Custom 2.6 Kernel on Power5 pSeries

[Yaoping Ruan]

Hi:

Yes, I did try mkinitrd to have the initrd image. I also tried "make 
install" to generate the image and copy the files, but without luck.

The following is steps I went into, maybe you see anything missed here:
1) get kernel-2.6.9-5.EL.src.rpm from source SRPMS
2) rpm -ivh /var/spool/up2date/kernel-2.6.9-5.EL.src.rpm
3) cd /usr/src/redhat/SPECS
4) rpmbuild -bp --target=ppc64 kernel-2.6.spec
5) cp -a /usr/src/redhat/BUILD/kernel-2.6.9/linux-2.6.9 /usr/src
6) ln -s /usr/src/linux-2.6.9 /usr/src/linux
7) cp /boot/config-2.6.9-5.EL .config (in /usr/src/linux-2.6.9)
8) make oldconfig
9) make menuconfig (added some drivers, and file systems. Most SCSI 
drivers are included, ext3 is enbled)
10) make; make modules; make modules_install; make install (check 
vmlinux, system.amp and initrd are installed under /boot)
11) update /etc/yaboot.conf to the new kernel, my yaboot looks as follow:

Hit <TAB> for boot options

partition=2
timeout=20
install=/usr/lib/yaboot/yaboot
default=linux
delay=5
nonvram

image=/vmlinux-2.6.9-smp
        label=2.6.9-smp
        read-only
        initrd=/initrd-2.6.9-smp.img
        root=/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol00
        append="console=hvsi1 rhgb"

image=/vmlinuz-2.6.9-5.EL
        label=linux
        read-only
        initrd=/initrd-2.6.9-5.EL.img
        root=/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol00
        append="console=hvsi1 rhgb"

(2.6.9-smp is the new kernel)

When the new kernel boots, it will reboot automatically at some point. 
Since I am using a dial-up console, I couldn't identify at which step if 
failed.

-Yaoping



will schmidt wrote:

> Yaoping Ruan wrote:
>
>> Hello,
>>
>> Is there anybody had successful experience compiling 2.6 kernel on 
>> Power 5 servers? We recently purchased a Power5 p520 server and 
>> installed with RHEL4 for ppc64. While the installation was ok, I had 
>> problem compiling a custom kernel.
>>
>> I installed the kernel src rpm, generated the ppc code, and compiled 
>> the kernel with the default config in /boot. When I updated the 
>> yaboot.conf and reboot, it died in the middle reporting "vfs error ...".
>>
>> I'd appreciate if anybody can share some experience with me, or give 
>> me some links for instruction.
>>
>> -Yaoping
>> _______________________________________________
>> Linuxppc64-dev mailing list
>> Linuxppc64-dev at ozlabs.org
>> https://ozlabs.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/linuxppc64-dev
>
>
> Did you also build an initrd with your new kernel?   (with mkinitrd 
> command?)
>
> Filesystems and scsi drivers are usually modules, and are most likely 
> missing from your newly built kernel.
>
>
> -Will