Date: Thu, 27 Jul 2000 09:18:16 -0700 (PDT)
From: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@transmeta.com>
> It would be nice, however, if there was a painless way to
> compile such external kernel modules so they easily work with whatever
> kernels happens to be on the machine.
You're right, right now kernel modules need some way of specifying where
the kernel is. I've always just had a define at the top of a makefile that
the user actually had to edit by hand (this was how early USB-development
was done, for example). Not very pretty, I guess. But at least it doesn't
screw the "normal" user packages.
I'd really, really, like some kind of convention that could be
standardized. It could be any one of
/usr/src/linux
/lib/include/`uname -r`
../linux
(the last requires that pcmcia and Rocketport packages have to be in the
same top-level directory as the kernel source tree).
I could live with any of these; as long as we all can agree on a single
convention, so that default is always right. If you don't like
/usr/src/linux because of the past history, and how user-mode packages
are using it incorrectly, let's create a new convention. I personally
think /lib/include (ala /lib/modules) is probably the best one but it
means dropping approxmiately 4 megabytes into /lib, which might cause
some problems for some partitioning schemes.
My external kernel module packages use a define at the top of a makefile
as well (and currently defaulted to /usr/src/linux; I can change that).
This is fine for me, but I'd like to be able to support users that don't
necessarily know how to edit Makefiles. I'd like for them to be able to
type "make" and "make install" as root, and that's about it. In order
to do this, we need some kind of convention. Covnentions are Good
Things.
- Ted
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