Restored from the server's own upgrades.html: a short, practical guide to
moving to the Linux kernel v2.0 and higher, from the days when a kernel bump meant updating half your
userland too.
Software broken under v2.0
Moving from the 1.2 series to 2.0 broke a surprising amount of software, because the kernel's interfaces had moved on. The server kept current versions of the pieces you needed:
- The upgrade list (the kernel's own
Changesfile) - read this first. - Kernel and modutils.
- GCC, binutils, ld.so, libc and make.
- getty_ps, hdparm, ppp, procps, sysvinit and xntpd.
Changes file that ships with
the kernel source, and update the listed tools before you boot the new kernel. A kernel that
boots but cannot run init or bring up PPP is no fun to debug at 2 am.Upgrading distributions
If you ran a distribution rather than rolling your own, the per-distribution upgrades were mirrored here too, including Red Hat (RPMS for i386) and Caldera. Picking up the distribution's own packages was almost always easier than upgrading each tool by hand.
Stable or bleeding edge?
The 2.1 development kernels were available and updated several times a day, but they were exactly that: development kernels that often required extra effort and expertise. For a stable, tested system, the advice never changed: use 2.0.