Chapter 37. Manually Upgrading the Kernel
The Red Hat Enterprise Linux kernel is custom built by the Red Hat kernel team
to ensure its integrity and compatibility with supported hardware. Before
Red Hat releases a kernel, it must first pass a rigorous set of quality assurance
tests.
Red Hat Enterprise Linux kernels are packaged in RPM format so that they are easy to upgrade
and verify using the Red Hat Update Agent, or the
up2date command. The Red Hat Update Agent
automatically queries the Red Hat Network servers and determines which packages need
to be updated on your machine, including the kernel. This chapter is
only useful for those individuals that require manual
updating of kernel packages, without using the up2date
command.
 | Warning |
|---|
| | Please note, that building a custom kernel is not supported by the Red Hat
Global Services Support team, and therefore is not explored in this manual.
|
 | Tip |
|---|
| | Use of up2date is highly
recommended by Red Hat for installing upgraded kernels.
|
For more information on Red Hat Network, the Red Hat Update Agent, and
up2date, refer to Chapter 17 Red Hat Network.
Red Hat Enterprise Linux contains the following kernel packages (some may not apply to
your architecture):
kernel — Contains the kernel and the
following key features:
Uniprocessor support for x86 and Athlon systems (can be run
on a multi-processor system, but only one processor is
utilized)
Multi-processor support for all other architectures
For x86 systems, only the first 4 GB of RAM is used; use the
kernel-hugemem package for x86 systems with
over 4 GB of RAM
kernel-devel — Contains the kernel
headers and makefiles sufficient to build modules against the
kernel package.
kernel-hugemem — (only for i686
systems) In addition to the options enabled for the
kernel package, the key configuration options
are as follows:
Support for more than 4 GB of RAM (up to 64 GB for
x86)
 | Note |
|---|
| | kernel-hugemem is
required for memory configurations higher than 16 GB.
|
PAE (Physical Address Extension) or 3 level paging on x86
processors that support PAE
Support for multiple processors
4GB/4GB split — 4GB of virtual address space for the
kernel and almost 4GB for each user process on x86 systems
kernel-hugemem-devel — Contains the
kernel headers and makefiles sufficient to build modules against the
kernel-hugemem package.
kernel-smp — Contains the kernel for
multi-processor systems. The following are the key features:
kernel-smp-devel — Contains the
kernel headers and makefiles sufficient to build modules against the
kernel-smp package.
kernel-utils — Contains utilities
that can be used to control the kernel or system hardware.
kernel-doc — Contains documentation
files from the kernel source. Various portions of the Linux kernel
and the device drivers shipped with it are documented in these
files. Installation of this package provides a reference
to the options that can be passed to Linux kernel modules at load
time.
By default, these files are placed in the
/usr/share/doc/kernel-doc-<version>/
directory.
| Note |
|---|
| | The kernel-source package has been removed and
replaced with an RPM that can only be retrieved from Red Hat Network. This
*.src.rpm must then be rebuilt locally using the
rpmbuild command. Refer to the latest distribution
Release Notes, including all updates, at https://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/enterprise/
for more information on obtaining and installing the kernel source
package.
|
