[wplug] Linux Programming Book

Dave Neuer mr_fred_smoothie at yahoo.com
Wed Apr 16 17:03:06 EDT 2003


Well, the only really important part of what Linus
said (that is relevant for this discussion, anyway)
is:

"In short, the _only_ people who should update their
/usr/include/linux tree are the people who actually
make library releases and compile their own glibc,
because if they want to take advantaged of new kernel
features they need those new definitions. That way
there is never any conflict between the library and
the headers, and you never get warnings like the
above.."

I.e., the /usr/include/* directory contents are put
there by glibc and other system libraries, and unless
you want compiling apps to fail, they shouldn't be
messed with. And, you should expect them to compile
kernel modules, since they're likely VERY old. They
ARE, however, what you should compilig user-space
Posix/Linux apps against.

Now, I've built a lot of kernels and kernel modules,
and I don't really see a problem w/ Linus' other
points, but then I don't use vendor-supplied kernels,
so I don't get weird symlinks all over the place.
I.e., I compile vanilla Linux from kernel.org in
/usr/src/linux, and handhelds.org CVS in my home dir.

Some *module* packages expect linux headers for the
kernel you're actually running to be in
/usr/src/linux, but you can override that (i.e. Eric's
"INCLUDEDIR=/usr/src/linux/include" suggestion or like
ALSA standalone w/ 'configure
--with-kernel-headers="my/path/to/headers"' or
somesuch).

I'd actually suggest the ALSA way though it's more
complicated.

Dave

--- John Strange <john at strangeness.org> wrote:
> Hmm, now I'm confused as well hehe..
> 
> My reasoning behind it was a few times I've had
> things not compile
> correctly with the default redhat
> /usr/src/include/linux, but when you
> link it directly into the kernel include files it
> would compile and run
> quite fine..  I'm confused now, I can see his point,
> but I wonder how
> many linux users actually follow his 3 points of
> compiling kernels?
> 
> Wonder how many people actually follow those rules
> for compiling kernels
> and not symlink /usr/include/linux, I've been doing
> that about 5 years
> now hehe.. doh..
> 
> - John
> 
> On Wed, 2003-04-16 at 15:31, Brian Medley wrote:
> > On Wed, Apr 16, 2003 at 03:12:36PM -0400, Weber,
> Larry A wrote:
> > 
> > > Thanks to John, Mike, Dave, Brian, and Eric.  I
> had fumbled with this
> > > problem for several days.  With your help, it is
> up and running in a few
> > > hours.  WPLUG is an impressive resource.
> > > 
> > > Only one question left.  /usr/include/linux
> contains all the kernel header
> > > files, but they don't compile.  So what good are
> they?  Other than to
> > > confuse me and waste my time do they have any
> value?
> > 
> > I found this:
> > 
> >
>
http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2000/debian-devel-200007/msg01566.html
> 
> _______________________________________________
> wplug mailing list
> wplug at wplug.org
> http://www.wplug.org/mailman/listinfo/wplug


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