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While the version of the kernel that is running does not usually affect any user
application, there are a small number of program for which the kernel
version is important.
This section describes a number of tools that are probably
already installed on your Linux system. If you upgrade your
kernel to a version different from the one that came with your distribution, some
of these packages may also need to be upgraded in order for the system to
work properly.
The util-linux package is a collection of small
utilities that do a wide range of different tasks. Most of these utilities
handle the mounting and creation of disk partitions and manipulation of the
hardware clock in the system.
If you wish to download and install the util-linux
package yourself, you can find it at
https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux.
As of the 2.6.18 kernel release, the 2.10o release of
util-linux is the oldest that works properly .
It is recommended that you install the latest version of this package,
because new version support new features added to the kernel.
Bind mounts are one example of an
option in newer kernels, and a newer version of
util-linux is needed in order to have them work
properly.
To determine which version of the util-linux package you
have on your system, run the following command:
$
fdformat --version
The module-init-tools package is needed if you wish to
use Linux kernel modules. A kernel module is a loadable chunk of code that
can be added to or removed from the kernel while the kernel is running. It
is useful to compile device drivers as modules and then load only the
ones that correspond to the hardware present in the system. All Linux distributions
use modules in order to load only the needed drivers and options for the
system based on the hardware present, instead of being forced to build all
possible drivers and options in the kernel in one large chunk. By
using modules, memory is saved by loading just the code that is needed to
control the machine properly.
The kernel module loading process underwent a radical change in the 2.6
kernel release. The linker for the module
(the code that resolves all symbols and figures out how to put the pieces
together in memory) is now built into the kernel, which makes the userspace
tools quite small. Older distributions have a package called
modutils that does not work properly with the 2.6
kernel. The module-init-tools package is what you need
to get the 2.6 kernel to work properly with modules.
If you wish to download and install the module-init-tools
package yourself, you can find it at
https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/module-init-tools.
As of the 2.6.18 kernel release, the 0.9.10
release of
module-init-tools is the oldest version that works properly . It is recommended that the latest version of this package be
installed, as new features added to the kernel can be used
by newer versions of this package. Blacklisting modules to prevent them
from being automatically loaded by the udev package is
one such option that is present in newer versions of
module-init-tools, but not older ones.
To determine which version of the module-init-tools
package you have on your system, run the following command:
$
depmod -V
Filesystem-specific tools
A wide range of tools specific to particular filesystems are necessary to
create, format, configure, and fix disk partitions. The
util-linux package has a few of these utilities, but
some of the more popular filesystems have separate packages that contain the
necessary programs.
The ext3 and experimental ext4
filesystems are upgrades of ext2 and can be
managed with the same tools; any recent version of an
ext2-based tool can work with the other two
filesystems as well.
To work with any of these filesystems, you must have the
e2fsprogs package.
If you wish to download and install this package yourself, you can find it at
https://e2fsprogs.sourceforge.net.
As of the 2.6.18 kernel release, the
1.29 release of
e2fsprogs is the oldest that works properly with the kernel. It is highly recommended that you use the newest version
in order to take advantage of newer features in the ext3 and ext4
filesystems.
To determine which version of e2fsprogs you have
on your system, run the following command:
$
tune2fs
To use the JFS filesystem from IBM, you must have the jfsutils pacakge.
If you wish to download and install this package yourself, you can find it at
https://jfs.sourceforge.net.
As of the 2.6.18 kernel release, the 1.1.3 release of
jfsutils is the oldest that works properly with the kernel.
To determine which version of jfsutils you have
on your system, run the following command:
$
fsck.jfs -V
To use the ReiserFS filesystem, you must have the reiserfsprogs package.
If you wish to download and install this package yourself, you can find it at
https://www.namesys.com/download.html.
As of the 2.6.18 kernel release, the 3.6.3 release of
reiserfsprogs is the oldest that works properly with the kernel.
To determine which version of reiserfsprogs you have
on your system, run the following command:
$
reiserfsck -V
To use the XFS filesystem from SGI, you must have the
xfsprogs package.
If you wish to download and install this package yourself, you can find it at
https://oss.sgi.com/projects/xfs.
As of the 2.6.18 kernel release, the 2.6.0 release of
xfsprogs is the oldest that works properly with the kernel.
To determine which version of xfsprogs you have
on your system, run the following command:
$
xfs_db -V
To use the quota functionality of the kernel, you must have the
quota-tools package.
[3]
This package includes programs that let you set quotas on users, provide
statistics on the amount of quota being used by different users, and issue
warnings when people get too close to using up their available filesystem
quota.
If you wish to download and install this package yourself, you can find it at
https://sourceforge.net/projects/linuxquota.
As of the 2.6.18 kernel release, the 3.09 release of
quota-tools is the oldest that works properly with the kernel.
To determine which version of quota-tools you have
on your system, run the following command:
$
quota -V
To use the NFS filesystem properly, you must have the
nfs-utils package.
[4]
This package includes programs that let you mount NFS partitions as a
client, and run an NFS server.
If you wish to download and install this package yourself, you can find it at
https://nfs.sf.net.
As of the 2.6.18 kernel release, the 1.0.5 release of
nfs-utils is the oldest that works properly with the kernel
To determine which version of nfs-utils you have
on your system, run the following command:
$
showmount --version
There are a few other important programs that are closely tied to the
kernel version. These programs are not usually required in order for the
kernel to work properly, but they enable access to different types of
hardware and functions.
udev is a program that enables Linux to provide a
persistent device naming system in the /dev directory.
It also provides a dynamic /dev, much like the
one provided by the older
(and now removed) devfs filesystem.
Almost all Linux distributions use udev to manage the
/dev directory, so it is required in order to properly
boot the machine.
Unfortunately, udev relies on the structure of
/sys, which has been known to change from time to time
with kernel releases. Some of these changes in the past have been known to
break udev, so that your machine will not boot properly.
If you have the latest version of udev recommended
by your kernel kernel, and have problems with it working properly, please
contact the udev developers on the mailing list
available at
[email protected].
It is highly recommended that you use the version of
udev that comes with your Linux distribution, as it is
tied into the distribution specific boot process very tightly. But if you
wish to upgrade udev on your own, you can find it at
https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/hotplug/udev.html.
As of the 2.6.18 kernel release, the 081 release of
udev is the oldest that works properly with the kernel.
It is recommended that you use the latest version of
udev, because
it will work better with newer kernels, due to changes
in how udev and the kernel communicate.
To determine which version of udev you have
on your system, run the following command:
$
udevinfo -V
The package procps includes the commonly used tools
ps and top, as well as many other
handy tools for managing and monitoring processes running on the system.
If you wish to download and install this package yourself, you can find it at
https://procps.sourceforge.net.
As of the 2.6.18 kernel release, the 3.2.0 release of
procps is the oldest that works properly with the kernel.
To determine which version of procps you have
on your system, run the following command:
$
ps --version
In order to properly use PCMCIA devices with Linux, a userspace helper
program must be used to set up the devices. For older kernel versions,
this program was called pcmcia-cs, but that has been
replaced with a much simpler system called pcmciautils.
If you wish to use PCMCIA devices, you must have this package installed for
them to work properly.
If you wish to download and install this package yourself, you can find it at
ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/pcmcia.
As of the 2.6.18 kernel release, the 004 release of
pcmciautils is the oldest that works properly with the kernel. But the latest version is recommended in
order to take advantage of newer features in the PCMCIA subsystem, such as
automatic driver loading when new devices are found.
To determine which version of pcmciautils you have
on your system, run the following command:
$
pccardctl -V
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