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Date:      Thu, 22 Mar 2001 12:55:36 -0800
From:      "David O'Brien" <obrien@freebsd.org>
To:        Matt Simerson <mpsimerson@hostpro.com>
Cc:        "'freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org'" <freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org>
Subject:   Re: 4.3-BETA world crashing 4.2-RELEASE kernel ?
Message-ID:  <20010322125536.B43860@dragon.nuxi.com>
In-Reply-To: <8D18712B2604D411A6BB009027F6449801B4B542@0SEA01EXSRV1>; from mpsimerson@hostpro.com on Thu, Mar 22, 2001 at 12:51:00PM -0700
References:  <8D18712B2604D411A6BB009027F6449801B4B542@0SEA01EXSRV1>

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On Thu, Mar 22, 2001 at 12:51:00PM -0700, Matt Simerson wrote:
> Actually, they aren't backwards. You've gone and snipped the parts of my
> original message that show that the commands are being executed at the same
> time.

I read you message twice and came away with the same idea.  You should
write more clearly.


> Maybe I'm understanding you incorrectly here but according to what you just
> said, a "make buildkernel" will fail unless you have a set of
> compiler/assembler/linker tools in /usr/obj that were built from the make
> buildworld process. This is inaccurate at best and I suspect it's just plain
> wrong. I can "rm -r /usr/obj/*", "cd /usr/src; make clean", and then "make
> buildkernel KERNEL=<BLAH>" and it will succeed and build a happy little
> fully functionaly kernel. I've done this hundreds of times with success.

The ability to do a `make buildkernel' with an empty /usr/obj is a new
feature.  But back to your misunderstanding.  What part about "if the
kernel source is changed to use language features not supported by the
existing installed tools, you cannot build a kernel with them" do you not
understand??

You obviously was not active when 4.x upgraded Binutils from 2.9.1 to
2.10.0 and the many of the asm bits were changed at the same time to
remove work arounds and bogusness done to satisfy Binutils 2.9.1.


> > Second, the install order above is not the conservative, careful
> > approach.  One should issue "make installkernel && reboot" after the
> > "make buildkernel" to ensure the new kernel works 
> > sufficiently well. 
> 
> Maybe that's _YOUR_ method for installing but it's not necessarily the best
> one. Kernel's are not guaranteed to be backwards compatible and I've
> installed a shiny new kernel that worked just fine and allowed my machine to
> come up single user but because of some rude change in /etc/rc, ipfw, or any
> of a number of places the machine couldn't make it to multi-user and allow
> me to get back in (via the network).

That you're doing this remotely is your problem.  Ask any of the
developers living on -CURRENT where often one wants to back out of a
newly compiled world.  The method I gave is the most sure and careful
way.  That you don't have consoles on your machines so you could do this
properly doesn't mean what I posted isn't the safest and should be
followed unless has special needs.


> Success at building and installing the kernel, world, AND running
> mergemaster gives me a reasonably good chance that when I issue the reboot,
> it'll come up nice and happy.

I'm happy for you.  But you have major flaws in your method where
problems can bite you hard.  As I said, I want users to know and use the
safest method.  I've seen enough email from users that were all confused
about the right steps -- often getting confused from posts such as yours
where you [hopefully] understand the consequences of your method and can
deal with them.  Many do not want to or cannot.


> Second, if I'm going through the bother of compiling a buildworld it's
> because I want the latest version of world on my system.

Want != ability.  I want a latest version of 5-CURRENT on my laptop, but
CardBus is broken right now, so I am living with a Dec world.  Such is
life.


> If there are some problems with the new kernel, I'm not going to revert
> back to world.old.  I'll fix whatever is screwed up with kernel and
> proceed.

Oh!  Want a job as a kernel hacker then?  I'd like to have my CardBus
working again (in current).  Also my AHA-2930u2 on a K6-2 machine...
 
-- 
-- David  (obrien@FreeBSD.org)
          GNU is Not Unix / Linux Is Not UniX

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