Re: Why from there? A rethink...

Horst von Brand (vonbrand@inf.utfsm.cl)
Thu, 14 May 1998 19:18:06 -0400

Riley Williams <rhw@bigfoot.com> said:
> Having thought further about this problem, I see that it isn't
> necessarily a problem in the first place since they are dealing with
> two different scenarios that do not need to intersect:
>
> 1. The full kernel source tarball DOES need to include the kernel
> version number to prevent problems caused by old files that are
> still lying round. This is the point that I was addressing in my
> earlier plea.
>
> 2. The kernel upgrade patch files DO NOT need to include the
> kernel version number since they are by their nature designed
> to be applied to an existing kernel source tree, and each
> patch file needs to be installed in sequence, so any suchlike
> excess files will be deleted by the correct installation of
> the relevant patch file for the version where it was deleted.

So, if you upgrade from 2.1.85 to 2.1.97 by patching, they are all called
linux-2.1.85? Won't do. If I have 2.1.85, and patch to 2.1.86, and then
untar 2.1.85 again, it breaks just as before, just the other way around.
Plus all the library includes won't find the right kernel includes anymore,
you'll have to go around and fix every last one of them if you don't want
random programs misteriously breaking all over the place because of
kernel-include version mismatches.

Sorry, there just isn't any "nice, fully automated way" of fixing this,
operator intervention _is_ required in all possible cases. The one with a
fixed kernel source root is the one that requieres least, and was selected
for that reason.

-- 
Dr. Horst H. von Brand                       mailto:vonbrand@inf.utfsm.cl
Departamento de Informatica                     Fono: +56 32 654431
Universidad Tecnica Federico Santa Maria              +56 32 654239
Casilla 110-V, Valparaiso, Chile                Fax:  +56 32 797513


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