Linux kernel build options

Kernel/Traditional compilation

This article is an introduction to building custom kernels from kernel.org sources. This method of compiling kernels is the traditional method common to all distributions. It can be, depending on your background, more complicated than using the Kernels/Arch Build System. Consider the Arch Build System tools are developed and maintained to make repeatable compilation tasks efficient and safe.

Contents

Preparation

It is not necessary (or recommended) to use the root account or root privileges (i.e. via Sudo) for kernel preparation.

Install the core packages

Install the base-devel package group, which contains necessary packages such as make and gcc . It is also recommended to install the following packages, as listed in the default Arch kernel PKGBUILD: xmlto , kmod , inetutils , bc , libelf , git , cpio , perl , tar , xz .

Create a kernel compilation directory

It is recommended to create a separate build directory for your kernel(s). In this example, the directory kernelbuild will be created in the home directory:

Download the kernel source

Download the kernel source from https://www.kernel.org. This should be the tarball ( tar.xz ) file for your chosen kernel.

It can be downloaded by simply right-clicking the tar.xz link in your browser and selecting Save Link As. , or any other number of ways via alternative graphical or command-line tools that utilise HTTP, TFTP, Rsync, or Git.

In the following command-line example, wget has been installed and is used inside the

/kernelbuild directory to obtain kernel 4.8.6:

You should also verify the correctness of the download before trusting it. First grab the signature, then use that to grab the fingerprint of the signing key, then use the fingerprint to obtain the actual signing key:

Note the signature was generated for the tar archive (i.e. extension .tar ), not the compressed .tar.xz file that you have downloaded. You need to decompress the latter without untarring it. Verify that you have xz installed, then you can proceed like so:

Do not proceed if this does not result in output that includes the string «Good signature».

If wget was not used inside the build directory, it will be necessary to move the tarball into it, e.g.

Unpack the kernel source

Within the build directory, unpack the kernel tarball:

To finalise the preparation, ensure that the kernel tree is absolutely clean; do not rely on the source tree being clean after unpacking. To do so, first change into the new kernel source directory created, and then run the make mrproper command:

Kernel configuration

This is the most crucial step in customizing the default kernel to reflect your computer’s precise specifications. Kernel configuration is set in its .config file, which includes the use of Kernel modules. By setting the options in .config properly, your kernel and computer will function most efficiently.

You can do a mixture of two things:

• Use the default Arch settings from an official kernel (recommended)
• Manually configure the kernel options (optional, advanced and not recommended)

Default Arch configuration

This method will create a .config file for the custom kernel using the default Arch kernel settings. If a stock Arch kernel is running, you can use the following command inside the custom kernel source directory:

Otherwise, the default configuration can be found online in the official Arch Linux kernel package.

Advanced configuration

There are several tools available to fine-tune the kernel configuration, which provide an alternative to otherwise spending hours manually configuring each and every one of the options available during compilation.

Those tools are:

• make menuconfig : Command-line ncurses interface superseded by nconfig
• make nconfig : Newer ncurses interface for the command-line
• make xconfig : User-friendly graphical interface that requires packagekit-qt5 to be installed as a dependency. This is the recommended method — especially for less experienced users — as it is easier to navigate, and information about each option is also displayed.
• make gconfig : Graphical configuration similar to xconfig but using gtk. This requires gtk2 , glib2 and libgladeAUR .

The chosen method should be run inside the kernel source directory, and all will either create a new .config file, or overwrite an existing one where present. All optional configurations will be automatically enabled, although any newer configuration options (i.e. with an older kernel .config ) may not be automatically selected.

Once the changes have been made save the .config file. It is a good idea to make a backup copy outside the source directory. You may need to do this multiple times before you get all the options right.

If unsure, only change a few options between compilations. If you cannot boot your newly built kernel, see the list of necessary config items here.

Running lspci -k # from liveCD lists names of kernel modules in use. Most importantly, you must maintain cgroups support. This is necessary for systemd. For more detailed information, see Gentoo:Kernel/Gentoo Kernel Configuration Guide and Gentoo:Intel#Kernel or Gentoo:Ryzen#Kernel for Intel or AMD Ryzen processors.

Compilation

Compilation time will vary from as little as fifteen minutes to over an hour, depending on your kernel configuration and processor capability. Once the .config file has been set for the custom kernel, within the source directory run the following command to compile:

Installation

Install the modules

Once the kernel has been compiled, the modules for it must follow. First build the modules:

Then install the modules. As root or with root privileges, run the following command to do so:

This will copy the compiled modules into /lib/modules/ — . For example, for kernel version 4.8 installed above, they would be copied to /lib/modules/4.8.6-ARCH . This keeps the modules for individual kernels used separated.

Copy the kernel to /boot directory

The kernel compilation process will generate a compressed bzImage (big zImage) of that kernel, which must be copied to the /boot directory and renamed in the process. Provided the name is prefixed with vmlinuz- , you may name the kernel as you wish. In the examples below, the installed and compiled 4.8 kernel has been copied over and renamed to vmlinuz-linux48 :

Make initial RAM disk

If you do not know what making an initial RAM disk is, see Initramfs on Wikipedia and mkinitcpio.

Automated preset method

An existing mkinitcpio preset can be copied and modified so that the custom kernel initramfs images can be generated in the same way as for an official kernel. This is useful where intending to recompile the kernel (e.g. where updated). In the example below, the preset file for the stock Arch kernel will be copied and modified for kernel 4.8, installed above.

First, copy the existing preset file, renaming it to match the name of the custom kernel specified as a suffix to /boot/vmlinuz- when copying the bzImage (in this case, linux48 ):

Second, edit the file and amend for the custom kernel. Note (again) that the ALL_kver= parameter also matches the name of the custom kernel specified when copying the bzImage :

Finally, generate the initramfs images for the custom kernel in the same way as for an official kernel:

Manual method

Rather than use a preset file, mkinitcpio can also be used to generate an initramfs file manually. The syntax of the command is:

• -k ( —kernel ): Specifies the modules to use when generating the initramfs image. The name will be the same as the name of the custom kernel source directory (and the modules directory for it, located in /usr/lib/modules/ ).
• -g ( —generate ): Specifies the name of the initramfs file to generate in the /boot directory. Again, using the naming convention mentioned above is recommended.

For example, the command for the 4.8 custom kernel installed above would be:

Copy System.map

The System.map file is not required for booting Linux. It is a type of «phone directory» list of functions in a particular build of a kernel. The System.map contains a list of kernel symbols (i.e function names, variable names etc) and their corresponding addresses. This «symbol-name to address mapping» is used by:

• Some processes like klogd, ksymoops, etc.
• By OOPS handler when information has to be dumped to the screen during a kernel crash (i.e info like in which function it has crashed).

If your /boot is on a filesystem which supports symlinks (i.e., not FAT32), copy System.map to /boot , appending your kernel’s name to the destination file. Then create a symlink from /boot/System.map to point to /boot/System.map- :

After completing all steps above, you should have the following 3 files and 1 soft symlink in your /boot directory along with any other previously existing files:

• Kernel: vmlinuz-
• Initramfs: Initramfs- .img
• System Map: System.map-
• System Map kernel symlink

Bootloader configuration

Add an entry for your new kernel in your bootloader’s configuration file. See Arch boot process#Feature comparison for possible boot loaders, their wiki articles and other information.

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Building External Modules¶

This document describes how to build an out-of-tree kernel module.

1. Introduction¶

“kbuild” is the build system used by the Linux kernel. Modules must use kbuild to stay compatible with changes in the build infrastructure and to pick up the right flags to “gcc.” Functionality for building modules both in-tree and out-of-tree is provided. The method for building either is similar, and all modules are initially developed and built out-of-tree.

Covered in this document is information aimed at developers interested in building out-of-tree (or “external”) modules. The author of an external module should supply a makefile that hides most of the complexity, so one only has to type “make” to build the module. This is easily accomplished, and a complete example will be presented in section 3.

2. How to Build External Modules¶

To build external modules, you must have a prebuilt kernel available that contains the configuration and header files used in the build. Also, the kernel must have been built with modules enabled. If you are using a distribution kernel, there will be a package for the kernel you are running provided by your distribution.

An alternative is to use the “make” target “modules_prepare.” This will make sure the kernel contains the information required. The target exists solely as a simple way to prepare a kernel source tree for building external modules.

NOTE: “modules_prepare” will not build Module.symvers even if CONFIG_MODVERSIONS is set; therefore, a full kernel build needs to be executed to make module versioning work.

2.1 Command Syntax¶

The command to build an external module is:

The kbuild system knows that an external module is being built due to the “M= ” option given in the command.

To build against the running kernel use:

Then to install the module(s) just built, add the target “modules_install” to the command:

2.2 Options¶

($KDIR refers to the path of the kernel source directory.)

make -C $KDIR M=$PWD

The directory where the kernel source is located. “make” will actually change to the specified directory when executing and will change back when finished.

Informs kbuild that an external module is being built. The value given to “M” is the absolute path of the directory where the external module (kbuild file) is located.

2.3 Targets¶

When building an external module, only a subset of the “make” targets are available.

make -C $KDIR M=$PWD [target]

The default will build the module(s) located in the current directory, so a target does not need to be specified. All output files will also be generated in this directory. No attempts are made to update the kernel source, and it is a precondition that a successful “make” has been executed for the kernel.

The default target for external modules. It has the same functionality as if no target was specified. See description above.

Install the external module(s). The default location is /lib/modules/ /extra/, but a prefix may be added with INSTALL_MOD_PATH (discussed in section 5).

Remove all generated files in the module directory only.

List the available targets for external modules.

2.4 Building Separate Files¶

It is possible to build single files that are part of a module. This works equally well for the kernel, a module, and even for external modules.

Example (The module foo.ko, consist of bar.o and baz.o):

3. Creating a Kbuild File for an External Module¶

In the last section we saw the command to build a module for the running kernel. The module is not actually built, however, because a build file is required. Contained in this file will be the name of the module(s) being built, along with the list of requisite source files. The file may be as simple as a single line:

The kbuild system will build .o from .c, and, after linking, will result in the kernel module .ko. The above line can be put in either a “Kbuild” file or a “Makefile.” When the module is built from multiple sources, an additional line is needed listing the files:

NOTE: Further documentation describing the syntax used by kbuild is located in Linux Kernel Makefiles .

The examples below demonstrate how to create a build file for the module 8123.ko, which is built from the following files:

3.1 Shared Makefile¶

An external module always includes a wrapper makefile that supports building the module using “make” with no arguments. This target is not used by kbuild; it is only for convenience. Additional functionality, such as test targets, can be included but should be filtered out from kbuild due to possible name clashes.

The check for KERNELRELEASE is used to separate the two parts of the makefile. In the example, kbuild will only see the two assignments, whereas “make” will see everything except these two assignments. This is due to two passes made on the file: the first pass is by the “make” instance run on the command line; the second pass is by the kbuild system, which is initiated by the parameterized “make” in the default target.

3.2 Separate Kbuild File and Makefile¶

In newer versions of the kernel, kbuild will first look for a file named “Kbuild,” and only if that is not found, will it then look for a makefile. Utilizing a “Kbuild” file allows us to split up the makefile from example 1 into two files:

The split in example 2 is questionable due to the simplicity of each file; however, some external modules use makefiles consisting of several hundred lines, and here it really pays off to separate the kbuild part from the rest.

The next example shows a backward compatible version.

Here the “Kbuild” file is included from the makefile. This allows an older version of kbuild, which only knows of makefiles, to be used when the “make” and kbuild parts are split into separate files.

3.3 Binary Blobs¶

Some external modules need to include an object file as a blob. kbuild has support for this, but requires the blob file to be named _shipped. When the kbuild rules kick in, a copy of _shipped is created with _shipped stripped off, giving us . This shortened filename can be used in the assignment to the module.

Throughout this section, 8123_bin.o_shipped has been used to build the kernel module 8123.ko; it has been included as 8123_bin.o:

Although there is no distinction between the ordinary source files and the binary file, kbuild will pick up different rules when creating the object file for the module.

3.4 Building Multiple Modules¶

kbuild supports building multiple modules with a single build file. For example, if you wanted to build two modules, foo.ko and bar.ko, the kbuild lines would be:

It is that simple!

4. Include Files¶

Within the kernel, header files are kept in standard locations according to the following rule:

If the header file only describes the internal interface of a module, then the file is placed in the same directory as the source files.

If the header file describes an interface used by other parts of the kernel that are located in different directories, then the file is placed in include/linux/.

There are two notable exceptions to this rule: larger subsystems have their own directory under include/, such as include/scsi; and architecture specific headers are located under arch/$(SRCARCH)/include/.

4.1 Kernel Includes¶

To include a header file located under include/linux/, simply use:

kbuild will add options to “gcc” so the relevant directories are searched.

4.2 Single Subdirectory¶

External modules tend to place header files in a separate include/ directory where their source is located, although this is not the usual kernel style. To inform kbuild of the directory, use either ccflags-y or CFLAGS_ .o.

Using the example from section 3, if we moved 8123_if.h to a subdirectory named include, the resulting kbuild file would look like:

Note that in the assignment there is no space between -I and the path. This is a limitation of kbuild: there must be no space present.

4.3 Several Subdirectories¶

kbuild can handle files that are spread over several directories. Consider the following example:

To build the module complex.ko, we then need the following kbuild file:

As you can see, kbuild knows how to handle object files located in other directories. The trick is to specify the directory relative to the kbuild file’s location. That being said, this is NOT recommended practice.

For the header files, kbuild must be explicitly told where to look. When kbuild executes, the current directory is always the root of the kernel tree (the argument to “-C”) and therefore an absolute path is needed. $(src) provides the absolute path by pointing to the directory where the currently executing kbuild file is located.

5. Module Installation¶

Modules which are included in the kernel are installed in the directory:

And external modules are installed in:

5.1 INSTALL_MOD_PATH¶

Above are the default directories but as always some level of customization is possible. A prefix can be added to the installation path using the variable INSTALL_MOD_PATH:

INSTALL_MOD_PATH may be set as an ordinary shell variable or, as shown above, can be specified on the command line when calling “make.” This has effect when installing both in-tree and out-of-tree modules.

5.2 INSTALL_MOD_DIR¶

External modules are by default installed to a directory under /lib/modules/$(KERNELRELEASE)/extra/, but you may wish to locate modules for a specific functionality in a separate directory. For this purpose, use INSTALL_MOD_DIR to specify an alternative name to “extra.”:

6. Module Versioning¶

Module versioning is enabled by the CONFIG_MODVERSIONS tag, and is used as a simple ABI consistency check. A CRC value of the full prototype for an exported symbol is created. When a module is loaded/used, the CRC values contained in the kernel are compared with similar values in the module; if they are not equal, the kernel refuses to load the module.

Module.symvers contains a list of all exported symbols from a kernel build.

6.1 Symbols From the Kernel (vmlinux + modules)В¶

During a kernel build, a file named Module.symvers will be generated. Module.symvers contains all exported symbols from the kernel and compiled modules. For each symbol, the corresponding CRC value is also stored.

The syntax of the Module.symvers file is:

The fields are separated by tabs and values may be empty (e.g. if no namespace is defined for an exported symbol).

For a kernel build without CONFIG_MODVERSIONS enabled, the CRC would read 0x00000000.

Module.symvers serves two purposes:

It lists all exported symbols from vmlinux and all modules.

It lists the CRC if CONFIG_MODVERSIONS is enabled.

6.2 Symbols and External Modules¶

When building an external module, the build system needs access to the symbols from the kernel to check if all external symbols are defined. This is done in the MODPOST step. modpost obtains the symbols by reading Module.symvers from the kernel source tree. During the MODPOST step, a new Module.symvers file will be written containing all exported symbols from that external module.

6.3 Symbols From Another External Module¶

Sometimes, an external module uses exported symbols from another external module. Kbuild needs to have full knowledge of all symbols to avoid spitting out warnings about undefined symbols. Two solutions exist for this situation.

NOTE: The method with a top-level kbuild file is recommended but may be impractical in certain situations.

Use a top-level kbuild file

If you have two modules, foo.ko and bar.ko, where foo.ko needs symbols from bar.ko, you can use a common top-level kbuild file so both modules are compiled in the same build. Consider the following directory layout:

The top-level kbuild file would then look like:

will then do the expected and compile both modules with full knowledge of symbols from either module.

Use “make” variable KBUILD_EXTRA_SYMBOLS

If it is impractical to add a top-level kbuild file, you can assign a space separated list of files to KBUILD_EXTRA_SYMBOLS in your build file. These files will be loaded by modpost during the initialization of its symbol tables.

7. Tips & Tricks¶

7.1 Testing for CONFIG_FOO_BAR¶

Modules often need to check for certain CONFIG_ options to decide if a specific feature is included in the module. In kbuild this is done by referencing the CONFIG_ variable directly:

External modules have traditionally used “grep” to check for specific CONFIG_ settings directly in .config. This usage is broken. As introduced before, external modules should use kbuild for building and can therefore use the same methods as in-tree modules when testing for CONFIG_ definitions.

© Copyright The kernel development community.

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