum: debc62758716a169df9f62e6ab2bc634
Total size of these packages: about 197 MB
In addition to the packages, several patches are also required. These patches correct any mistakes in the packages that should be fixed by the maintainer. The patches also make small modifications to make the packages easier to work with. The following patches will be needed to build an LFS system:
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/bash-3.2-fixes-5.patch
MD5 sum: 70e2c3983575a8e82f8601a417e126f0
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/bzip2-1.0.4-install_docs-1.patch
MD5 sum: 6a5ac7e89b791aae556de0f745916f7f
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/coreutils-6.9-i18n-1.patch
MD5 sum: 806ce5bcb16a763a77bea411ec5ff637
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/coreutils-6.9-suppress_uptime_kill_su-1.patch
MD5 sum: e8ae92cdec364ca2a318f5c4c77bf032
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/coreutils-6.9-uname-1.patch
MD5 sum: c05b735710fbd62239588c07084852a0
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/db-4.5.20-fixes-1.patch
MD5 sum: 4d6a476c9ccd1bb9fba9de0b5229f0da
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/diffutils-2.8.1-i18n-1.patch
MD5 sum: c8d481223db274a33b121fb8c25af9f7
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/expect-5.43.0-spawn-1.patch
MD5 sum: ef6d0d0221c571fb420afb7033b3bbba
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/gawk-3.1.5-segfault_fix-1.patch
MD5 sum: 7679530d88bf3eb56c42eb6aba342ddb
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/gcc-4.1.2-specs-1.patch
MD5 sum: a17be8ccfb978e73f382be5093dd8abd
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/grep-2.5.1a-redhat_fixes-2.patch
MD5 sum: 2c67910be2d0a54714f63ce350e6d8a6
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/groff-1.18.1.4-debian_fixes-1.patch
MD5 sum: 05607e7fcfd6e5091f020bf44ddca10b
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/grub-0.97-disk_geometry-1.patch
MD5 sum: bf1594e82940e25d089feca74c6f1879
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/inetutils-1.5-no_server_man_pages-2.patch
MD5 sum: ec83aa00fb111f6f9d9aca04de9cb753
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/kbd-1.12-backspace-1.patch
MD5 sum: 692c88bb76906d99cc20446fadfb6499
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/kbd-1.12-gcc4_fixes-1.patch
MD5 sum: 615bc1e381ab646f04d8045751ed1f69
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/man-db-2.4.4-fixes-1.patch
MD5 sum: f75b3c44bb801778cf188b87454ff9c1
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/mktemp-1.5-add_tempfile-3.patch
MD5 sum: 65d73faabe3f637ad79853b460d30a19
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/module-init-tools-3.2.2-modprobe-1.patch
MD5 sum: f1e452fdf3b8d7ef60148125e390c3e8
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/ncurses-5.6-coverity_fixes-1.patch
MD5 sum: aa2fa9d0e89bbfdb4ce7e0e6b4b46670
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/perl-5.8.8-libc-2.patch
MD5 sum: 3bf8aef1fb6eb6110405e699e4141f99
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/readline-5.2-fixes-3.patch
MD5 sum: dfa4b750f226cf9ea034ec753a78a742
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/shadow-4.0.18.1-useradd_fix-2.patch
MD5 sum: 5f35528f38d5432d5fa2dd79d04bdfdd
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/sysklogd-1.4.1-8bit-1.patch
MD5 sum: cc0d9c3bd67a6b6357e42807cf06073e
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/sysklogd-1.4.1-fixes-2.patch
MD5 sum: ed5b25ca9a4eeb4f4f82b300a27b1ef4
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/texinfo-4.9-multibyte-1.patch
MD5 sum: 6cb5b760cfdd2dd53a0430eb572a8aaa
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/texinfo-4.9-tempfile_fix-1.patch
MD5 sum: 559bda136a2ac7777ecb67511227af85
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/util-linux-2.12r-cramfs-1.patch
MD5 sum: 1c3f40b30e12738eb7b66a35b7374572
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/util-linux-2.12r-lseek-1.patch
MD5 sum: 5d6c86321c1ea74d7ed7cf57861da423
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/vim-7.1-fixes-1.patch
MD5 sum: 744bc215560d3fbe80bfef4bab270f9a
Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.3/vim-7.1-mandir-1.patch
MD5 sum: b6426eb4192faba1e867ddd502323f5b
Total size of these patches: about 782.9 KB
In addition to the above required patches, there exist a number of optional patches created by the LFS community. These optional patches solve minor problems or enable functionality that is not enabled by default. Feel free to peruse the patches database located at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/ and acquire any additional patches to suit the system needs.
Throughout this book, the environment variable LFS will be used several times. It is paramount
that this variable is always defined. It should be set to the
mount point chosen for the LFS partition. Check that the
LFS variable is set up properly
with:
echo $LFS
Make sure the output shows the path to the LFS partition's
mount point, which is /mnt/lfs if
the provided example was followed. If the output is incorrect,
the variable can be set with:
export LFS=/mnt/lfs
Having this variable set is beneficial in that commands such as mkdir $LFS/tools can be typed literally. The shell will automatically replace “$LFS” with “/mnt/lfs” (or whatever the variable was set to) when it processes the command line.
Do not forget to check that $LFS is
set whenever you leave and reenter the current working
environment (as when doing a su to root or another user).
All programs compiled in Chapter
5 will be installed under $LFS/tools to keep them separate from the
programs compiled in Chapter
6. The programs compiled here are temporary tools and will
not be a part of the final LFS system. By keeping these
programs in a separate directory, they can easily be discarded
later after their use. This also prevents these programs from
ending up in the host production directories (easy to do by
accident in Chapter
5).
Create the required directory by running the following as
root:
mkdir -v $LFS/tools
The next step is to create a /tools symlink on the host system. This will
point to the newly-created directory on the LFS partition. Run
this command as root as well:
ln -sv $LFS/tools /
The above command is correct. The ln command has a few
syntactic variations, so be sure to check info coreutils ln and
ln(1) before reporting what you
may think is an error.
The created symlink enables the toolchain to be compiled so
that it always refers to /tools,
meaning that the compiler, assembler, and linker will work both
in this chapter (when we are still using some tools from the
host) and in the next (when we are “chrooted” to the LFS partition).
When logged in as user root,
making a single mistake can damage or destroy a system.
Therefore, we recommend building the packages in this chapter
as an unprivileged user. You could use your own user name, but
to make it easier to set up a clean working environment, create
a new user called lfs as a
member of a new group (also named lfs) and use this user during the
installation process. As root,
issue the following commands to add the new user:
groupadd lfs useradd -s /bin/bash -g lfs -m -k /dev/null lfs
The meaning of the command line options:
-s
/bin/bash
This makes bash the default shell
for user lfs.
-g
lfs
This option adds user lfs
to group lfs.
-m
This creates a home directory for lfs.
-k
/dev/null
This parameter prevents possible copying of files from a
skeleton directory (default is /etc/skel) by changing the input
location to the special null device.
lfs
This is the actual name for the created group and user.
To log in as lfs (as opposed to
switching to user lfs when
logged in as root, which does
not require the lfs user to
have a password), give lfs a
password:
passwd lfs
Grant lfs full access to
$LFS/tools by making lfs the directory owner:
chown -v lfs $LFS/tools
If a separate working directory was created as suggested, give
user lfs ownership of this
directory:
chown -v lfs $LFS/sources
Next, login as user lfs. This
can be done via a virtual console, through a display manager,
or with the following substitute user command:
su - lfs
The “-” instructs
su to start a
login shell as opposed to a non-login shell. The difference
between these two types of shells can be found in detail in
bash(1) and info bash.
Set up a good working environment by creating two new startup
files for the bash shell. While logged in
as user lfs, issue the
following command to create a new .bash_profile:
cat > ~/.bash_profile << "EOF"
exec env -i HOME=$HOME TERM=$TERM PS1='\u:\w\$ ' /bin/bash
EOF
When logged on as user lfs, the
initial shell is usually a login shell which reads the
/etc/profile of the host
(probably containing some settings and environment variables)
and then .bash_profile. The
exec env
-i.../bin/bash command in the .bash_profile file replaces the running shell
with a new one with a completely empty environment, except for
the HOME, TERM, and PS1
variables. This ensures that no unwanted and potentially
hazardous environment variables from the host system leak into
the build environment. The technique used here achieves the
goal of ensuring a clean environment.
The new instance of the shell is a non-login shell, which does not read
the /etc/profile or .bash_profile files, but rather reads the
.bashrc file instead. Create the
.bashrc file now:
cat > ~/.bashrc << "EOF"
set +h
umask 022
LFS=/mnt/lfs
LC_ALL=POSIX
PATH=/tools/bin:/bin:/usr/bin
export LFS LC_ALL PATH
EOF
The set +h
command turns off bash's hash function. Hashing
is ordinarily a useful feature—bash uses a hash table to
remember the full path of executable files to avoid searching
the PATH time and again to find the
same executable. However, the new tools should be used as soon
as they are installed. By switching off the hash function, the
shell will always search the PATH
when a program is to be run. As such, the shell will find the
newly compiled tools in $LFS/tools as soon as they are available
without remembering a previous version of the same program in a
different location.
Setting the user file-creation mask (umask) to 022 ensures that
newly created files and directories are only writable by their
owner, but are readable and executable by anyone (assuming
default modes are used by the open(2) system call, new files will end up
with permission mode 644 and directories with mode 755).
The LFS variable should be set to
the chosen mount point.
The LC_ALL variable controls the
localization of certain programs, making their messages follow
the conventions of a specified country. If the host system uses
a version of Glibc older than 2.2.4, having LC_ALL set to something other than
“POSIX” or
“C” (during this
chapter) may cause issues if you exit the chroot environment
and wish to return later. Setting LC_ALL to “POSIX” or “C” (the two are equivalent) ensures that
everything will work as expected in the chroot environment.
By putting /tools/bin ahead of
the standard PATH, all the programs
installed in Chapter
5 are picked up by the shell immediately after their
installation. This, combined with turning off hashing, limits
the risk that old programs are used from the host when the same
programs are available in the chapter 5 environment.
Finally, to have the environment fully prepared for building the temporary tools, source the just-created user profile:
source ~/.bash_profile
Many people would like to know beforehand approximately how long it takes to compile and install each package. Because Linux From Scratch can be built on many different systems, it is impossible to provide accurate time estimates. The biggest package (Glibc) will take approximately 20 minutes on the fastest systems, but could take up to three days on slower systems! Instead of providing actual times, the Standard Build Unit (SBU) measure will be used instead.
The SBU measure works as follows. The first package to be compiled from this book is Binutils in Chapter 5. The time it takes to compile this package is what will be referred to as the Standard Build Unit or SBU. All other compile times will be expressed relative to this time.
For example, consider a package whose compilation time is 4.5 SBUs. This means that if a system took 10 minutes to compile and install the first pass of Binutils, it will take approximately 45 minutes to build this example package. Fortunately, most build times are shorter than the one for Binutils.
In general, SBUs are not entirely accurate because they depend on many factors, including the host system's version of GCC. Note that on Symmetric Multi-Processor (SMP)-based machines, SBUs are even less accurate. They are provided here to give an estimate of how long it might take to install a package, but the numbers can vary by as much as dozens of minutes in some cases.
To view actual timings for a number of specific machines, we recommend The LinuxFromScratch SBU Home Page at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/~sbu/.
Most packages provide a test suite. Running the test suite for a newly built package is a good idea because it can provide a “sanity check” indicating that everything compiled correctly. A test suite that passes its set of checks usually proves that the package is functioning as the developer intended. It does not, however, guarantee that the package is totally bug free.
Some test suites are more important than others. For example, the test suites for the core toolchain packages—GCC, Binutils, and Glibc—are of the utmost importance due to their central role in a properly functioning system. The test suites for GCC and Glibc can take a very long time to complete, especially on slower hardware, but are strongly recommended.
Experience has shown that there is little to be gained from running the test suites in Chapter 5. There can be no escaping the fact that the host system always exerts some influence on the tests in that chapter, often causing inexplicable failures. Because the tools built in Chapter 5 are temporary and eventually discarded, we do not recommend running the test suites in Chapter 5 for the average reader. The instructions for running those test suites are provided for the benefit of testers and developers, but they are strictly optional.
A common issue with running the test suites for Binutils and
GCC is running out of pseudo terminals (PTYs). This can result
in a high number of failing tests. This may happen for several
reasons, but the most likely cause is that the host system does
not have the devpts file system
set up correctly. This issue is discussed in greater detail in
Chapter
5.
Sometimes package test suites will fail, but for reasons which the developers are aware of and have deemed non-critical. Consult the logs located at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/build-logs/6.3/ to verify whether or not these failures are expected. This site is valid for all tests throughout this book.
This chapter shows how to compile and install a minimal Linux system. This system will contain just enough tools to start constructing the final LFS system in Chapter 6 and allow a working environment with more user convenience than a minimum environment would.
There are two steps in building this minimal system. The first step is to build a new and host-independent toolchain (compiler, assembler, linker, libraries, and a few useful utilities). The second step uses this toolchain to build the other essential tools.
The files compiled in this chapter will be installed under the
$LFS/tools directory to keep them
separate from the files installed in the next chapter and the
host production directories. Since the packages compiled here
are temporary, we do not want them to pollute the soon-to-be
LFS system.
Before issuing the build instructions for a package, the
package should be unpacked as user lfs, and a cd into the created
directory should be performed. The build instructions assume
that the bash
shell is in use.
Several of the packages are patched before compilation, but only when the patch is needed to circumvent a problem. A patch is often needed in both this and the next chapter, but sometimes in only one or the other. Therefore, do not be concerned if instructions for a downloaded patch seem to be missing. Warning messages about offset or fuzz may also be encountered when applying a patch. Do not worry about these warnings, as the patch was still successfully applied.
During the compilation of most packages, there will be several warnings that scroll by on the screen. These are normal and can safely be ignored. These warnings are as they appear—warnings about deprecated, but not invalid, use of the C or C++ syntax. C standards change fairly often, and some packages still use the older standard. This is not a problem, but does prompt the warning.
After installing each package, delete its source and build directories, unless specifically instructed otherwise. Deleting the sources prevents mis-configuration when the same package is reinstalled later.
Check one last time that the LFS
environment variable is set up properly:
echo $LFS
Make sure the output shows the path to the LFS partition's
mount point, which is /mnt/lfs,
using our example.
This section explains some of the rationale and technical details behind the overall build method. It is not essential to immediately understand everything in this section. Most of this information will be clearer after performing an actual build. This section can be referred back to at any time during the process.
The overall goal of Chapter 5 is to provide a temporary environment that can be chrooted into and from which can be produced a clean, trouble-free build of the target LFS system in Chapter 6. Along the way, we separate the new system from the host system as much as possible, and in doing so, build a self-contained and self-hosted toolchain. It should be noted that the build process has been designed to minimize the risks for new readers and provide maximum educational value at the same time.
Before continuing, be aware of the name of the working
platform, often referred to as the target triplet. Many
times, the target triplet will probably be i686-pc-linux-gnu. A simple way to
determine the name of the target triplet is to run the
config.guess
script that comes with the source for many packages. Unpack
the Binutils sources and run the script: ./config.guess and note the
output.
Also be aware of the name of the platform's dynamic linker,
often referred to as the dynamic loader (not to be confused
with the standard linker ld that is part of
Binutils). The dynamic linker provided by Glibc finds and
loads the shared libraries needed by a program, prepares the
program to run, and then runs it. The name of the dynamic
linker will usually be ld-linux.so.2. On platforms that are less
prevalent, the name might be ld.so.1, and newer 64 bit platforms might
be named something else entirely. The name of the platform's
dynamic linker can be determined by looking in the
/lib directory on the host
system. A sure-fire way to determine the name is to inspect a
random binary from the host system by running: readelf -l <name of binary> | grep
interpreter and noting the output. The
authoritative reference covering all platforms is in the
shlib-versions file in the root
of the Glibc source tree.
Some key technical points of how the Chapter 5 build method works:
The process is similar in principle to cross-compiling, whereby tools installed in the same prefix work in cooperation, and thus utilize a little GNU “magic”
Careful manipulation of the standard linker's library search path ensures programs are linked only against chosen libraries
Careful manipulation of gcc's specs file tells the compiler which
target dynamic linker will be used
Binutils is installed first because the configure runs of both GCC and Glibc perform various feature tests on the assembler and linker to determine which software features to enable or disable. This is more important than one might first realize. An incorrectly configured GCC or Glibc can result in a subtly broken toolchain, where the impact of such breakage might not show up until near the end of the build of an entire distribution. A test suite failure will usually highlight this error before too much additional work is performed.
Binutils installs its assembler and linker in two locations,
/tools/bin and /tools/$TARGET_TRIPLET/bin. The tools in one
location are hard linked to the other. An important facet of
the linker is its library search order. Detailed information
can be obtained from ld by passing it the
--verbose flag. For
example, an ld --verbose | grep
SEARCH will illustrate the current search paths
and their order. It shows which files are linked by
ld by compiling a
dummy program and passing the --verbose switch to the linker.
For example, gcc dummy.c
-Wl,--verbose 2>&1 | grep succeeded will
show all the files successfully opened during the linking.
The next package installed is GCC. An example of what can be seen during its run of configure is:
checking what assembler to use...
/tools/i686-pc-linux-gnu/bin/as
checking what linker to use... /tools/i686-pc-linux-gnu/bin/ld
This is important for the reasons mentioned above. It also
demonstrates that GCC's configure script does not search the
PATH directories to find which tools to use. However, during
the actual operation of gcc itself, the same search
paths are not necessarily used. To find out which standard
linker gcc will
use, run: gcc
-print-prog-name=ld.
Detailed information can be obtained from gcc by passing it the
-v command line option
while compiling a dummy program. For example, gcc -v dummy.c will show
detailed information about the preprocessor, compilation, and
assembly stages, including gcc's included search paths
and their order.
The next package installed is Glibc. The most important
considerations for building Glibc are the compiler, binary
tools, and kernel headers. The compiler is generally not an
issue since Glibc will always use the gcc found in a PATH directory. The binary tools and kernel
headers can be a bit more complicated. Therefore, take no risks
and use the available configure switches to enforce the correct
selections. After the run of configure, check the contents
of the config.make file in the
glibc-build directory for all
important details. Note the use of CC="gcc -B/tools/bin/" to control
which binary tools are used and the use of the -nostdinc and -isystem flags to control the
compiler's include search path. These items highlight an
important aspect of the Glibc package—it is very
self-sufficient in terms of its build machinery and generally
does not rely on toolchain defaults.
After the Glibc installation, make some adjustments to ensure
that searching and linking take place only within the
/tools prefix. Install an
adjusted ld,
which has a hard-wired search path limited to /tools/lib. Then amend gcc's specs file to point to
the new dynamic linker in /tools/lib. This last step is vital to the
whole process. As mentioned above, a hard-wired path to a
dynamic linker is embedded into every Executable and Link
Format (ELF)-shared executable. This can be inspected by
running: readelf -l <name of
binary> | grep interpreter. Amending gcc's
specs file ensures that every program compiled from here
through the end of this chapter will use the new dynamic linker
in /tools/lib.
The need to use the new dynamic linker is also the reason why
the Specs patch is applied for the second pass of GCC. Failure
to do so will result in the GCC programs themselves having the
name of the dynamic linker from the host system's /lib directory embedded into them, which
would defeat the goal of getting away from the host.
During the second pass of Binutils, we are able to utilize the
--with-lib-path
configure switch to control ld's library search path.
From this point onwards, the core toolchain is self-contained
and self-hosted. The remainder of the Chapter
5 packages all build against the new Glibc in /tools.
Upon entering the chroot environment in Chapter
6, the first major package to be installed is Glibc, due to
its self-sufficient nature mentioned above. Once this Glibc is
installed into /usr, perform a
quick changeover of the toolchain defaults, then proceed in
building the rest of the target LFS system.
The Binutils package contains a linker, an assembler, and other tools for handling object files.
It is important that Binutils be the first package compiled because both Glibc and GCC perform various tests on the available linker and assembler to determine which of their own features to enable.
The Binutils documentation recommends building Binutils outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:
mkdir -v ../binutils-build cd ../binutils-build
In order for the SBU values listed in the rest of the book
to be of any use, measure the time it takes to build this
package from the configuration, up to and including the
first install. To achieve this easily, wrap the three
commands in a time command like this:
time { ./configure ...
&& make && make install; }.
Now prepare Binutils for compilation:
CC="gcc -B/usr/bin/" ../binutils-2.17/configure \
--prefix=/tools --disable-nls --disable-werror
The meaning of the configure options:
CC="gcc
-B/usr/bin/"
This forces gcc to prefer the
linker from the host in /usr/bin. This is necessary on some
hosts where the new ld built here is not
compatible with the host's gcc.
--prefix=/tools
This tells the configure script to prepare to install
the Binutils programs in the /tools directory.
--disable-nls
This disables internationalization as i18n is not needed for the temporary tools.
--disable-werror
This prevents the build from stopping in the event that there are warnings from the host's compiler.
Continue with compiling the package:
make
Compilation is now complete. Ordinarily we would now run the test suite, but at this early stage the test suite framework (Tcl, Expect, and DejaGNU) is not yet in place. The benefits of running the tests at this point are minimal since the programs from this first pass will soon be replaced by those from the second.
Install the package:
make install
Next, prepare the linker for the “Adjusting” phase later on:
make -C ld clean make -C ld LIB_PATH=/tools/lib cp -v ld/ld-new /tools/bin
The meaning of the make parameters:
-C ld
clean
This tells the make program to remove all compiled
files in the ld
subdirectory.
-C ld
LIB_PATH=/tools/lib
This option rebuilds everything in the ld subdirectory. Specifying the
LIB_PATH Makefile variable
on the command line allows us to override the default
value and point it to the temporary tools location. The
value of this variable specifies the linker's default
library search path. This preparation is used later in
the chapter.
Details on this package are located in Section 6.11.2, “Contents of Binutils.”
The GCC package contains the GNU compiler collection, which includes the C and C++ compilers.
The GCC documentation recommends building GCC outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:
mkdir -v ../gcc-build cd ../gcc-build
Prepare GCC for compilation:
CC="gcc -B/usr/bin/" ../gcc-4.1.2/configure --prefix=/tools \
--with-local-prefix=/tools --disable-nls --enable-shared \
--enable-languages=c
The meaning of the configure options:
CC="gcc
-B/usr/bin/"
This forces gcc to prefer the
linker from the host in /usr/bin. This is necessary on some
hosts where the new ld built in the
previous section is not compatible with the host's
gcc.
--with-local-prefix=/tools
The purpose of this switch is to remove /usr/local/include from gcc's include search
path. This is not absolutely essential, however, it
helps to minimize the influence of the host system.
--enable-shared
This switch allows the building of libgcc_s.so.1 and libgcc_eh.a. Having libgcc_eh.a available ensures that
the configure script for Glibc (the next package we
compile) produces the proper results.
--enable-languages=c
This option ensures that only the C compiler is built.
Continue with compiling the package:
make bootstrap
The meaning of the make parameter:
bootstrap
This target does not just compile GCC, but compiles it several times. It uses the programs compiled in a first round to compile itself a second time, and then again a third time. It then compares these second and third compiles to make sure it can reproduce itself flawlessly. This also implies that it was compiled correctly.
Compilation is now complete. At this point, the test suite would normally be run, but, as mentioned before, the test suite framework is not in place yet. The benefits of running the tests at this point are minimal since the programs from this first pass will soon be replaced.
Install the package:
make install
As a finishing touch, create a symlink. Many programs and scripts run cc instead of gcc, which is used to keep programs generic and therefore usable on all kinds of UNIX systems where the GNU C compiler is not always installed. Running cc leaves the system administrator free to decide which C compiler to install:
ln -vs gcc /tools/bin/cc
Details on this package are located in Section 6.12.2, “Contents of GCC.”
The Linux API Headers expose the kernel's API for use by Glibc.
The Linux kernel needs to expose an Application Programming Interface (API) for the system's C library (Glibc in LFS) to utilize. This is done by way of sanitizing various C header files that are shipped in the Linux kernel source tarball.
Install the header files:
make mrproper make headers_check make INSTALL_HDR_PATH=dest headers_install cp -rv dest/include/* /tools/include
Details on this package are located in Section 6.7.2, “Contents of Linux API Headers.”
The Glibc package contains the main C library. This library provides the basic routines for allocating memory, searching directories, opening and closing files, reading and writing files, string handling, pattern matching, arithmetic, and so on.
The Glibc documentation recommends building Glibc outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:
mkdir -v ../glibc-build cd ../glibc-build
Next, prepare Glibc for compilation:
../glibc-2.5.1/configure --prefix=/tools \
--disable-profile --enable-add-ons \
--enable-kernel=2.6.0 --with-binutils=/tools/bin \
--without-gd --with-headers=/tools/include \
--without-selinux
The meaning of the configure options:
--disable-profile
This builds the libraries without profiling information. Omit this option if profiling on the temporary tools is necessary.
--enable-add-ons
This tells Glibc to use the NPTL add-on as its threading library.
--enable-kernel=2.6.0
This tells Glibc to compile the library with support for 2.6.x Linux kernels.
--with-binutils=/tools/bin
While not required, this switch ensures that there are no errors pertaining to which Binutils programs get used during the Glibc build.
--without-gd
This prevents the build of the memusagestat program, which insists on linking against the host's libraries (libgd, libpng, libz, etc.).
--with-headers=/tools/include
This tells Glibc to compile itself against the headers recently installed to the tools directory, so that it knows exactly what features the kernel has and can optimize itself accordingly.
--without-selinux
When building from hosts that include SELinux functionality (e.g., Fedora Core 3), Glibc will build with support for SELinux. As the LFS tools environment does not contain support for SELinux, a Glibc compiled with such support will fail to operate correctly.
During this stage the following warning might appear:
configure: WARNING: *** These auxiliary programs are missing or *** incompatible versions: msgfmt *** some features will be disabled. *** Check the INSTALL file for required versions.
The missing or incompatible msgfmt program is generally harmless, but it can sometimes cause issues when running the test suite. This msgfmt program is part of the Gettext package which the host distribution should provide. If msgfmt is present but deemed incompatible, upgrade the host system's Gettext package or continue without it and see if the test suite runs without problems regardless.
Compile the package:
make
Compilation is now complete. As mentioned earlier, running the test suites for the temporary tools installed in this chapter is not mandatory. To run the Glibc test suite (if desired), the following command will do so:
make check
For a discussion of test failures that are of particular importance, please see Section 6.9, “Glibc-2.5.1.”
In this chapter, some tests can be adversely affected by existing tools or environmental issues on the host system. Glibc test suite failures in this chapter are typically not worrisome. The Glibc installed in Chapter 6 is the one that will ultimately end up being used, so that is the one that needs to pass most tests (even in Chapter 6, some failures could still occur, for example, with the math tests).
When experiencing a failure, make a note of it, then continue by reissuing the make check command. The test suite should pick up where it left off and continue. This stop-start sequence can be circumvented by issuing a make -k check command. If using this option, be sure to log the output so that the log file can be examined for failures later.
The install stage of Glibc will issue a harmless warning at
the end about the absence of /tools/etc/ld.so.conf. Prevent this warning
with:
mkdir -v /tools/etc touch /tools/etc/ld.so.conf
Install the package:
make install
Different countries and cultures have varying conventions for how to communicate. These conventions range from the format for representing dates and times to more complex issues, such as the language spoken. The “internationalization” of GNU programs works by locale.
If the test suites are not being run in this chapter (as per the recommendation), there is no need to install the locales now. The appropriate locales will be installed in the next chapter. To install the Glibc locales anyway, use instructions from Section 6.9, “Glibc-2.5.1.”
Details on this package are located in Section 6.9.4, “Contents of Glibc.”
Now that the temporary C libraries have been installed, all tools compiled in the rest of this chapter should be linked against these libraries. In order to accomplish this, the linker and the compiler's specs file need to be adjusted.
The linker, adjusted at the end of the first pass of Binutils,
needs to be renamed so that it can be properly found and used.
First, backup the original linker, then replace it with the
adjusted linker. We'll also create a link to its counterpart in
/tools/$(gcc -dumpmachine)/bin:
mv -v /tools/bin/{ld,ld-old}
mv -v /tools/$(gcc -dumpmachine)/bin/{ld,ld-old}
mv -v /tools/bin/{ld-new,ld}
ln -sv /tools/bin/ld /tools/$(gcc -dumpmachine)/bin/ld
From this point onwards, everything will link only against the
libraries in /tools/lib.
The next task is to point GCC to the new dynamic linker. This is done by dumping GCC's “specs” file to a location where GCC will look for it by default. A simple sed substitution then alters the dynamic linker that GCC will use.
For the sake of accuracy, it is recommended to use a copy-and-paste method when issuing the following command. Be sure to visually inspect the specs file and verify that all occurrences of “/lib/ld-linux.so.2” have been replaced with “/tools/lib/ld-linux.so.2”:
If working on a platform where the name of the dynamic linker
is something other than ld-linux.so.2, replace “ld-linux.so.2” with the name of the
platform's dynamic linker in the following commands. Refer to
Section 5.2,
“Toolchain Technical Notes,” if necessary.
gcc -dumpspecs | sed 's@^/lib/ld-linux.so.2@/tools&@g' \ > `dirname $(gcc -print-libgcc-file-name)`/specs
During the build process, GCC runs a script (fixincludes) that scans the system for header files that may need to be fixed (they might contain syntax errors, for example), and installs the fixed versions in a private include directory. There is a possibility that, as a result of this process, some header files from the host system have found their way into GCC's private include directory. As the rest of this chapter only requires the headers from GCC and Glibc, which have both been installed at this point, any “fixed” headers can safely be removed. This helps to avoid any host headers polluting the build environment. Run the following commands to remove the header files in GCC's private include directory (you may find it easier to copy and paste these commands, rather than typing them by hand, due to their length):
GCC_INCLUDEDIR=`dirname $(gcc -print-libgcc-file-name)`/include &&
find ${GCC_INCLUDEDIR}/* -maxdepth 0 -xtype d -exec rm -rvf '{}' \; &&
rm -vf `grep -l "DO NOT EDIT THIS FILE" ${GCC_INCLUDEDIR}/*` &&
unset GCC_INCLUDEDIR
At this point, it is imperative to stop and ensure that the basic functions (compiling and linking) of the new toolchain are working as expected. To perform a sanity check, run the following commands:
echo 'main(){}' > dummy.c
cc dummy.c
readelf -l a.out | grep ': /tools'
If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be of the form:
[Requesting program interpreter:
/tools/lib/ld-linux.so.2]
Note that /tools/lib appears as
the prefix of the dynamic linker.
If the output is not shown as above or there was no output at
all, then something is wrong. Investigate and retrace the
steps to find out where the problem is and correct it. This
issue must be resolved before continuing on. First, perform
the sanity check again, using gcc instead of cc. If this works, then the
/tools/bin/cc symlink is
missing. Revisit Section 5.4,
“GCC-4.1.2 - Pass 1,” and install the
symlink. Next, ensure that the PATH is correct. This can be checked by
running echo
$PATH and verifying that /tools/bin is at the head of the list. If
the PATH is wrong it could mean
that you are not logged in as user lfs or that something went wrong back in
Section 4.4,
“Setting Up the Environment.” Another option
is that something may have gone wrong with the specs file
amendment above. In this case, redo the specs file amendment,
being careful to copy-and-paste the commands.
Once all is well, clean up the test files:
rm -v dummy.c a.out
Building TCL in the next section will serve as an additional check that the toolchain has been built properly. If TCL fails to build, it is an indication that something has gone wrong with the Binutils, GCC, or Glibc installation, but not with TCL itself.
The Tcl package contains the Tool Command Language.
This package and the next two (Expect and DejaGNU) are installed to support running the test suites for GCC and Binutils. Installing three packages for testing purposes may seem excessive, but it is very reassuring, if not essential, to know that the most important tools are working properly. Even if the test suites are not run in this chapter (they are not mandatory), these packages are required to run the test suites in Chapter 6.
Prepare Tcl for compilation:
cd unix ./configure --prefix=/tools
Build the package:
make
To test the results, issue: TZ=UTC make test. The Tcl
test suite is known to experience failures under certain host
conditions that are not fully understood. Therefore, test
suite failures here are not surprising, and are not
considered critical. The TZ=UTC parameter sets the time
zone to Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), also known as
Greenwich Mean Time (GMT), but only for the duration of the
test suite run. This ensures that the clock tests are
exercised correctly. Details on the TZ environment variable are provided in
Chapter
7.
Install the package:
make install
Install Tcl's headers. The next package, Expect, requires them to build.
make install-private-headers
Now make a necessary symbolic link:
ln -sv tclsh8.4 /tools/bin/tclsh
The Expect package contains a program for carrying out scripted dialogues with other interactive programs.
First, fix a bug that can result in false failures during the GCC test suite run:
patch -Np1 -i ../expect-5.43.0-spawn-1.patch
Next, force Expect's configure script to use /bin/stty instead of a /usr/local/bin/stty it may find on the host
system. This will ensure that our testsuite tools remain sane
for the final builds of our toolchain:
cp configure{,.bak}
sed 's:/usr/local/bin:/bin:' configure.bak > configure
Now prepare Expect for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/tools --with-tcl=/tools/lib \ --with-tclinclude=/tools/include --with-x=no
The meaning of the configure options:
--with-tcl=/tools/lib
This ensures that the configure script finds the Tcl installation in the temporary tools location instead of possibly locating an existing one on the host system.
--with-tclinclude=/tools/include
This explicitly tells Expect where to find Tcl's internal headers. Using this option avoids conditions where configure fails because it cannot automatically discover the location of Tcl's headers.
--with-x=no
This tells the configure script not to search for Tk (the Tcl GUI component) or the X Window System libraries, both of which may reside on the host system but will not exist in the temporary environment.
Build the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make test. Note that the
Expect test suite is known to experience failures under
certain host conditions that are not within our control.
Therefore, test suite failures here are not surprising and
are not considered critical.
Install the package:
make SCRIPTS="" install
The meaning of the make parameter:
SCRIPTS=""
This prevents installation of the supplementary Expect scripts, which are not needed.
The DejaGNU package contains a framework for testing other programs.
Prepare DejaGNU for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/tools
Build and install the package:
make install
To test the results, issue: make check.
The GCC package contains the GNU compiler collection, which includes the C and C++ compilers.
The tools required to test GCC and Binutils—Tcl, Expect
and DejaGNU—are installed now. GCC and Binutils can now
be rebuilt, linking them against the new Glibc and testing
them properly (if running the test suites in this chapter).
Please note that these test suites are highly dependent on
properly functioning PTYs which are provided by the host.
PTYs are most commonly implemented via the devpts file system. Check to see if the
host system is set up correctly in this regard by performing
a quick test:
expect -c "spawn ls"
The response might be:
The system has no more ptys.
Ask your system administrator to create more.If the above message is received, the host does not have its PTYs set up properly. In this case, there is no point in running the test suites for GCC and Binutils until this issue is resolved. Please consult the LFS FAQ at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org//lfs/faq.html#no-ptys for more information on how to get PTYs working.
As previously explained in Section 5.7, “Adjusting the Toolchain”, under normal circumstances the GCC fixincludes script is run in order to fix potentially broken header files. As GCC-4.1.2 and Glibc-2.5.1 have already been installed at this point, and their respective header files are known to not require fixing, the fixincludes script is not required. As mentioned previously, the script may in fact pollute the build environment by installing fixed headers from the host system into GCC's private include directory. The running of the fixincludes script can be suppressed by issuing the following commands:
cp -v gcc/Makefile.in{,.orig}
sed 's@\./fixinc\.sh@-c true@' gcc/Makefile.in.orig > gcc/Makefile.in
The bootstrap build performed in Section 5.4,
“GCC-4.1.2 - Pass 1” built GCC with the
-fomit-frame-pointer compiler
flag. Non-bootstrap builds omit this flag by default, so
apply the following sed to use it in order to
ensure consistent compiler builds:
cp -v gcc/Makefile.in{,.tmp}
sed 's/^XCFLAGS =$/& -fomit-frame-pointer/' gcc/Makefile.in.tmp \
> gcc/Makefile.in
Apply the following patch to change the location of GCC's
default dynamic linker (typically ld-linux.so.2):
patch -Np1 -i ../gcc-4.1.2-specs-1.patch
The above patch also removes /usr/include from GCC's include search
path. Patching now rather than adjusting the specs file after
installation ensures that the new dynamic linker is used
during the actual build of GCC. That is, all of the binaries
created during the build will link against the new Glibc.
The above patch is critical in ensuring a successful overall build. Do not forget to apply it.
Create a separate build directory again:
mkdir -v ../gcc-build cd ../gcc-build
Before starting to build GCC, remember to unset any environment variables that override the default optimization flags.
Now prepare GCC for compilation:
../gcc-4.1.2/configure --prefix=/tools \
--with-local-prefix=/tools --enable-clocale=gnu \
--enable-shared --enable-threads=posix \
--enable-__cxa_atexit --enable-languages=c,c++ \
--disable-libstdcxx-pch
The meaning of the new configure options:
--enable-clocale=gnu
This option ensures the correct locale model is selected for the C++ libraries under all circumstances. If the configure script finds the de_DE locale installed, it will select the correct gnu locale model. However, if the de_DE locale is not installed, there is the risk of building Application Binary Interface (ABI)-incompatible C++ libraries because the incorrect generic locale model may be selected.
--enable-threads=posix
This enables C++ exception handling for multi-threaded code.
--enable-__cxa_atexit
This option allows use of __cxa_atexit, rather than
atexit, to register C++
destructors for local statics and global objects. This
option is essential for fully standards-compliant
handling of destructors. It also affects the C++ ABI,
and therefore results in C++ shared libraries and C++
programs that are interoperable with other Linux
distributions.
--enable-languages=c,c++
This option ensures that both the C and C++ compilers are built.
--disable-libstdcxx-pch
Do not build the pre-compiled header (PCH) for
libstdc++. It takes up a
lot of space, and we have no use for it.
Compile the package:
make
There is no need to use the bootstrap target now because
the compiler being used to compile this GCC was built from
the exact same version of the GCC sources used earlier.
Compilation is now complete. As previously mentioned, running the test suites for the temporary tools compiled in this chapter is not mandatory. To run the GCC test suite anyway, use the following command:
make -k check
The -k flag is used
to make the test suite run through to completion and not stop
at the first failure. The GCC test suite is very
comprehensive and is almost guaranteed to generate a few
failures.
For a discussion of test failures that are of particular importance, please see Section 6.12, “GCC-4.1.2.”
Install the package:
make install
At this point, it is imperative to stop and ensure that the basic functions (compiling and linking) of the new toolchain are working as expected. To perform a sanity check, run the following commands:
echo 'main(){}' > dummy.c
cc dummy.c
readelf -l a.out | grep ': /tools'
If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be of the form:
[Requesting program interpreter:
/tools/lib/ld-linux.so.2]
Note that /tools/lib appears
as the prefix of the dynamic linker.
If the output is not shown as above or there was no output
at all, then something is wrong. Investigate and retrace
the steps to find out where the problem is and correct it.
This issue must be resolved before continuing on. First,
perform the sanity check again, using gcc instead of
cc. If this
works, then the /tools/bin/cc
symlink is missing. Revisit Section 5.4,
“GCC-4.1.2 - Pass 1,” and install the
symlink. Next, ensure that the PATH is correct. This can be checked by
running echo
$PATH and verifying that /tools/bin is at the head of the list. If
the PATH is wrong it could mean
that you are not logged in as user lfs or that something went wrong back
in Section 4.4,
“Setting Up the Environment.” Another
option is that something may have gone wrong with the specs
file amendment above. In this case, redo the specs file
amendment, being careful to copy-and-paste the commands.
Once all is well, clean up the test files:
rm -v dummy.c a.out
Details on this package are located in Section 6.12.2, “Contents of GCC.”
The Binutils package contains a linker, an assembler, and other tools for handling object files.
Create a separate build directory again:
mkdir -v ../binutils-build cd ../binutils-build
Prepare Binutils for compilation:
../binutils-2.17/configure --prefix=/tools \
--disable-nls --with-lib-path=/tools/lib
The meaning of the new configure options:
--with-lib-path=/tools/lib
This tells the configure script to specify the library
search path during the compilation of Binutils,
resulting in /tools/lib
being passed to the linker. This prevents the linker
from searching through library directories on the host.
Compile the package:
make
Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the Binutils test suite anyway, issue the following command:
make check
Install the package:
make install
Now prepare the linker for the “Re-adjusting” phase in the next chapter:
make -C ld clean make -C ld LIB_PATH=/usr/lib:/lib cp -v ld/ld-new /tools/bin
Details on this package are located in Section 6.11.2, “Contents of Binutils.”
The Ncurses package contains libraries for terminal-independent handling of character screens.
Prepare Ncurses for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/tools --with-shared \
--without-debug --without-ada --enable-overwrite
The meaning of the configure options:
--without-ada
This ensures that Ncurses does not build support for the Ada compiler which may be present on the host but will not be available once we enter the chroot environment.
--enable-overwrite
This tells Ncurses to install its header files into
/tools/include, instead
of /tools/include/ncurses, to ensure
that other packages can find the Ncurses headers
successfully.
Compile the package:
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install
Details on this package are located in Section 6.20.2, “Contents of Ncurses.”
The Bash package contains the Bourne-Again SHell.
Apply fixes for several bugs discovered since the initial release of Bash-3.2:
patch -Np1 -i ../bash-3.2-fixes-5.patch
Prepare Bash for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/tools --without-bash-malloc
The meaning of the configure option:
--without-bash-malloc
This option turns off the use of Bash's memory
allocation (malloc)
function which is known to cause segmentation faults.
By turning this option off, Bash will use the
malloc functions from
Glibc which are more stable.
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make tests.
Install the package:
make install
Make a link for the programs that use sh for a shell:
ln -vs bash /tools/bin/sh
Details on this package are located in Section 6.28.2, “Contents of Bash.”
The Bzip2 package contains programs for compressing and decompressing files. Compressing text files with bzip2 yields a much better compression percentage than with the traditional gzip.
The Bzip2 package does not contain a configure script. Compile and test it with:
make
Install the package:
make PREFIX=/tools install
Details on this package are located in Section 6.29.2, “Contents of Bzip2.”
The Coreutils package contains utilities for showing and setting the basic system characteristics.
Prepare Coreutils for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/tools
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make RUN_EXPENSIVE_TESTS=yes
check. The RUN_EXPENSIVE_TESTS=yes
parameter tells the test suite to run several additional
tests that are considered relatively expensive (in terms of
CPU power and memory usage) on some platforms, but generally
are not a problem on Linux.
Install the package:
make install
The above command refuses to install su because it cannot install it setuid root
as a non-privileged user. By manually installing it with a
different name, we can use it for running tests in the final
system as a non-privileged user and we keep a possibly useful
su from our
host first place in our PATH. Install it with:
cp -v src/su /tools/bin/su-tools
Details on this package are located in Section 6.16.2, “Contents of Coreutils.”
The Diffutils package contains programs that show the differences between files or directories.
Prepare Diffutils for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/tools
Compile the package:
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install
Details on this package are located in Section 6.30.2, “Contents of Diffutils.”
The Findutils package contains programs to find files. These programs are provided to recursively search through a directory tree and to create, maintain, and search a database (often faster than the recursive find, but unreliable if the database has not been recently updated).
Prepare Findutils for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/tools
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
Details on this package are located in Section 6.32.2, “Contents of Findutils.”
The Gawk package contains programs for manipulating text files.
Prepare Gawk for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/tools
Due to a bug in the configure script, Gawk
fails to detect certain aspects of locale support in Glibc.
This bug leads to, e.g., Gettext testsuite failures. Work
around this issue by appending the missing macro definitions
to config.h:
cat >> config.h << "EOF"
#define HAVE_LANGINFO_CODESET 1
#define HAVE_LC_MESSAGES 1
EOF
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
Details on this package are located in Section 6.35.2, “Contents of Gawk.”
The Gettext package contains utilities for internationalization and localization. These allow programs to be compiled with NLS (Native Language Support), enabling them to output messages in the user's native language.
For our temporary set of tools, we only need to build and install one binary from Gettext.
Prepare Gettext for compilation:
cd gettext-tools ./configure --prefix=/tools --disable-shared
The meaning of the configure option:
--disable-shared
We do not need to install any of the shared Gettext libraries at this time, therefore there is no need to build them.
Compile the package:
make -C gnulib-lib make -C src msgfmt
As only one binary has been compiled, it is not possible to run the testsuite without compiling additional support libraries from the Gettext package. It is therefore not recommended to attempt to run the testsuite at this stage.
Install the msgfmt binary:
cp -v src/msgfmt /tools/bin
Details on this package are located in Section 6.36.2, “Contents of Gettext.”
The Grep package contains programs for searching through files.
Prepare Grep for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/tools \
--disable-perl-regexp
The meaning of the configure option:
--disable-perl-regexp
This ensures that the grep program does not get linked against a Perl Compatible Regular Expression (PCRE) library that may be present on the host but will not be available once we enter the chroot environment.
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
Details on this package are located in Section 6.37.2, “Contents of Grep.”
The Gzip package contains programs for compressing and decompressing files.
Prepare Gzip for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/tools
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
Details on this package are located in Section 6.39.2, “Contents of Gzip.”
The Make package contains a program for compiling packages.
Prepare Make for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/tools
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
Details on this package are located in Section 6.44.2, “Contents of Make.”
The Patch package contains a program for modifying or creating files by applying a “patch” file typically created by the diff program.
Prepare Patch for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/tools
Compile the package:
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install
Details on this package are located in Section 6.48.2, “Contents of Patch.”
The Perl package contains the Practical Extraction and Report Language.
First adapt some hard-wired paths to the C library by applying the following patch:
patch -Np1 -i ../perl-5.8.8-libc-2.patch
Prepare Perl for compilation (make sure to get the 'Data/Dumper Fcntl IO POSIX' part of the command correct—they are all letters):
./configure.gnu --prefix=/tools -Dstatic_ext='Data/Dumper Fcntl IO POSIX'
The meaning of the configure options:
-Dstatic_ext='Data/Dumper Fcntl IO
POSIX'
This tells Perl to build the minimum set of static extensions needed for installing and testing the Coreutils and Glibc packages in the next chapter.
Only a few of the utilities contained in this package need to be built:
make perl utilities
Although Perl comes with a test suite, it is not recommended to run it at this point. Only part of Perl was built and running make test now will cause the rest of Perl to be built as well, which is unnecessary at this point. The test suite can be run in the next chapter if desired.
Install these tools and their libraries:
cp -v perl pod/pod2man /tools/bin mkdir -pv /tools/lib/perl5/5.8.8 cp -Rv lib/* /tools/lib/perl5/5.8.8
Details on this package are located in Section 6.23.2, “Contents of Perl.”
The Sed package contains a stream editor.
Prepare Sed for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/tools
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
Details on this package are located in Section 6.14.2, “Contents of Sed.”
The Tar package contains an archiving program.
Prepare Tar for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/tools
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
Details on this package are located in Section 6.53.2, “Contents of Tar.”
The Texinfo package contains programs for reading, writing, and converting info pages.
Prepare Texinfo for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/tools
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
Details on this package are located in Section 6.54.2, “Contents of Texinfo.”
The Util-linux package contains miscellaneous utility programs. Among them are utilities for handling file systems, consoles, partitions, and messages.
Util-linux does not use the freshly installed headers and
libraries from the /tools
directory by default. This is fixed by altering the configure
script:
sed -i 's@/usr/include@/tools/include@g' configure
Prepare Util-linux for compilation:
./configure
Compile some support routines:
make -C lib
Only a few of the utilities contained in this package need to be built:
make -C mount mount umount make -C text-utils more
This package does not come with a test suite.
Copy these programs to the temporary tools directory:
cp -v mount/{,u}mount text-utils/more /tools/bin
Details on this package are located in Section 6.56.3, “Contents of Util-linux.”
The steps in this section are optional, but if the LFS partition is rather small, it is beneficial to learn that unnecessary items can be removed. The executables and libraries built so far contain about 70 MB of unneeded debugging symbols. Remove those symbols with:
strip --strip-debug /tools/lib/*
strip --strip-unneeded /tools/{,s}bin/*
The last of the above commands will skip some twenty files, reporting that it does not recognize their file format. Most of these are scripts instead of binaries.
Take care not to use
--strip-unneeded on the
libraries. The static ones would be destroyed and the toolchain
packages would need to be built all over again.
To save nearly 20 MB more, remove the documentation:
rm -rf /tools/{info,man}
At this point, you should have at least 850 MB of free space in
$LFS that can be used to build and
install Glibc in the next phase. If you can build and install
Glibc, you can build and install the rest too.
The commands in the remainder of this book must be performed
while logged in as user root
and no longer as user lfs.
Also, double check that $LFS is
set in root's environment.
Currently, the $LFS/tools
directory is owned by the user lfs, a user that exists only on the host
system. If the $LFS/tools
directory is kept as is, the files are owned by a user ID
without a corresponding account. This is dangerous because a
user account created later could get this same user ID and
would own the $LFS/tools
directory and all the files therein, thus exposing these files
to possible malicious manipulation.
To avoid this issue, you could add the lfs user to the new LFS system later when
creating the /etc/passwd file,
taking care to assign it the same user and group IDs as on the
host system. Better yet, change the ownership of the
$LFS/tools directory to user
root by running the following
command:
chown -R root:root $LFS/tools
Although the $LFS/tools directory
can be deleted once the LFS system has been finished, it can be
retained to build additional LFS systems of the same book version. How best
to backup $LFS/tools is a matter
of personal preference and is left as an exercise for the
reader.
If you intend to keep the temporary tools for use in building future LFS systems, now is the time to back them up. Subsequent commands in chapter 6 will alter the tools currently in place, rendering them useless for future builds.
In this chapter, we enter the building site and start constructing the LFS system in earnest. That is, we chroot into the temporary mini Linux system, make a few final preparations, and then begin installing the packages.
The installation of this software is straightforward. Although in many cases the installation instructions could be made shorter and more generic, we have opted to provide the full instructions for every package to minimize the possibilities for mistakes. The key to learning what makes a Linux system work is to know what each package is used for and why the user (or the system) needs it. For every installed package, a summary of its contents is given, followed by concise descriptions of each program and library the package installed.
If using compiler optimizations, please review the optimization
hint at
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/optimization.txt.
Compiler optimizations can make a program run slightly faster,
but they may also cause compilation difficulties and problems
when running the program. If a package refuses to compile when
using optimization, try to compile it without optimization and
see if that fixes the problem. Even if the package does compile
when using optimization, there is the risk it may have been
compiled incorrectly because of the complex interactions
between the code and build tools. Also note that the
-march and -mtune options may cause problems with the
toolchain packages (Binutils, GCC and Glibc). The small
potential gains achieved in using compiler optimizations are
often outweighed by the risks. First-time builders of LFS are
encouraged to build without custom optimizations. The
subsequent system will still run very fast and be stable at the
same time.
The order that packages are installed in this chapter needs to
be strictly followed to ensure that no program accidentally
acquires a path referring to /tools hard-wired into it. For the same
reason, do not compile packages in parallel. Compiling in
parallel may save time (especially on dual-CPU machines), but
it could result in a program containing a hard-wired path to
/tools, which will cause the
program to stop working when that directory is removed.
Before the installation instructions, each installation page provides information about the package, including a concise description of what it contains, approximately how long it will take to build, and how much disk space is required during this building process. Following the installation instructions, there is a list of programs and libraries (along with brief descriptions of these) that the package installs.
Various file systems exported by the kernel are used to communicate to and from the kernel itself. These file systems are virtual in that no disk space is used for them. The content of the file systems resides in memory.
Begin by creating directories onto which the file systems will be mounted:
mkdir -pv $LFS/{dev,proc,sys}
When the kernel boots the system, it requires the presence of
a few device nodes, in particular the console and null devices. The device nodes will be
created on the hard disk so that they are available before
udevd has been
started, and additionally when Linux is started with
init=/bin/bash.
Create the devices by running the following commands:
mknod -m 600 $LFS/dev/console c 5 1 mknod -m 666 $LFS/dev/null c 1 3
The recommended method of populating the /dev directory with devices is to mount a
virtual filesystem (such as tmpfs) on the /dev directory, and allow the devices to be
created dynamically on that virtual filesystem as they are
detected or accessed. This is generally done during the boot
process by Udev. Since this new system does not yet have Udev
and has not yet been booted, it is necessary to mount and
populate /dev manually. This is
accomplished by bind mounting the host system's /dev directory. A bind mount is a special
type of mount that allows you to create a mirror of a
directory or mount point to some other location. Use the
following command to achieve this:
mount -v --bind /dev $LFS/dev
Package Management is an often requested addition to the LFS Book. A Package Manager allows tracking the installation of files making it easy to remove and upgrade packages. Before you begin to wonder, NO—this section will not talk about nor recommend any particular package manager. What it provides is a roundup of the more popular techniques and how they work. The perfect package manager for you may be among these techniques or may be a combination of two or more of these techniques. This section briefly mentions issues that may arise when upgrading packages.
Some reasons why no package manager is mentioned in LFS or BLFS include:
Dealing with package management takes the focus away from the goals of these books—teaching how a Linux system is built.
There are multiple solutions for package management, each having its strengths and drawbacks. Including one that satisfies all audiences is difficult.
There are some hints written on the topic of package management. Visit the Hints Project and see if one of them fits your need.
A Package Manager makes it easy to upgrade to newer versions when they are released. Generally the instructions in the LFS and BLFS Book can be used to upgrade to the newer versions. Here are some points that you should be aware of when upgrading packages, especially on a running system.
If one of the toolchain packages (Glibc, GCC or Binutils) needs to be upgraded to a newer minor version, it is safer to rebuild LFS. Though you may be able to get by rebuilding all the packages in their dependency order, we do not recommend it. For example, if glibc-2.2.x needs to be updated to glibc-2.3.x, it is safer to rebuild. For micro version updates, a simple reinstallation usually works, but is not guaranteed. For example, upgrading from glibc-2.3.4 to glibc-2.3.5 will not usually cause any problems.
If a package containing a shared library is updated,
and if the name of the library changes, then all the
packages dynamically linked to the library need to be
recompiled to link against the newer library. (Note
that there is no correlation between the package
version and the name of the library.) For example,
consider a package foo-1.2.3 that installs a shared
library with name libfoo.so.1. Say you upgrade the
package to a newer version foo-1.2.4 that installs a
shared library with name libfoo.so.2. In this case, all
packages that are dynamically linked to libfoo.so.1 need to be recompiled to
link against libfoo.so.2.
Note that you should not remove the previous libraries
until the dependent packages are recompiled.
The following are some common package management techniques. Before making a decision on a package manager, do some research on the various techniques, particularly the drawbacks of the particular scheme.
Yes, this is a package management technique. Some folks do not find the need for a package manager because they know the packages intimately and know what files are installed by each package. Some users also do not need any package management because they plan on rebuilding the entire system when a package is changed.
This is a simplistic package management that does not need
any extra package to manage the installations. Each package
is installed in a separate directory. For example, package
foo-1.1 is installed in /usr/pkg/foo-1.1 and a symlink is made
from /usr/pkg/foo to
/usr/pkg/foo-1.1. When
installing a new version foo-1.2, it is installed in
/usr/pkg/foo-1.2 and the
previous symlink is replaced by a symlink to the new
version.
Environment variables such as PATH, LD_LIBRARY_PATH, MANPATH, INFOPATH
and CPPFLAGS need to be expanded
to include /usr/pkg/foo. For
more than a few packages, this scheme becomes unmanageable.
This is a variation of the previous package management
technique. Each package is installed similar to the
previous scheme. But instead of making the symlink, each
file is symlinked into the /usr hierarchy. This removes the need to
expand the environment variables. Though the symlinks can
be created by the user to automate the creation, many
package managers have been written using this approach. A
few of the popular ones include Stow, Epkg, Graft, and
Depot.
The installation needs to be faked, so that the package
thinks that it is installed in /usr though in reality it is installed in
the /usr/pkg hierarchy.
Installing in this manner is not usually a trivial task.
For example, consider that you are installing a package
libfoo-1.1. The following instructions may not install the
package properly:
./configure --prefix=/usr/pkg/libfoo/1.1 make make install
The installation will work, but the dependent packages may
not link to libfoo as you would expect. If you compile a
package that links against libfoo, you may notice that it
is linked to /usr/pkg/libfoo/1.1/lib/libfoo.so.1
instead of /usr/lib/libfoo.so.1 as you would expect.
The correct approach is to use the DESTDIR strategy to fake installation of the
package. This approach works as follows:
./configure --prefix=/usr make make DESTDIR=/usr/pkg/libfoo/1.1 install
Most packages support this approach, but there are some
which do not. For the non-compliant packages, you may
either need to manually install the package, or you may
find that it is easier to install some problematic packages
into /opt.
In this technique, a file is timestamped before the installation of the package. After the installation, a simple use of the find command with the appropriate options can generate a log of all the files installed after the timestamp file was created. A package manager written with this approach is install-log.
Though this scheme has the advantage of being simple, it has two drawbacks. If, during installation, the files are installed with any timestamp other than the current time, those files will not be tracked by the package manager. Also, this scheme can only be used when one package is installed at a time. The logs are not reliable if two packages are being installed on two different consoles.
In this approach, a library is preloaded before installation. During installation, this library tracks the packages that are being installed by attaching itself to various executables such as cp, install, mv and tracking the system calls that modify the filesystem. For this approach to work, all the executables need to be dynamically linked without the suid or sgid bit. Preloading the library may cause some unwanted side-effects during installation. Therefore, it is advised that one performs some tests to ensure that the package manager does not break anything and logs all the appropriate files.
In this scheme, the package installation is faked into a separate tree as described in the Symlink style package management. After the installation, a package archive is created using the installed files. This archive is then used to install the package either on the local machine or can even be used to install the package on other machines.
This approach is used by most of the package managers found in the commercial distributions. Examples of package managers that follow this approach are RPM (which, incidentally, is required by the Linux Standard Base Specification), pkg-utils, Debian's apt, and Gentoo's Portage system. A hint describing how to adopt this style of package management for LFS systems is located at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/fakeroot.txt.
This scheme, unique to LFS, was devised by Matthias Benkmann, and is available from the Hints Project. In this scheme, each package is installed as a separate user into the standard locations. Files belonging to a package are easily identified by checking the user ID. The features and shortcomings of this approach are too complex to describe in this section. For the details please see the hint at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/more_control_and_pkg_man.txt.
It is time to enter the chroot environment to begin building
and installing the final LFS system. As user root, run the following command to enter
the realm that is, at the moment, populated with only the
temporary tools:
chroot "$LFS" /tools/bin/env -i \
HOME=/root TERM="$TERM" PS1='\u:\w\$ ' \
PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin:/tools/bin \
/tools/bin/bash --login +h
The -i option given to
the env command
will clear all variables of the chroot environment. After that,
only the HOME, TERM, PS1, and
PATH variables are set again. The
TERM=$TERM construct
will set the TERM variable inside
chroot to the same value as outside chroot. This variable is
needed for programs like vim and less to operate properly. If
other variables are needed, such as CFLAGS or CXXFLAGS,
this is a good place to set them again.
From this point on, there is no need to use the LFS variable anymore, because all work will be
restricted to the LFS file system. This is because the Bash
shell is told that $LFS is now
the root (/) directory.
Notice that /tools/bin comes last
in the PATH. This means that a
temporary tool will no longer be used once its final version is
installed. This occurs when the shell does not
“remember” the locations
of executed binaries—for this reason, hashing is switched
off by passing the +h
option to bash.
Note that the bash prompt will say
I have no name! This is
normal because the /etc/passwd
file has not been created yet.
It is important that all the commands throughout the remainder of this chapter and the following chapters are run from within the chroot environment. If you leave this environment for any reason (rebooting for example), ensure that the virtual kernel filesystems are mounted as explained in Section 6.2.2, “Mounting and Populating /dev” and Section 6.2.3, “Mounting Virtual Kernel File Systems” and enter chroot again before continuing with the installation.
It is time to create some structure in the LFS file system. Create a standard directory tree by issuing the following commands:
mkdir -pv /{bin,boot,etc/opt,home,lib,mnt,opt}
mkdir -pv /{media/{floppy,cdrom},sbin,srv,var}
install -dv -m 0750 /root
install -dv -m 1777 /tmp /var/tmp
mkdir -pv /usr/{,local/}{bin,include,lib,sbin,src}
mkdir -pv /usr/{,local/}share/{doc,info,locale,man}
mkdir -v /usr/{,local/}share/{misc,terminfo,zoneinfo}
mkdir -pv /usr/{,local/}share/man/man{1..8}
for dir in /usr /usr/local; do
ln -sv share/{man,doc,info} $dir
done
mkdir -v /var/{lock,log,mail,run,spool}
mkdir -pv /var/{opt,cache,lib/{misc,locate},local}
Directories are, by default, created with permission mode 755,
but this is not desirable for all directories. In the commands
above, two changes are made—one to the home directory of
user root, and another to the
directories for temporary files.
The first mode change ensures that not just anybody can enter
the /root directory—the
same as a normal user would do with his or her home directory.
The second mode change makes sure that any user can write to
the /tmp and /var/tmp directories, but cannot remove
another user's files from them. The latter is prohibited by the
so-called “sticky bit,”
the highest bit (1) in the 1777 bit mask.
The directory tree is based on the Filesystem Hierarchy
Standard (FHS) (available at http://www.pathname.com/fhs/).
In addition to the FHS, we create compatibility symlinks for
the man, doc, and info
directories since many packages still try to install their
documentation into /usr/<directory> or /usr/local/<directory> as opposed to
/usr/share/<directory> or
/usr/local/share/<directory>. The FHS
also stipulates the existence of /usr/local/games and /usr/share/games. The FHS is not precise as
to the structure of the /usr/local/share subdirectory, so we create
only the directories that are needed. However, feel free to
create these directories if you prefer to conform more
strictly to the FHS.
Some programs use hard-wired paths to programs which do not exist yet. In order to satisfy these programs, create a number of symbolic links which will be replaced by real files throughout the course of this chapter after the software has been installed:
ln -sv /tools/bin/{bash,cat,echo,grep,pwd,stty} /bin
ln -sv /tools/bin/perl /usr/bin
ln -sv /tools/lib/libgcc_s.so{,.1} /usr/lib
ln -sv /tools/lib/libstdc++.so{,.6} /usr/lib
ln -sv bash /bin/sh
A proper Linux system maintains a list of the mounted file
systems in the file /etc/mtab.
Normally, this file would be created when we mount a new file
system. Since we will not be mounting any file systems inside
our chroot environment, create an empty file for utilities that
expect the presence of /etc/mtab:
touch /etc/mtab
In order for user root to be
able to login and for the name “root” to be recognized, there must be
relevant entries in the /etc/passwd and /etc/group files.
Create the /etc/passwd file by
running the following command:
cat > /etc/passwd << "EOF"
root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash
nobody:x:99:99:Unprivileged User:/dev/null:/bin/false
EOF
The actual password for root
(the “x” used here is
just a placeholder) will be set later.
Create the /etc/group file by
running the following command:
cat > /etc/group << "EOF"
root:x:0:
bin:x:1:
sys:x:2:
kmem:x:3:
tty:x:4:
tape:x:5:
daemon:x:6:
floppy:x:7:
disk:x:8:
lp:x:9:
dialout:x:10:
audio:x:11:
video:x:12:
utmp:x:13:
usb:x:14:
cdrom:x:15:
mail:x:34:
nogroup:x:99:
EOF
The created groups are not part of any standard—they are
groups decided on in part by the requirements of the Udev
configuration in this chapter, and in part by common convention
employed by a number of existing Linux distributions. The Linux
Standard Base (LSB, available at http://www.linuxbase.org)
recommends only that, besides the group root with a Group ID (GID) of 0, a group
bin with a GID of 1 be present.
All other group names and GIDs can be chosen freely by the
system administrator since well-written programs do not depend
on GID numbers, but rather use the group's name.
To remove the “I have no
name!” prompt, start a new shell. Since a full
Glibc was installed in Chapter
5 and the /etc/passwd and
/etc/group files have been
created, user name and group name resolution will now work:
exec /tools/bin/bash --login +h
Note the use of the +h
directive. This tells bash not to use its internal
path hashing. Without this directive, bash would remember the paths
to binaries it has executed. To ensure the use of the newly
compiled binaries as soon as they are installed, the +h directive will be used for the
duration of this chapter.
The login, agetty, and init programs (and others) use a number of log files to record information such as who was logged into the system and when. However, these programs will not write to the log files if they do not already exist. Initialize the log files and give them proper permissions:
touch /var/run/utmp /var/log/{btmp,lastlog,wtmp}
chgrp -v utmp /var/run/utmp /var/log/lastlog
chmod -v 664 /var/run/utmp /var/log/lastlog
The /var/run/utmp file records
the users that are currently logged in. The /var/log/wtmp file records all logins and
logouts. The /var/log/lastlog
file records when each user last logged in. The /var/log/btmp file records the bad login
attempts.
The Linux API Headers expose the kernel's API for use by Glibc.
The Linux kernel needs to expose an Application Programming Interface (API) for the system's C library (Glibc in LFS) to utilize. This is done by way of sanitizing various C header files that are shipped in the Linux kernel source tarball.
Apply a sed
subsitution to suppress the installation of header files in
/usr/include/scsi. The versions
provided by Glibc will be used instead:
sed -i '/scsi/d' include/Kbuild
Install the header files:
make mrproper make headers_check make INSTALL_HDR_PATH=dest headers_install cp -rv dest/include/* /usr/include
The Man-pages package contains over 3,000 man pages.
Install Man-pages by running:
make install
The Glibc package contains the main C library. This library provides the basic routines for allocating memory, searching directories, opening and closing files, reading and writing files, string handling, pattern matching, arithmetic, and so on.
Some packages outside of LFS suggest installing GNU
libiconv in order to translate data from one encoding to
another. The project's home page (http://www.gnu.org/software/libiconv/)
says “This library provides an
iconv() implementation, for
use on systems which don't have one, or whose
implementation cannot convert from/to
Unicode.” Glibc provides an iconv() implementation and can convert
from/to Unicode, therefore libiconv is not required on an
LFS system.
The Glibc build system is self-contained and will install
perfectly, even though the compiler specs file and linker are
still pointing at /tools. The
specs and linker cannot be adjusted before the Glibc install
because the Glibc autoconf tests would give false results and
defeat the goal of achieving a clean build.
The glibc-libidn tarball adds support for internationalized
domain names (IDN) to Glibc. Many programs that support IDN
require the full libidn
library, not this add-on (see
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/general/libidn.html).
Unpack the tarball from within the Glibc source directory:
tar -xvf ../glibc-libidn-2.5.1.tar.gz mv glibc-libidn-2.5.1 libidn
In the vi_VN.TCVN locale, bash enters an infinite loop at startup. It is unknown whether this is a bash bug or a Glibc problem. Disable installation of this locale in order to avoid the problem:
sed -i '/vi_VN.TCVN/d' localedata/SUPPORTED
When running make
install, a script called test-installation.pl performs a small
sanity test on our newly installed Glibc. However, because
our toolchain still points to the /tools directory, the sanity test would be
carried out against the wrong Glibc. We can force the script
to check the Glibc we have just installed with the following:
sed -i \
's|libs -o|libs -L/usr/lib -Wl,-dynamic-linker=/lib/ld-linux.so.2 -o|' \
scripts/test-installation.pl
The ldd shell script contains Bash-specific syntax. Change it's default program interpreter to /bin/bash in case another /bin/sh is installed as described in the Shells chapter of the BLFS book:
sed -i 's|@BASH@|/bin/bash|' elf/ldd.bash.in
The Glibc documentation recommends building Glibc outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:
mkdir -v ../glibc-build cd ../glibc-build
Prepare Glibc for compilation:
../glibc-2.5.1/configure --prefix=/usr \
--disable-profile --enable-add-ons \
--enable-kernel=2.6.0 --libexecdir=/usr/lib/glibc
The meaning of the new configure options:
--libexecdir=/usr/lib/glibc
This changes the location of the pt_chown program from
its default of /usr/libexec to /usr/lib/glibc.
Compile the package:
make
In this section, the test suite for Glibc is considered critical. Do not skip it under any circumstance.
Test the results:
make -k check 2>&1 | tee glibc-check-log grep Error glibc-check-log
You will probably see an expected (ignored) failure in the posix/annexc test. In addition the Glibc test suite is somewhat dependent on the host system. This is a list of the most common issues:
The nptl/tst-cancel1 test will fail when using the 4.1 series of GCC.
The nptl/tst-clock2 and tst-attr3 tests sometimes fail. The reason is not completely understood, but indications are that a heavy system load can trigger these failures.
The math tests sometimes fail when running on systems where the CPU is not a relatively new genuine Intel or authentic AMD processor.
If you have mounted the LFS partition with the
noatime option,
the atime test
will fail. As mentioned in Section 2.4,
“Mounting the New Partition”, do not
use the noatime
option while building LFS.
When running on older and slower hardware or on systems under load, some tests can fail because of test timeouts being exceeded.
Though it is a harmless message, the install stage of Glibc
will complain about the absence of /etc/ld.so.conf. Prevent this warning with:
touch /etc/ld.so.conf
Install the package:
make install
The locales that can make the system respond in a different language were not installed by the above command. None of the locales are required, but if some of them are missing, testsuites of the future packages would skip important testcases.
Individual locales can be installed using the localedef program. E.g.,
the first localedef command below
combines the /usr/share/i18n/locales/de_DE
charset-independent locale definition with the /usr/share/i18n/charmaps/ISO-8859-1.gz
charmap definition and appends the result to the /usr/lib/locale/locale-archive file. The
following instructions will install the minimum set of
locales necessary for the optimal coverage of tests:
mkdir -pv /usr/lib/locale localedef -i de_DE -f ISO-8859-1 de_DE localedef -i de_DE@euro -f ISO-8859-15 de_DE@euro localedef -i en_HK -f ISO-8859-1 en_HK localedef -i en_PH -f ISO-8859-1 en_PH localedef -i en_US -f ISO-8859-1 en_US localedef -i en_US -f UTF-8 en_US.UTF-8 localedef -i es_MX -f ISO-8859-1 es_MX localedef -i fa_IR -f UTF-8 fa_IR localedef -i fr_FR -f ISO-8859-1 fr_FR localedef -i fr_FR@euro -f ISO-8859-15 fr_FR@euro localedef -i fr_FR -f UTF-8 fr_FR.UTF-8 localedef -i it_IT -f ISO-8859-1 it_IT localedef -i ja_JP -f EUC-JP ja_JP
In addition, install the locale for your own country, language and character set.
Alternatively, install all locales listed in the glibc-2.5.1/localedata/SUPPORTED file (it
includes every locale listed above and many more) at once
with the following time-consuming command:
make localedata/install-locales
Then use the localedef command to create
and install locales not listed in the glibc-2.5.1/localedata/SUPPORTED file in
the unlikely case if you need them.
The /etc/nsswitch.conf file
needs to be created because, although Glibc provides defaults
when this file is missing or corrupt, the Glibc defaults do
not work well in a networked environment. The time zone also
needs to be configured.
Create a new file /etc/nsswitch.conf by running the
following:
cat > /etc/nsswitch.conf << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/nsswitch.conf
passwd: files
group: files
shadow: files
hosts: files dns
networks: files
protocols: files
services: files
ethers: files
rpc: files
# End /etc/nsswitch.conf
EOF
One way to determine the local time zone, run the following script:
tzselect
After answering a few questions about the location, the
script will output the name of the time zone (e.g.,
America/Edmonton).
There are also some other possible timezones listed in
/usr/share/zoneinfo such as
Canada/Eastern or
EST5EDT that are not
identified by the script but can be used.
Then create the /etc/localtime
file by running:
cp -v --remove-destination /usr/share/zoneinfo/<xxx> \
/etc/localtime
Replace <xxx>
with the name of the time zone selected (e.g.,
Canada/Eastern).
The meaning of the cp option:
--remove-destination
This is needed to force removal of the already existing
symbolic link. The reason for copying the file instead
of using a symlink is to cover the situation where
/usr is on a separate
partition. This could be important when booted into
single user mode.
By default, the dynamic loader (/lib/ld-linux.so.2) searches through
/lib and /usr/lib for dynamic libraries that are
needed by programs as they are run. However, if there are
libraries in directories other than /lib and /usr/lib, these need to be added to the
/etc/ld.so.conf file in order
for the dynamic loader to find them. Two directories that are
commonly known to contain additional libraries are
/usr/local/lib and /opt/lib, so add those directories to the
dynamic loader's search path.
Create a new file /etc/ld.so.conf by running the following:
cat > /etc/ld.so.conf << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/ld.so.conf
/usr/local/lib
/opt/lib
# End /etc/ld.so.conf
EOF
|
Can be used to create a stack trace when a program terminates with a segmentation fault |
|
|
Generates message catalogues |
|
|
Displays the system configuration values for file system specific variables |
|
|
Gets entries from an administrative database |
|
|
Performs character set conversion |
|
|
Creates fastloading iconv module configuration files |
|
|
Configures the dynamic linker runtime bindings |
|
|
Reports which shared libraries are required by each given program or shared library |
|
|
Assists ldd with object files |
|
|
Prints various information about the current locale |
|
|
Compiles locale specifications |
|
|
Reads and interprets a memory trace file and displays a summary in human-readable format |
|
|
A daemon that provides a cache for the most common name service requests |
|
|
Dumps information generated by PC profiling |
|
|
A helper program for grantpt to set the owner, group and access permissions of a slave pseudo terminal |
|
|
Generates C code to implement the Remote Procecure Call (RPC) protocol |
|
|
Makes an RPC call to an RPC server |
|
|
A statically linked ln program |
|
|
Reads and displays shared object profiling data |
|
|
Asks the user about the location of the system and reports the corresponding time zone description |
|
|
Traces the execution of a program by printing the currently executed function |
|
|
The time zone dumper |
|
|
The time zone compiler |
|
|
The helper program for shared library executables |
|
|
Used internally by Glibc as a gross hack to get
broken programs (e.g., some Motif applications)
running. See comments in |
|
|
The segmentation fault signal handler, used by catchsegv |
|
|
An asynchronous name lookup library |
|
|
Provides the portability needed in order to run certain Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD) programs under Linux |
|
|
The main C library |
|
|
Used internally by Glibc for handling
internationalized domain names in the |
|
|
The cryptography library |
|
|
The dynamic linking interface library |
|
|
Dummy library containing no functions. Previously was a runtime library for g++ |
|
|
Linking in this module forces error handling rules for math functions as defined by the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE). The default is POSIX.1 error handling |
|
|
The mathematical library |
|
|
Turns on memory allocation checking when linked to |
|
|
Used by memusage to help collect information about the memory usage of a program |
|
|
The network services library |
|
|
The Name Service Switch libraries, containing functions for resolving host names, user names, group names, aliases, services, protocols, etc. |
|
|
Contains profiling functions used to track the amount of CPU time spent in specific source code lines |
|
|
The POSIX threads library |
|
|
Contains functions for creating, sending, and interpreting packets to the Internet domain name servers |
|
|
Contains functions providing miscellaneous RPC services |
|
|
Contains functions providing most of the interfaces specified by the POSIX.1b Realtime Extension |
|
|
Contains functions useful for building debuggers for multi-threaded programs |
|
|
Contains code for “standard” functions used in many different Unix utilities |
Now that the final C libraries have been installed, it is time
to adjust the toolchain again. The toolchain will be adjusted
so that it will link any newly compiled program against these
new libraries. This is a similar process used in the
“Adjusting” phase in the
beginning of Chapter
5, but with the adjustments reversed. In Chapter
5, the chain was guided from the host's /{,usr/}lib directories to the new
/tools/lib directory. Now, the
chain will be guided from that same /tools/lib directory to the LFS /{,usr/}lib directories.
First, backup the /tools linker,
and replace it with the adjusted linker we made in chapter 5.
We'll also create a link to its counterpart in /tools/$(gcc -dumpmachine)/bin:
mv -v /tools/bin/{ld,ld-old}
mv -v /tools/$(gcc -dumpmachine)/bin/{ld,ld-old}
mv -v /tools/bin/{ld-new,ld}
ln -sv /tools/bin/ld /tools/$(gcc -dumpmachine)/bin/ld
Next, amend the GCC specs file so that it points to the new dynamic linker, and so that GCC knows where to find the correct headers and Glibc start files. A sed command accomplishes this:
If working on a platform where the name of the dynamic linker
is something other than ld-linux.so.2, substitute
“ld-linux.so.2” with
the name of the platform's dynamic linker in the following
commands. Refer to Section 5.2,
“Toolchain Technical Notes,” if necessary.
gcc -dumpspecs | sed \
-e 's@/tools/lib/ld-linux.so.2@/lib/ld-linux.so.2@g' \
-e '/\*startfile_prefix_spec:/{n;s@.*@/usr/lib/ @}' \
-e '/\*cpp:/{n;s@$@ -isystem /usr/include@}' > \
`dirname $(gcc --print-libgcc-file-name)`/specs
It is a good idea to visually inspect the specs file to verify the intended change was actually made.
It is imperative at this point to ensure that the basic functions (compiling and linking) of the adjusted toolchain are working as expected. To do this, perform the following sanity checks:
echo 'main(){}' > dummy.c
cc dummy.c -v -Wl,--verbose &> dummy.log
readelf -l a.out | grep ': /lib'
If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be (allowing for platform-specific differences in dynamic linker name):
[Requesting program interpreter: /lib/ld-linux.so.2]
Note that /lib is now the prefix
of our dynamic linker.
Now make sure that we're setup to use the correct startfiles:
grep -o '/usr/lib.*/crt[1in].*succeeded' dummy.log
If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be:
/usr/lib/crt1.o succeeded
/usr/lib/crti.o succeeded
/usr/lib/crtn.o succeededVerify that the compiler is searching for the correct header files:
grep -B1 '^ /usr/include' dummy.log
This command should return successfully with the following output:
#include <...> search starts here:
/usr/includeNext, verify that the new linker is being used with the correct search paths:
grep 'SEARCH.*/usr/lib' dummy.log |sed 's|; |\n|g'
If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be:
SEARCH_DIR("/tools/i686-pc-linux-gnu/lib")
SEARCH_DIR("/usr/lib")
SEARCH_DIR("/lib");Next make sure that we're using the correct libc:
grep "/lib/libc.so.6 " dummy.log
If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be:
attempt to open /lib/libc.so.6 succeededLastly, make sure GCC is using the correct dynamic linker:
grep found dummy.log
If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be (allowing for platform-specific differences in dynamic linker name):
found ld-linux.so.2 at /lib/ld-linux.so.2If the output does not appear as shown above or is not received at all, then something is seriously wrong. Investigate and retrace the steps to find out where the problem is and correct it. The most likely reason is that something went wrong with the specs file adjustment. Any issues will need to be resolved before continuing on with the process.
Once everything is working correctly, clean up the test files:
rm -v dummy.c a.out dummy.log
The Binutils package contains a linker, an assembler, and other tools for handling object files.
Verify that the PTYs are working properly inside the chroot environment. Check that everything is set up correctly by performing a simple test:
expect -c "spawn ls"
If the following message shows up, the chroot environment is not set up for proper PTY operation:
The system has no more ptys.
Ask your system administrator to create more.This issue needs to be resolved before running the test suites for Binutils and GCC.
The Binutils documentation recommends building Binutils outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:
mkdir -v ../binutils-build cd ../binutils-build
Prepare Binutils for compilation:
../binutils-2.17/configure --prefix=/usr \
--enable-shared
Compile the package:
make tooldir=/usr
The meaning of the make parameter:
tooldir=/usr
Normally, the tooldir (the directory where the
executables will ultimately be located) is set to
$(exec_prefix)/$(target_alias). For
example, i686 machines would expand that to
/usr/i686-pc-linux-gnu.
Because this is a custom system, this target-specific
directory in /usr is not
required. $(exec_prefix)/$(target_alias) would
be used if the system was used to cross-compile (for
example, compiling a package on an Intel machine that
generates code that can be executed on PowerPC
machines).
The test suite for Binutils in this section is considered critical. Do not skip it under any circumstances.
Test the results:
make check
Install the package:
make tooldir=/usr install
Install the libiberty header
file that is needed by some packages:
cp -v ../binutils-2.17/include/libiberty.h /usr/include
|
Translates program addresses to file names and line numbers; given an address and the name of an executable, it uses the debugging information in the executable to determine which source file and line number are associated with the address |
|
|
Creates, modifies, and extracts from archives |
|
|
An assembler that assembles the output of gcc into object files |
|
|
Used by the linker to de-mangle C++ and Java symbols and to keep overloaded functions from clashing |
|
|
Displays call graph profile data |
|
|
A linker that combines a number of object and archive files into a single file, relocating their data and tying up symbol references |
|
|
Lists the symbols occurring in a given object file |
|
|
Translates one type of object file into another |
|
|
Displays information about the given object file, with options controlling the particular information to display; the information shown is useful to programmers who are working on the compilation tools |
|
|
Generates an index of the contents of an archive and stores it in the archive; the index lists all of the symbols defined by archive members that are relocatable object files |
|
|
Displays information about ELF type binaries |
|
|
Lists the section sizes and the total size for the given object files |
|
|
Outputs, for each given file, the sequences of printable characters that are of at least the specified length (defaulting to four); for object files, it prints, by default, only the strings from the initializing and loading sections while for other types of files, it scans the entire file |
|
|
Discards symbols from object files |
|
|
Contains routines used by various GNU programs, including getopt, obstack, strerror, strtol, and strtoul |
|
|
The Binary File Descriptor library |
|
|
A library for dealing with opcodes—the “readable text” versions of instructions for the processor; it is used for building utilities like objdump. |
The GCC package contains the GNU compiler collection, which includes the C and C++ compilers.
Apply a sed
substitution that will suppress the installation of
libiberty.a. The version of
libiberty.a provided by
Binutils will be used instead:
sed -i 's/install_to_$(INSTALL_DEST) //' libiberty/Makefile.in
The bootstrap build performed in Section 5.4,
“GCC-4.1.2 - Pass 1” built GCC with the
-fomit-frame-pointer compiler
flag. Non-bootstrap builds omit this flag by default, so
apply the following sed to use it in order to
ensure consistent compiler builds:
sed -i 's/^XCFLAGS =$/& -fomit-frame-pointer/' gcc/Makefile.in
The fixincludes script is known to occasionally erroneously attempt to "fix" the system headers installed so far. As the headers installed by GCC-4.1.2 and Glibc-2.5.1 are known to not require fixing, issue the following command to prevent the fixincludes script from running:
sed -i 's@\./fixinc\.sh@-c true@' gcc/Makefile.in
GCC provides a gccbug script which detects at compile time whether mktemp is present, and hardcodes the result in a test. This will cause the script to fall back to using less random names for temporary files. We will be installing mktemp later, so the following sed will simulate its presence:
sed -i 's/@have_mktemp_command@/yes/' gcc/gccbug.in
The GCC documentation recommends building GCC outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:
mkdir -v ../gcc-build cd ../gcc-build
Prepare GCC for compilation:
../gcc-4.1.2/configure --prefix=/usr \
--libexecdir=/usr/lib --enable-shared \
--enable-threads=posix --enable-__cxa_atexit \
--enable-clocale=gnu --enable-languages=c,c++
Compile the package:
make
In this section, the test suite for GCC is considered critical. Do not skip it under any circumstance.
Test the results, but do not stop at errors:
make -k check
To receive a summary of the test suite results, run:
../gcc-4.1.2/contrib/test_summary
For only the summaries, pipe the output through
grep -A7
Summ.
Results can be compared with those located at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/build-logs/6.3/.
A few unexpected failures cannot always be avoided. The GCC
developers are usually aware of these issues, but have not
resolved them yet. In particular, the libmudflap tests are known be particularly
problematic as a result of a bug in GCC (http://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=20003).
Unless the test results are vastly different from those at
the above URL, it is safe to continue.
Install the package:
make install
Some packages expect the C preprocessor to be installed in
the /lib directory. To support
those packages, create this symlink:
ln -sv ../usr/bin/cpp /lib
Many packages use the name cc to call the C compiler. To satisfy those packages, create a symlink:
ln -sv gcc /usr/bin/cc
Now that our final toolchain is in place, it is important to again ensure that compiling and linking will work as expected. We do this by performing the same sanity checks as we did earlier in the chapter:
echo 'main(){}' > dummy.c
cc dummy.c -v -Wl,--verbose &> dummy.log
readelf -l a.out | grep ': /lib'
If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be (allowing for platform-specific differences in dynamic linker name):
[Requesting program interpreter: /lib/ld-linux.so.2]Now make sure that we're setup to use the correct startfiles:
grep -o '/usr/lib.*/crt[1in].*succeeded' dummy.log
If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be:
/usr/lib/gcc/i686-pc-linux-gnu/4.1.2/../../../crt1.o succeeded
/usr/lib/gcc/i686-pc-linux-gnu/4.1.2/../../../crti.o succeeded
/usr/lib/gcc/i686-pc-linux-gnu/4.1.2/../../../crtn.o succeededVerify that the compiler is searching for the correct header files:
grep -B3 '^ /usr/include' dummy.log
This command should return successfully with the following output:
#include <...> search starts here:
/usr/local/include
/usr/lib/gcc/i686-pc-linux-gnu/4.1.2/include
/usr/includeNext, verify that the new linker is being used with the correct search paths:
grep 'SEARCH.*/usr/lib' dummy.log |sed 's|; |\n|g'
If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be:
SEARCH_DIR("/usr/i686-pc-linux-gnu/lib")
SEARCH_DIR("/usr/local/lib")
SEARCH_DIR("/lib")
SEARCH_DIR("/usr/lib");Next make sure that we're using the correct libc:
grep "/lib/libc.so.6 " dummy.log
If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be:
attempt to open /lib/libc.so.6 succeededLastly, make sure GCC is using the correct dynamic linker:
grep found dummy.log
If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be (allowing for platform-specific differences in dynamic linker name):
found ld-linux.so.2 at /lib/ld-linux.so.2If the output does not appear as shown above or is not received at all, then something is seriously wrong. Investigate and retrace the steps to find out where the problem is and correct it. The most likely reason is that something went wrong with the specs file adjustment. Any issues will need to be resolved before continuing on with the process.
Once everything is working correctly, clean up the test files:
rm -v dummy.c a.out dummy.log
|
The C++ compiler |
|
|
The C compiler |
|
|
The C preprocessor; it is used by the compiler to expand the #include, #define, and similar statements in the source files |
|
|
The C++ compiler |
|
|
The C compiler |
|
|
A shell script used to help create useful bug reports |
|
|
A coverage testing tool; it is used to analyze programs to determine where optimizations will have the most effect |
|
|
Contains run-time support for gcc |
|
|
Contains routines that support GCC's bounds checking functionality |
|
|
Contains routines supporting GCC's stack-smashing protection functionality |
|
|
The standard C++ library |
|
|
Provides supporting routines for the C++ programming language |
The Berkeley DB package contains programs and utilities used by many other applications for database related functions.
There are instructions to build this package in the BLFS book if you need to build the RPC server or additional language bindings. The additional language bindings will require additional packages to be installed. See http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/server/databases.html#db for suggested installation instructions.
Also, GDBM could be used in place of Berkeley DB to satisfy Man-DB. However, since Berkeley DB is considered a core part of the LFS build, it will not be listed as a dependency for any package in the BLFS book. Likewise, many hours go into testing LFS with Berkeley DB installed, not with GDBM. If you fully understand the risks versus benefits of using GDBM and wish to use it anyway, see the BLFS instructions located at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/general/gdbm.html
Apply a patch to Berkeley DB to fix a couple of bugs when accessing databases via its Java API:
patch -Np1 -i ../db-4.5.20-fixes-1.patch
Prepare Berkeley DB for compilation:
cd build_unix ../dist/configure --prefix=/usr --enable-compat185 --enable-cxx
The meaning of the configure options:
--enable-compat185
This option enables building Berkeley DB 1.85 compatibility API.
--enable-cxx
This option enables building C++ API libraries.
Compile the package:
make
It is not possible to test the package meaningfully, because
that would involve building TCL bindings. TCL bindings cannot
be built properly now because TCL is linked against Glibc in
/tools, not against Glibc in
/usr.
Install the package:
make docdir=/usr/share/doc/db-4.5.20 install
The meaning of the make parameter:
docdir=...
This variable specifies the correct place for the documentation.
Fix the ownership of the installed documentation:
chown -Rv root:root /usr/share/doc/db-4.5.20
|
Prints the pathnames of log files that are no longer in use |
|
|
A daemon used to monitor and checkpoint database logs |
|
|
A daemon used to abort lock requests when deadlocks are detected |
|
|
Converts database files to a plain-text file format readable by db_load |
|
|
Creates “hot backup” or “hot failover” snapshots of Berkeley DB databases |
|
|
Is used to create database files from plain-text files |
|
|
Converts database log files to human readable text |
|
|
Is used to restore a database to a consistent state after a failure |
|
|
Displays statistics for Berkeley databases |
|
|
Is used to upgrade database files to a newer version of Berkeley DB |
|
|
Is used to run consistency checks on database files |
|
|
Contains functions to manipulate database files from C programs |
|
|
Contains functions to manipulate database files from C++ programs |
The Sed package contains a stream editor.
Prepare Sed for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr --bindir=/bin --enable-html
The meaning of the new configure option:
--enable-html
This builds the HTML documentation.
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
The E2fsprogs package contains the utilities for handling the
ext2 file system. It also
supports the ext3 journaling
file system.
Fix a hardcoded path to /bin/rm
in E2fsprogs' testsuite:
sed -i -e 's@/bin/rm@/tools&@' lib/blkid/test_probe.in
The E2fsprogs documentation recommends that the package be built in a subdirectory of the source tree:
mkdir -v build cd build
Prepare E2fsprogs for compilation:
../configure --prefix=/usr --with-root-prefix="" \
--enable-elf-shlibs
The meaning of the configure options:
--with-root-prefix=""
Certain programs (such as the e2fsck program) are
considered essential programs. When, for example,
/usr is not mounted,
these programs still need to be available. They belong
in directories like /lib
and /sbin. If this option
is not passed to E2fsprogs' configure, the programs are
installed into the /usr
directory.
--enable-elf-shlibs
This creates the shared libraries which some programs in this package use.
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
One of the E2fsprogs tests will attempt to allocate 256 MB of memory. If you do not have significantly more RAM than this, it is recommended to enable sufficient swap space for the test. See Section 2.3, “Creating a File System on the Partition” and Section 2.4, “Mounting the New Partition” for details on creating and enabling swap space.
Install the binaries, documentation, and shared libraries:
make install
Install the static libraries and headers:
make install-libs
|
Searches a device (usually a disk partition) for bad blocks |
|
|
A command line utility to locate and print block device attributes |
|
|
Changes the attributes of files on an |
|
|
An error table compiler; it converts a table of
error-code names and messages into a C source file
suitable for use with the |
|
|
A file system debugger; it can be used to examine
and change the state of an |
|
|
Prints the super block and blocks group information for the file system present on a given device |
|
|
Is used to check, and optionally repair
|
|
|
Is used to save critical |
|
|
Displays or changes the file system label on the
|
|
|
Reports on how badly fragmented a particular file might be |
|
|
Finds a file system by label or Universally Unique Identifier (UUID) |
|
|
Is used to check, and optionally repair, file systems |
|
|
By default checks |
|
|
By default checks |
|
|
Saves the output of a command in a log file |
|
|
Lists the attributes of files on a second extended file system |
|
|
Converts a table of command names and help messages
into a C source file suitable for use with the
|
|
|
Creates an |
|
|
By default creates |
|
|
By default creates |
|
|
Used to create a |
|
|
Can be used to enlarge or shrink an |
|
|
Adjusts tunable file system parameters on an
|
|
|
Creates new UUIDs. Each new UUID can reasonably be considered unique among all UUIDs created, on the local system and on other systems, in the past and in the future |
|
|
Contains routines for device identification and token extraction |
|
|
The common error display routine |
|
|
Used by dumpe2fs, chattr, and lsattr |
|
|
Contains routines to enable user-level programs to
manipulate an |
|
|
Used by debugfs |
|
|
Contains routines for generating unique identifiers for objects that may be accessible beyond the local system |
The Coreutils package contains utilities for showing and setting the basic system characteristics.
A known issue with the uname program from this
package is that the -p switch always returns
unknown. The following
patch fixes this behavior for Intel architectures:
patch -Np1 -i ../coreutils-6.9-uname-1.patch
Prevent Coreutils from installing binaries that will be installed by other packages later:
patch -Np1 -i ../coreutils-6.9-suppress_uptime_kill_su-1.patch
POSIX requires that programs from Coreutils recognize character boundaries correctly even in multibyte locales. The following patch fixes this non-compliance and other internationalization-related bugs:
patch -Np1 -i ../coreutils-6.9-i18n-1.patch
In order for the tests added by this patch to pass, the permissions for the test file have to be changed:
chmod +x tests/sort/sort-mb-tests
In the past, many bugs were found in this patch. When reporting new bugs to Coreutils maintainers, please check first if they are reproducible without this patch.
Now prepare Coreutils for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr
Compile the package:
make
Skip down to “Install the package” if not running the test suite.
Now the test suite is ready to be run. First, run the tests
that are meant to be run as user root:
make NON_ROOT_USERNAME=nobody check-root
We're going to run the remainder of the tests as the
nobody user. Certain tests,
however, require that the user be a member of more than one
group. So that these tests are not skipped we'll add a
temporary group and make the user nobody a part of it:
echo "dummy:x:1000:nobody" >> /etc/group
Now run the tests:
su-tools nobody -s /bin/bash -c "make RUN_EXPENSIVE_TESTS=yes check"
Remove the temporary group:
sed -i '/dummy/d' /etc/group
Install the package:
make install
Move programs to the locations specified by the FHS:
mv -v /usr/bin/{cat,chgrp,chmod,chown,cp,date,dd,df,echo} /bin
mv -v /usr/bin/{false,hostname,ln,ls,mkdir,mknod,mv,pwd,readlink,rm} /bin
mv -v /usr/bin/{rmdir,stty,sync,true,uname} /bin
mv -v /usr/bin/chroot /usr/sbin
Some of the scripts in the LFS-Bootscripts package depend on
head,
sleep, and
nice. As
/usr may not be available
during the early stages of booting, those binaries need to be
on the root partition:
mv -v /usr/bin/{head,sleep,nice} /bin
|
Encodes and decodes data according to the base64 (RFC 3548) specification |
|
|
Strips any path and a given suffix from a file name |
|
|
Concatenates files to standard output |
|
|
Changes the group ownership of files and directories |
|
|
Changes the permissions of each file to the given mode; the mode can be either a symbolic representation of the changes to make or an octal number representing the new permissions |
|
|
Changes the user and/or group ownership of files and directories |
|
|
Runs a command with the specified directory as the
|
|
|
Prints the Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC) checksum and the byte counts of each specified file |
|
|
Compares two sorted files, outputting in three columns the lines that are unique and the lines that are common |
|
|
Copies files |
|
|
Splits a given file into several new files, separating them according to given patterns or line numbers and outputting the byte count of each new file |
|
|
Prints sections of lines, selecting the parts according to given fields or positions |
|
|
Displays the current time in the given format, or sets the system date |
|
|
Copies a file using the given block size and count, while optionally performing conversions on it |
|
|
Reports the amount of disk space available (and used) on all mounted file systems, or only on the file systems holding the selected files |
|
|
Lists the contents of each given directory (the same as the ls command) |
|
|
Outputs commands to set the |
|
|
Strips the non-directory suffix from a file name |
|
|
Reports the amount of disk space used by the current directory, by each of the given directories (including all subdirectories) or by each of the given files |
|
|
Displays the given strings |
|
|
Runs a command in a modified environment |
|
|
Converts tabs to spaces |
|
|
Evaluates expressions |
|
|
Prints the prime factors of all specified integer numbers |
|
|
Does nothing, unsuccessfully; it always exits with a status code indicating failure |
|
|
Reformats the paragraphs in the given files |
|
|
Wraps the lines in the given files |
|
|
Reports a user's group memberships |
|
|
Prints the first ten lines (or the given number of lines) of each given file |
|
|
Reports the numeric identifier (in hexadecimal) of the host |
|
|
Reports or sets the name of the host |
|
|
Reports the effective user ID, group ID, and group memberships of the current user or specified user |
|
|
Copies files while setting their permission modes and, if possible, their owner and group |
|
|
Joins the lines that have identical join fields from two separate files |
|
|
Creates a hard link with the given name to a file |
|
|
Makes hard links or soft (symbolic) links between files |
|
|
Reports the current user's login name |
|
|
Lists the contents of each given directory |
|
|
Reports or checks Message Digest 5 (MD5) checksums |
|
|
Creates directories with the given names |
|
|
Creates First-In, First-Outs (FIFOs), a “named pipe” in UNIX parlance, with the given names |
|
|
Creates device nodes with the given names; a device node is a character special file, a block special file, or a FIFO |
|
|
Moves or renames files or directories |
|
|
Runs a program with modified scheduling priority |
|
|
Numbers the lines from the given files |
|
|
Runs a command immune to hangups, with its output redirected to a log file |
|
|
Dumps files in octal and other formats |
|
|
Merges the given files, joining sequentially corresponding lines side by side, separated by tab characters |
|
|
Checks if file names are valid or portable |
|
|
Is a lightweight finger client; it reports some information about the given users |
|
|
Paginates and columnates files for printing |
|
|
Prints the environment |
|
|
Prints the given arguments according to the given format, much like the C printf function |
|
|
Produces a permuted index from the contents of the given files, with each keyword in its context |
|
|
Reports the name of the current working directory |
|
|
Reports the value of the given symbolic link |
|
|
Removes files or directories |
|
|
Removes directories if they are empty |
|
|
Prints a sequence of numbers within a given range and with a given increment |
|
|
Prints or checks 160-bit Secure Hash Algorithm 1 (SHA1) checksums |
|
|
Prints or checks 224-bit Secure Hash Algorithm checksums |
|
|
Prints or checks 256-bit Secure Hash Algorithm checksums |
|
|
Prints or checks 384-bit Secure Hash Algorithm checksums |
|
|
Prints or checks 512-bit Secure Hash Algorithm checksums |
|
|
Overwrites the given files repeatedly with complex patterns, making it difficult to recover the data |
|
|
Shuffles lines of text |
|
|
Pauses for the given amount of time |
|
|
Sorts the lines from the given files |
|
|
Splits the given file into pieces, by size or by number of lines |
|
|
Displays file or filesystem status |
|
|
Sets or reports terminal line settings |
|
|
Prints checksum and block counts for each given file |
|
|
Flushes file system buffers; it forces changed blocks to disk and updates the super block |
|
|
Concatenates the given files in reverse |
|
|
Prints the last ten lines (or the given number of lines) of each given file |
|
|
Reads from standard input while writing both to standard output and to the given files |
|
|
Compares values and checks file types |
|
|
Changes file timestamps, setting the access and modification times of the given files to the current time; files that do not exist are created with zero length |
|
|
Translates, squeezes, and deletes the given characters from standard input |
|
|
Does nothing, successfully; it always exits with a status code indicating success |
|
|
Performs a topological sort; it writes a completely ordered list according to the partial ordering in a given file |
|
|
Reports the file name of the terminal connected to standard input |
|
|
Reports system information |
|
|
Converts spaces to tabs |
|
|
Discards all but one of successive identical lines |
|
|
Removes the given file |
|
|
Reports the names of the users currently logged on |
|
|
Is the same as ls -l |
|
|
Reports the number of lines, words, and bytes for each given file, as well as a total line when more than one file is given |
|
|
Reports who is logged on |
|
|
Reports the user name associated with the current effective user ID |
|
|
Repeatedly outputs “y” or a given string until killed |
The Iana-Etc package provides data for network services and protocols.
The following command converts the raw data provided by IANA
into the correct formats for the /etc/protocols and /etc/services data files:
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install
The M4 package contains a macro processor.
Prepare M4 for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
|
copies the given files while expanding the macros that they contain. These macros are either built-in or user-defined and can take any number of arguments. Besides performing macro expansion, m4 has built-in functions for including named files, running Unix commands, performing integer arithmetic, manipulating text, recursion, etc. The m4 program can be used either as a front-end to a compiler or as a macro processor in its own right. |
The Bison package contains a parser generator.
Prepare Bison for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr
The configure system causes bison to be built without support for internationalization of error messages if a bison program is not already in $PATH. The following addition will correct this:
echo '#define YYENABLE_NLS 1' >> config.h
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
|
Generates, from a series of rules, a program for analyzing the structure of text files; Bison is a replacement for Yacc (Yet Another Compiler Compiler) |
|
|
A wrapper for bison, meant for
programs that still call yacc instead of
bison; it calls
bison
with the |
|
|
The Yacc library containing implementations of
Yacc-compatible |
The Ncurses package contains libraries for terminal-independent handling of character screens.
Apply the following patch to fix a number of issues uncovered by the static code analysis tool, Coverity:
patch -Np1 -i ../ncurses-5.6-coverity_fixes-1.patch
Prepare Ncurses for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr --with-shared --without-debug --enable-widec
The meaning of the configure option:
--enable-widec
This switch causes wide-character libraries (e.g.,
libncursesw.so.5.6) to be
built instead of normal ones (e.g., libncurses.so.5.6). These
wide-character libraries are usable in both multibyte
and traditional 8-bit locales, while normal libraries
work properly only in 8-bit locales. Wide-character and
normal libraries are source-compatible, but not
binary-compatible.
Compile the package:
make
This package has a test suite, but it can only be run after
the package has been installed. The tests reside in the
test/ directory. See the
README file in that directory
for further details.
Install the package:
make install
Correct the permissions of a library that should not be executable:
chmod -v 644 /usr/lib/libncurses++w.a
Move the libraries to the /lib
directory, where they are expected to reside:
mv -v /usr/lib/libncursesw.so.5* /lib
Because the libraries have been moved, one symlink points to a non-existent file. Recreate it:
ln -sfv ../../lib/libncursesw.so.5 /usr/lib/libncursesw.so
Many applications still expect the linker to be able to find non-wide-character Ncurses libraries. Trick such applications into linking with wide-character libraries by means of symlinks and linker scripts:
for lib in curses ncurses form panel menu ; do \
rm -vf /usr/lib/lib${lib}.so ; \
echo "INPUT(-l${lib}w)" >/usr/lib/lib${lib}.so ; \
ln -sfv lib${lib}w.a /usr/lib/lib${lib}.a ; \
done
ln -sfv libncurses++w.a /usr/lib/libncurses++.a
Finally, make sure that old applications that look for
-lcurses at build time are
still buildable:
rm -vf /usr/lib/libcursesw.so echo "INPUT(-lncursesw)" >/usr/lib/libcursesw.so ln -sfv libncurses.so /usr/lib/libcurses.so ln -sfv libncursesw.a /usr/lib/libcursesw.a ln -sfv libncurses.a /usr/lib/libcurses.a
The instructions above don't create non-wide-character Ncurses libraries since no package installed by compiling from sources would link against them at runtime. If you must have such libraries because of some binary-only application, build them with the following commands:
make distclean ./configure --prefix=/usr --with-shared --without-normal \ --without-debug --without-cxx-binding make sources libs cp -av lib/lib*.so.5* /usr/lib
|
Converts a termcap description into a terminfo description |
|
|
Clears the screen, if possible |
|
|
Compares or prints out terminfo descriptions |
|
|
Converts a terminfo description into a termcap description |
|
|
Reinitializes a terminal to its default values |
|
|
The terminfo action checker; it is mainly used to test the accuracy of an entry in the terminfo database |
|
|
The terminfo entry-description compiler that translates a terminfo file from source format into the binary format needed for the ncurses library routines. A terminfo file contains information on the capabilities of a certain terminal |
|
|
Lists all available terminal types, giving the primary name and description for each |
|
|
Makes the values of terminal-dependent capabilities available to the shell; it can also be used to reset or initialize a terminal or report its long name |
|
|
Can be used to initialize terminals |
|
|
A link to |
|
|
Contains functions to display text in many complex ways on a terminal screen; a good example of the use of these functions is the menu displayed during the kernel's make menuconfig |
|
|
Contains functions to implement forms |
|
|
Contains functions to implement menus |
|
|
Contains functions to implement panels |
The Procps package contains programs for monitoring processes.
Compile the package:
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install
|
Reports the amount of free and used memory (both physical and swap memory) in the system |
|
|
Sends signals to processes |
|
|
Looks up processes based on their name and other attributes |
|
|
Signals processes based on their name and other attributes |
|
|
Reports the memory map of the given process |
|
|
Lists the current running processes |
|
|
Reports the current working directory of a process |
|
|
Sends signals to processes matching the given criteria |
|
|
Displays detailed kernel slap cache information in real time |
|
|
Changes the scheduling priority of processes matching the given criteria |
|
|
Modifies kernel parameters at run time |
|
|
Prints a graph of the current system load average |
|
|
Displays a list of the most CPU intensive processes; it provides an ongoing look at processor activity in real time |
|
|
Reports how long the system has been running, how many users are logged on, and the system load averages |
|
|
Reports virtual memory statistics, giving information about processes, memory, paging, block Input/Output (IO), traps, and CPU activity |
|
|
Shows which users are currently logged on, where, and since when |
|
|
Runs a given command repeatedly, displaying the first screen-full of its output; this allows a user to watch the output change over time |
|
|
Contains the functions used by most programs in this package |
The Libtool package contains the GNU generic library support script. It wraps the complexity of using shared libraries in a consistent, portable interface.
Prepare Libtool for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
The Perl package contains the Practical Extraction and Report Language.
First create a basic /etc/hosts
file to be referenced in one of Perl's configuration files as
well as the optional testsuite:
echo "127.0.0.1 localhost $(hostname)" > /etc/hosts
To have full control over the way Perl is set up, you can run the interactive Configure script and hand-pick the way this package is built. If you prefer, you can use the defaults that Perl auto-detects, by preparing Perl for compilation with:
./configure.gnu --prefix=/usr \
-Dman1dir=/usr/share/man/man1 \
-Dman3dir=/usr/share/man/man3 \
-Dpager="/usr/bin/less -isR"
The meaning of the configure options:
-Dpager="/usr/bin/less
-isR"
This corrects an error in the way that perldoc invokes the less program.
-Dman1dir=/usr/share/man/man1
-Dman3dir=/usr/share/man/man3
Since Groff is not installed yet, Configure thinks that we do not want man pages for Perl. Issuing these parameters overrides this decision.
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make test.
Install the package:
make install
|
Translates awk to Perl |
|
|
Dumps C structures as generated from cc -g -S |
|
|
Interact with the Comprehensive Perl Archive Network (CPAN) from the command line |
|
|
Displays Perl profile data |
|
|
Builds a Perl extension for the Encode module from either Unicode Character Mappings or Tcl Encoding Files |
|
|
Translates find commands to Perl |
|
|
Converts |
|
|
Converts |
|
|
Shell script for examining installed Perl modules, and can even create a tarball from an installed module |
|
|
Can be used to configure the |
|
|
Combines some of the best features of C, sed, awk and sh into a single swiss-army language |
|
|
A hard link to perl |
|
|
Used to generate bug reports about Perl, or the modules that come with it, and mail them |
|
|
Generates executables from Perl programs |
|
|
Displays a piece of documentation in pod format that is embedded in the Perl installation tree or in a Perl script |
|
|
The Perl Installation Verification Procedure; it can be used to verify that Perl and its libraries have been installed correctly |
|
|
A Perl version of the character encoding converter iconv |
|
|
A rough tool for converting Perl4 |
|
|
Converts files from pod format to HTML format |
|
|
Converts files from pod format to LaTeX format |
|
|
Converts pod data to formatted *roff input |
|
|
Converts pod data to formatted ASCII text |
|
|
Prints usage messages from embedded pod docs in files |
|
|
Checks the syntax of pod format documentation files |
|
|
Displays selected sections of pod documentation |
|
|
Command line tool for running tests against the Test::Harness module. |
|
|
A Perl version of the stream editor sed |
|
|
Dumps C structures as generated from cc -g -S stabs |
|
|
Translates sed scripts to Perl |
|
|
Is used to force verbose warning diagnostics in Perl |
|
|
Converts Perl XS code into C code |
The Readline package is a set of libraries that offers command-line editing and history capabilities.
Reinstalling Readline will cause the old libraries to be moved to <libraryname>.old. While this is normally not a problem, in some cases it can trigger a linking bug in ldconfig. This can be avoided by issuing the following two seds:
sed -i '/MV.*old/d' Makefile.in
sed -i '/{OLDSUFF}/c:' support/shlib-install
Readline contains a bug in its handling of non-multibyte characters, which can lead to incorrect display calculations and incorrect redisplay. Fix this issue by applying the following patch from the upstream maintainer:
patch -Np1 -i ../readline-5.2-fixes-3.patch
Prepare Readline for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr --libdir=/lib
Compile the package:
make SHLIB_LIBS=-lncurses
The meaning of the make option:
SHLIB_LIBS=-lncurses
This option forces Readline to link against the
libncurses (really,
libncursesw) library.
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install
Now move the static libraries to a more appropriate location:
mv -v /lib/lib{readline,history}.a /usr/lib
Next, remove the .so files in
/lib and relink them into
/usr/lib:
rm -v /lib/lib{readline,history}.so
ln -sfv ../../lib/libreadline.so.5 /usr/lib/libreadline.so
ln -sfv ../../lib/libhistory.so.5 /usr/lib/libhistory.so
The Zlib package contains compression and decompression routines used by some programs.
Zlib is known to build its shared library incorrectly if
CFLAGS is specified in the
environment. If using a specified CFLAGS variable, be sure to add the
-fPIC directive to
the CFLAGS variable for the
duration of the configure command below, then remove it
afterwards.
Prepare Zlib for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr --shared --libdir=/lib
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the shared library:
make install
The previous command installed a .so file in /lib. We will remove it and relink it into
/usr/lib:
rm -v /lib/libz.so ln -sfv ../../lib/libz.so.1.2.3 /usr/lib/libz.so
Build the static library:
make clean ./configure --prefix=/usr make
To test the results again, issue: make check.
Install the static library:
make install
Fix the permissions on the static library:
chmod -v 644 /usr/lib/libz.a
The Autoconf package contains programs for producing shell scripts that can automatically configure source code.
Prepare Autoconf for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check. This takes a
long time, about 3 SBUs. In addition, 6 tests are skipped
that use Automake. For full test coverage, Autoconf can be
re-tested after Automake has been installed.
Install the package:
make install
|
Produces shell scripts that automatically configure software source code packages to adapt to many kinds of Unix-like systems. The configuration scripts it produces are independent—running them does not require the autoconf program. |
|
|
A tool for creating template files of C #define statements for configure to use |
|
|
A wrapper for the M4 macro processor |
|
|
Automatically runs autoconf, autoheader, aclocal, automake, gettextize, and libtoolize in the correct order to save time when changes are made to autoconf and automake template files |
|
|
Helps to create a |
|
|
Modifies a |
|
|
Helps when writing |
The Automake package contains programs for generating Makefiles for use with Autoconf.
Prepare Automake for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check. This takes a
long time, about 10 SBUs.
Install the package:
make install
|
A script that installs aclocal-style M4 files |
|
|
Generates |
|
|
A hard link to aclocal |
|
|
A tool for automatically generating |
|
|
A hard link to automake |
|
|
A wrapper for compilers |
|
|
A script that attempts to guess the canonical triplet for the given build, host, or target architecture |
|
|
A configuration validation subroutine script |
|
|
A script for compiling a program so that dependency information is generated in addition to the desired output |
|
|
Byte-compiles Emacs Lisp code |
|
|
A script that installs a program, script, or data file |
|
|
A script that prints the modification time of a file or directory |
|
|
A script acting as a common stub for missing GNU programs during an installation |
|
|
A script that creates a directory tree |
|
|
Compiles a Python program |
|
|
A script to create a symlink tree of a directory tree |
|
|
A wrapper for lex and yacc |
The Bash package contains the Bourne-Again SHell.
If you downloaded the Bash documentation tarball and wish to install HTML documentation, issue the following commands:
tar -xvf ../bash-doc-3.2.tar.gz
sed -i "s|htmldir = @htmldir@|htmldir = /usr/share/doc/bash-3.2|" \
Makefile.in
Apply fixes for several bugs discovered since the initial release of Bash-3.2:
patch -Np1 -i ../bash-3.2-fixes-5.patch
Prepare Bash for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr --bindir=/bin \
--without-bash-malloc --with-installed-readline
The meaning of the configure options:
--with-installed-readline
This option tells Bash to use the readline library that is already
installed on the system rather than using its own
readline version.
Compile the package:
make
Skip down to “Install the package” if not running the test suite.
To prepare the tests, ensure that the locale setting from our
environment will be used and that the nobody user can read the standard input
device and write to the sources tree:
sed -i 's/LANG/LC_ALL/' tests/intl.tests sed -i 's@tests@& </dev/tty@' tests/run-test chown -Rv nobody ./
Now, run the tests as the nobody user:
su-tools nobody -s /bin/bash -c "make tests"
Install the package:
make install
Run the newly compiled bash program (replacing the one that is currently being executed):
exec /bin/bash --login +h
The parameters used make the bash process an interactive login shell and continue to disable hashing so that new programs are found as they become available.
|
A widely-used command interpreter; it performs many types of expansions and substitutions on a given command line before executing it, thus making this interpreter a powerful tool |
|
|
A shell script to help the user compose and mail standard formatted bug reports concerning bash |
|
|
A symlink to the bash program; when invoked as sh, bash tries to mimic the startup behavior of historical versions of sh as closely as possible, while conforming to the POSIX standard as well |
The Bzip2 package contains programs for compressing and decompressing files. Compressing text files with bzip2 yields a much better compression percentage than with the traditional gzip.
Apply a patch to install the documentation for this package:
patch -Np1 -i ../bzip2-1.0.4-install_docs-1.patch
Prepare Bzip2 for compilation with:
make -f Makefile-libbz2_so make clean
The meaning of the make parameter:
-f
Makefile-libbz2_so
This will cause Bzip2 to be built using a different
Makefile file, in this
case the Makefile-libbz2_so file, which
creates a dynamic libbz2.so library and links the Bzip2
utilities against it.
Compile and test the package:
make
Install the programs:
make PREFIX=/usr install
Install the shared bzip2 binary into the
/bin directory, make some
necessary symbolic links, and clean up:
cp -v bzip2-shared /bin/bzip2
cp -av libbz2.so* /lib
ln -sv ../../lib/libbz2.so.1.0 /usr/lib/libbz2.so
rm -v /usr/bin/{bunzip2,bzcat,bzip2}
ln -sv bzip2 /bin/bunzip2
ln -sv bzip2 /bin/bzcat
|
Decompresses bzipped files |
|
|
Decompresses to standard output |
|
|
Runs cmp on bzipped files |
|
|
Runs diff on bzipped files |
|
|
Runs grep on bzipped files |
|
|
Runs egrep on bzipped files |
|
|
Runs fgrep on bzipped files |
|
|
Compresses files using the Burrows-Wheeler block sorting text compression algorithm with Huffman coding; the compression rate is better than that achieved by more conventional compressors using “Lempel-Ziv” algorithms, like gzip |
|
|
Tries to recover data from damaged bzipped files |
|
|
Runs less on bzipped files |
|
|
Runs more on bzipped files |
|
|
The library implementing lossless, block-sorting data compression, using the Burrows-Wheeler algorithm |
The Diffutils package contains programs that show the differences between files or directories.
POSIX requires the diff command to treat whitespace characters according to the current locale. The following patch fixes the non-compliance issue:
patch -Np1 -i ../diffutils-2.8.1-i18n-1.patch
The above patch will cause the Diffutils build system to
attempt to rebuild the diff.1
man page using the unavailable program help2man. The result is an
unreadable man page for diff. We can avoid this by
updating the timestamp on the file man/diff.1:
touch man/diff.1
Prepare Diffutils for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr
Compile the package:
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install
The File package contains a utility for determining the type of a given file or files.
Prepare File for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr
Compile the package:
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install
The Findutils package contains programs to find files. These programs are provided to recursively search through a directory tree and to create, maintain, and search a database (often faster than the recursive find, but unreliable if the database has not been recently updated).
Prepare Findutils for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr --libexecdir=/usr/lib/findutils \
--localstatedir=/var/lib/locate
The meaning of the configure options:
--localstatedir
This option changes the location of the locate database to be
in /var/lib/locate, which
is FHS-compliant.
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
Some of the scripts in the LFS-Bootscripts package depend on
find. As
/usr may not be available
during the early stages of booting, this program needs to be
on the root partition. The updatedb script also needs
to be modified to correct an explicit path:
mv -v /usr/bin/find /bin
sed -i -e 's/find:=${BINDIR}/find:=\/bin/' /usr/bin/updatedb
|
Was formerly used to produce locate databases |
|
|
Was formerly used to produce locate databases; it is the ancestor of frcode. |
|
|
Searches given directory trees for files matching the specified criteria |
|
|
Is called by updatedb to compress the list of file names; it uses front-compression, reducing the database size by a factor of four to five. |
|
|
Searches through a database of file names and reports the names that contain a given string or match a given pattern |
|
|
Updates the locate database; it scans the entire file system (including other file systems that are currently mounted, unless told not to) and puts every file name it finds into the database |
|
|
Can be used to apply a given command to a list of files |
The Flex package contains a utility for generating programs that recognize patterns in text.
Prepare Flex for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
There are some packages that expect to find the lex library in /usr/lib. Create a symlink to account for
this:
ln -sv libfl.a /usr/lib/libl.a
A few programs do not know about flex yet and try to run its
predecessor, lex. To support those
programs, create a wrapper script named lex that calls flex in lex emulation mode:
cat > /usr/bin/lex << "EOF"
#!/bin/sh
# Begin /usr/bin/lex
exec /usr/bin/flex -l "$@"
# End /usr/bin/lex
EOF
chmod -v 755 /usr/bin/lex
The GRUB package contains the GRand Unified Bootloader.
This package is known to have issues when its default
optimization flags (including the -march and -mcpu options) are changed. If
any environment variables that override default optimizations
have been defined, such as CFLAGS
and CXXFLAGS, unset them when
building GRUB.
Start by applying the following patch to allow for better drive detection, fix some GCC 4.x issues, and provide better SATA support for some disk controllers:
patch -Np1 -i ../grub-0.97-disk_geometry-1.patch
Prepare GRUB for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
mkdir -v /boot/grub
cp -v /usr/lib/grub/i386-pc/stage{1,2} /boot/grub
Replace i386-pc with whatever
directory is appropriate for the hardware in use.
The i386-pc directory contains
a number of *stage1_5 files,
different ones for different file systems. Review the files
available and copy the appropriate ones to the /boot/grub directory. Most users will copy
the e2fs_stage1_5 and/or
reiserfs_stage1_5 files.
|
The Grand Unified Bootloader's command shell |
|
|
Installs GRUB on the given device |
|
|
Encrypts a password in MD5 format |
|
|
Sets the default boot entry for GRUB |
|
|
Generates a terminfo command from a terminfo name; it can be employed if an unknown terminal is being used |
|
|
Checks the format of a multi-boot kernel |
The Gawk package contains programs for manipulating text files.
Under some circumstances, Gawk-3.1.5 attempts to free a chunk of memory that was not allocated. This bug is fixed by the following patch:
patch -Np1 -i ../gawk-3.1.5-segfault_fix-1.patch
Prepare Gawk for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr --libexecdir=/usr/lib
Due to a bug in the configure script, Gawk
fails to detect certain aspects of locale support in Glibc.
This bug leads to, e.g., Gettext testsuite failures. Work
around this issue by appending the missing macro definitions
to config.h:
cat >> config.h << "EOF"
#define HAVE_LANGINFO_CODESET 1
#define HAVE_LC_MESSAGES 1
EOF
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
The Gettext package contains utilities for internationalization and localization. These allow programs to be compiled with NLS (Native Language Support), enabling them to output messages in the user's native language.
Prepare Gettext for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check. This takes a
very long time, around 5 SBUs.
Install the package:
make install
|
Copies standard Gettext infrastructure files into a source package |
|
|
Outputs a system-dependent table of character encoding aliases |
|
|
Outputs a system-dependent set of variables, describing how to set the runtime search path of shared libraries in an executable |
|
|
Substitutes environment variables in shell format strings |
|
|
Translates a natural language message into the user's language by looking up the translation in a message catalog |
|
|
Primarily serves as a shell function library for gettext |
|
|
Copies all standard Gettext files into the given top-level directory of a package to begin internationalizing it |
|
|
Displays a network hostname in various forms |
|
|
Filters the messages of a translation catalog according to their attributes and manipulates the attributes |
|
|
Concatenates and merges the given |
|
|
Compares two |
|
|
Finds the messages that are common to to the given
|
|
|
Converts a translation catalog to a different character encoding |
|
|
Creates an English translation catalog |
|
|
Applies a command to all translations of a translation catalog |
|
|
Applies a filter to all translations of a translation catalog |
|
|
Generates a binary message catalog from a translation catalog |
|
|
Extracts all messages of a translation catalog that match a given pattern or belong to some given source files |
|
|
Creates a new |
|
|
Combines two raw translations into a single file |
|
|
Decompiles a binary message catalog into raw translation text |
|
|
Unifies duplicate translations in a translation catalog |
|
|
Displays native language translations of a textual message whose grammatical form depends on a number |
|
|
Recodes Serbian text from Cyrillic to Latin script |
|
|
Extracts the translatable message lines from the given source files to make the first translation template |
|
|
defines the autosprintf class, which makes C formatted output routines usable in C++ programs, for use with the <string> strings and the <iostream> streams |
|
|
a private library containing common routines used by the various Gettext programs; these are not intended for general use |
|
|
Used to write specialized programs that process
|
|
|
A private library containing common routines used by the various Gettext programs; these are not intended for general use |
The Grep package contains programs for searching through files.
The current Grep package has many bugs, especially in the support of multibyte locales. RedHat fixed some of them with the following patch:
patch -Np1 -i ../grep-2.5.1a-redhat_fixes-2.patch
In order for the tests added by this patch to pass, the permissions for the test file have to be changed:
chmod +x tests/fmbtest.sh
Prepare Grep for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr --bindir=/bin
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
The Groff package contains programs for processing and formatting text.
Apply the patch that adds the “ascii8” and “nippon” devices to Groff:
patch -Np1 -i ../groff-1.18.1.4-debian_fixes-1.patch
These devices are used by Man-DB when formatting non-English manual pages that are not in the ISO-8859-1 encoding. Currently, there is no working patch for Groff-1.19.x that adds this functionality.
Many screen fonts don't have Unicode single quotes and dashes in them. Tell Groff to use the ASCII equivalents instead:
sed -i -e 's/2010/002D/' -e 's/2212/002D/' \
-e 's/2018/0060/' -e 's/2019/0027/' font/devutf8/R.proto
Groff expects the environment variable PAGE to contain the default paper size. For
users in the United States, PAGE=letter is appropriate.
Elsewhere, PAGE=A4
may be more suitable. While the default paper size is
configured during compilation, it can be overridden later by
echoing either “A4” or
“letter” to the
/etc/papersize file.
Prepare Groff for compilation:
PAGE=<paper_size> ./configure --prefix=/usr --enable-multibyte
Compile the package:
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install
Some documentation programs, such as xman, will not work properly without the following symlinks:
ln -sv eqn /usr/bin/geqn ln -sv tbl /usr/bin/gtbl
|
Reads a troff font file and adds some additional font-metric information that is used by the groff system |
|
|
Creates a font file for use with groff and grops |
|
|
Compiles descriptions of equations embedded within troff input files into commands that are understood by troff |
|
|
Converts a troff EQN (equation) into a cropped image |
|
|
A link to eqn |
|
|
A groff preprocessor for gremlin files |
|
|
A driver for groff that produces TeX dvi format |
|
|
A front-end to the groff document formatting system; normally, it runs the troff program and a post-processor appropriate for the selected device |
|
|
Displays groff files and man pages on X and tty terminals |
|
|
Reads files and guesses which of the groff options
|
|
|
Is a groff driver for Canon CAPSL printers (LBP-4 and LBP-8 series laser printers) |
|
|
Is a driver for groff that produces output in PCL5 format suitable for an HP LaserJet 4 printer |
|
|
Translates the output of GNU troff to PostScript |
|
|
Translates the output of GNU troff into a form suitable for typewriter-like devices |
|
|
A link to tbl |
|
|
Creates a font file for use with groff -Tlj4 from an HP-tagged font metric file |
|
|
Creates an inverted index for the bibliographic databases with a specified file for use with refer, lookbib, and lkbib |
|
|
Searches bibliographic databases for references that contain specified keys and reports any references found |
|
|
Prints a prompt on the standard error (unless the standard input is not a terminal), reads a line containing a set of keywords from the standard input, searches the bibliographic databases in a specified file for references containing those keywords, prints any references found on the standard output, and repeats this process until the end of input |
|
|
A simple preprocessor for groff |
|
|
Formats equations for American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII) output |
|
|
A script that emulates the nroff command using groff |
|
|
Translates a PostScript font in |
|
|
Compiles descriptions of pictures embedded within troff or TeX input files into commands understood by TeX or troff |
|
|
Converts a PIC diagram into a cropped image |
|
|
Translates the output of GNU troff to HTML |
|
|
Translates the output of GNU troff to HTML |
|
|
Copies the contents of a file to the standard output, except that lines between .[ and .] are interpreted as citations, and lines between .R1 and .R2 are interpreted as commands for how citations are to be processed |
|
|
Reads files and replaces lines of the form .so file by the contents of the mentioned file |
|
|
Compiles descriptions of tables embedded within troff input files into commands that are understood by troff |
|
|
Creates a font file for use with groff -Tdvi |
|
|
Is highly compatible with Unix troff; it should usually be invoked using the groff command, which will also run preprocessors and post-processors in the appropriate order and with the appropriate options |
The Gzip package contains programs for compressing and decompressing files.
Prepare Gzip for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr --bindir=/bin
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
Move some programs that do not need to be on the root filesystem:
mv -v /bin/{gzexe,uncompress,zcmp,zdiff,zegrep} /usr/bin
mv -v /bin/{zfgrep,zforce,zgrep,zless,zmore,znew} /usr/bin
|
Decompresses gzipped files |
|
|
Creates self-decompressing executable files |
|
|
Compresses the given files using Lempel-Ziv (LZ77) coding |
|
|
Decompresses compressed files |
|
|
Decompresses the given gzipped files to standard output |
|
|
Runs cmp on gzipped files |
|
|
Runs diff on gzipped files |
|
|
Runs egrep on gzipped files |
|
|
Runs fgrep on gzipped files |
|
|
Forces a |
|
|
Runs grep on gzipped files |
|
|
Runs less on gzipped files |
|
|
Runs more on gzipped files |
|
|
Re-compresses files from compress format
to gzip
format— |
The Inetutils package contains programs for basic networking.
All programs that come with Inetutils will not be installed. However, the Inetutils build system will insist on installing all the man pages anyway. The following patch will correct this situation:
patch -Np1 -i ../inetutils-1.5-no_server_man_pages-2.patch
Prepare Inetutils for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr --libexecdir=/usr/sbin \
--sysconfdir=/etc --localstatedir=/var \
--disable-ifconfig --disable-logger --disable-syslogd \
--disable-whois --disable-servers
The meaning of the configure options:
--disable-ifconfig
This option prevents Inetutils from installing the ifconfig, which can be used to configure network interfaces. LFS uses ip from IPRoute2 to perform this task.
--disable-logger
This option prevents Inetutils from installing the logger program, which is used by scripts to pass messages to the System Log Daemon. Do not install it because Util-linux installs a better version later.
--disable-syslogd
This option prevents Inetutils from installing the System Log Daemon, which is installed with the Sysklogd package.
--disable-whois
This option disables the building of the Inetutils whois client, which is out of date. Instructions for a better whois client are in the BLFS book.
--disable-servers
This disables the installation of the various network servers included as part of the Inetutils package. These servers are deemed not appropriate in a basic LFS system. Some are insecure by nature and are only considered safe on trusted networks. More information can be found at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/basicnet/inetutils.html. Note that better replacements are available for many of these servers.
Compile the package:
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install
Move the ping program to its FHS-compliant place:
mv -v /usr/bin/ping /bin
|
Is the file transfer protocol program |
|
|
Sends echo-request packets and reports how long the replies take |
|
|
A version of ping for IPv6 networks |
|
|
Performs remote file copy |
|
|
Performs remote login |
|
|
Runs a remote shell |
|
|
Is used to chat with another user |
|
|
An interface to the TELNET protocol |
|
|
A trivial file transfer program |
The IPRoute2 package contains programs for basic and advanced IPV4-based networking.
The installation of two manual pages is broken and results in dangling symlinks. Fix this with the following command:
sed -i -e '/tc-bfifo.8/d' -e '/tc-pfifo.8/s/pbfifo/bfifo/' Makefile
Compile the package:
make SBINDIR=/sbin
The meaning of the make option:
SBINDIR=/sbin
This ensures that the IPRoute2 binaries will install
into /sbin. This is the
correct location according to the FHS, because some of
the IPRoute2 binaries are used by the LFS-Bootscripts
package.
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make SBINDIR=/sbin install
The arpd binary
links against the Berkeley DB libraries that reside in
/usr and uses a database in
/var/lib/arpd/arpd.db. Thus,
according to the FHS, it must be in /usr/sbin. Move it there:
mv -v /sbin/arpd /usr/sbin
|
Userspace ARP daemon, useful in really large networks, where the kernelspace ARP implementation is insufficient, or when setting up a honeypot |
|
|
Connection status utility |
|
|
A shell script wrapper for the ip command |
|
|
Shows the interface statistics, including the amount of transmitted and received packets by interface |
|
|
The main executable. It has several different functions:
ip link ip addr allows users to look at addresses and their properties, add new addresses, and delete old ones ip neighbor allows users to look at neighbor bindings and their properties, add new neighbor entries, and delete old ones ip rule allows users to look at the routing policies and change them ip route allows users to look at the routing table and change routing table rules ip tunnel allows users to look at the IP tunnels and their properties, and change them ip maddr allows users to look at the multicast addresses and their properties, and change them ip mroute allows users to set, change, or delete the multicast routing ip monitor allows users to continously monitor the state of devices, addresses and routes |
|
|
Provides Linux network statistics. It is a generalized and more feature-complete replacement for the old rtstat program |
|
|
Shows network statistics |
|
|
A component of ip route. This is for flushing the routing tables |
|
|
A component of ip route. This is for listing the routing tables |
|
|
Displays the contents of |
|
|
Route monitoring utility |
|
|
Converts the output of ip -o back into a readable form |
|
|
Route status utility |
|
|
Similar to the netstat command; shows active connections |
|
|
Traffic Controlling Executable; this is for Quality Of Service (QOS) and Class Of Service (COS) implementations tc qdisc allows users to setup the queueing discipline tc class allows users to setup classes based on the queuing discipline scheduling tc estimator allows users to estimate the network flow into a network tc filter allows users to setup the QOS/COS packet filtering tc policy allows users to setup the QOS/COS policies |
The Kbd package contains key-table files and keyboard utilities.
The behaviour of the Backspace and Delete keys is not consistent across the keymaps in the Kbd package. The following patch fixes this issue for i386 keymaps:
patch -Np1 -i ../kbd-1.12-backspace-1.patch
After patching, the Backspace key generates the character with code 127, and the Delete key generates a well-known escape sequence.
Patch Kbd to fix a bug in setfont that is triggered when compiling with GCC-4.1.2:
patch -Np1 -i ../kbd-1.12-gcc4_fixes-1.patch
Prepare Kbd for compilation:
./configure --datadir=/lib/kbd
The meaning of the configure options:
--datadir=/lib/kbd
This option puts keyboard layout data in a directory
that will always be on the root partition instead of
the default /usr/share/kbd.
Compile the package:
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install
For some languages (e.g., Belarusian) the Kbd package doesn't provide a useful keymap where the stock “by” keymap assumes the ISO-8859-5 encoding, and the CP1251 keymap is normally used. Users of such languages have to download working keymaps separately.
Some of the scripts in the LFS-Bootscripts package depend on
kbd_mode,
openvt, and
setfont. As
/usr may not be available
during the early stages of booting, those binaries need to be
on the root partition:
mv -v /usr/bin/{kbd_mode,openvt,setfont} /bin
|
Changes the foreground virtual terminal |
|
|
Deallocates unused virtual terminals |
|
|
Dumps the keyboard translation tables |
|
|
Prints the number of the active virtual terminal |
|
|
Prints the kernel scancode-to-keycode mapping table |
|
|
Reports or sets the keyboard mode |
|
|
Sets the keyboard repeat and delay rates |
|
|
Loads the keyboard translation tables |
|
|
Loads the kernel unicode-to-font mapping table |
|
|
An obsolete program that used to load a user-defined output character mapping table into the console driver; this is now done by setfont |
|
|
Starts a program on a new virtual terminal (VT) |
|
|
A link to psfxtable |
|
|
A link to psfxtable |
|
|
A link to psfxtable |
|
|
Handle Unicode character tables for console fonts |
|
|
Changes the kernel idea of the console size |
|
|
Changes the Enhanced Graphic Adapter (EGA) and Video Graphics Array (VGA) fonts on the console |
|
|
Loads kernel scancode-to-keycode mapping table entries; this is useful if there are unusual keys on the keyboard |
|
|
Sets the keyboard flags and Light Emitting Diodes (LEDs) |
|
|
Defines the keyboard meta-key handling |
|
|
Shows the current EGA/VGA console screen font |
|
|
Reports the scancodes, keycodes, and ASCII codes of the keys pressed on the keyboard |
|
|
Puts the keyboard and console in UNICODE mode. Don't use this program unless your keymap file is in the ISO-8859-1 encoding. For other encodings, this utility produces incorrect results. |
|
|
Reverts keyboard and console from UNICODE mode |
The Less package contains a text file viewer.
Prepare Less for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr --sysconfdir=/etc
The meaning of the configure options:
--sysconfdir=/etc
This option tells the programs created by the package
to look in /etc for the
configuration files.
Compile the package:
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install
The Make package contains a program for compiling packages.
Prepare Make for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
The Man-DB package contains programs for finding and viewing man pages.
Four adjustments need to be made to the sources of Man-DB.
The first one changes the location of translated manual pages that come with Man-DB, in order for them to be accessible in both traditional and UTF-8 locales:
mv man/de{_DE.88591,}
mv man/es{_ES.88591,}
mv man/it{_IT.88591,}
mv man/ja{_JP.eucJP,}
sed -i 's,\*_\*,??,' man/Makefile.in
The second change is a sed substitution to delete
the “/usr/man” and
“/usr/local/man” lines
in the man_db.conf file to
prevent redundant results when using programs such as
whatis:
sed -i -e '\%\t/usr/man%d' -e '\%\t/usr/local/man%d' src/man_db.conf.in
The third change accounts for programs that Man-DB should be able to find at runtime, but that haven't been installed yet:
cat >> include/manconfig.h.in << "EOF"
#define WEB_BROWSER "exec /usr/bin/lynx"
#define COL "/usr/bin/col"
#define VGRIND "/usr/bin/vgrind"
#define GRAP "/usr/bin/grap"
EOF
The col program is a part of the Util-linux package, lynx is a text-based web browser (see BLFS for installation instructions), vgrind converts program sources to Groff input, and grap is useful for typesetting graphs in Groff documents. The vgrind and grap programs are not normally needed for viewing manual pages. They are not part of LFS or BLFS, but you should be able to install them yourself after finishing LFS if you wish to do so.
Finally, patch the sources to fix output errors if the man page is prematurely aborted by pressing the 'q' key.
patch -Np1 -i ../man-db-2.4.4-fixes-1.patch
Prepare Man-DB for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr --enable-mb-groff --disable-setuid
The meaning of the configure options:
--enable-mb-groff
This tells the man program to use the “ascii8” and “nippon” Groff devices for formatting non-ISO-8859-1 manual pages.
--disable-setuid
This disables making the man program setuid to
user man.
Compile the package:
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install
Some packages provide UTF-8 man pages which this version of man is unable to display. The following script will allow some of these to be converted into the expected encodings shown in the table below. Man-DB expects the manual pages to be in the encodings in the table, and will convert them as necessary to the actual locale encoding when it displays them, so that they will display in both UTF-8 and traditional locales. Because this script is intended for limited use during the system build, for public data, we will not bother with error checking, nor use a non-predictable temporary file name:
cat >> convert-mans << "EOF"
#!/bin/sh -e
FROM="$1"
TO="$2"
shift ; shift
while [ $# -gt 0 ]
do
FILE="$1"
shift
iconv -f "$FROM" -t "$TO" "$FILE" >.tmp.iconv
mv .tmp.iconv "$FILE"
done
EOF
install -m755 convert-mans /usr/bin
Additional information regarding the compression of man and info pages can be found in the BLFS book at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/cvs/postlfs/compressdoc.html.
Linux distributions have different policies concerning the character encoding in which manual pages are stored in the filesystem. E.g., RedHat stores all manual pages in UTF-8, while Debian uses language-specific (mostly 8-bit) encodings. This leads to incompatibility of packages with manual pages designed for different distributions.
LFS uses the same conventions as Debian. This was chosen because Man-DB does not understand man pages stored in UTF-8. And, for our purposes, Man-DB is preferable to Man as it works without extra configuration in any locale. Lastly, as of now, there is no fully-working implementation of the RedHat convention. RedHat's groff is known to misformat text.
The relationship between language codes and the expected encoding of manual pages is listed below. Man-DB automatically converts them to the locale encoding while viewing.
Table 6.1. Expected character encoding of manual pages
| Language (code) | Encoding |
|---|---|
| Danish (da) | ISO-8859-1 |
| German (de) | ISO-8859-1 |
| English (en) | ISO-8859-1 |
| Spanish (es) | ISO-8859-1 |
| Finnish (fi) | ISO-8859-1 |
| French (fr) | ISO-8859-1 |
| Irish (ga) | ISO-8859-1 |
| Galician (gl) | ISO-8859-1 |
| Indonesian (id) | ISO-8859-1 |
| Icelandic (is) | ISO-8859-1 |
| Italian (it) | ISO-8859-1 |
| Dutch (nl) | ISO-8859-1 |
| Norwegian (no) | ISO-8859-1 |
| Portuguese (pt) | ISO-8859-1 |
| Swedish (sv) | ISO-8859-1 |
| Czech (cs) | ISO-8859-2 |
| Croatian (hr) | ISO-8859-2 |
| Hungarian (hu) | ISO-8859-2 |
| Japanese (ja) | EUC-JP |
| Korean (ko) | EUC-KR |
| Polish (pl) | ISO-8859-2 |
| Russian (ru) | KOI8-R |
| Slovak (sk) | ISO-8859-2 |
| Turkish (tr) | ISO-8859-9 |
Manual pages in languages not in the list are not supported. Norwegian doesn't work now because of the transition from no_NO to nb_NO locale, and Korean is non-functional because of the incomplete Groff patch.
If upstream distributes the manual pages in the same encoding
as Man-DB expects, the manual pages can be copied to
/usr/share/man/.
E.g., French manual pages (http://ccb.club.fr/man/man-fr-1.58.0.tar.bz2)
can be installed with the following command:
<language code>
mkdir -p /usr/share/man/fr cp -rv man? /usr/share/man/fr
If upstream distributes manual pages in UTF-8 (i.e., “for RedHat”) instead of the encoding listed in the table above, they have to be converted from UTF-8 to the encoding listed in the table before installation. This can be achieved with convert-mans, e.g., Spanish manual pages (http://ditec.um.es/~piernas/manpages-es/man-pages-es-1.55.tar.bz2) can be installed with the following commands:
mv man7/iso_8859-7.7{,X}
convert-mans UTF-8 ISO-8859-1 man?/*.?
mv man7/iso_8859-7.7{X,}
make install
The need to exclude the man7/iso_8859-7.7 file from the
conversion process because it is already in ISO-8859-1 is a
packaging bug in man-pages-es-1.55. Future versions should
not require this workaround.
|
Dumps the whatis database contents in human-readable form |
|
|
Searches the whatis database and displays the short descriptions of system commands that contain a given string |
|
|
Creates or updates the pre-formatted manual pages |
|
|
Reformat man pages so that Man-DB can display them |
|
|
Displays one-line summary information about a given manual page |
|
|
Formats and displays the requested manual page |
|
|
Creates or updates the whatis database |
|
|
Displays the contents of $MANPATH or (if $MANPATH is not set) a suitable search path based on the settings in man.conf and the user's environment |
|
|
Searches the whatis database and displays the short descriptions of system commands that contain the given keyword as a separate word |
|
|
Reads files and replaces lines of the form .so file by the contents of the mentioned file |
The Mktemp package contains programs used to create secure temporary files in shell scripts.
Many scripts still use the deprecated tempfile program, which has functionality similar to mktemp. Patch Mktemp to include a tempfile wrapper:
patch -Np1 -i ../mktemp-1.5-add_tempfile-3.patch
Prepare Mktemp for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr --with-libc
The meaning of the configure options:
--with-libc
This causes the mktemp program to use the mkstemp and mkdtemp functions from the system C library instead of its own implementation of them.
Compile the package:
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install make install-tempfile
The Module-Init-Tools package contains programs for handling kernel modules in Linux kernels greater than or equal to version 2.5.47.
First correct a potential problem when modules are specified using regular expressions:
patch -Np1 -i ../module-init-tools-3.2.2-modprobe-1.patch
Issue the following commands to perform the tests (note that the make distclean command is required to clean up the source tree, as the source gets recompiled as part of the testing process):
./configure make check make distclean
Prepare Module-Init-Tools for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/ --enable-zlib
Compile the package:
make
Install the package:
make INSTALL=install install
The meaning of the make parameter:
INSTALL=install
Normally, make install will not install the binaries if they already exist. This option overrides that behavior by calling install instead of using the default wrapper script.
|
Creates a dependency file based on the symbols it finds in the existing set of modules; this dependency file is used by modprobe to automatically load the required modules |
|
|
Creates a modprobe.conf file from an existing 2.2 or 2.4 module setup |
|
|
Installs a loadable module in the running kernel |
|
|
A statically compiled version of insmod |
|
|
Lists currently loaded modules |
|
|
Examines an object file associated with a kernel module and displays any information that it can glean |
|
|
Uses a dependency file, created by depmod, to automatically load relevant modules |
|
|
Unloads modules from the running kernel |
The Patch package contains a program for modifying or creating files by applying a “patch” file typically created by the diff program.
Prepare Patch for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr
Compile the package:
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install
The Psmisc package contains programs for displaying information about running processes.
Prepare Psmisc for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr --exec-prefix=""
The meaning of the configure options:
--exec-prefix=""
This ensures that the Psmisc binaries will install into
/bin instead of
/usr/bin. This is the
correct location according to the FHS, because some of
the Psmisc binaries are used by the LFS-Bootscripts
package.
Compile the package:
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install
There is no reason for the pstree and pstree.x11 programs to
reside in /bin. Therefore, move
them to /usr/bin:
mv -v /bin/pstree* /usr/bin
By default, Psmisc's pidof program is not installed. This usually is not a problem because it is installed later in the Sysvinit package, which provides a better pidof program. If Sysvinit will not be used for a particular system, complete the installation of Psmisc by creating the following symlink:
ln -sv killall /bin/pidof
|
Reports the Process IDs (PIDs) of processes that use the given files or file systems |
|
|
Kills processes by name; it sends a signal to all processes running any of the given commands |
|
|
Reports the Process IDs (PIDs) of processes that use the given files or file systems |
|
|
Peek at file descriptors of a running process, given its PID |
|
|
Displays running processes as a tree |
|
|
Same as pstree, except that it waits for confirmation before exiting |
The Shadow package contains programs for handling passwords in a secure way.
If you would like to enforce the use of strong passwords,
refer to
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/postlfs/cracklib.html
for installing Cracklib prior to building Shadow. Then add
--with-libcrack to
the configure
command below.
Fix a bug in the useradd and usermod programs which
prevent them from accepting group names rather than group ID
numbers to the -g option:
patch -Np1 -i ../shadow-4.0.18.1-useradd_fix-2.patch
Prepare Shadow for compilation:
./configure --libdir=/lib --sysconfdir=/etc --enable-shared \
--without-selinux
The meaning of the configure options:
--without-selinux
Support for selinux is enabled by default, but selinux is not built in a base LFS system. The configure script will fail if this option is not used.
Disable the installation of the groups program and its man pages, as Coreutils provides a better version:
sed -i 's/groups$(EXEEXT) //' src/Makefile
find man -name Makefile -exec sed -i 's/groups\.1 / /' {} \;
Disable the installation of Chinese and Korean manual pages, since Man-DB cannot format them properly:
sed -i -e 's/ ko//' -e 's/ zh_CN zh_TW//' man/Makefile
Shadow supplies other manual pages in a UTF-8 encoding. Man-DB can display these in the recommended encodings by using the convert-mans script which we installed:
for i in de es fi fr id it pt_BR; do
convert-mans UTF-8 ISO-8859-1 man/${i}/*.?
done
for i in cs hu pl; do
convert-mans UTF-8 ISO-8859-2 man/${i}/*.?
done
convert-mans UTF-8 EUC-JP man/ja/*.?
convert-mans UTF-8 KOI8-R man/ru/*.?
convert-mans UTF-8 ISO-8859-9 man/tr/*.?
Instead of using the default
crypt method, use the
more secure MD5 method
of password encryption, which also allows passwords longer
than 8 characters. It is also necessary to change the
obsolete /var/spool/mail
location for user mailboxes that Shadow uses by default to
the /var/mail location used
currently:
sed -i -e 's@#MD5_CRYPT_ENAB.no@MD5_CRYPT_ENAB yes@' \
-e 's@/var/spool/mail@/var/mail@' etc/login.defs
If you built Shadow with Cracklib support, run the following:
sed -i 's@DICTPATH.*@DICTPATH\t/lib/cracklib/pw_dict@' \
etc/login.defs
Compile the package:
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install
Move a misplaced program to its proper location:
mv -v /usr/bin/passwd /bin
Move Shadow's libraries to more appropriate locations:
mv -v /lib/libshadow.*a /usr/lib rm -v /lib/libshadow.so ln -sfv ../../lib/libshadow.so.0 /usr/lib/libshadow.so
This package contains utilities to add, modify, and delete
users and groups; set and change their passwords; and perform
other administrative tasks. For a full explanation of what
password shadowing
means, see the doc/HOWTO file
within the unpacked source tree. If using Shadow support,
keep in mind that programs which need to verify passwords
(display managers, FTP programs, pop3 daemons, etc.) must be
Shadow-compliant. That is, they need to be able to work with
shadowed passwords.
To enable shadowed passwords, run the following command:
pwconv
To enable shadowed group passwords, run:
grpconv
Shadow's stock configuration for the useradd utility is not suitable for LFS systems. Use the following commands to change the default home directory for new users and prevent the creation of mail spool files:
useradd -D -b /home sed -i 's/yes/no/' /etc/default/useradd
Choose a password for user root and set it by running:
passwd root
|
Used to change the maximum number of days between obligatory password changes |
|
|
Used to change a user's full name and other information |
|
|
Used to update group passwords in batch mode |
|
|
Used to update user passwords in batch mode |
|
|
Used to change a user's default login shell |
|
|
Checks and enforces the current password expiration policy |
|
|
Is used to examine the log of login failures, to set a maximum number of failures before an account is blocked, or to reset the failure count |
|
|
Is used to add and delete members and administrators to groups |
|
|
Creates a group with the given name |
|
|
Deletes the group with the given name |
|
|
Allows a user to administer his/her own group membership list without the requirement of super user privileges. |
|
|
Is used to modify the given group's name or GID |
|
|
Verifies the integrity of the group files
|
|
|
Creates or updates the shadow group file from the normal group file |
|
|
Updates |
|
|
Reports the most recent login of all users or of a given user |
|
|
Is used by the system to let users sign on |
|
|
Is a daemon used to enforce restrictions on log-on time and ports |
|
|
Is used to change the current GID during a login session |
|
|
Is used to create or update an entire series of user accounts |
|
|
Displays a message that an account is not available. Designed to be used as the default shell for accounts that have been disabled |
|
|
Is used to change the password for a user or group account |
|
|
Verifies the integrity of the password files
|
|
|
Creates or updates the shadow password file from the normal password file |
|
|
Updates |
|
|
Executes a given command while the user's GID is set to that of the given group |
|
|
Runs a shell with substitute user and group IDs |
|
|
Creates a new user with the given name, or updates the default new-user information |
|
|
Deletes the given user account |
|
|
Is used to modify the given user's login name, User Identification (UID), shell, initial group, home directory, etc. |
|
|
Edits the |
|
|
Edits the |
|
|
Contains functions used by most programs in this package |
The Sysklogd package contains programs for logging system messages, such as those given by the kernel when unusual things happen.
The following patch fixes various issues, including a problem building Sysklogd with Linux 2.6 series kernels:
patch -Np1 -i ../sysklogd-1.4.1-fixes-2.patch
The following patch makes sysklogd treat bytes in the 0x80--0x9f range literally in the messages being logged, instead of replacing them with octal codes. Unpatched sysklogd would damage messages in the UTF-8 encoding:
patch -Np1 -i ../sysklogd-1.4.1-8bit-1.patch
Compile the package:
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make install
Create a new /etc/syslog.conf
file by running the following:
cat > /etc/syslog.conf << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/syslog.conf
auth,authpriv.* -/var/log/auth.log
*.*;auth,authpriv.none -/var/log/sys.log
daemon.* -/var/log/daemon.log
kern.* -/var/log/kern.log
mail.* -/var/log/mail.log
user.* -/var/log/user.log
*.emerg *
# End /etc/syslog.conf
EOF
|
A system daemon for intercepting and logging kernel messages |
|
|
Logs the messages that system programs offer for logging. Every logged message contains at least a date stamp and a hostname, and normally the program's name too, but that depends on how trusting the logging daemon is told to be |
The Sysvinit package contains programs for controlling the startup, running, and shutdown of the system.
When run-levels are changed (for example, when halting the system), init sends termination signals to those processes that init itself started and that should not be running in the new run-level. While doing this, init outputs messages like “Sending processes the TERM signal” which seem to imply that it is sending these signals to all currently running processes. To avoid this misinterpretation, modify the source so that these messages read like “Sending processes configured via /etc/inittab the TERM signal” instead:
sed -i 's@Sending processes@& configured via /etc/inittab@g' \
src/init.c
Compile the package:
make -C src
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make -C src install
Create a new file /etc/inittab
by running the following:
cat > /etc/inittab << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/inittab
id:3:initdefault:
si::sysinit:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc sysinit
l0:0:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 0
l1:S1:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 1
l2:2:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 2
l3:3:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 3
l4:4:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 4
l5:5:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 5
l6:6:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 6
ca:12345:ctrlaltdel:/sbin/shutdown -t1 -a -r now
su:S016:once:/sbin/sulogin
1:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty1 9600
2:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty2 9600
3:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty3 9600
4:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty4 9600
5:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty5 9600
6:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty6 9600
# End /etc/inittab
EOF
|
Logs boot messages to a log file |
|
|
Normally invokes shutdown with the
|
|
|
The first process to be started when the kernel has initialized the hardware which takes over the boot process and starts all the proceses it is instructed to |
|
|
Sends a signal to all processes, except the processes in its own session so it will not kill the shell running the script that called it |
|
|
Shows which users last logged in (and out),
searching back through the |
|
|
Shows the failed login attempts, as logged in
|
|
|
Controls whether other users can send messages to the current user's terminal |
|
|
Checks if the directory is a mountpoint |
|
|
Reports the PIDs of the given programs |
|
|
Tells the kernel to halt the system and switch off the computer (see halt) |
|
|
Tells the kernel to reboot the system (see halt) |
|
|
Reports the previous and the current run-level, as
noted in the last run-level record in |
|
|
Brings the system down in a secure way, signaling all processes and notifying all logged-in users |
|
|
Allows |
|
|
Tells init which run-level to change to |
|
|
Displays the content of the given login file in a more user-friendly format |
|
|
Writes a message to all logged-in users |
The Tar package contains an archiving program.
Prepare Tar for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr --bindir=/bin --libexecdir=/usr/sbin
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
The Texinfo package contains programs for reading, writing, and converting info pages.
The info program makes assumptions such as that a string occupies the same number of character cells on the screen and bytes in memory and that one can break the string anywhere, which fail in UTF-8 based locales. The patch below makes them valid by falling back to English messages when a multibyte locale is in use:
patch -Np1 -i ../texinfo-4.9-multibyte-1.patch
Texinfo allows local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on temporary files. Apply the following patch to fix this:
patch -Np1 -i ../texinfo-4.9-tempfile_fix-1.patch
Prepare Texinfo for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make check.
Install the package:
make install
Optionally, install the components belonging in a TeX installation:
make TEXMF=/usr/share/texmf install-tex
The meaning of the make parameter:
TEXMF=/usr/share/texmf
The TEXMF makefile variable
holds the location of the root of the TeX tree if, for
example, a TeX package will be installed later.
The Info documentation system uses a plain text file to hold
its list of menu entries. The file is located at /usr/share/info/dir. Unfortunately, due to
occasional problems in the Makefiles of various packages, it
can sometimes get out of sync with the info pages installed
on the system. If the /usr/share/info/dir file ever needs to be
recreated, the following optional commands will accomplish
the task:
cd /usr/share/info rm dir for f in * do install-info $f dir 2>/dev/null done
|
Used to read info pages which are similar to man pages, but often go much deeper than just explaining all the available command line options. For example, compare man bison and info bison. |
|
|
Compiles a source file containing Info customizations into a binary format |
|
|
Used to install info pages; it updates entries in the info index file |
|
|
Translates the given Texinfo source documents into info pages, plain text, or HTML |
|
|
Used to format the given Texinfo document into a device-independent file that can be printed |
|
|
Used to format the given Texinfo document into a Portable Document Format (PDF) file |
|
|
Used to sort Texinfo index files |
The Udev package contains programs for dynamic creation of device nodes.
The udev-config tarball contains LFS-specific files used to configure Udev. Unpack it into the Udev source directory:
tar -xvf ../udev-config-6.3.tar.bz2
Create some devices and directories that Udev cannot handle due to them being required very early in the boot process:
install -dv /lib/{firmware,udev/devices/{pts,shm}}
mknod -m0666 /lib/udev/devices/null c 1 3
ln -sv /proc/self/fd /lib/udev/devices/fd
ln -sv /proc/self/fd/0 /lib/udev/devices/stdin
ln -sv /proc/self/fd/1 /lib/udev/devices/stdout
ln -sv /proc/self/fd/2 /lib/udev/devices/stderr
ln -sv /proc/kcore /lib/udev/devices/core
Compile the package:
make EXTRAS="`echo extras/*/`"
The meaning of the make option:
EXTRAS=...
This builds the helper binaries that can aid in writing custom Udev rules.
To test the results, issue: make test.
Note that the Udev testsuite will produce numerous messages in the host system's logs. These are harmless and can be ignored.
Install the package:
make DESTDIR=/ EXTRAS="`echo extras/*/`" install
The meaning of the make parameter:
DESTDIR=/
This prevents the Udev build process from killing any udevd processes that may be running on the host system.
Udev has to be configured in order to work properly, as it only installs a few configuration files by default. First install the commonly-used rules files provided by Udev:
cp -v etc/udev/rules.d/[0-9]* /etc/udev/rules.d/
Now install the LFS-specific rules files:
cd udev-config-6.3 make install
Install the documentation that explains the LFS-specific rules files:
make install-doc
Install the documentation that explains the commonly-used rules files provided by Udev:
make install-extra-doc
Install the documentation that explains how to create custom Udev rules:
cd ..
install -m644 -v docs/writing_udev_rules/index.html \
/usr/share/doc/udev-113/index.html
|
Provides Udev with a unique string and additional information (uuid, label) for an ATA drive |
|
|
Provides Udev with the capabilities of a CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive |
|
|
Creates all possible floppy devices based on the CMOS type |
|
|
Provides Udev with the EDD ID for a BIOS disk drive |
|
|
Uploads firmware to devices |
|
|
Provide the shortest possible unique hardware path to a device |
|
|
Provides Udev with a unique SCSI identifier based on the data returned from sending a SCSI INQUIRY command to the specified device |
|
|
Configures a number of options for the running udevd daemon, such as the log level. |
|
|
A daemon that listens for uevents on the netlink socket, creates devices and runs the configured external programs in response to these uevents |
|
|
Allows users to query the Udev database for
information on any device currently present on the
system; it also provides a way to query any device
in the |
|
|
Prints the event received from the kernel and the environment which Udev sends out after rule processing |
|
|
Watches the Udev event queue and exits if all current uevents have been handled |
|
|
Simulates a uevent for the given device, and prints out the name of the node the real udevd would have created, or the name of the renamed network interface |
|
|
Triggers kernel device uevents to be replayed |
|
|
Provides Udev with information about USB devices |
|
|
Provides Udev with the label and uuid of a filesystem |
|
|
A script which generates Udev rules to provide stable names for optical drives (see also Section 7.12, “Creating Custom Symlinks to Devices”) |
|
|
A script which generates rules to provide stable names for network interfaces (see also Section 7.13, “Configuring the network Script”) |
|
|
Contains Udev configuation files, device permissions, and rules for device naming |
The Util-linux package contains miscellaneous utility programs. Among them are utilities for handling file systems, consoles, partitions, and messages.
The FHS recommends using the /var/lib/hwclock directory instead of the
usual /etc directory as the
location for the adjtime file.
To make the hwclock program
FHS-compliant, run the following:
sed -e 's@etc/adjtime@var/lib/hwclock/adjtime@g' \
-i $(grep -rl '/etc/adjtime' .)
mkdir -pv /var/lib/hwclock
Util-linux fails to compile against newer versions of Linux kernel headers. The following patches properly fix the problems:
patch -Np1 -i ../util-linux-2.12r-cramfs-1.patch patch -Np1 -i ../util-linux-2.12r-lseek-1.patch
Prepare Util-linux for compilation:
./configure
Compile the package:
make HAVE_KILL=yes HAVE_SLN=yes
The meaning of the make parameters:
HAVE_KILL=yes
This prevents the kill program (already installed by Procps) from being built and installed again.
HAVE_SLN=yes
This prevents the sln program (a statically linked version of ln already installed by Glibc) from being built and installed again.
This package does not come with a test suite.
Install the package:
make HAVE_KILL=yes HAVE_SLN=yes install
|
Opens a tty port, prompts for a login name, and then invokes the login program |
|
|
Reports the machine's architecture |
|
|
Allows users to call block device ioctls from the command line |
|
|
Displays a simple calendar |
|
|
Manipulates the partition table of the given device |
|
|
Finds duplicate executables |
|
|
Filters out reverse line feeds |
|
|
Filters nroff output for terminals that lack some capabilities, such as overstriking and half-lines |
|
|
Filters out the given columns |
|
|
Formats a given file into multiple columns |
|
|
Sets the function of the Ctrl+Alt+Del key combination to a hard or a soft reset |
|
|
Tunes the parameters of the serial line drivers for Cyclades cards |
|
|
Gives the Discordian date or converts the given Gregorian date to a Discordian one |
|
|
Dumps the kernel boot messages |
|
|
Tunes the performance and interactivity of a block device |
|
|
Low-level formats a floppy disk |
|
|
Manipulates the paritition table of the given device |
|
|
Acquires a file lock and then executes a command with the lock held |
|
|
Performs a consistency check on the Cramfs file system on the given device |
|
|
Performs a consistency check on the Minix file system on the given device |
|
|
Parses options in the given command line |
|
|
Dumps the given file in hexadecimal or in another given format |
|
|
Reads or sets the system's hardware clock, also called the Real-Time Clock (RTC) or Basic Input-Output System (BIOS) clock |
|
|
Removes the given Inter-Process Communication (IPC) resource |
|
|
Provides IPC status information |
|
|
Reports the size of an iso9660 file system |
|
|
Copies a single line |
|
|
Enters the given message into the system log |
|
|
Displays lines that begin with the given string |
|
|
Sets up and controls loop devices |
|
|
Generates magic cookies (128-bit random hexadecimal numbers) for xauth |
|
|
Builds a file system on a device (usually a hard disk partition) |
|
|
Creates a Santa Cruz Operations (SCO) bfs file system |
|
|
Creates a cramfs file system |
|
|
Creates a Minix file system |
|
|
Initializes the given device or file to be used as a swap area |
|
|
A filter for paging through text one screen at a time |
|
|
Attaches the file system on the given device to a specified directory in the file-system tree |
|
|
Shows the symbolic links in the given pathnames |
|
|
Displays a text file one screen full at a time |
|
|
Makes the given file system the new root file system of the current process |
|
|
Sets the size of the RAM disk in a bootable image |
|
|
Used to bind a Linux raw character device to a block device |
|
|
Queries and sets the root device, among other things, in a bootable image |
|
|
Reads kernel profiling information |
|
|
Renames the given files, replacing a given string with another |
|
|
Alters the priority of running processes |
|
|
Reverses the lines of a given file |
|
|
Sets the rootflags in a bootable image |
|
|
Makes a typescript of a terminal session |
|
|
Sets user-provided floppy disk parameters |
|
|
Runs the given program in a new session |
|
|
Sets terminal attributes |
|
|
A disk partition table manipulator |
|
|
Disables devices and files for paging and swapping |
|
|
Enables devices and files for paging and swapping and lists the devices and files currently in use |
|
|
Tracks the growth of a log file. Displays the last 10 lines of a log file, then continues displaying any new entries in the log file as they are created |
|
|
Tunes the parameters of the line printer |
|
|
A filter for translating underscores into escape sequences indicating underlining for the terminal in use |
|
|
Disconnects a file system from the system's file tree |
|
|
Sets the video mode in a bootable image |
|
|
Reports the location of the binary, source, and man page for the given command |
|
|
Sends a message to the given user if that user has not disabled receipt of such messages |
The Vim package contains a powerful text editor.
If you prefer another editor—such as Emacs, Joe, or Nano—please refer to http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/postlfs/editors.html for suggested installation instructions.
First, unpack both vim-7.1.tar.bz2 and (optionally)
vim-7.1-lang.tar.gz archives
into the same directory.
Apply a patch which fixes various issues already found and fixed by the upstream maintainers since the inital release of Vim-7.1:
patch -Np1 -i ../vim-7.1-fixes-1.patch
This version of Vim installs translated man pages and places them into directories that will not be searched by Man-DB. Patch Vim so that it installs its man pages into searchable directories and ultimately allows Man-DB to transcode the page into the desired format at run-time:
patch -Np1 -i ../vim-7.1-mandir-1.patch
Finally, change the default location of the vimrc configuration file to /etc:
echo '#define SYS_VIMRC_FILE "/etc/vimrc"' >> src/feature.h
Now prepare Vim for compilation:
./configure --prefix=/usr --enable-multibyte
The meaning of the configure options:
--enable-multibyte
This switch enables support for editing files in multibyte character encodings. This is needed if using a locale with a multibyte character set. This switch is also helpful to be able to edit text files initially created in Linux distributions like Fedora Core that use UTF-8 as a default character set.
Compile the package:
make
To test the results, issue: make test. However, this
test suite outputs a lot of binary data to the screen, which
can cause issues with the settings of the current terminal.
This can be resolved by redirecting the output to a log file.
Install the package:
make install
Many users are used to using vi instead of vim. To allow execution of vim when users habitually enter vi, create a symlink for both the binary and the man page in the provided languages:
ln -sv vim /usr/bin/vi
for L in "" fr it pl ru; do
ln -sv vim.1 /usr/share/man/$L/man1/vi.1
done
By default, Vim's documentation is installed in /usr/share/vim. The following symlink
allows the documentation to be accessed via /usr/share/doc/vim-7.1, making it
consistent with the location of documentation for other
packages:
ln -sv ../vim/vim71/doc /usr/share/doc/vim-7.1
If an X Window System is going to be installed on the LFS system, it may be necessary to recompile Vim after installing X. Vim comes with a GUI version of the editor that requires X and some additional libraries to be installed. For more information on this process, refer to the Vim documentation and the Vim installation page in the BLFS book at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/postlfs/editors.html#postlfs-editors-vim.
By default, vim runs in vi-incompatible mode. This may be new to users who have used other editors in the past. The “nocompatible” setting is included below to highlight the fact that a new behavior is being used. It also reminds those who would change to “compatible” mode that it should be the first setting in the configuration file. This is necessary because it changes other settings, and overrides must come after this setting. Create a default vim configuration file by running the following:
cat > /etc/vimrc << "EOF"
" Begin /etc/vimrc
set nocompatible
set backspace=2
syntax on
if (&term == "iterm") || (&term == "putty")
set background=dark
endif
" End /etc/vimrc
EOF
The set nocompatible
setting makes vim behave in a more useful
way (the default) than the vi-compatible manner. Remove the
“no” to keep the old
vi behavior.
The set backspace=2
setting allows backspacing over line breaks, autoindents, and
the start of insert. The syntax
on parameter enables vim's syntax highlighting.
Finally, the if
statement with the set
background=dark setting corrects vim's guess about the
background color of some terminal emulators. This gives the
highlighting a better color scheme for use on the black
background of these programs.
Documentation for other available options can be obtained by running the following command:
vim -c ':options'
By default, Vim only installs spell files for the English
language. To install spell files for your preferred
language, download the *.spl
and optionally, the *.sug
files for your language and character encoding from
ftp://ftp.vim.org/pub/vim/runtime/spell/
and save them to /usr/share/vim/vim71/spell/.
To use these spell files, some configuration in
/etc/vimrc is needed, e.g.:
set spelllang=en,ru
set spellFor more information, see the appropriate README file located at the URL above.
|
A filter for creating an error file that can be read by vim |
|
|
Reformats the error messages of the Perl interpreter for use with the “quickfix” mode of vim |
|
|
Starts vim in ex mode |
|
|
A script that starts vim with less.vim |
|
|
Processes vim errors |
|
|
Creates a tags file for Perl code for use by vim |
|
|
Checks the spelling of arguments |
|
|
Is a restricted version of view; no shell commands can be started and view cannot be suspended |
|
|
Is a restricted version of vim; no shell commands can be started and vim cannot be suspended |
|
|
Generates a tags file for Perl scripts |
|
|
Link to vim |
|
|
Starts vim in read-only mode |
|
|
Is the editor |
|
|
Starts vim with the terminal in 132-column mode |
|
|
Converts Vim documentation to HypterText Markup Language (HTML) |
|
|
Edits two or three versions of a file with vim and show differences |
|
|
Enables the DEC locator input model on a remote terminal |
|
|
Spell checks a file and generates the syntax statements necessary to highlight in vim. This script requires the old Unix spell command, which is provided neither in LFS nor in BLFS |
|
|
Teaches the basic keys and commands of vim |
|
|
Creates a hex dump of the given file; it can also do the reverse, so it can be used for binary patching |
Most programs and libraries are, by default, compiled with
debugging symbols included (with gcc's -g option). This means that when
debugging a program or library that was compiled with debugging
information included, the debugger can provide not only memory
addresses, but also the names of the routines and variables.
However, the inclusion of these debugging symbols enlarges a program or library significantly. The following is an example of the amount of space these symbols occupy:
A bash binary with debugging symbols: 1200 KB
A bash binary without debugging symbols: 480 KB
Glibc and GCC files (/lib
and /usr/lib) with
debugging symbols: 87 MB
Glibc and GCC files without debugging symbols: 16 MB
Sizes may vary depending on which compiler and C library were used, but when comparing programs with and without debugging symbols, the difference will usually be a factor between two and five.
Because most users will never use a debugger on their system software, a lot of disk space can be regained by removing these symbols. The next section shows how to strip all debugging symbols from the programs and libraries. Additional information on system optimization can be found at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/optimization.txt.
If the intended user is not a programmer and does not plan to do any debugging on the system software, the system size can be decreased by about 90 MB by removing the debugging symbols from binaries and libraries. This causes no inconvenience other than not being able to debug the software fully anymore.
Most people who use the command mentioned below do not experience any difficulties. However, it is easy to make a typo and render the new system unusable, so before running the strip command, it is a good idea to make a backup of the LFS system in its current state.
Before performing the stripping, take special care to ensure that none of the binaries that are about to be stripped are running. If unsure whether the user entered chroot with the command given in Section 6.4, “Entering the Chroot Environment,” first exit from chroot:
logout
Then reenter it with:
chroot $LFS /tools/bin/env -i \
HOME=/root TERM=$TERM PS1='\u:\w\$ ' \
PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin \
/tools/bin/bash --login
Now the binaries and libraries can be safely stripped:
/tools/bin/find /{,usr/}{bin,lib,sbin} -type f \
-exec /tools/bin/strip --strip-debug '{}' ';'
A large number of files will be reported as having their file format not recognized. These warnings can be safely ignored. These warnings indicate that those files are scripts instead of binaries.
If disk space is very tight, the --strip-all option can be used on
the binaries in /{,usr/}{bin,sbin} to gain several more
megabytes. Do not use this option on libraries—they will
be destroyed.
From now on, when reentering the chroot environment after exiting, use the following modified chroot command:
chroot "$LFS" /usr/bin/env -i \
HOME=/root TERM="$TERM" PS1='\u:\w\$ ' \
PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin \
/bin/bash --login
The reason for this is that the programs in /tools are no longer needed. Since they are
no longer needed you can delete the /tools directory if so desired.
Removing /tools will also
remove the temporary copies of Tcl, Expect, and DejaGNU which
were used for running the toolchain tests. If you need these
programs later on, they will need to be recompiled and
re-installed. The BLFS book has instructions for this (see
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/).
If the virtual kernel file systems have been unmounted, either manually or through a reboot, ensure that the virtual kernel file systems are mounted when reentering the chroot. This process was explained in Section 6.2.2, “Mounting and Populating /dev” and Section 6.2.3, “Mounting Virtual Kernel File Systems”.
This chapter details how to install and configure the LFS-Bootscripts package. Most of these scripts will work without modification, but a few require additional configuration files because they deal with hardware-dependent information.
System-V style init scripts are employed in this book because they are widely used. For additional options, a hint detailing the BSD style init setup is available at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/bsd-init.txt. Searching the LFS mailing lists for “depinit” will also offer additional choices.
If using an alternative style of init scripts, skip this chapter and move on to Chapter 8.
The LFS-Bootscripts package contains a set of scripts to start/stop the LFS system at bootup/shutdown.
Install the package:
make install
|
Checks the integrity of the file systems before they are mounted (with the exception of journal and network based file systems) |
|
|
Removes files that should not be preserved between
reboots, such as those in |
|
|
Loads the correct keymap table for the desired keyboard layout; it also sets the screen font |
|
|
Sets the kernel log level to control messages reaching the console. |
|
|
Contains common functions, such as error and status checking, that are used by several bootscripts |
|
|
Halts the system |
|
|
Assists the network script with stopping network devices |
|
|
Assists the network script with starting network devices |
|
|
Sets up the system's hostname and local loopback device |
|
|
Loads kernel modules listed in |
|
|
Mounts all file systems, except ones that are marked noauto or are network based |
|
|
Mounts virtual kernel file systems, such as
|
|
|
Sets up network interfaces, such as network cards, and sets up the default gateway (where applicable) |
|
|
The master run-level control script; it is responsible for running all the other bootscripts one-by-one, in a sequence determined by the name of the symbolic links being processed |
|
|
Reboots the system |
|
|
Makes sure every process is terminated before the system reboots or halts |
|
|
Resets the kernel clock to local time in case the hardware clock is not set to UTC time |
|
|
Provides the functionality needed to assign a static Internet Protocol (IP) address to a network interface |
|
|
Enables and disables swap files and partitions |
|
|
Loads system configuration values from |
|
|
Starts and stops the system and kernel log daemons |
|
|
A template to create custom bootscripts for other daemons |
|
|
Prepares the |
|
|
Retries failed udev uevents, and copies generated
rules files from |
Linux uses a special booting facility named SysVinit that is based on a concept of run-levels. It can be quite different from one system to another, so it cannot be assumed that because things worked in one particular Linux distribution, they should work the same in LFS too. LFS has its own way of doing things, but it respects generally accepted standards.
SysVinit (which will be referred to as “init” from now on) works using a
run-levels scheme. There are seven (numbered 0 to 6) run-levels
(actually, there are more run-levels, but they are for special
cases and are generally not used. See init(8) for more details), and each one of
those corresponds to the actions the computer is supposed to
perform when it starts up. The default run-level is 3. Here are
the descriptions of the different run-levels as they are
implemented:
0: halt the computer
1: single-user mode
2: multi-user mode without networking
3: multi-user mode with networking
4: reserved for customization, otherwise does the same as 3
5: same as 4, it is usually used for GUI login (like X's xdm or KDE's kdm)
6: reboot the computer
The command used to change run-levels is init <runlevel>,
where <runlevel> is the target
run-level. For example, to reboot the computer, a user could
issue the init 6
command, which is an alias for the reboot command. Likewise,
init 0 is an
alias for the halt command.
There are a number of directories under /etc/rc.d that look like rc?.d (where ? is the number of the
run-level) and rcsysinit.d, all
containing a number of symbolic links. Some begin with a
K, the others begin with
an S, and all of them
have two numbers following the initial letter. The K means to
stop (kill) a service and the S means to start a service. The
numbers determine the order in which the scripts are run, from
00 to 99—the lower the number the earlier it gets
executed. When init switches to another
run-level, the appropriate services are either started or
stopped, depending on the runlevel chosen.
The real scripts are in /etc/rc.d/init.d. They do the actual work,
and the symlinks all point to them. Killing links and starting
links point to the same script in /etc/rc.d/init.d. This is because the scripts
can be called with different parameters like start, stop, restart, reload, and status. When a K link is
encountered, the appropriate script is run with the stop argument. When an S link is
encountered, the appropriate script is run with the start argument.
There is one exception to this explanation. Links that start
with an S in the
rc0.d and rc6.d directories will not cause anything to
be started. They will be called with the parameter stop to stop something. The logic
behind this is that when a user is going to reboot or halt the
system, nothing needs to be started. The system only needs to
be stopped.
These are descriptions of what the arguments make the scripts do:
start
The service is started.
stop
The service is stopped.
restart
The service is stopped and then started again.
reload
The configuration of the service is updated. This is used after the configuration file of a service was modified, when the service does not need to be restarted.
status
Tells if the service is running and with which PIDs.
Feel free to modify the way the boot process works (after all, it is your own LFS system). The files given here are an example of how it can be done.
In Chapter 6, we installed the Udev package. Before we go into the details regarding how this works, a brief history of previous methods of handling devices is in order.
Linux systems in general traditionally use a static device
creation method, whereby a great many device nodes are created
under /dev (sometimes literally
thousands of nodes), regardless of whether the corresponding
hardware devices actually exist. This is typically done via a
MAKEDEV script,
which contains a number of calls to the mknod program with the
relevant major and minor device numbers for every possible
device that might exist in the world.
Using the Udev method, only those devices which are detected by
the kernel get device nodes created for them. Because these
device nodes will be created each time the system boots, they
will be stored on a tmpfs file
system (a virtual file system that resides entirely in system
memory). Device nodes do not require much space, so the memory
that is used is negligible.
In February 2000, a new filesystem called devfs was merged into the 2.3.46 kernel
and was made available during the 2.4 series of stable
kernels. Although it was present in the kernel source itself,
this method of creating devices dynamically never received
overwhelming support from the core kernel developers.
The main problem with the approach adopted by devfs was the way it handled device
detection, creation, and naming. The latter issue, that of
device node naming, was perhaps the most critical. It is
generally accepted that if device names are allowed to be
configurable, then the device naming policy should be up to a
system administrator, not imposed on them by any particular
developer(s). The devfs file
system also suffers from race conditions that are inherent in
its design and cannot be fixed without a substantial revision
to the kernel. It was marked as deprecated for a long period
– due to a lack of maintenance – and was finally
removed from the kernel in June, 2006.
With the development of the unstable 2.5 kernel tree, later
released as the 2.6 series of stable kernels, a new virtual
filesystem called sysfs came
to be. The job of sysfs is to
export a view of the system's hardware configuration to
userspace processes. With this userspace-visible
representation, the possibility of seeing a userspace
replacement for devfs became
much more realistic.
The sysfs filesystem was
mentioned briefly above. One may wonder how sysfs knows about the devices present
on a system and what device numbers should be used for
them. Drivers that have been compiled into the kernel
directly register their objects with sysfs as they are detected by the
kernel. For drivers compiled as modules, this registration
will happen when the module is loaded. Once the
sysfs filesystem is mounted
(on /sys), data which the
built-in drivers registered with sysfs are available to userspace
processes and to udevd for device node
creation.
The S10udev
initscript takes care of creating device nodes when Linux
is booted. The script unsets the uevent handler from the
default of /sbin/hotplug. This is
done because the kernel no longer needs to call out to an
external binary. Instead udevd will listen on a
netlink socket for uevents that the kernel raises. Next,
the bootscript copies any static device nodes that exist in
/lib/udev/devices to
/dev. This is necessary
because some devices, directories, and symlinks are needed
before the dynamic device handling processes are available
during the early stages of booting a system. Creating
static device nodes in /lib/udev/devices also provides an easy
workaround for devices that are not supported by the
dynamic device handling infrastructure. The bootscript then
starts the Udev daemon, udevd, which will act on
any uevents it receives. Finally, the bootscript forces the
kernel to replay uevents for any devices that have already
been registered and then waits for udevd to handle them.
To obtain the right major and minor number for a device,
Udev relies on the information provided by sysfs in /sys. For example, /sys/class/tty/vcs/dev contains the
string “7:0”. This
string is used by udevd to create a device
node with major number 7 and minor 0. The names and permissions of
the nodes created under the /dev directory are determined by rules
specified in the files within the /etc/udev/rules.d/ directory. These are
numbered in a similar fashion to the LFS-Bootscripts
package. If udevd can't find a rule
for the device it is creating, it will default permissions
to 660 and ownership
to root:root.
Documentation on the syntax of the Udev rules configuration
files are available in /usr/share/doc/udev-113/index.html
Device drivers compiled as modules may have aliases built
into them. Aliases are visible in the output of the
modinfo
program and are usually related to the bus-specific
identifiers of devices supported by a module. For example,
the snd-fm801 driver
supports PCI devices with vendor ID 0x1319 and device ID
0x0801, and has an alias of “pci:v00001319d00000801sv*sd*bc04sc01i*”.
For most devices, the bus driver exports the alias of the
driver that would handle the device via sysfs. E.g., the /sys/bus/pci/devices/0000:00:0d.0/modalias
file might contain the string “pci:v00001319d00000801sv00001319sd00001319bc04sc01i00”.
The rules that LFS installs will cause udevd to call out to
/sbin/modprobe with the
contents of the MODALIAS uevent
environment variable (that should be the same as the
contents of the modalias file
in sysfs), thus loading all modules whose aliases match
this string after wildcard expansion.
In this example, this means that, in addition to snd-fm801, the obsolete (and unwanted) forte driver will be loaded if it is available. See below for ways in which the loading of unwanted drivers can be prevented.
The kernel itself is also able to load modules for network protocols, filesystems and NLS support on demand.
There are a few possible problems when it comes to automatically creating device nodes.
Udev will only load a module if it has a bus-specific alias
and the bus driver properly exports the necessary aliases
to sysfs. In other cases,
one should arrange module loading by other means. With
Linux-2.6.22.5, Udev is known to load properly-written
drivers for INPUT, IDE, PCI, USB, SCSI, SERIO and FireWire
devices.
To determine if the device driver you require has the
necessary support for Udev, run modinfo with the module
name as the argument. Now try locating the device directory
under /sys/bus and check
whether there is a modalias
file there.
If the modalias file exists
in sysfs, the driver
supports the device and can talk to it directly, but
doesn't have the alias, it is a bug in the driver. Load the
driver without the help from Udev and expect the issue to
be fixed later.
If there is no modalias file
in the relevant directory under /sys/bus, this means that the kernel
developers have not yet added modalias support to this bus
type. With Linux-2.6.22.5, this is the case with ISA
busses. Expect this issue to be fixed in later kernel
versions.
Udev is not intended to load “wrapper” drivers such as snd-pcm-oss and non-hardware drivers such as loop at all.
If the “wrapper”
module only enhances the functionality provided by some
other module (e.g., snd-pcm-oss enhances the
functionality of snd-pcm by making the sound
cards available to OSS applications), configure
modprobe to
load the wrapper after Udev loads the wrapped module. To do
this, add an “install” line in /etc/modprobe.conf. For example:
install snd-pcm /sbin/modprobe -i snd-pcm ; \
/sbin/modprobe snd-pcm-oss ; true
If the module in question is not a wrapper and is useful by
itself, configure the S05modules bootscript to
load this module on system boot. To do this, add the module
name to the /etc/sysconfig/modules file on a separate
line. This works for wrapper modules too, but is suboptimal
in that case.
Either don't build the module, or blacklist it in
/etc/modprobe.conf file as
done with the forte
module in the example below:
blacklist forteBlacklisted modules can still be loaded manually with the explicit modprobe command.
This usually happens if a rule unexpectedly matches a device. For example, a poorly-writen rule can match both a SCSI disk (as desired) and the corresponding SCSI generic device (incorrectly) by vendor. Find the offending rule and make it more specific.
This may be another manifestation of the previous problem.
If not, and your rule uses sysfs attributes, it may be a kernel
timing issue, to be fixed in later kernels. For now, you
can work around it by creating a rule that waits for the
used sysfs attribute and
appending it to the /etc/udev/rules.d/10-wait_for_sysfs.rules
file. Please notify the LFS Development list if you do so
and it helps.
Further text assumes that the driver is built statically into the kernel or already loaded as a module, and that you have already checked that Udev doesn't create a misnamed device.
Udev has no information needed to create a device node if a
kernel driver does not export its data to sysfs. This is most common with third
party drivers from outside the kernel tree. Create a static
device node in /lib/udev/devices with the appropriate
major/minor numbers (see the file devices.txt inside the kernel
documentation or the documentation provided by the third
party driver vendor). The static device node will be copied
to /dev by the S10udev bootscript.
This is due to the fact that Udev, by design, handles uevents and loads modules in parallel, and thus in an unpredictable order. This will never be “fixed”. You should not rely upon the kernel device names being stable. Instead, create your own rules that make symlinks with stable names based on some stable attributes of the device, such as a serial number or the output of various *_id utilities installed by Udev. See Section 7.12, “Creating Custom Symlinks to Devices” and Section 7.13, “Configuring the network Script” for examples.
Additional helpful documentation is available at the following sites:
A Userspace Implementation of devfs
http://www.kroah.com/linux/talks/ols_2003_udev_paper/Reprint-Kroah-Hartman-OLS2003.pdf
udev FAQ http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/hotplug/udev-FAQ
The sysfs Filesystem
http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/mochel/doc/papers/ols-2005/mochel.pdf
The setclock
script reads the time from the hardware clock, also known as
the BIOS or the Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor (CMOS)
clock. If the hardware clock is set to UTC, this script will
convert the hardware clock's time to the local time using the
/etc/localtime file (which tells
the hwclock
program which timezone the user is in). There is no way to
detect whether or not the hardware clock is set to UTC, so this
needs to be configured manually.
If you cannot remember whether or not the hardware clock is set
to UTC, find out by running the hwclock --localtime --show
command. This will display what the current time is according
to the hardware clock. If this time matches whatever your watch
says, then the hardware clock is set to local time. If the
output from hwclock is not local time,
chances are it is set to UTC time. Verify this by adding or
subtracting the proper amount of hours for the timezone to the
time shown by hwclock. For example, if you
are currently in the MST timezone, which is also known as GMT
-0700, add seven hours to the local time.
Change the value of the UTC variable
below to a value of 0
(zero) if the hardware clock is not set to UTC time.
Create a new file /etc/sysconfig/clock by running the
following:
cat > /etc/sysconfig/clock << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/sysconfig/clock
UTC=1
# End /etc/sysconfig/clock
EOF
A good hint explaining how to deal with time on LFS is
available at
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/time.txt.
It explains issues such as time zones, UTC, and the
TZ environment variable.
This section discusses how to configure the console and consolelog bootscripts that set up the keyboard map, console font and console kernel log level. If non-ASCII characters (e.g., the copyright sign, the British pound sign and Euro symbol) will not be used and the keyboard is a U.S. one, much of this section can be skipped. Without the configuration file, the console bootscript will do nothing.
The console and
consolelog script
reads the /etc/sysconfig/console
file for configuration information. Decide which keymap and
screen font will be used. Various language-specific HOWTOs can
also help with this, see http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/HOWTO-INDEX/other-lang.html.
If still in doubt, look in the /lib/kbd directory for valid keymaps and
screen fonts. Read loadkeys(1)
and setfont(8) manual pages to
determine the correct arguments for these programs.
The /etc/sysconfig/console file
should contain lines of the form: VARIABLE="value". The
following variables are recognized:
This variable specifies the log level for kernel messages sent to the console as set by dmesg. Valid levels are from "1" (no messages) to "8". The default level is "7".
This variable specifies the arguments for the loadkeys program, typically, the name of keymap to load, e.g., “es”. If this variable is not set, the bootscript will not run the loadkeys program, and the default kernel keymap will be used.
This (rarely used) variable specifies the arguments for the second call to the loadkeys program. This is useful if the stock keymap is not completely satisfactory and a small adjustment has to be made. E.g., to include the Euro sign into a keymap that normally doesn't have it, set this variable to “euro2”.
This variable specifies the arguments for the setfont program. Typically, this includes the font name, “-m”, and the name of the application character map to load. E.g., in order to load the “lat1-16” font together with the “8859-1” application character map (as it is appropriate in the USA), set this variable to “lat1-16 -m 8859-1”. If this variable is not set, the bootscript will not run the setfont program, and the default VGA font will be used together with the default application character map.
Set this variable to “1”, “yes” or “true” in order to put the console into UTF-8 mode. This is useful in UTF-8 based locales and harmful otherwise.
For many keyboard layouts, there is no stock Unicode keymap in the Kbd package. The console bootscript will convert an available keymap to UTF-8 on the fly if this variable is set to the encoding of the available non-UTF-8 keymap.
Some examples:
For a non-Unicode setup, only the KEYMAP and FONT variables are generally needed. E.g., for a Polish setup, one would use:
cat > /etc/sysconfig/console << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/sysconfig/console
KEYMAP="pl2"
FONT="lat2a-16 -m 8859-2"
# End /etc/sysconfig/console
EOF
As mentioned above, it is sometimes necessary to adjust a stock keymap slightly. The following example adds the Euro symbol to the German keymap:
cat > /etc/sysconfig/console << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/sysconfig/console
KEYMAP="de-latin1"
KEYMAP_CORRECTIONS="euro2"
FONT="lat0-16 -m 8859-15"
# End /etc/sysconfig/console
EOF
The following is a Unicode-enabled example for Bulgarian, where a stock UTF-8 keymap exists:
cat > /etc/sysconfig/console << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/sysconfig/console
UNICODE="1"
KEYMAP="bg_bds-utf8"
FONT="LatArCyrHeb-16"
# End /etc/sysconfig/console
EOF
Due to the use of a 512-glyph LatArCyrHeb-16 font in the previous example, bright colors are no longer available on the Linux console unless a framebuffer is used. If one wants to have bright colors without framebuffer and can live without characters not belonging to his language, it is still possible to use a language-specific 256-glyph font, as illustrated below:
cat > /etc/sysconfig/console << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/sysconfig/console
UNICODE="1"
KEYMAP="bg_bds-utf8"
FONT="cyr-sun16"
# End /etc/sysconfig/console
EOF
There is no pre-made UTF-8 Russian keyamp, therefore it has to be produced by converting the existing KOI8-R keymap as illustrated below:
cat > /etc/sysconfig/console << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/sysconfig/console
UNICODE="1"
KEYMAP="ru_ms"
LEGACY_CHARSET="koi8-r"
FONT="LatArCyrHeb-16"
# End /etc/sysconfig/console
EOF
Some keymaps have dead keys (i.e., keys that don't produce a character by themselves, but put an accent on the character produced by the next key) or define composition rules (such as: “press Ctrl+. A E to get Æ” in the default keymap). Linux-2.6.22.5 in UTF-8 keyboard mode assumes that accented characters produced via dead keys or composing are in the Latin-1 range of Unicode, and it is impossible to change this assumption. Thus, accented characters needed for, e.g., the Czech language, can't be typed on Linux console in UTF-8 mode (but files containing these characters can be displayed correctly). The solution is either to avoid the use of UTF-8, or to install the X window system that doesn't have this limitation in its input handling.
For Chinese, Japanese, Korean and some other languages, the Linux console cannot be configured to display the needed characters. Users who need such languages should install the X Window System, fonts that cover the necessary character ranges, and the proper input method (e.g., SCIM, it supports a wide variety of languages).
The /etc/sysconfig/console file
only controls the Linux text console localization. It has
nothing to do with setting the proper keyboard layout and
terminal fonts in the X Window System, with ssh sessions or
with a serial console. In such situations, limitations
mentioned in the last two list items above do not apply.
The sysklogd script invokes the
syslogd program
with the -m 0 option.
This option turns off the periodic timestamp mark that
syslogd writes to
the log files every 20 minutes by default. If you want to turn
on this periodic timestamp mark, edit the sysklogd script and make the changes
accordingly. See man
syslogd for more information.
The inputrc file handles keyboard
mapping for specific situations. This file is the startup file
used by Readline — the input-related library — used
by Bash and most other shells.
Most people do not need user-specific keyboard mappings so the
command below creates a global /etc/inputrc used by everyone who logs in. If
you later decide you need to override the defaults on a
per-user basis, you can create a .inputrc file in the user's home directory
with the modified mappings.
For more information on how to edit the inputrc file, see info bash under the
Readline Init File
section. info
readline is also a good source of information.
Below is a generic global inputrc
along with comments to explain what the various options do.
Note that comments cannot be on the same line as commands.
Create the file using the following command:
cat > /etc/inputrc << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/inputrc
# Modified by Chris Lynn <roryo@roryo.dynup.net>
# Allow the command prompt to wrap to the next line
set horizontal-scroll-mode Off
# Enable 8bit input
set meta-flag On
set input-meta On
# Turns off 8th bit stripping
set convert-meta Off
# Keep the 8th bit for display
set output-meta On
# none, visible or audible
set bell-style none
# All of the following map the escape sequence of the value
# contained in the 1st argument to the readline specific functions
"\eOd": backward-word
"\eOc": forward-word
# for linux console
"\e[1~": beginning-of-line
"\e[4~": end-of-line
"\e[5~": beginning-of-history
"\e[6~": end-of-history
"\e[3~": delete-char
"\e[2~": quoted-insert
# for xterm
"\eOH": beginning-of-line
"\eOF": end-of-line
# for Konsole
"\e[H": beginning-of-line
"\e[F": end-of-line
# End /etc/inputrc
EOF
The shell program /bin/bash (hereafter referred
to as “the shell”) uses
a collection of startup files to help create an environment to
run in. Each file has a specific use and may affect login and
interactive environments differently. The files in the
/etc directory provide global
settings. If an equivalent file exists in the home directory,
it may override the global settings.
An interactive login shell is started after a successful login,
using /bin/login,
by reading the /etc/passwd file.
An interactive non-login shell is started at the command-line
(e.g., [prompt]$/bin/bash). A non-interactive
shell is usually present when a shell script is running. It is
non-interactive because it is processing a script and not
waiting for user input between commands.
For more information, see info bash under the Bash Startup Files and Interactive Shells section.
The files /etc/profile and
~/.bash_profile are read when the
shell is invoked as an interactive login shell.
The base /etc/profile below sets
some environment variables necessary for native language
support. Setting them properly results in:
The output of programs translated into the native language
Correct classification of characters into letters, digits and other classes. This is necessary for bash to properly accept non-ASCII characters in command lines in non-English locales
The correct alphabetical sorting order for the country
Appropriate default paper size
Correct formatting of monetary, time, and date values
Replace <ll>
below with the two-letter code for the desired language (e.g.,
“en”) and <CC> with the two-letter
code for the appropriate country (e.g., “GB”). <charmap> should be
replaced with the canonical charmap for your chosen locale.
Optional modifiers such as “@euro” may also be present.
The list of all locales supported by Glibc can be obtained by running the following command:
locale -a
Charmaps can have a number of aliases, e.g.,
“ISO-8859-1” is also
referred to as “iso8859-1” and “iso88591”. Some applications cannot handle
the various synonyms correctly (e.g., require that
“UTF-8” is written as
“UTF-8”, not
“utf8”), so it is safest
in most cases to choose the canonical name for a particular
locale. To determine the canonical name, run the following
command, where <locale
name> is the output given by locale -a for your preferred
locale (“en_GB.iso88591”
in our example).
LC_ALL=<locale name> locale charmap
For the “en_GB.iso88591” locale, the above command will print:
ISO-8859-1This results in a final locale setting of “en_GB.ISO-8859-1”. It is important that the locale found using the heuristic above is tested prior to it being added to the Bash startup files:
LC_ALL=<locale name> locale language LC_ALL=<locale name> locale charmap LC_ALL=<locale name> locale int_curr_symbol LC_ALL=<locale name> locale int_prefix
The above commands should print the language name, the character encoding used by the locale, the local currency, and the prefix to dial before the telephone number in order to get into the country. If any of the commands above fail with a message similar to the one shown below, this means that your locale was either not installed in Chapter 6 or is not supported by the default installation of Glibc.
locale: Cannot set LC_* to default locale: No such file or directoryIf this happens, you should either install the desired locale using the localedef command, or consider choosing a different locale. Further instructions assume that there are no such error messages from Glibc.
Some packages beyond LFS may also lack support for your chosen locale. One example is the X library (part of the X Window System), which outputs the following error message if the locale does not exactly match one of the character map names in its internal files:
Warning: locale not supported by Xlib, locale set to CIn several cases Xlib expects that the character map will be listed in uppercase notation with canonical dashes. For instance, "ISO-8859-1" rather than "iso88591". It is also possible to find an appropriate specification by removing the charmap part of the locale specification. This can be checked by running the locale charmap command in both locales. For example, one would have to change "de_DE.ISO-8859-15@euro" to "de_DE@euro" in order to get this locale recognized by Xlib.
Other packages can also function incorrectly (but may not necessarily display any error messages) if the locale name does not meet their expectations. In those cases, investigating how other Linux distributions support your locale might provide some useful information.
Once the proper locale settings have been determined, create
the /etc/profile file:
cat > /etc/profile << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/profile
export LANG=<ll>_<CC>.<charmap><@modifiers>
# End /etc/profile
EOF
The “C” (default) and “en_US” (the recommended one for United States English users) locales are different. “C” uses the US-ASCII 7-bit character set, and treats bytes with the high bit set as invalid characters. That's why, e.g., the ls command substitutes them with question marks in that locale. Also, an attempt to send mail with such characters from Mutt or Pine results in non-RFC-conforming messages being sent (the charset in the outgoing mail is indicated as “unknown 8-bit”). So you can use the “C” locale only if you are sure that you will never need 8-bit characters.
UTF-8 based locales are not supported well by many programs. E.g., the watch program displays only ASCII characters in UTF-8 locales and has no such restriction in traditional 8-bit locales like en_US. Work is in progress to document and, if possible, fix such problems, see http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/introduction/locale-issues.html.
Part of the job of the localnet script is setting
the system's hostname. This needs to be configured in the
/etc/sysconfig/network file.
Create the /etc/sysconfig/network
file and enter a hostname by running:
echo "HOSTNAME=<lfs>" > /etc/sysconfig/network
<lfs> needs to
be replaced with the name given to the computer. Do not enter
the Fully Qualified Domain Name (FQDN) here. That information
will be put in the /etc/hosts
file in the next section.
If a network card is to be configured, decide on the IP
address, fully-qualified domain name (FQDN), and possible
aliases for use in the /etc/hosts
file. The syntax is:
IP_address myhost.example.org aliasesUnless the computer is to be visible to the Internet (i.e., there is a registered domain and a valid block of assigned IP addresses—most users do not have this), make sure that the IP address is in the private network IP address range. Valid ranges are:
Private Network Address Range Normal Prefix
10.0.0.1 - 10.255.255.254 8
172.x.0.1 - 172.x.255.254 16
192.168.y.1 - 192.168.y.254 24x can be any number in the range 16-31. y can be any number in the range 0-255.
A valid private IP address could be 192.168.1.1. A valid FQDN for this IP could be lfs.example.org.
Even if not using a network card, a valid FQDN is still required. This is necessary for certain programs to operate correctly.
Create the /etc/hosts file by
running:
cat > /etc/hosts << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/hosts (network card version)
127.0.0.1 localhost
<192.168.1.1> <HOSTNAME.example.org> [alias1] [alias2 ...]
# End /etc/hosts (network card version)
EOF
The <192.168.1.1> and
<HOSTNAME.example.org>
values need to be changed for specific users or requirements
(if assigned an IP address by a network/system administrator
and the machine will be connected to an existing network). The
optional alias name(s) can be omitted.
If a network card is not going to be configured, create the
/etc/hosts file by running:
cat > /etc/hosts << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/hosts (no network card version)
127.0.0.1 <HOSTNAME.example.org> <HOSTNAME> localhost
# End /etc/hosts (no network card version)
EOF
Some software that you may want to install later (e.g.,
various media players) expect the /dev/cdrom and /dev/dvd symlinks to exist, and to point to
a CD-ROM or DVD-ROM device. Also, it may be convenient to put
references to those symlinks into /etc/fstab. Udev comes with a script that
will generate rules files to create these symlinks for you,
depending on the capabilities of each device, but you need to
decide which of two modes of operation you wish to have the
script use.
First, the script can operate in “by-path” mode (used by default for USB and FireWire devices), where the rules it creates depend on the physical path to the CD or DVD device. Second, it can operate in “by-id” mode (default for IDE and SCSI devices), where the rules it creates depend on identification strings stored in the CD or DVD device itself. The path is determined by Udev's path_id script, and the identification strings are read from the hardware by its ata_id or scsi_id programs, depending on which type of device you have.
There are advantages to each approach; the correct approach to use will depend on what kinds of device changes may happen. If you expect the physical path to the device (that is, the ports and/or slots that it plugs into) to change, for example because you plan on moving the drive to a different IDE port or a different USB connector, then you should use the “by-id” mode. On the other hand, if you expect the device's identification to change, for example because it may die, and you would replace it with a different device with the same capabilities and which is plugged into the same connectors, then you should use the “by-path” mode.
If either type of change is possible with your drive, then choose a mode based on the type of change you expect to happen more often.
External devices (for example, a USB-connected CD drive) should not use by-path persistence, because each time the device is plugged into a new external port, its physical path will change. All externally-connected devices will have this problem if you write Udev rules to recognize them by their physical path; the problem is not limited to CD and DVD drives.
If you wish to see the values that the Udev scripts will use,
then for the appropriate CD-ROM device, find the
corresponding directory under /sys (e.g., this can be /sys/block/hdd) and run a command similar
to the following:
udevtest /sys/block/hdd
Look at the lines containing the output of various *_id programs. The “by-id” mode will use the ID_SERIAL value if it exists and is not empty, otherwise it will use a combination of ID_MODEL and ID_REVISION. The “by-path” mode will use the ID_PATH value.
If the default mode is not suitable for your situation, then
the following modification can be made to the /etc/udev/rules.d/75-cd-aliases-generator.rules
file, as follows (where mode is one of
“by-id” or
“by-path”):
sed -i -e 's/write_cd_rules/& mode/' \
/etc/udev/rules.d/75-cd-aliases-generator.rules
Note that it is not necessary to create the rules files or
symlinks at this time, because you have bind-mounted the
host's /dev directory into the
LFS system, and we assume the symlinks exist on the host. The
rules and symlinks will be created the first time you boot
your LFS system.
However, if you have multiple CD-ROM devices, then the
symlinks generated at that time may point to different
devices than they point to on your host, because devices are
not discovered in a predictable order. The assignments
created when you first boot the LFS system will be stable, so
this is only an issue if you need the symlinks on both
systems to point to the same device. If you need that, then
inspect (and possibly edit) the generated /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-cd.rules
file after booting, to make sure the assigned symlinks match
what you need.
As explained in
Section 7.4, “Device and Module Handling on an LFS
System”, the order in which devices with the same
function appear in /dev is
essentially random. E.g., if you have a USB web camera and a
TV tuner, sometimes /dev/video0
refers to the camera and /dev/video1 refers to the tuner, and
sometimes after a reboot the order changes to the opposite
one. For all classes of hardware except sound cards and
network cards, this is fixable by creating udev rules for
custom persistent symlinks. The case of network cards is
covered separately in Section 7.13,
“Configuring the network Script”, and sound
card configuration can be found in BLFS.
For each of your devices that is likely to have this problem
(even if the problem doesn't exist in your current Linux
distribution), find the corresponding directory under
/sys/class or /sys/block. For video devices, this may be
/sys/class/video4linux/video. Figure out the
attributes that identify the device uniquely (usually, vendor
and product IDs and/or serial numbers work):
X
udevinfo -a -p /sys/class/video4linux/video0
Then write rules that create the symlinks, e.g.:
cat > /etc/udev/rules.d/83-duplicate_devs.rules << EOF
# Persistent symlinks for webcam and tuner
KERNEL=="video*", ATTRS{idProduct}=="1910", ATTRS{idVendor}=="0d81", \
SYMLINK+="webcam"
KERNEL=="video*", ATTRS{device}=="0x036f", ATTRS{vendor}=="0x109e", \
SYMLINK+="tvtuner"
EOF
Be aware that Udev does not recognize the backslash for line continuation. This example works properly because both the backslash and newline are ignored by the shell. This makes the shell send each rule to cat on only one line. (The shell ignores this sequence because the EOF string used in the here-document redirection is not enclosed in either double or single quotes. For more details, see the bash(1) manpage, and search it for "Here Documents".)
If modifying Udev rules with an editor, be sure to leave each rule on one physical line.
The result is that /dev/video0
and /dev/video1 devices still
refer randomly to the tuner and the web camera (and thus
should never be used directly), but there are symlinks
/dev/tvtuner and /dev/webcam that always point to the
correct device.
More information on writing Udev rules can be found in
/usr/share/doc/udev-113/index.html.
This section only applies if a network card is to be configured.
If a network card will not be used, there is likely no need to
create any configuration files relating to network cards. If
that is the case, remove the network symlinks from all run-level
directories (/etc/rc.d/rc*.d).
With Udev and modular network drivers, the network interface
numbering is not persistent across reboots by default,
because the drivers are loaded in parallel and, thus, in
random order. For example, on a computer having two network
cards made by Intel and Realtek, the network card
manufactured by Intel may become eth0 and the Realtek card becomes
eth1. In some cases, after a
reboot the cards get renumbered the other way around. To
avoid this, Udev comes with a script and some rules to assign
stable names to network cards based on their MAC address.
Pre-generate the rules to ensure the same names get assigned to the same devices at every boot, including the first:
/lib/udev/write_net_rules all_interfaces
Now, inspect the /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules
file, to find out which name was assigned to which network
device:
cat /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules
The file begins with a comment block followed by two lines for each NIC. The first line for each NIC is a commented description showing its hardware IDs (e.g. its PC vendor and device IDs, if it's a PCI card), along with its driver in parentheses, if the driver can be found. Neither the hardware ID nor the driver is used to determine which name to give an interface. The second line is the Udev rule that matches this NIC and actually assigns it a name.
All Udev rules are made up of several keys, separated by commas and optional whitespace. This rule's keys and an explanations of each of them are as follows:
SUBSYSTEM=="net" - This
tells Udev to ignore devices that are not network
cards.
DRIVERS=="?*" - This
exists so that Udev will ignore VLAN or bridge
sub-interfaces (because these sub-interfaces do not
have drivers). These sub-interfaces are skipped because
the name that would be assigned would collide with
their parent devices.
ATTRS{type}=="1" -
Optional. This key will only be added if this NIC is a
wireless NIC whose driver creates multiple virtual
interfaces; it ensures the rule only matches the
primary interface. The secondary interfaces are not
matched for the same reason that VLAN and bridge
sub-interfaces are not matched: there would be a name
collision.
ATTRS{address} - The value
of this key is the NIC's MAC address.
NAME - The value of this
key is the name that Udev will assign to this
interface.
The value of NAME is the
important part. Make sure you know which name has been
assigned to each of your network cards before proceeding, and
be sure to use that NAME value
when creating your configuration files below.
Which interfaces are brought up and down by the network
script depends on the files and directories in the
/etc/sysconfig/network-devices
hierarchy. This directory should contain a sub-directory for
each interface to be configured, such as ifconfig.xyz, where “xyz” is a network interface name. Inside
this directory would be files defining the attributes to this
interface, such as its IP address(es), subnet masks, and so
forth.
The following command creates a sample ipv4 file for the eth0 device:
cd /etc/sysconfig/network-devices
mkdir -v ifconfig.eth0
cat > ifconfig.eth0/ipv4 << "EOF"
ONBOOT=yes
SERVICE=ipv4-static
IP=192.168.1.1
GATEWAY=192.168.1.2
PREFIX=24
BROADCAST=192.168.1.255
EOF
The values of these variables must be changed in every file
to match the proper setup. If the ONBOOT variable is set to “yes” the network script will bring up
the Network Interface Card (NIC) during booting of the
system. If set to anything but “yes” the NIC will be ignored by the
network script and not be brought up.
The SERVICE variable defines the
method used for obtaining the IP address. The LFS-Bootscripts
package has a modular IP assignment format, and creating
additional files in the /etc/sysconfig/network-devices/services
directory allows other IP assignment methods. This is
commonly used for Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP),
which is addressed in the BLFS book.
The GATEWAY variable should
contain the default gateway IP address, if one is present. If
not, then comment out the variable entirely.
The PREFIX variable needs to
contain the number of bits used in the subnet. Each octet in
an IP address is 8 bits. If the subnet's netmask is
255.255.255.0, then it is using the first three octets (24
bits) to specify the network number. If the netmask is
255.255.255.240, it would be using the first 28 bits.
Prefixes longer than 24 bits are commonly used by DSL and
cable-based Internet Service Providers (ISPs). In this
example (PREFIX=24), the netmask is 255.255.255.0. Adjust the
PREFIX variable according to your
specific subnet.
If the system is going to be connected to the Internet, it
will need some means of Domain Name Service (DNS) name
resolution to resolve Internet domain names to IP addresses,
and vice versa. This is best achieved by placing the IP
address of the DNS server, available from the ISP or network
administrator, into /etc/resolv.conf. Create the file by
running the following:
cat > /etc/resolv.conf << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/resolv.conf
domain <Your Domain Name>
nameserver <IP address of your primary nameserver>
nameserver <IP address of your secondary nameserver>
# End /etc/resolv.conf
EOF
Replace <IP address of the
nameserver> with the IP address of the DNS
most appropriate for the setup. There will often be more than
one entry (requirements demand secondary servers for fallback
capability). If you only need or want one DNS server, remove
the second nameserver
line from the file. The IP address may also be a router on
the local network.
It is time to make the LFS system bootable. This chapter
discusses creating an fstab file,
building a kernel for the new LFS system, and installing the
GRUB boot loader so that the LFS system can be selected for
booting at startup.
The /etc/fstab file is used by
some programs to determine where file systems are to be mounted
by default, in which order, and which must be checked (for
integrity errors) prior to mounting. Create a new file systems
table like this:
cat > /etc/fstab << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/fstab
# file system mount-point type options dump fsck
# order
/dev/<xxx> / <fff> defaults 1 1
/dev/<yyy> swap swap pri=1 0 0
proc /proc proc defaults 0 0
sysfs /sys sysfs defaults 0 0
devpts /dev/pts devpts gid=4,mode=620 0 0
shm /dev/shm tmpfs defaults 0 0
# End /etc/fstab
EOF
Replace <xxx>,
<yyy>, and
<fff> with the
values appropriate for the system, for example, hda2, hda5, and
ext3. For details on the six
fields in this file, see man 5
fstab.
The /dev/shm mount point for
tmpfs is included to allow
enabling POSIX-shared memory. The kernel must have the required
support built into it for this to work (more about this is in
the next section). Please note that very little software
currently uses POSIX-shared memory. Therefore, consider the
/dev/shm mount point optional.
For more information, see Documentation/filesystems/tmpfs.txt in the
kernel source tree.
Filesystems with MS-DOS or Windows origin (i.e.: vfat, ntfs,
smbfs, cifs, iso9660, udf) need the “iocharset” mount option in order for
non-ASCII characters in file names to be interpreted properly.
The value of this option should be the same as the character
set of your locale, adjusted in such a way that the kernel
understands it. This works if the relevant character set
definition (found under File systems -> Native Language
Support) has been compiled into the kernel or built as a
module. The “codepage”
option is also needed for vfat and smbfs filesystems. It should
be set to the codepage number used under MS-DOS in your
country. E.g., in order to mount USB flash drives, a
ru_RU.KOI8-R user would need the following in the options
portion of its mount line in /etc/fstab:
noauto,user,quiet,showexec,iocharset=koi8r,codepage=866The corresponding options fragment for ru_RU.UTF-8 users is:
noauto,user,quiet,showexec,iocharset=utf8,codepage=866In the latter case, the kernel emits the following message:
FAT: utf8 is not a recommended IO charset for FAT filesystems,
filesystem will be case sensitive!This negative recommendation should be ignored, since all other values of the “iocharset” option result in wrong display of filenames in UTF-8 locales.
It is also possible to specify default codepage and iocharset
values for some filesystems during kernel configuration. The
relevant parameters are named “Default NLS Option” (CONFIG_NLS_DEFAULT), “Default Remote NLS Option” (CONFIG_SMB_NLS_DEFAULT), “Default codepage for FAT” (CONFIG_FAT_DEFAULT_CODEPAGE), and
“Default iocharset for
FAT” (CONFIG_FAT_DEFAULT_IOCHARSET). There is no way
to specify these settings for the ntfs filesystem at kernel
compilation time.
The Linux package contains the Linux kernel.
Building the kernel involves a few steps—configuration,
compilation, and installation. Read the README file in the kernel source tree for
alternative methods to the way this book configures the
kernel.
Prepare for compilation by running the following command:
make mrproper
This ensures that the kernel tree is absolutely clean. The kernel team recommends that this command be issued prior to each kernel compilation. Do not rely on the source tree being clean after un-tarring.
Configure the kernel via a menu-driven interface. BLFS has some information regarding particular kernel configuration requirements of packages outside of LFS at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/longindex.html#kernel-config-index:
make LANG=<host_LANG_value> LC_ALL= menuconfig
The meaning of the make parameters:
LANG=<host_LANG_value>
LC_ALL=
This establishes the locale setting to the one used on the host. This is needed for a proper menuconfig ncurses interface line drawing on UTF-8 linux text console.
Be sure to replace <host_LANG_value>
by the value of the $LANG
variable from your host. If not set, you could use
instead the host's value of $LC_ALL or $LC_CTYPE.
Alternatively, make
oldconfig may be more appropriate in some
situations. See the README file
for more information.
If desired, skip kernel configuration by copying the kernel
config file, .config, from the
host system (assuming it is available) to the unpacked
linux-2.6.22.5 directory.
However, we do not recommend this option. It is often better
to explore all the configuration menus and create the kernel
configuration from scratch.
Compile the kernel image and modules:
make
If using kernel modules, an /etc/modprobe.conf file may be needed.
Information pertaining to modules and kernel configuration is
located in Section 7.4,
“Device and Module Handling on an LFS System”
and in the kernel documentation in the linux-2.6.22.5/Documentation directory.
Also, modprobe.conf(5) may be
of interest.
Install the modules, if the kernel configuration uses them:
make modules_install
After kernel compilation is complete, additional steps are
required to complete the installation. Some files need to be
copied to the /boot directory.
The path to the kernel image may vary depending on the platform being used. The following command assumes an x86 architecture:
cp -v arch/i386/boot/bzImage /boot/lfskernel-2.6.22.5
System.map is a symbol file for
the kernel. It maps the function entry points of every
function in the kernel API, as well as the addresses of the
kernel data structures for the running kernel. Issue the
following command to install the map file:
cp -v System.map /boot/System.map-2.6.22.5
The kernel configuration file .config produced by the make menuconfig step above
contains all the configuration selections for the kernel that
was just compiled. It is a good idea to keep this file for
future reference:
cp -v .config /boot/config-2.6.22.5
Install the documentation for the Linux kernel:
install -d /usr/share/doc/linux-2.6.22.5 cp -r Documentation/* /usr/share/doc/linux-2.6.22.5
It is important to note that the files in the kernel source directory are not owned by root. Whenever a package is unpacked as user root (like we did inside chroot), the files have the user and group IDs of whatever they were on the packager's computer. This is usually not a problem for any other package to be installed because the source tree is removed after the installation. However, the Linux source tree is often retained for a long time. Because of this, there is a chance that whatever user ID the packager used will be assigned to somebody on the machine. That person would then have write access to the kernel source.
If the kernel source tree is going to be retained, run
chown -R 0:0 on
the linux-2.6.22.5 directory to
ensure all files are owned by user root.
Some kernel documentation recommends creating a symlink
from /usr/src/linux pointing
to the kernel source directory. This is specific to kernels
prior to the 2.6 series and must
not be created on an LFS system as it can cause
problems for packages you may wish to build once your base
LFS system is complete.
The headers in the system's include directory should always be the ones against which
Glibc was compiled, that is, the sanitised headers from
this Linux kernel tarball. Therefore, they should
never be replaced by
either the raw kernel headers or any other kernel sanitized
headers.
|
Contains all the configuration selections for the kernel |
|
|
The engine of the Linux system. When turning on the computer, the kernel is the first part of the operating system that gets loaded. It detects and initializes all components of the computer's hardware, then makes these components available as a tree of files to the software and turns a single CPU into a multitasking machine capable of running scores of programs seemingly at the same time |
|
|
A list of addresses and symbols; it maps the entry points and addresses of all the functions and data structures in the kernel |
Your shiny new LFS system is almost complete. One of the last things to do is to ensure that the system can be properly booted. The instructions below apply only to computers of IA-32 architecture, meaning mainstream PCs. Information on “boot loading” for other architectures should be available in the usual resource-specific locations for those architectures.
Boot loading can be a complex area, so a few cautionary words are in order. Be familiar with the current boot loader and any other operating systems present on the hard drive(s) that need to be bootable. Make sure that an emergency boot disk is ready to “rescue” the computer if the computer becomes unusable (un-bootable).
Earlier, we compiled and installed the GRUB boot loader software in preparation for this step. The procedure involves writing some special GRUB files to specific locations on the hard drive. We highly recommend creating a GRUB boot floppy diskette as a backup. Insert a blank floppy diskette and run the following commands:
dd if=/boot/grub/stage1 of=/dev/fd0 bs=512 count=1 dd if=/boot/grub/stage2 of=/dev/fd0 bs=512 seek=1
Remove the diskette and store it somewhere safe. Now, run the grub shell:
grub
GRUB uses its own naming structure for drives and partitions in
the form of (hdn,m),
where n is the hard
drive number and m is
the partition number, both starting from zero. For example,
partition hda1 is (hd0,0) to GRUB and hdb3 is (hd1,2). In contrast to Linux, GRUB
does not consider CD-ROM drives to be hard drives. For example,
if using a CD on hdb and a second
hard drive on hdc, that second
hard drive would still be (hd1).
Using the above information, determine the appropriate
designator for the root partition (or boot partition, if a
separate one is used). For the following example, it is assumed
that the root (or separate boot) partition is hda4.
Tell GRUB where to search for its stage{1,2} files. The Tab key can be used
everywhere to make GRUB show the alternatives:
root (hd0,3)
The following command will overwrite the current boot loader.
Do not run the command if this is not desired, for example,
if using a third party boot manager to manage the Master Boot
Record (MBR). In this scenario, it would make more sense to
install GRUB into the “boot
sector” of the LFS partition. In this case, this
next command would become setup (hd0,3).
Tell GRUB to install itself into the MBR of hda:
setup (hd0)
If all went well, GRUB will have reported finding its files in
/boot/grub. That's all there is
to it. Quit the grub shell:
quit
Create a “menu list” file defining GRUB's boot menu:
cat > /boot/grub/menu.lst << "EOF"
# Begin /boot/grub/menu.lst
# By default boot the first menu entry.
default 0
# Allow 30 seconds before booting the default.
timeout 30
# Use prettier colors.
color green/black light-green/black
# The first entry is for LFS.
title LFS 6.3
root (hd0,3)
kernel /boot/lfskernel-2.6.22.5 root=/dev/hda4
EOF
Add an entry for the host distribution if desired. It might look like this:
cat >> /boot/grub/menu.lst << "EOF"
title Red Hat
root (hd0,2)
kernel /boot/kernel-2.6.5 root=/dev/hda3
initrd /boot/initrd-2.6.5
EOF
If dual-booting Windows, the following entry will allow booting it:
cat >> /boot/grub/menu.lst << "EOF"
title Windows
rootnoverify (hd0,0)
chainloader +1
EOF
If info grub does not provide all necessary material, additional information regarding GRUB is located on its website at: http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/.
The FHS stipulates that GRUB's menu.lst file should be symlinked to
/etc/grub/menu.lst. To satisfy
this requirement, issue the following command:
mkdir -v /etc/grub ln -sv /boot/grub/menu.lst /etc/grub
Well done! The new LFS system is installed! We wish you much success with your shiny new custom-built Linux system.
It may be a good idea to create an /etc/lfs-release file. By having this file,
it is very easy for you (and for us if you need to ask for help
at some point) to find out which LFS version is installed on
the system. Create this file by running:
echo 6.3 > /etc/lfs-release
Now that you have finished the book, do you want to be counted as an LFS user? Head over to http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/cgi-bin/lfscounter.cgi and register as an LFS user by entering your name and the first LFS version you have used.
Let's reboot into LFS now.
Now that all of the software has been installed, it is time to reboot your computer. However, you should be aware of a few things. The system you have created in this book is quite minimal, and most likely will not have the functionality you would need to be able to continue forward. By installing a few extra packages from the BLFS book while still in our current chroot environment, you can leave yourself in a much better position to continue on once you reboot into your new LFS installation. Installing a text mode web browser, such as Lynx, you can easily view the BLFS book in one virtual terminal, while building packages in another. The GPM package will also allow you to perform copy/paste actions in your virtual terminals. Lastly, if you are in a situation where static IP configuration does not meet your networking requirements, installing packages such as Dhcpcd or PPP at this point might also be useful.
Now that we have said that, lets move on to booting our shiny new LFS installation for the first time! First exit from the chroot environment:
logout
Then unmount the virtual files systems:
umount -v $LFS/dev/pts umount -v $LFS/dev/shm umount -v $LFS/dev umount -v $LFS/proc umount -v $LFS/sys
Unmount the LFS file system itself:
umount -v $LFS
If multiple partitions were created, unmount the other partitions before unmounting the main one, like this:
umount -v $LFS/usr umount -v $LFS/home umount -v $LFS
Now, reboot the system with:
shutdown -r now
Assuming the GRUB boot loader was set up as outlined earlier, the menu is set to boot LFS 6.3 automatically.
When the reboot is complete, the LFS system is ready for use and more software may be added to suit your needs.
Thank you for reading this LFS book. We hope that you have found this book helpful and have learned more about the system creation process.
Now that the LFS system is installed, you may be wondering “What next?” To answer that question, we have compiled a list of resources for you.
Maintenance
Bugs and security notices are reported regularly for all software. Since an LFS system is compiled from source, it is up to you to keep abreast of such reports. There are several online resources that track such reports, some of which are shown below:
Freshmeat.net (http://freshmeat.net/)
Freshmeat can notify you (via email) of new versions of packages installed on your system.
CERT (Computer Emergency Response Team)
CERT has a mailing list that publishes security alerts concerning various operating systems and applications. Subscription information is available at http://www.us-cert.gov/cas/signup.html.
Bugtraq
Bugtraq is a full-disclosure computer security mailing list. It publishes newly discovered security issues, and occasionally potential fixes for them. Subscription information is available at http://www.securityfocus.com/archive.
Beyond Linux From Scratch
The Beyond Linux From Scratch book covers installation procedures for a wide range of software beyond the scope of the LFS Book. The BLFS project is located at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/.
LFS Hints
The LFS Hints are a collection of educational documents submitted by volunteers in the LFS community. The hints are available at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/list.html.
Mailing lists
There are several LFS mailing lists you may subscribe to if you are in need of help, want to stay current with the latest developments, want to contribute to the project, and more. See Chapter 1 - Mailing Lists for more information.
The Linux Documentation Project
The goal of The Linux Documentation Project (TLDP) is to collaborate on all of the issues of Linux documentation. The TLDP features a large collection of HOWTOs, guides, and man pages. It is located at http://www.tldp.org/.
|
ABI |
Application Binary Interface |
|
ALFS |
Automated Linux From Scratch |
|
ALSA |
Advanced Linux Sound Architecture |
|
API |
Application Programming Interface |
|
ASCII |
American Standard Code for Information Interchange |
|
BIOS |
Basic Input/Output System |
|
BLFS |
Beyond Linux From Scratch |
|
BSD |
Berkeley Software Distribution |
|
chroot |
change root |
|
CMOS |
Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor |
|
COS |
Class Of Service |
|
CPU |
Central Processing Unit |
|
CRC |
Cyclic Redundancy Check |
|
CVS |
Concurrent Versions System |
|
DHCP |
Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol |
|
DNS |
Domain Name Service |
|
EGA |
Enhanced Graphics Adapter |
|
ELF |
Executable and Linkable Format |
|
EOF |
End of File |
|
EQN |
equation |
|
EVMS |
Enterprise Volume Management System |
|
ext2 |
second extended file system |
|
ext3 |
third extended file system |
|
FAQ |
Frequently Asked Questions |
|
FHS |
Filesystem Hierarchy Standard |
|
FIFO |
First-In, First Out |
|
FQDN |
Fully Qualified Domain Name |
|
FTP |
File Transfer Protocol |
|
GB |
Gibabytes |
|
GCC |
GNU Compiler Collection |
|
GID |
Group Identifier |
|
GMT |
Greenwich Mean Time |
|
GPG |
GNU Privacy Guard |
|
HTML |
Hypertext Markup Language |
|
IDE |
Integrated Drive Electronics |
|
IEEE |
Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers |
|
IO |
Input/Output |
|
IP |
Internet Protocol |
|
IPC |
Inter-Process Communication |
|
IRC |
Internet Relay Chat |
|
ISO |
International Organization for Standardization |
|
ISP |
Internet Service Provider |
|
KB |
Kilobytes |
|
LED |
Light Emitting Diode |
|
LFS |
Linux From Scratch |
|
LSB |
Linux Standard Base |
|
MB |
Megabytes |
|
MBR |
Master Boot Record |
|
MD5 |
Message Digest 5 |
|
NIC |
Network Interface Card |
|
NLS |
Native Language Support |
|
NNTP |
Network News Transport Protocol |
|
NPTL |
Native POSIX Threading Library |
|
OSS |
Open Sound System |
|
PCH |
Pre-Compiled Headers |
|
PCRE |
Perl Compatible Regular Expression |
|
PID |
Process Identifier |
|
PLFS |
Pure Linux From Scratch |
|
PTY |
pseudo terminal |
|
QA |
Quality Assurance |
|
QOS |
Quality Of Service |
|
RAM |
Random Access Memory |
|
RPC |
Remote Procedure Call |
|
RTC |
Real Time Clock |
|
SBU |
Standard Build Unit |
|
SCO |
The Santa Cruz Operation |
|
SGR |
Select Graphic Rendition |
|
SHA1 |
Secure-Hash Algorithm 1 |
|
SMP |
Symmetric Multi-Processor |
|
TLDP |
The Linux Documentation Project |
|
TFTP |
Trivial File Transfer Protocol |
|
TLS |
Thread-Local Storage |
|
UID |
User Identifier |
|
umask |
user file-creation mask |
|
USB |
Universal Serial Bus |
|
UTC |
Coordinated Universal Time |
|
UUID |
Universally Unique Identifier |
|
VC |
Virtual Console |
|
VGA |
Video Graphics Array |
|
VT |
Virtual Terminal |
We would like to thank the following people and organizations for their contributions to the Linux From Scratch Project.
Gerard Beekmans <gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS Creator, LFS Project Leader
Matthew Burgess <matthew AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS Project Leader, LFS Technical Writer/Editor
Bruce Dubbs <bdubbs AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS Release Manager
Manuel Canales Esparcia <manuel AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS/BLFS/HLFS XML and XSL Maintainer
Jim Gifford <jim AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – CLFS Project Co-Leader
Bryan Kadzban <bryan AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS Technical Writer
Jeremy Huntwork <jhuntwork AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS Technical Writer, LFS LiveCD Maintainer
Randy McMurchy <randy AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – BLFS Project Leader
Dan Nicholson <dnicholson AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS and BLFS Editor
Ken Moffat <ken AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS and CLFS Editor
Ryan Oliver <ryan AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – CLFS Project Co-Leader
Alexander E. Patrakov <alexander AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS Technical Writer, LFS Internationalization Editor, LFS Live CD Maintainer
Countless other people on the various LFS and BLFS mailing lists who helped make this book possible by giving their suggestions, testing the book, and submitting bug reports, instructions, and their experiences with installing various packages.
Manuel Canales Esparcia <macana AT macana-es D0T com> – Spanish LFS translation project
Johan Lenglet <johan AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – French LFS translation project
Anderson Lizardo <lizardo AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – Portuguese LFS translation project
Thomas Reitelbach <tr AT erdfunkstelle D0T de> – German LFS translation project
Scott Kveton <scott AT osuosl D0T org> – lfs.oregonstate.edu mirror
William Astle <lost AT l-w D0T net> – ca.linuxfromscratch.org mirror
Eujon Sellers <jpolen@rackspace.com> – lfs.introspeed.com mirror
Justin Knierim <tim@idge.net> – lfs-matrix.net mirror
Manuel Canales Esparcia <manuel AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – lfsmirror.lfs-es.info mirror
Luis Falcon <Luis Falcon> – torredehanoi.org mirror
Guido Passet <guido AT primerelay D0T net> – nl.linuxfromscratch.org mirror
Bastiaan Jacques <baafie AT planet D0T nl> – lfs.pagefault.net mirror
Sven Cranshoff <sven D0T cranshoff AT lineo D0T be> – lfs.lineo.be mirror
Scarlet Belgium – lfs.scarlet.be mirror
Sebastian Faulborn <info AT aliensoft D0T org> – lfs.aliensoft.org mirror
Stuart Fox <stuart AT dontuse D0T ms> – lfs.dontuse.ms mirror
Ralf Uhlemann <admin AT realhost D0T de> – lfs.oss-mirror.org mirror
Antonin Sprinzl <Antonin D0T Sprinzl AT tuwien D0T ac D0T at> – at.linuxfromscratch.org mirror
Fredrik Danerklint <fredan-lfs AT fredan D0T org> – se.linuxfromscratch.org mirror
Franck <franck AT linuxpourtous D0T com> – lfs.linuxpourtous.com mirror
Philippe Baqué <baque AT cict D0T fr> – lfs.cict.fr mirror
Vitaly Chekasin <gyouja AT pilgrims D0T ru> – lfs.pilgrims.ru mirror
Benjamin Heil <kontakt AT wankoo D0T org> – lfs.wankoo.org mirror
Satit Phermsawang <satit AT wbac D0T ac D0T th> – lfs.phayoune.org mirror
Shizunet Co.,Ltd. <info AT shizu-net D0T jp> – lfs.mirror.shizu-net.jp mirror
Init World <http://www.initworld.com/> – lfs.initworld.com mirror
Jason Andrade <jason AT dstc D0T edu D0T au> – au.linuxfromscratch.org mirror
Christine Barczak <theladyskye AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS Book Editor
Archaic <archaic@linuxfromscratch.org> – LFS Technical Writer/Editor, HLFS Project Leader, BLFS Editor, Hints and Patches Project Maintainer
Nathan Coulson <nathan AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS-Bootscripts Maintainer
Timothy Bauscher
Robert Briggs
Ian Chilton
Jeroen Coumans <jeroen AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – Website Developer, FAQ Maintainer
Alex Groenewoud – LFS Technical Writer
Marc Heerdink
Mark Hymers
Seth W. Klein – FAQ maintainer
Nicholas Leippe <nicholas AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – Wiki Maintainer
Anderson Lizardo <lizardo AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – Website Backend-Scripts Maintainer
Simon Perreault
Scot Mc Pherson <scot AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS NNTP Gateway Maintainer
Greg Schafer <gschafer AT zip D0T com D0T au> – LFS Technical Writer
Jesse Tie-Ten-Quee – LFS Technical Writer
James Robertson <jwrober AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – Bugzilla Maintainer
Tushar Teredesai <tushar AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – BLFS Book Editor, Hints and Patches Project Leader
Jeremy Utley <jeremy AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS Technical Writer, Bugzilla Maintainer, LFS-Bootscripts Maintainer
Zack Winkles <zwinkles AT gmail D0T com> – LFS Technical Writer
Dean Benson <dean AT vipersoft D0T co D0T uk> for several monetary contributions
Hagen Herrschaft <hrx AT hrxnet D0T de> for donating a 2.2 GHz P4 system, now running under the name of Lorien
SEO Company Canada supports Open Source projects and different Linux distributions
VA Software who, on behalf of Linux.com, donated a VA Linux 420 (former StartX SP2) workstation
Mark Stone for donating Belgarath, the first linuxfromscratch.org server
Every package built in LFS relies on one or more other packages in order to build and install properly. Some packages even participate in circular dependencies, that is, the first package depends on the second which in turn depends on the first. Because of these dependencies, the order in which packages are built in LFS is very important. The purpose of this page is to document the dependencies of each package built in LFS.
For each package we build, we have listed three types of dependencies. The first lists what other packages need to be available in order to compile and install the package in question. The second lists what packages, in addition to those on the first list, need to be available in order to run the testsuites. The last list of dependencies are packages that require this package to be built and installed in its final location before they are built and installed. In most cases, this is because these packages will hardcode paths to binaries within their scripts. If not built in a certain order, this could result in paths of /tools/bin/[binary] being placed inside scripts installed to the final system. This is obviously not desirable.