Linux From Scratch

Version 6.8

Created by Gerard Beekmans

Edited by Matthew Burgess and Bruce Dubbs

Copyright © 1999-2011, Gerard Beekmans

All rights reserved.

This book is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

Computer instructions may be extracted from the book under the MIT License.

Linux® is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds.


Table of Contents

Preface

Foreword

My journey to learn and better understand Linux began over a decade ago, back in 1998. I had just installed my first Linux distribution and had quickly become intrigued with the whole concept and philosophy behind Linux.

There are always many ways to accomplish a single task. The same can be said about Linux distributions. A great many have existed over the years. Some still exist, some have morphed into something else, yet others have been relegated to our memories. They all do things differently to suit the needs of their target audience. Because so many different ways to accomplish the same end goal exist, I began to realize I no longer had to be limited by any one implementation. Prior to discovering Linux, we simply put up with issues in other Operating Systems as you had no choice. It was what it was, whether you liked it or not. With Linux, the concept of choice began to emerge. If you didn't like something, you were free, even encouraged, to change it.

I tried a number of distributions and could not decide on any one. They were great systems in their own right. It wasn't a matter of right and wrong anymore. It had become a matter of personal taste. With all that choice available, it became apparent that there would not be a single system that would be perfect for me. So I set out to create my own Linux system that would fully conform to my personal preferences.

To truly make it my own system, I resolved to compile everything from source code instead of using pre-compiled binary packages. This “perfect” Linux system would have the strengths of various systems without their perceived weaknesses. At first, the idea was rather daunting. I remained committed to the idea that such a system could be built.

After sorting through issues such as circular dependencies and compile-time errors, I finally built a custom-built Linux system. It was fully operational and perfectly usable like any of the other Linux systems out there at the time. But it was my own creation. It was very satisfying to have put together such a system myself. The only thing better would have been to create each piece of software myself. This was the next best thing.

As I shared my goals and experiences with other members of the Linux community, it became apparent that there was a sustained interest in these ideas. It quickly became plain that such custom-built Linux systems serve not only to meet user specific requirements, but also serve as an ideal learning opportunity for programmers and system administrators to enhance their (existing) Linux skills. Out of this broadened interest, the Linux From Scratch Project was born.

This Linux From Scratch book is the central core around that project. It provides the background and instructions necessary for you to design and build your own system. While this book provides a template that will result in a correctly working system, you are free to alter the instructions to suit yourself, which is, in part, an important part of this project. You remain in control; we just lend a helping hand to get you started on your own journey.

I sincerely hope you will have a great time working on your own Linux From Scratch system and enjoy the numerous benefits of having a system that is truly your own.

--
Gerard Beekmans
gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org

Audience

There are many reasons why you would want to read this book. One of the questions many people raise is, “why go through all the hassle of manually building a Linux system from scratch when you can just download and install an existing one?

One important reason for this project's existence is to help you learn how a Linux system works from the inside out. Building an LFS system helps demonstrate what makes Linux tick, and how things work together and depend on each other. One of the best things that this learning experience can provide is the ability to customize a Linux system to suit your own unique needs.

Another key benefit of LFS is that it allows you to have more control over the system without relying on someone else's Linux implementation. With LFS, you are in the driver's seat and dictate every aspect of the system.

LFS allows you to create very compact Linux systems. When installing regular distributions, you are often forced to install a great many programs which are probably never used or understood. These programs waste resources. You may argue that with today's hard drive and CPUs, such resources are no longer a consideration. Sometimes, however, you are still constrained by size considerations if nothing else. Think about bootable CDs, USB sticks, and embedded systems. Those are areas where LFS can be beneficial.

Another advantage of a custom built Linux system is security. By compiling the entire system from source code, you are empowered to audit everything and apply all the security patches desired. It is no longer necessary to wait for somebody else to compile binary packages that fix a security hole. Unless you examine the patch and implement it yourself, you have no guarantee that the new binary package was built correctly and adequately fixes the problem.

The goal of Linux From Scratch is to build a complete and usable foundation-level system. If you do not wish to build your own Linux system from scratch, you may not entirely benefit from the information in this book.

There are too many other good reasons to build your own LFS system to list them all here. In the end, education is by far the most powerful of reasons. As you continue in your LFS experience, you will discover the power that information and knowledge truly bring.

LFS Target Architectures

The primary target architecture of LFS is the 32-bit Intel CPU. If you have not built an LFS system before, you should probably start with that target. The 32-bit architecture is the most widely supported Linux system and is most compatible with both open source and proprietary software.

On the other hand, the instructions in this book are known to work, with some modifications, with both Power PC and 64-bit AMD/Intel CPUs. To build a system that utilizes one of these CPUs, the main prerequisite, in addition to those on the next few pages, is an existing Linux system such as an earlier LFS installation, Ubuntu, Red Hat/Fedora, SuSE, or other distribution that targets the architecture that you have. Also note that a 32-bit distribution can be installed and used as a host system on a 64-bit AMD/Intel computer.

Some other facts about 64-bit systems need to be added here. When compared to a 32-bit system, the sizes of executable programs are slightly larger and the execution speeds are only slightly faster. For example, in a test build of LFS-6.5 on a Core2Duo CPU based system, the following statistics were measured:

Architecture Build Time     Build Size 
32-bit       198.5 minutes  648 MB 
64-bit       190.6 minutes  709 MB

As you can see, the 64-bit build is only 4% faster and is 9% larger than the 32-bit build. The gain from going to a 64-bit system is relatively minimal. Of course, if you have more than 4GB of RAM or want to manipulate data that exceeds 4GB, the advantages of a 64-bit system are substantial.

The default 64-bit build that results from LFS is considered a "pure" 64-bit system. That is, it supports 64-bit executables only. Building a "multi-lib" system requires compiling many applications twice, once for a 32-bit system and once for a 64-bit system. This is not directly supported in LFS because it would interfere with the educational objective of providing the instructions needed for a straightforward base Linux system. You can refer to the Cross Linux From Scratch project for this advanced topic.

There is one last comment about 64-bit systems. There are some packages that cannot currently be built in a "pure" 64-bit system or require specialized build instructions. Generally, these packages have some embedded 32-bit specific assembly language instructions that fail when building on a 64-bit system. This includes some Xorg drivers from Beyond Linux From Scratch (BLFS). Many of these problems can be worked around, but may require some specialized procedures or patches.

LFS and Standards

The structure of LFS follows Linux standards as closely as possible. The primary standards are:

  • The Single UNIX Specification Version 3 (POSIX). Note: Free registration is required.

  • Filesystem Hierarchy Standard (FHS)

  • Linux Standard Base (LSB) Core Specification 4.0

    The LSB has five separate standards: Core, C++, Desktop, Runtime Languages, and Printing. In addition to generic requirements there are also architecture specific requirements. LFS attempts to conform to the architectures discussed in the previous section.

    Note

    Many people do not agree with the requirements of the LSB. The main purpose of defining it is to ensure that proprietary software will be able to be installed and run properly on a compliant system. Since LFS is source based, the user has complete control over what packages are desired and many choose not to install some packages that are specified by the LSB.

Creating a complete LFS system capable of passing the LSB certifications tests is possible, but not without many additional packages that are beyond the scope of LFS. Most of these additional packages have installation instructions in BLFS.

Packages supplied by LFS needed to satisfy the LSB Requirements

LSB Core:

Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, File, Findutils, Gawk, Grep, Gzip, M4, Man-DB, Ncurses, Procps, Psmisc, Sed, Shadow, Tar, Util-linux, Zlib

LSB C++:

Gcc

LSB Desktop:

None

LSB Runtime Languages:

Perl

LSB Printing:

None

LSB Multimeda:

None

Packages supplied by BLFS needed to satisfy the LSB Requirements

LSB Core:

Bc, Cpio, Ed, Fcrontab, PAM, Sendmail (or Postfix or Exim)

LSB C++:

None

LSB Desktop:

ATK, Cairo, Desktop-file-utils, Freetype, Fontconfig, Glib2, GTK+2, Icon-naming-utils, Libjpeg, Libpng, Libxml2, MesaLib, Pango, Qt3, Qt4, Xorg

LSB Runtime Languages:

Python

LSB Printing:

CUPS

LSB Multimeda:

Alsa Libraries, NSPR, NSS, OpenSSL, Java

Packages not supplied by LFS or BLFS needed to satisfy the LSB Requirements

LSB Core:

At, Batch, Install_initd, Lsb_release, Remove_initd, Test

LSB C++:

None

LSB Desktop:

None

LSB Runtime Languages:

None

LSB Printing:

None

LSB Multimeda:

Xdg-utils

Rationale for Packages in the Book

As stated earlier, the goal of LFS is to build a complete and usable foundation-level system. This includes all packages needed to replicate itself while providing a relatively minimal base from which to customize a more complete system based on the choices of the user. This does not mean that LFS is the smallest system possible. Several important packages are included that are not strictly required. The lists below document the rationale for each package in the book.

  • Autoconf

    This package contains programs for producing shell scripts that can automatically configure source code from a developer's template. It is often needed to rebuild a package after updates to the build procedures.

  • Automake

    This package contains programs for generating Make files from a template. It is often needed to rebuild a package after updates to the build procedures.

  • Bash

    This package satisfies an LSB core requirement to provide a Bourne Shell interface to the system. It was chosen over other shell packages because of its common usage and extensive capabilities beyond basic shell functions.

  • Binutils

    This package contains a linker, an assembler, and other tools for handling object files. The programs in this package are needed to compile most of the packages in an LFS system and beyond.

  • Bison

    This package contains the GNU version of yacc (Yet Another Compiler Compiler) needed to build several other LFS programs.

  • Bzip2

    This package contains programs for compressing and decompressing files. It is required to decompress many LFS packages.

  • Coreutils

    This package contains a number of essential programs for viewing and manipulating files and directories. These programs are needed for command line file management, and are necessary for the installation procedures of every package in LFS.

  • DejaGNU

    This package contains a framework for testing other programs. It is only installed in the temporary toolchain.

  • Diffutils

    This package contains programs that show the differences between files or directories. These programs can be used to create patches, and are also used in many packages' build procedures.

  • Expect

    This package contains a program for carrying out scripted dialogues with other interactive programs. It is commonly used for testing other packages. It is only installed in the temporary toolchain.

  • E2fsprogs

    This package contains the utilities for handling the ext2, ext3 and ext4 file systems. These are the most common and thoroughly tested file systems that Linux supports.

  • File

    This package contains a utility for determining the type of a given file or files. A few packages need it to build.

  • Findutils

    This package contains programs to find files in a file system. It is used in many packages' build scripts.

  • Flex

    This package contains a utility for generating programs that recognize patterns in text. It is the GNU version of the lex (lexical analyzer) program. It is required to build several LFS packages.

  • Gawk

    This package contains programs for manipulating text files. It is the GNU version of awk (Aho-Weinberg-Kernighan). It is used in many other packages' build scripts.

  • Gcc

    This package is the Gnu Compiler Collection. It contains the C and C++ compilers as well as several others not built by LFS.

  • GDBM

    This package contains the GNU Database Manager library. It is used by one other LFS package, Man-DB.

  • Gettext

    This package contains utilities and libraries for internationalization and localization of numerous packages.

  • Glibc

    This package contains the main C library. Linux programs would not run without it.

  • GMP

    This package contains math libraries that provide useful functions for arbitrary precision arithmetic. It is required to build Gcc.

  • Grep

    This package contains programs for searching through files. These programs are used by most packages' build scripts.

  • Groff

    This package contains programs for processing and formatting text. One important function of these programs is to format man pages.

  • GRUB

    This package is the Grand Unified Boot Loader. It is one of several boot loaders available, but is the most flexible.

  • Gzip

    This package contains programs for compressing and decompressing files. It is needed to decompress many packages in LFS and beyond.

  • Iana-etc

    This package provides data for network services and protocols. It is needed to enable proper networking capabilities.

  • Inetutils

    This package contains programs for basic network administration.

  • IProute2

    This package contains programs for basic and advanced IPv4 and IPv6 networking. It was chosen over the other common network tools package (net-tools) for its IPv6 capabilities.

  • Kbd

    This package contains key-table files, keyboard utilities for non-US keyboards, and a number of console fonts.

  • Less

    This package contains a very nice text file viewer that allows scrolling up or down when viewing a file. It is also used by Man-DB for viewing manpages.

  • Libtool

    This package contains the GNU generic library support script. It wraps the complexity of using shared libraries in a consistent, portable interface. It is needed by the test suites in other LFS packages.

  • Linux Kernel

    This package is the Operating System. It is the Linux in the GNU/Linux environment.

  • M4

    This package contains a general text macro processor useful as a build tool for other programs.

  • Make

    This package contains a program for directing the building of packages. It is required by almost every package in LFS.

  • Man-DB

    This package contains programs for finding and viewing man pages. It was chosen instead of the man package due to superior internationalization capabilities. It supplies the man program.

  • Man-pages

    This package contains the actual contents of the basic Linux man pages.

  • Module-Init-Tools

    This package contains programs needed to administer Linux kernel modules.

  • MPC

    This package contains functions for the arithmetic of complex numbers. It is required by Gcc.

  • MPFR

    This package contains functions for multiple precision arithmetic. It is required by Gcc.

  • Ncurses

    This package contains libraries for terminal-independent handling of character screens. It is often used to provide cursor control for a menuing system. It is needed by a number of packages in LFS.

  • Patch

    This package contains a program for modifying or creating files by applying a patch file typically created by the diff program. It is needed by the build procedure for several LFS packages.

  • Perl

    This package is an interpreter for the runtime language PERL. It is needed for the installation and test suites of several LFS packages.

  • Pkg-config

    This package contains a tool for passing the include path and/or library paths to build tools during the configure and make processes. It is needed by many LFS packages.

  • Procps

    This package contains programs for monitoring processes. These programs are useful for system administration, and are also used by the LFS Bootscripts.

  • Psmisc

    This package contains programs for displaying information about running processes. These programs are useful for system administration.

  • Readline

    This package is a set of libraries that offers command-line editing and history capabilities. It is used by Bash.

  • Sed

    This package allows editing of text without opening it in a text editor. It is also needed by most LFS packages' configure scripts.

  • Shadow

    This package contains programs for handling passwords in a secure way.

  • Sysklogd

    This package contains programs for logging system messages, such as those given by the kernel or daemon processes when unusual events occur.

  • Sysvinit

    This package provides the init program, which is the parent of all other processes on the Linux system.

  • Tar

    This package provides archiving and extraction capabilities of virtually all packages used in LFS.

  • Tcl

    This package contains the Tool Command Language used in many test suites in LFS packages. It is only installed in the temporary toolchain.

  • Texinfo

    This package contains programs for reading, writing, and converting info pages. It is used in the installation procedures of many LFS packages.

  • Udev

    This package contains programs for dynamic creation of device nodes. It is an alternative to creating thousands of static devices in the /dev directory.

  • Util-linux

    This package contains miscellaneous utility programs. Among them are utilities for handling file systems, consoles, partitions, and messages.

  • Vim

    This package contains an editor. It was chosen because of its compatibility with the classic vi editor and its huge number of powerful capabilities. An editor is a very personal choice for many users and any other editor could be substituted if desired.

  • XZ Utils

    This package contains programs for compressing and decompressing files. It provides the highest compression generally available and the useful for decompressing packages XZ or LZMA format.

  • Zlib

    This package contains compression and decompression routines used by some programs.

Prerequisites

Building an LFS system is not a simple task. It requires a certain level of existing knowledge of Unix system administration in order to resolve problems and correctly execute the commands listed. In particular, as an absolute minimum, you should already have the ability to use the command line (shell) to copy or move files and directories, list directory and file contents, and change the current directory. It is also expected that you have a reasonable knowledge of using and installing Linux software.

Because the LFS book assumes at least this basic level of skill, the various LFS support forums are unlikely to be able to provide you with much assistance in these areas. You will find that your questions regarding such basic knowledge will likely go unanswered or you will simply be referred to the LFS essential pre-reading list.

Before building an LFS system, we recommend reading the following HOWTOs:

Host System Requirements

Your host system should have the following software with the minimum versions indicated. This should not be an issue for most modern Linux distributions. Also note that many distributions will place software headers into separate packages, often in the form of “<package-name>-devel” or “<package-name>-dev”. Be sure to install those if your distribution provides them.

Earlier versions of the listed software packages may work, but has not been tested.

  • Bash-3.2 (/bin/sh should be a symbolic or hard link to bash)

  • Binutils-2.17 (Versions greater than 2.21 are not recommended as they have not been tested)

  • Bison-2.3 (/usr/bin/yacc should be a link to bison or small script that executes bison)

  • Bzip2-1.0.4

  • Coreutils-6.9

  • Diffutils-2.8.1

  • Findutils-4.2.31

  • Gawk-3.1.5 (/usr/bin/awk should be a link to gawk)

  • Gcc-4.1.2 (Versions greater than 4.5.2 are not recommended as they have not been tested)

  • Glibc-2.5.1 (Versions greater than 2.13 are not recommended as they have not been tested)

  • Grep-2.5.1a

  • Gzip-1.3.12

  • Linux Kernel-2.6.22.5 (having been compiled with GCC-4.1.2 or greater)

    The reason for the kernel version requirement is that we specify that version when building glibc in Chapter 6 at the recommendation of the developers.

    If the host kernel is either earlier than 2.6.22.5, or it was not compiled using a GCC-4.1.2 (or later) compiler, you will need to replace the kernel with one adhering to the specifications. There are two ways you can go about this. First, see if your Linux vendor provides a 2.6.22.5 or later kernel package. If so, you may wish to install it. If your vendor doesn't offer an acceptable kernel package, or you would prefer not to install it, you can compile a kernel yourself. Instructions for compiling the kernel and configuring the boot loader (assuming the host uses GRUB) are located in Chapter 8.

  • M4-1.4.10

  • Make-3.81

  • Patch-2.5.4

  • Perl-5.8.8

  • Sed-4.1.5

  • Tar-1.18

  • Texinfo-4.9

Note that the symlinks mentioned above are required to build an LFS system using the instructions contained within this book. Symlinks that point to other software (such as dash, mawk, etc.) may work, but are not tested or supported by the LFS development team, and may require either deviation from the instructions or additional patches to some packages.

To see whether your host system has all the appropriate versions, and the ability to compile programs, run the following:

cat > version-check.sh << "EOF"
#!/bin/bash
export LC_ALL=C

# Simple script to list version numbers of critical development tools

bash --version | head -n1 | cut -d" " -f2-4
echo "/bin/sh -> `readlink -f /bin/sh`"
echo -n "Binutils: "; ld --version | head -n1 | cut -d" " -f3-
bison --version | head -n1
if [ -e /usr/bin/yacc ];
  then echo "/usr/bin/yacc -> `readlink -f /usr/bin/yacc`"; 
  else echo "yacc not found"; fi
bzip2 --version 2>&1 < /dev/null | head -n1 | cut -d" " -f1,6-
echo -n "Coreutils: "; chown --version | head -n1 | cut -d")" -f2
diff --version | head -n1
find --version | head -n1
gawk --version | head -n1
if [ -e /usr/bin/awk ];
  then echo "/usr/bin/awk -> `readlink -f /usr/bin/awk`"; 
  else echo "awk not found"; fi
gcc --version | head -n1
/lib/libc.so.6 | head -n1 | cut -d"," -f1
grep --version | head -n1
gzip --version | head -n1
cat /proc/version
m4 --version | head -n1
make --version | head -n1
patch --version | head -n1
echo Perl `perl -V:version`
sed --version | head -n1
tar --version | head -n1
echo "Texinfo: `makeinfo --version | head -n1`"
echo 'main(){}' > dummy.c && gcc -o dummy dummy.c
if [ -x dummy ]; then echo "Compilation OK";
  else echo "Compilation failed"; fi
rm -f dummy.c dummy

EOF

bash version-check.sh

Typography

To make things easier to follow, there are a few typographical conventions used throughout this book. This section contains some examples of the typographical format found throughout Linux From Scratch.

./configure --prefix=/usr

This form of text is designed to be typed exactly as seen unless otherwise noted in the surrounding text. It is also used in the explanation sections to identify which of the commands is being referenced.

In some cases, a logical line is extended to two or more physical lines with a backslash at the end of the line.

CC="gcc -B/usr/bin/" ../binutils-2.18/configure \
  --prefix=/tools --disable-nls --disable-werror

Note that the backslash must be followed by an immediate return. Other whitespace characters like spaces or tab characters will create incorrect results.

install-info: unknown option '--dir-file=/mnt/lfs/usr/info/dir'

This form of text (fixed-width text) shows screen output, usually as the result of commands issued. This format is also used to show filenames, such as /etc/ld.so.conf.

Emphasis

This form of text is used for several purposes in the book. Its main purpose is to emphasize important points or items.

http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/

This format is used for hyperlinks both within the LFS community and to external pages. It includes HOWTOs, download locations, and websites.

cat > $LFS/etc/group << "EOF"
root:x:0:
bin:x:1:
......
EOF

This format is used when creating configuration files. The first command tells the system to create the file $LFS/etc/group from whatever is typed on the following lines until the sequence End Of File (EOF) is encountered. Therefore, this entire section is generally typed as seen.

<REPLACED TEXT>

This format is used to encapsulate text that is not to be typed as seen or for copy-and-paste operations.

[OPTIONAL TEXT]

This format is used to encapsulate text that is optional.

passwd(5)

This format is used to refer to a specific manual (man) page. The number inside parentheses indicates a specific section inside the manuals. For example, passwd has two man pages. Per LFS installation instructions, those two man pages will be located at /usr/share/man/man1/passwd.1 and /usr/share/man/man5/passwd.5. When the book uses passwd(5) it is specifically referring to /usr/share/man/man5/passwd.5. man passwd will print the first man page it finds that matches “passwd”, which will be /usr/share/man/man1/passwd.1. For this example, you will need to run man 5 passwd in order to read the specific page being referred to. It should be noted that most man pages do not have duplicate page names in different sections. Therefore, man <program name> is generally sufficient.

Structure

This book is divided into the following parts.

Part I - Introduction

Part I explains a few important notes on how to proceed with the LFS installation. This section also provides meta-information about the book.

Part II - Preparing for the Build

Part II describes how to prepare for the building process—making a partition, downloading the packages, and compiling temporary tools.

Part III - Building the LFS System

Part III guides the reader through the building of the LFS system—compiling and installing all the packages one by one, setting up the boot scripts, and installing the kernel. The resulting Linux system is the foundation on which other software can be built to expand the system as desired. At the end of this book, there is an easy to use reference listing all of the programs, libraries, and important files that have been installed.

Errata

The software used to create an LFS system is constantly being updated and enhanced. Security warnings and bug fixes may become available after the LFS book has been released. To check whether the package versions or instructions in this release of LFS need any modifications to accommodate security vulnerabilities or other bug fixes, please visit http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/errata/6.8/ before proceeding with your build. You should note any changes shown and apply them to the relevant section of the book as you progress with building the LFS system.

Part I. Introduction

Chapter 1. Introduction

1.1. How to Build an LFS System

The LFS system will be built by using an already installed Linux distribution (such as Debian, Mandriva, Red Hat, or SUSE). This existing Linux system (the host) will be used as a starting point to provide necessary programs, including a compiler, linker, and shell, to build the new system. Select the “development” option during the distribution installation to be able to access these tools.

As an alternative to installing a separate distribution onto your machine, you may wish to use the Linux From Scratch LiveCD or a LiveCD from a commercial distribution. The LFS LiveCD works well as a host system, providing all the tools you need to successfully follow the instructions in this book. The LiveCD version is behind the current book, but is still useful as a host for building the current book. The “-nosrc” or “-min” editions of the LiveCD are the most appropriate for building a current LFS system. For more information about the LFS LiveCD or to download a copy, visit http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/livecd/.

Note

The LFS LiveCD might not work on newer hardware configurations, failing to boot or failing to detect some devices such as some SATA hard drives.

Chapter 2 of this book describes how to create a new Linux native partition and file system. This is the place where the new LFS system will be compiled and installed. Chapter 3 explains which packages and patches need to be downloaded to build an LFS system and how to store them on the new file system. Chapter 4 discusses the setup of an appropriate working environment. Please read Chapter 4 carefully as it explains several important issues you need be aware of before beginning to work your way through Chapter 5 and beyond.

Chapter 5 explains the installation of a number of packages that will form the basic development suite (or toolchain) which is used to build the actual system in Chapter 6. Some of these packages are needed to resolve circular dependencies—for example, to compile a compiler, you need a compiler.

Chapter 5 also shows you how to build a first pass of the toolchain, including Binutils and GCC (first pass basically means these two core packages will be reinstalled). The next step is to build Glibc, the C library. Glibc will be compiled by the toolchain programs built in the first pass. Then, a second pass of the toolchain will be built. This time, the toolchain will be dynamically linked against the newly built Glibc. The remaining Chapter 5 packages are built using this second pass toolchain. When this is done, the LFS installation process will no longer depend on the host distribution, with the exception of the running kernel.

This effort to isolate the new system from the host distribution may seem excessive. A full technical explanation as to why this is done is provided in Section 5.2, “Toolchain Technical Notes”.

In Chapter 6, the full LFS system is built. The chroot (change root) program is used to enter a virtual environment and start a new shell whose root directory will be set to the LFS partition. This is very similar to rebooting and instructing the kernel to mount the LFS partition as the root partition. The system does not actually reboot, but instead chroot's because creating a bootable system requires additional work which is not necessary just yet. The major advantage is that “chrooting” allows you to continue using the host system while LFS is being built. While waiting for package compilations to complete, you can continue using your computer as normal.

To finish the installation, the LFS-Bootscripts are set up in Chapter 7, and the kernel and boot loader are set up in Chapter 8. Chapter 9 contains information on continuing the LFS experience beyond this book. After the steps in this book have been implemented, the computer will be ready to reboot into the new LFS system.

This is the process in a nutshell. Detailed information on each step is discussed in the following chapters and package descriptions. Items that may seem complicated will be clarified, and everything will fall into place as you embark on the LFS adventure.

1.2. What's new since the last release

Below is a list of package updates made since the previous release of the book.

Upgraded to:

  • Autoconf 2.68

  • Bash 4.2

  • Binutils 2.21

  • Bzip2 1.0.6

  • Coreutils 8.10

  • E2fsprogs 1.41.14

  • Expect 5.45

  • File 5.05

  • GCC 4.5.2

  • Glibc 2.13

  • Grep 2.7

  • Groff 1.21

  • IPRoute2 2.6.37

  • Libtool 2.4

  • Linux 2.6.37

  • M4 1.4.15

  • Man-DB 2.5.9

  • Man-pages 3.32

  • Perl 5.12.3

  • Psmisc 22.13

  • Readline 6.2

  • Shadow 4.1.4.3

  • Tar 1.25

  • TCL 8.5.9

  • Udev 166

Added:

  • bzip2-1.0.6-install_docs-1.patch

  • coreutils-8.10-i18n-1.patch

  • coreutils-8.10-uname-1.patch

  • gcc-4.5.2-startfiles_fix-1.patch

  • glibc-2.13-gcc_fix-1.patch

  • perl-5.12.3-libc-1.patch

  • procps-3.2.8-fix_HZ_errors-1.patch

  • xz-5.0.1

  • util-linux-2.19

Removed:

  • bash-4.1-fixes-2.patch

  • bzip2-1.0.5-install_docs-1.patch

  • bzip2-1.0.5-version_fixes-1.patch

  • coreutils-8.5-i18n-1.patch

  • coreutils-8.5-uname-2.patch

  • expect-5.44.1.15-no_tk-1.patch

  • gcc-4.5.1-startfiles_fix-1.patch

  • glibc-2.12.1-gcc_fix-1.patch

  • glibc-2.12.1-makefile_fix-1.patch

  • man-db-2.5.7-fix_man_assertion-1.patch

  • perl-5.12.1-libc-1.patch

  • tar-1.23-overflow_fix-1.patch

  • util-linux-ng-2.18

1.3. Changelog

This is version 6.8 of the Linux From Scratch book, dated March 4, 2011. If this book is more than six months old, a newer and better version is probably already available. To find out, please check one of the mirrors via http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/mirrors.html.

Below is a list of changes made since the previous release of the book.

Changelog Entries:

  • 2011-03-04

    • [bdubbs] Release LFS 6.8.

  • 2011-02-18

    • [bdubbs] Fix several urls in Chapter 3. Thanks to splotz90 for the patch.

    • [bryan] Fix the sed in the CD-ROM symlinks section, to sync with upstream changes to the file being modified.

  • 2011-02-16

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Shadow-4.1.4.3. Fixes #2832.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Readline-6.2. Fixes #2831.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Bash-4.2. Fixes #2830.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Udev-166. Fixes #2829.

  • 2011-02-10

    • [bdubbs] Upgrade to coreutils-8.10. Fixes #2828.

    • [bdubbs] Upgrade to Util-linux-2.19. Changed name from util-linux-ng. Fixes #2805.

  • 2011-02-04

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Glibc-2.13. Fixes #2827.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to XZ-5.0.1. Fixes #2826.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Perl-5.12.3. Fixes #2824.

  • 2011-01-27

    • [bdubbs] Add a sed that modifies incorrect defines in glibc. Thanks to Bryan Kadzban for identifying the proper fix. Fixes #2820.

  • 2011-01-25

    • [bdubbs] Add a note about optionally building popt before pkg-config. Fixes #2781.

  • 2011-01-24

    • [bdubbs] Move chroot man page to man8. Fixes #2782.

  • 2011-01-23

    • [matthew] Ignore failing tests in Man-DB as they're only due to a change in Groff-1.21's warning output. Fixes #2823.

    • [matthew] Change password hashing from MD5 to SHA-512. Fixes #2814.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to File-5.05. Fixes #2821.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to IPRoute2-2.6.37. Fixes #2817.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Coreutils-8.9. Fixes #2815.

  • 2011-01-10

    • [ken] Updated to Linux-2.6.37. Fixes #2816.

    • [ken] Updated to Groff-1.21. Fixes #2813.

  • 2011-01-04

    • [bdubbs] Move XZ-Utils to before Man-DB. Tweak install instructions.

  • 2011-01-02

    • [bdubbs] Added XZ-Utils as a new compression utility package for independent use or with tar. Fixes #2619.

  • 2010-12-29

    • [ken] Allow shadow to install its korean and chinese man-pages, since man-db can now format them. Thanks to William Immendorf for the report.

  • 2010-12-28

    • [matthew] Upgrade to E2fsprogs-1.41.14. Fixes #2812.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Coreutils-8.8. Fixes #2811.

  • 2010-12-19

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Udev-165. Fixes #2810.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to GCC-4.5.2. Fixes #2809.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to E2fsprogs-1.41.13. Fixes #2807.

  • 2010-12-14

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Glibc-2.12.2. Fixes #2804.

  • 2010-12-13

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Binutils-2.21. Fixes #2803.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Man-Pages-3.32. Fixes #2802.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Linux-2.6.36.2. Fixes #2799.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Man-DB-2.5.9. Fixes #2797.

  • 2010-11-18

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Man-Pages-3.31. Fixes #2794.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Expect-5.45. Fixes #2791.

  • 2010-11-10

    • [matthew] Add security fixes for Glibc. Fixes #2790.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Man-Pages-3.30. Fixes #2788.

    • [matthew] Mention Inetutils' testsuite, and also install its HTML documentation. Fixes #2784 and #2785

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Tar-1.25, and also install its HTML documentation. Fixes #2777 and #2786.

  • 2010-10-27

    • [bdubbs] Add an example on how to use wget-list. Fixes #2778.

  • 2010-10-26

    • [bdubbs] Clarify text in Chapter 5 GCC Pass 1 concerning supporting packages.

  • 2010-10-24

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Udev-164. Fixes #2775.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Man-Pages-3.29. Fixes #2774.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Linux-2.6.36. Fixes #2773.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Coreutils-8.6. Fixes #2771.

  • 2010-10-18

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Bash 4.1 patch level 9. Fixes #2770.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Udev-163. Fixes #2769.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Man-Pages-3.28. Fixes #2765.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Linux-2.6.35.7. Fixes #2764.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Autoconf-2.68. Fixes #2763.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Libtool-2.4. Fixes #2762.

  • 2010-09-22

    • [matthew] Following r9370, fix the Autoconf underquoting bug in Autoconf itself, rather than just the one affected LFS package, Pkg-config.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Linux-2.6.35.5. Fixes #2761.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Grep-2.7. Fixes #2760.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Bzip2-1.0.6. Fixes #2759.

    • [matthew] Add patch to fix "Unknown HZ value" error in some procps tools. Thanks to DJ Lucas for the report and patch. Fixes #2758.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Tcl-8.5.9. Fixes #2753.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Perl-5.12.2. Fixes #2752.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Psmisc-22.13. Fixes #2751.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Man-Pages-3.27. Fixes #2750.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to Udev-162. Fixes #2747.

    • [matthew] Upgrade to M4-1.4.15. Fixes #2744.

  • 2010-09-18

    • [bdubbs] - LFS-6.7 released.

1.4. Resources

1.4.1. FAQ

If during the building of the LFS system you encounter any errors, have any questions, or think there is a typo in the book, please start by consulting the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) that is located at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/faq/.

1.4.2. Mailing Lists

The linuxfromscratch.org server hosts a number of mailing lists used for the development of the LFS project. These lists include the main development and support lists, among others. If the FAQ does not solve the problem you are having, the next step would be to search the mailing lists at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/search.html.

For information on the different lists, how to subscribe, archive locations, and additional information, visit http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/mail.html.

1.4.3. IRC

Several members of the LFS community offer assistance on our community Internet Relay Chat (IRC) network. Before using this support, please make sure that your question is not already answered in the LFS FAQ or the mailing list archives. You can find the IRC network at irc.linuxfromscratch.org. The support channel is named #LFS-support.

1.4.4. Mirror Sites

The LFS project has a number of world-wide mirrors to make accessing the website and downloading the required packages more convenient. Please visit the LFS website at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/mirrors.html for a list of current mirrors.

1.4.5. Contact Information

Please direct all your questions and comments to one of the LFS mailing lists (see above).

1.5. Help

If an issue or a question is encountered while working through this book, please check the FAQ page at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/faq/#generalfaq. Questions are often already answered there. If your question is not answered on this page, try to find the source of the problem. The following hint will give you some guidance for troubleshooting: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/errors.txt.

If you cannot find your problem listed in the FAQ, search the mailing lists at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/search.html.

We also have a wonderful LFS community that is willing to offer assistance through the mailing lists and IRC (see the Section 1.4, “Resources” section of this book). However, we get several support questions every day and many of them can be easily answered by going to the FAQ and by searching the mailing lists first. So, for us to offer the best assistance possible, you need to do some research on your own first. That allows us to focus on the more unusual support needs. If your searches do not produce a solution, please include all relevant information (mentioned below) in your request for help.

1.5.1. Things to Mention

Apart from a brief explanation of the problem being experienced, the essential things to include in any request for help are:

  • The version of the book being used (in this case 6.8)

  • The host distribution and version being used to create LFS

  • The output from the Section vii, “Host System Requirements”

  • The package or section the problem was encountered in

  • The exact error message or symptom being received

  • Note whether you have deviated from the book at all

Note

Deviating from this book does not mean that we will not help you. After all, LFS is about personal preference. Being upfront about any changes to the established procedure helps us evaluate and determine possible causes of your problem.

1.5.2. Configure Script Problems

If something goes wrong while running the configure script, review the config.log file. This file may contain errors encountered during configure which were not printed to the screen. Include the relevant lines if you need to ask for help.

1.5.3. Compilation Problems

Both the screen output and the contents of various files are useful in determining the cause of compilation problems. The screen output from the configure script and the make run can be helpful. It is not necessary to include the entire output, but do include enough of the relevant information. Below is an example of the type of information to include from the screen output from make:

gcc -DALIASPATH=\"/mnt/lfs/usr/share/locale:.\"
-DLOCALEDIR=\"/mnt/lfs/usr/share/locale\"
-DLIBDIR=\"/mnt/lfs/usr/lib\"
-DINCLUDEDIR=\"/mnt/lfs/usr/include\" -DHAVE_CONFIG_H -I. -I.
-g -O2 -c getopt1.c
gcc -g -O2 -static -o make ar.o arscan.o commands.o dir.o
expand.o file.o function.o getopt.o implicit.o job.o main.o
misc.o read.o remake.o rule.o signame.o variable.o vpath.o
default.o remote-stub.o version.o opt1.o
-lutil job.o: In function `load_too_high':
/lfs/tmp/make-3.79.1/job.c:1565: undefined reference
to `getloadavg'
collect2: ld returned 1 exit status
make[2]: *** [make] Error 1
make[2]: Leaving directory `/lfs/tmp/make-3.79.1'
make[1]: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
make[1]: Leaving directory `/lfs/tmp/make-3.79.1'
make: *** [all-recursive-am] Error 2

In this case, many people would just include the bottom section:

make [2]: *** [make] Error 1

This is not enough information to properly diagnose the problem because it only notes that something went wrong, not what went wrong. The entire section, as in the example above, is what should be saved because it includes the command that was executed and the associated error message(s).

An excellent article about asking for help on the Internet is available online at http://catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html. Read and follow the hints in this document to increase the likelihood of getting the help you need.

Part II. Preparing for the Build

Chapter 2. Preparing a New Partition

2.1. Introduction

In this chapter, the partition which will host the LFS system is prepared. We will create the partition itself, create a file system on it, and mount it.

2.2. Creating a New Partition

Like most other operating systems, LFS is usually installed on a dedicated partition. The recommended approach to building an LFS system is to use an available empty partition or, if you have enough unpartitioned space, to create one.

A minimal system requires a partition of around 1.3 gigabytes (GB). This is enough to store all the source tarballs and compile the packages. However, if the LFS system is intended to be the primary Linux system, additional software will probably be installed which will require additional space (2-3 GB). The LFS system itself will not take up this much room. A large portion of this requirement is to provide sufficient free temporary storage. Compiling packages can require a lot of disk space which will be reclaimed after the package is installed.

Because there is not always enough Random Access Memory (RAM) available for compilation processes, it is a good idea to use a small disk partition as swap space. This is used by the kernel to store seldom-used data and leave more memory available for active processes. The swap partition for an LFS system can be the same as the one used by the host system, in which case it is not necessary to create another one.

Start a disk partitioning program such as cfdisk or fdisk with a command line option naming the hard disk on which the new partition will be created—for example /dev/hda for the primary Integrated Drive Electronics (IDE) disk. Create a Linux native partition and a swap partition, if needed. Please refer to cfdisk(8) or fdisk(8) if you do not yet know how to use the programs.

Remember the designation of the new partition (e.g., hda5). This book will refer to this as the LFS partition. Also remember the designation of the swap partition. These names will be needed later for the /etc/fstab file.

2.2.1. Other Partition Issues

Requests for advice on system partitioning are often posted on the LFS mailing lists. This is a highly subjective topic. The default for most distributions is to use the entire drive with the exception of one small swap partition. This is not optimal for LFS for several reasons. It reduces flexibility, makes sharing of data across multiple distributions or LFS builds more difficult, makes backups more time consuming, and can waste disk space through inefficient allocation of file system structures.

2.2.1.1. The Root Partition

A root LFS partition (not to be confused with the /root directory) of ten gigabytes is a good compromise for most systems. It provides enough space to build LFS and most of BLFS, but is small enough so that multiple partitions can be easily created for experimentation.

2.2.1.2. The Swap Partition

Most distributions automatically create a swap partition. Generally the recommended size of the swap partition is about twice the amount of physical RAM, however this is rarely needed. If disk space is limited, hold the swap partition to two gigabytes and monitor the amount of disk swapping.

Swapping is never good. Generally you can tell if a system is swapping by just listening to disk activity and observing how the system reacts to commands. The first reaction to swapping should be to check for an unreasonable command such as trying to edit a five gigabyte file. If swapping becomes a normal occurance, the best solution is to purchase more RAM for your system.

2.2.1.3. Convenience Partitions

There are several other partitions that are not required, but should be considered when designing a disk layout. The following list is not comprehensive, but is meant as a guide.

  • /boot – Highly recommended. Use this partition to store kernels and other booting information. To minimize potential boot problems with larger disks, make this the first physical partition on your first disk drive. A partition size of 100 megabytes is quite adequate.

  • /home – Highly recommended. Share your home directory and user customization across multiple distributions or LFS builds. The size is generally fairly large and depends on available disk space.

  • /usr – A separate /usr partition is generally used if providing a server for a thin client or diskless workstation. It is normally not needed for LFS. A size of five gigabytes will handle most installations.

  • /opt – This directory is most useful for BLFS where multiple installations of large packages like Gnome or KDE can be installed without embedding the files in the /usr hierarchy. If used, five to ten gigabytes is generally adequate.

  • /tmp – A separate /tmp directory is rare, but useful if configuring a thin client. This partition, if used, will usually not need to exceed a couple of gigabytes.

  • /usr/src – This partition is very useful for providing a location to store BLFS source files and share them across LFS builds. It can also be used as a location for building BLFS packages. A reasonably large partition of 30-50 gigabytes allows plenty of room.

Any separate partition that you want automatically mounted upon boot needs to be specified in the /etc/fstab. Details about how to specify partitions will be discussed in Section 8.2, “Creating the /etc/fstab File”.

2.3. Creating a File System on the Partition

Now that a blank partition has been set up, the file system can be created. The most widely-used system in the Linux world is the second extended file system (ext2), but with newer high-capacity hard disks, journaling file systems are becoming increasingly popular. The third extended filesystem (ext3) is a widely used enhancement to ext2, which adds journaling capabilities and is compatible with the E2fsprogs utilities. We will create an ext3 file system. Instructions for creating other file systems can be found at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/postlfs/filesystems.html.

To create an ext3 file system on the LFS partition, run the following:

mke2fs -jv /dev/<xxx>

Replace <xxx> with the name of the LFS partition (hda5 in our previous example).

Note

Some host distributions use custom features in their filesystem creation tools (E2fsprogs). This can cause problems when booting into your new LFS in Chapter 9, as those features will not be supported by the LFS-installed E2fsprogs; you will get an error similar to “unsupported filesystem features, upgrade your e2fsprogs”. To check if your host system uses custom enhancements, run the following command:

debugfs -R feature /dev/<xxx>

If the output contains features other than has_journal, ext_attr, resize_inode, dir_index, filetype, sparse_super, large_file or needs_recovery, then your host system may have custom enhancements. In that case, to avoid later problems, you should compile the stock E2fsprogs package and use the resulting binaries to re-create the filesystem on your LFS partition:

cd /tmp
tar -xzvf /path/to/sources/e2fsprogs-1.41.14.tar.gz
cd e2fsprogs-1.41.14
mkdir -v build
cd build
../configure
make #note that we intentionally don't 'make install' here!
./misc/mke2fs -jv /dev/<xxx>
cd /tmp
rm -rfv e2fsprogs-1.41.14

If you are using an existing swap partition, there is no need to format it. If a new swap partition was created, it will need to be initialized with this command:

mkswap /dev/<yyy>

Replace <yyy> with the name of the swap partition.

2.4. Mounting the New Partition

Now that a file system has been created, the partition needs to be made accessible. In order to do this, the partition needs to be mounted at a chosen mount point. For the purposes of this book, it is assumed that the file system is mounted under /mnt/lfs, but the directory choice is up to you.

Choose a mount point and assign it to the LFS environment variable by running:

export LFS=/mnt/lfs

Next, create the mount point and mount the LFS file system by running:

mkdir -pv $LFS
mount -v -t ext3 /dev/<xxx> $LFS

Replace <xxx> with the designation of the LFS partition.

If using multiple partitions for LFS (e.g., one for / and another for /usr), mount them using:

mkdir -pv $LFS
mount -v -t ext3 /dev/<xxx> $LFS
mkdir -v $LFS/usr
mount -v -t ext3 /dev/<yyy> $LFS/usr

Replace <xxx> and <yyy> with the appropriate partition names.

Ensure that this new partition is not mounted with permissions that are too restrictive (such as the nosuid, nodev, or noatime options). Run the mount command without any parameters to see what options are set for the mounted LFS partition. If nosuid, nodev, and/or noatime are set, the partition will need to be remounted.

If you are using a swap partition, ensure that it is enabled using the swapon command:

/sbin/swapon -v /dev/<zzz>

Replace <zzz> with the name of the swap partition.

Now that there is an established place to work, it is time to download the packages.

Chapter 3. Packages and Patches

3.1. Introduction

This chapter includes a list of packages that need to be downloaded in order to build a basic Linux system. The listed version numbers correspond to versions of the software that are known to work, and this book is based on their use. We highly recommend against using newer versions because the build commands for one version may not work with a newer version. The newest package versions may also have problems that require work-arounds. These work-arounds will be developed and stabilized in the development version of the book.

Download locations may not always be accessible. If a download location has changed since this book was published, Google (http://www.google.com/) provides a useful search engine for most packages. If this search is unsuccessful, try one of the alternative means of downloading discussed at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/packages.html#packages.

Downloaded packages and patches will need to be stored somewhere that is conveniently available throughout the entire build. A working directory is also required to unpack the sources and build them. $LFS/sources can be used both as the place to store the tarballs and patches and as a working directory. By using this directory, the required elements will be located on the LFS partition and will be available during all stages of the building process.

To create this directory, execute the following command, as user root, before starting the download session:

mkdir -v $LFS/sources

Make this directory writable and sticky. “Sticky” means that even if multiple users have write permission on a directory, only the owner of a file can delete the file within a sticky directory. The following command will enable the write and sticky modes:

chmod -v a+wt $LFS/sources

An easy way to download all of the packages and patches is by using wget-list as an input to wget. For example:

wget -i wget-list -P $LFS/sources

3.2. All Packages

Download or otherwise obtain the following packages:

Autoconf (2.68) - 1,350 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/autoconf/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/autoconf/autoconf-2.68.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 864d785215aa60d627c91fcb21b05b07

Automake (1.11.1) - 1,042 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/automake/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/automake/automake-1.11.1.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: c2972c4d9b3e29c03d5f2af86249876f

Bash (4.2) - 6,845 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/bash/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/bash/bash-4.2.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 3fb927c7c33022f1c327f14a81c0d4b0

Binutils (2.21) - 18,304 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/binutils/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/binutils/binutils-2.21.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: c84c5acc9d266f1a7044b51c85a823f5

Bison (2.4.3) - 1,614 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/bison/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/bison/bison-2.4.3.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: c1d3ea81bc370dbd43b6f0b2cd21287e

Bzip2 (1.0.6) - 764 KB:

Home page: http://www.bzip.org/

Download: http://www.bzip.org/1.0.6/bzip2-1.0.6.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 00b516f4704d4a7cb50a1d97e6e8e15b

Coreutils (8.10) - 11,064 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/coreutils/coreutils-8.10.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 74d54d09fc5c1bd3337127f49c88b1c5

DejaGNU (1.4.4) - 1,055 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/dejagnu/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/dejagnu/dejagnu-1.4.4.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 053f18fd5d00873de365413cab17a666

Diffutils (3.0) - 1,781 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/diffutils/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/diffutils/diffutils-3.0.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 684aaba1baab743a2a90e52162ff07da

E2fsprogs (1.41.14) - 4,406 KB:

Home page: http://e2fsprogs.sourceforge.net/

Download: http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/e2fsprogs/e2fsprogs-1.41.14.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 05f70470aea2ef7efbb0845b2b116720

Expect (5.45) - 614 KB:

Home page: http://expect.sourceforge.net/

Download: http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/expect/expect5.45.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 44e1a4f4c877e9ddc5a542dfa7ecc92b

File (5.05) - 583 KB:

Home page: http://www.darwinsys.com/file/

Download: ftp://ftp.astron.com/pub/file/file-5.05.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 0b429063710457be2bd17a18389cb018

Note

File (5.05) may no longer be available at the listed location. The site administrators of the master download location occasionally remove older versions when new ones are released. An alternative download location that may have the correct version available can also be found at: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/download.html#ftp.

Findutils (4.4.2) - 2,100 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/findutils/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/findutils/findutils-4.4.2.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 351cc4adb07d54877fa15f75fb77d39f

Flex (2.5.35) - 1,227 KB:

Home page: http://flex.sourceforge.net

Download: http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/flex/flex-2.5.35.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 10714e50cea54dc7a227e3eddcd44d57

Gawk (3.1.8) - 1,938 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/gawk/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gawk/gawk-3.1.8.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 52b41c6c4418b3226dfb8f82076193bb

GCC (4.5.2) - 64,774 KB:

Home page: http://gcc.gnu.org/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gcc/gcc-4.5.2/gcc-4.5.2.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: d6559145853fbaaa0fd7556ed93bce9a

GDBM (1.8.3) - 223 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/gdbm/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gdbm/gdbm-1.8.3.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 1d1b1d5c0245b1c00aff92da751e9aa1

Gettext (0.18.1.1) - 14,785 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/gettext/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gettext/gettext-0.18.1.1.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 3dd55b952826d2b32f51308f2f91aa89

Glibc (2.13) - 15,357 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/libc/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/glibc/glibc-2.13.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 38808215a7c40aa0bb47a5e6d3d12475

GMP (5.0.1) - 1,959 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/gmp/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gmp/gmp-5.0.1.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 6bac6df75c192a13419dfd71d19240a7

Grep (2.7) - 1,466 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/grep/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/grep/grep-2.7.tar.gz

MD5 sum: e848f07e3e79aa7899345d17c7e4115e

Groff (1.21) - 3,774 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/groff/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/groff/groff-1.21.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 8b8cd29385b97616a0f0d96d0951c5bf

GRUB (1.98) - 2,392 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/

Download: ftp://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/grub/grub-1.98.tar.gz

MD5 sum: c0bcf60e524739bb64e3a2d4e3732a59

Gzip (1.4) - 886 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/gzip/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gzip/gzip-1.4.tar.gz

MD5 sum: e381b8506210c794278f5527cba0e765

Iana-Etc (2.30) - 201 KB:

Home page: http://freshmeat.net/projects/iana-etc/

Download: http://anduin.linuxfromscratch.org/sources/LFS/lfs-packages/conglomeration//iana-etc/iana-etc-2.30.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 3ba3afb1d1b261383d247f46cb135ee8

Inetutils (1.8) - 1,810 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/inetutils/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/inetutils/inetutils-1.8.tar.gz

MD5 sum: ad8fdcdf1797b9ca258264a6b04e48fd

IPRoute2 (2.6.37) - 380 KB:

Home page: http://www.linuxfoundation.org/collaborate/workgroups/networking/iproute2

Download: http://devresources.linuxfoundation.org/dev/iproute2/download/iproute2-2.6.37.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 9774ff9d74ebd301bf56bd8d74473786

Kbd (1.15.2) - 1,520 KB:

Download: http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kbd/kbd-1.15.2.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 77d0b51454522bc6c170bbdc6e31202a

Less (436) - 297 KB:

Home page: http://www.greenwoodsoftware.com/less/

Download: http://www.greenwoodsoftware.com/less/less-436.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 817bf051953ad2dea825a1cdf460caa4

LFS-Bootscripts (20100627) - 43 KB:

Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/downloads/6.8/lfs-bootscripts-20100627.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 8260bdb271caa3b538f8e95f65998864

Libtool (2.4) - 2,520 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/libtool/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/libtool/libtool-2.4.tar.gz

MD5 sum: b32b04148ecdd7344abc6fe8bd1bb021

Linux (2.6.37) - 71,854 KB:

Home page: http://www.kernel.org/

Download: http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.6/linux-2.6.37.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: c8ee37b4fdccdb651e0603d35350b434

Note

The Linux kernel is updated relatively often, many times due to discoveries of security vulnerabilities. The latest available 2.6.37.x kernel version should be used, unless the errata page says otherwise.

For users with limited speed or expensive bandwidth who wish to update the Linux kernel, a baseline version of the package and patches can be downloaded separately. This may save some time or cost for a subsequent patch level upgrade within a minor release.

M4 (1.4.15) - 1,099 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/m4/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/m4/m4-1.4.15.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: c7c32540bc3842d5550f88d47ef551d8

Make (3.82) - 1,213 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/make/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/make/make-3.82.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 1a11100f3c63fcf5753818e59d63088f

Man-DB (2.5.9) - 2,312 KB:

Home page: http://www.nongnu.org/man-db/

Download: http://download.savannah.gnu.org/releases/man-db/man-db-2.5.9.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 9841394f5c5fe7e2dd2e0c5fb4766d0f

Man-pages (3.32) - 1,108 KB:

Home page: http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/

Download: http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/docs/manpages/man-pages-3.32.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 1278c5289660e42a597fefd30d9bdcf0

Module-Init-Tools (3.12) - 917 KB:

Home page: https://modules.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Module_init_tools_3_12

Download: http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/module-init-tools/module-init-tools-3.12.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 8b2257ce9abef74c4a44d825d23140f3

MPC (0.8.2) - 536 KB:

Home page: http://www.multiprecision.org/

Download: http://www.multiprecision.org/mpc/download/mpc-0.8.2.tar.gz

MD5 sum: e98267ebd5648a39f881d66797122fb6

MPFR (3.0.0) - 1,112 KB:

Home page: http://www.mpfr.org/

Download: http://www.mpfr.org/mpfr-3.0.0/mpfr-3.0.0.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: f45bac3584922c8004a10060ab1a8f9f

Ncurses (5.7) - 2,388 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/ncurses/

Download: ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/ncurses/ncurses-5.7.tar.gz

MD5 sum: cce05daf61a64501ef6cd8da1f727ec6

Patch (2.6.1) - 248 KB:

Home page: http://savannah.gnu.org/projects/patch/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/patch/patch-2.6.1.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 0818d1763ae0c4281bcdc63cdac0b2c0

Perl (5.12.3) - 11,759 KB:

Home page: http://www.perl.org/

Download: http://www.cpan.org/src/5.0/perl-5.12.3.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 72f3f7e1c700e79bbf9d9279ca5b42d9

Pkg-config (0.25) - 966 KB:

Home page: http://pkg-config.freedesktop.org/

Download: http://pkgconfig.freedesktop.org/releases/pkg-config-0.25.tar.gz

MD5 sum: a3270bab3f4b69b7dc6dbdacbcae9745

Procps (3.2.8) - 279 KB:

Home page: http://procps.sourceforge.net/

Download: http://procps.sourceforge.net/procps-3.2.8.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 9532714b6846013ca9898984ba4cd7e0

Psmisc (22.13) - 373 KB:

Home page: http://psmisc.sourceforge.net/

Download: http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/psmisc/psmisc-22.13.tar.gz

MD5 sum: e2c339e6b65b730042084023784a729e

Readline (6.2) - 2,225 KB:

Home page: http://cnswww.cns.cwru.edu/php/chet/readline/rltop.html

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/readline/readline-6.2.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 67948acb2ca081f23359d0256e9a271c

Sed (4.2.1) - 878 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/sed/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/sed/sed-4.2.1.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 7d310fbd76e01a01115075c1fd3f455a

Shadow (4.1.4.3) - 1,762 KB:

Home page: http://pkg-shadow.alioth.debian.org/

Download: ftp://pkg-shadow.alioth.debian.org/pub/pkg-shadow/shadow-4.1.4.3.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: b8608d8294ac88974f27b20f991c0e79

Sysklogd (1.5) - 85 KB:

Home page: http://www.infodrom.org/projects/sysklogd/

Download: http://www.infodrom.org/projects/sysklogd/download/sysklogd-1.5.tar.gz

MD5 sum: e053094e8103165f98ddafe828f6ae4b

Sysvinit (2.88dsf) - 108 KB:

Home page: http://savannah.nongnu.org/projects/sysvinit

Download: http://download.savannah.gnu.org/releases/sysvinit/sysvinit-2.88dsf.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 6eda8a97b86e0a6f59dabbf25202aa6f

Tar (1.25) - 2,273 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/tar/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/tar/tar-1.25.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 6e497f861c77bbba2f7da4e10270995b

Tcl (8.5.9) - 4,365 KB:

Home page: http://tcl.sourceforge.net/

Download: http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/tcl/tcl8.5.9-src.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 8512d8db3233041dd68a81476906012a

Texinfo (4.13a) - 2,687 KB:

Home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/texinfo/

Download: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/texinfo/texinfo-4.13a.tar.gz

MD5 sum: 71ba711519209b5fb583fed2b3d86fcb

Udev (166) - 573 KB:

Home page: http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/hotplug/udev.html

Download: http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/hotplug/udev-166.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 4db27d73fdbe94f47fd89fdd105c2dfb

Udev Test Tarball (166) - 150 KB:

Download: http://anduin.linuxfromscratch.org/sources/other/udev-166-testfiles.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 64ada14e464dee3388787e3aebf2ac34

Udev Configuration Tarball - 7 KB:

Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/downloads/6.8/udev-config-20100128.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 32de4eb504b2ad67b43cb4fe16da92e2

Util-linux (2.19) - 4,288 KB:

Home page: http://userweb.kernel.org/~kzak/util-linux/

Download: http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/v2.19/util-linux-2.19.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 590ca71aad0b254e2631d84401f28255

Vim (7.3) - 8,675 KB:

Home page: http://www.vim.org

Download: ftp://ftp.vim.org/pub/vim/unix/vim-7.3.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: 5b9510a17074e2b37d8bb38ae09edbf2

Xz Utils (5.0.1) - 982 KB:

Home page: http://tukaani.org/xz

Download: http://tukaani.org/xz/xz-5.0.1.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: cb6c7a58cec4d663a395c54d186ca0c6

Zlib (1.2.5) - 532 KB:

Home page: http://www.zlib.net/

Download: http://www.zlib.net/zlib-1.2.5.tar.bz2

MD5 sum: be1e89810e66150f5b0327984d8625a0

Total size of these packages: about 286 MB

3.3. Needed Patches

In addition to the packages, several patches are also required. These patches correct any mistakes in the packages that should be fixed by the maintainer. The patches also make small modifications to make the packages easier to work with. The following patches will be needed to build an LFS system:

Bzip2 Documentation Patch - 1.6 KB:

Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.8/bzip2-1.0.6-install_docs-1.patch

MD5 sum: 6a5ac7e89b791aae556de0f745916f7f

Coreutils Internationalization Fixes Patch - 120 KB:

Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.8/coreutils-8.10-i18n-1.patch

MD5 sum: 28895e1112835ca04119158d1883a6d5

Coreutils Uname Patch - 1.6 KB:

Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.8/coreutils-8.10-uname-1.patch

MD5 sum: 500481b75892e5c07e19e9953a690e54

Dejagnu Consolidated Patch - 6 KB:

Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.8/dejagnu-1.4.4-consolidated-1.patch

MD5 sum: b9949a8abcc210d1dc9cdda06821c199

Flex GCC-4.4.x Patch - 1 KB:

Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.8/flex-2.5.35-gcc44-1.patch

MD5 sum: ad9109820534278c6dd0898178c0788f

GCC Startfiles Fix Patch - 1.5 KB:

Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.8/gcc-4.5.2-startfiles_fix-1.patch

MD5 sum: 799ef1971350d2e3c794f2123f247cc6

Glibc GCC Build Fix Patch - 2.5 KB:

Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.8/glibc-2.13-gcc_fix-1.patch

MD5 sum: d1f28cb98acb9417fe52596908bbb9fd

Kbd Backspace/Delete Fix Patch - 12 KB:

Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.8/kbd-1.15.2-backspace-1.patch

MD5 sum: f75cca16a38da6caa7d52151f7136895

Patch Testsuite Fix Patch - 1 KB:

Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.8/patch-2.6.1-test_fix-1.patch

MD5 sum: c51e1a95bfc5310635d05081472c3534

Perl Libc Patch - 1 KB:

Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.8/perl-5.12.3-libc-1.patch

MD5 sum: 800dfd3c9618731ee5cf57f77a7942b4

Procps HZ Errors Patch - 2.3 KB:

Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.8/procps-3.2.8-fix_HZ_errors-1.patch

MD5 sum: 2ea4c8e9a2c2a5a291ec63c92d7c6e3b

Procps Watch Patch - 3.5 KB:

Download: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/6.8/procps-3.2.8-watch_unicode-1.patch

MD5 sum: cd1a757e532d93662a7ed71da80e6b58

Total size of these patches: about 154 KB

In addition to the above required patches, there exist a number of optional patches created by the LFS community. These optional patches solve minor problems or enable functionality that is not enabled by default. Feel free to peruse the patches database located at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/downloads/ and acquire any additional patches to suit your system needs.

Chapter 4. Final Preparations

4.1. About $LFS

Throughout this book, the environment variable LFS will be used. It is paramount that this variable is always defined. It should be set to the mount point chosen for the LFS partition. Check that the LFS variable is set up properly with:

echo $LFS

Make sure the output shows the path to the LFS partition's mount point, which is /mnt/lfs if the provided example was followed. If the output is incorrect, the variable can be set with:

export LFS=/mnt/lfs

Having this variable set is beneficial in that commands such as mkdir $LFS/tools can be typed literally. The shell will automatically replace “$LFS” with “/mnt/lfs” (or whatever the variable was set to) when it processes the command line.

Do not forget to check that $LFS is set whenever you leave and reenter the current working environment (as when doing a su to root or another user).

4.2. Creating the $LFS/tools Directory

All programs compiled in Chapter 5 will be installed under $LFS/tools to keep them separate from the programs compiled in Chapter 6. The programs compiled here are temporary tools and will not be a part of the final LFS system. By keeping these programs in a separate directory, they can easily be discarded later after their use. This also prevents these programs from ending up in the host production directories (easy to do by accident in Chapter 5).

Create the required directory by running the following as root:

mkdir -v $LFS/tools

The next step is to create a /tools symlink on the host system. This will point to the newly-created directory on the LFS partition. Run this command as root as well:

ln -sv $LFS/tools /

Note

The above command is correct. The ln command has a few syntactic variations, so be sure to check info coreutils ln and ln(1) before reporting what you may think is an error.

The created symlink enables the toolchain to be compiled so that it always refers to /tools, meaning that the compiler, assembler, and linker will work both in Chapter 5 (when we are still using some tools from the host) and in the next (when we are “chrooted” to the LFS partition).

4.3. Adding the LFS User

When logged in as user root, making a single mistake can damage or destroy a system. Therefore, we recommend building the packages in this chapter as an unprivileged user. You could use your own user name, but to make it easier to set up a clean working environment, create a new user called lfs as a member of a new group (also named lfs) and use this user during the installation process. As root, issue the following commands to add the new user:

groupadd lfs
useradd -s /bin/bash -g lfs -m -k /dev/null lfs

The meaning of the command line options:

-s /bin/bash

This makes bash the default shell for user lfs.

-g lfs

This option adds user lfs to group lfs.

-m

This creates a home directory for lfs.

-k /dev/null

This parameter prevents possible copying of files from a skeleton directory (default is /etc/skel) by changing the input location to the special null device.

lfs

This is the actual name for the created group and user.

To log in as lfs (as opposed to switching to user lfs when logged in as root, which does not require the lfs user to have a password), give lfs a password:

passwd lfs

Grant lfs full access to $LFS/tools by making lfs the directory owner:

chown -v lfs $LFS/tools

If a separate working directory was created as suggested, give user lfs ownership of this directory:

chown -v lfs $LFS/sources

Next, login as user lfs. This can be done via a virtual console, through a display manager, or with the following substitute user command:

su - lfs

The “-” instructs su to start a login shell as opposed to a non-login shell. The difference between these two types of shells can be found in detail in bash(1) and info bash.

4.4. Setting Up the Environment

Set up a good working environment by creating two new startup files for the bash shell. While logged in as user lfs, issue the following command to create a new .bash_profile:

cat > ~/.bash_profile << "EOF"
exec env -i HOME=$HOME TERM=$TERM PS1='\u:\w\$ ' /bin/bash
EOF

When logged on as user lfs, the initial shell is usually a login shell which reads the /etc/profile of the host (probably containing some settings and environment variables) and then .bash_profile. The exec env -i.../bin/bash command in the .bash_profile file replaces the running shell with a new one with a completely empty environment, except for the HOME, TERM, and PS1 variables. This ensures that no unwanted and potentially hazardous environment variables from the host system leak into the build environment. The technique used here achieves the goal of ensuring a clean environment.

The new instance of the shell is a non-login shell, which does not read the /etc/profile or .bash_profile files, but rather reads the .bashrc file instead. Create the .bashrc file now:

cat > ~/.bashrc << "EOF"
set +h
umask 022
LFS=/mnt/lfs
LC_ALL=POSIX
LFS_TGT=$(uname -m)-lfs-linux-gnu
PATH=/tools/bin:/bin:/usr/bin
export LFS LC_ALL LFS_TGT PATH
EOF

The set +h command turns off bash's hash function. Hashing is ordinarily a useful feature—bash uses a hash table to remember the full path of executable files to avoid searching the PATH time and again to find the same executable. However, the new tools should be used as soon as they are installed. By switching off the hash function, the shell will always search the PATH when a program is to be run. As such, the shell will find the newly compiled tools in $LFS/tools as soon as they are available without remembering a previous version of the same program in a different location.

Setting the user file-creation mask (umask) to 022 ensures that newly created files and directories are only writable by their owner, but are readable and executable by anyone (assuming default modes are used by the open(2) system call, new files will end up with permission mode 644 and directories with mode 755).

The LFS variable should be set to the chosen mount point.

The LC_ALL variable controls the localization of certain programs, making their messages follow the conventions of a specified country. If the host system uses a version of Glibc older than 2.2.4, having LC_ALL set to something other than “POSIX” or “C” (during this chapter) may cause issues if you exit the chroot environment and wish to return later. Setting LC_ALL to “POSIX” or “C” (the two are equivalent) ensures that everything will work as expected in the chroot environment.

The LFS_TGT variable sets a non-default, but compatible machine description for use when building our cross compiler and linker and when cross compiling our temporary toolchain. More information is contained in Section 5.2, “Toolchain Technical Notes”.

By putting /tools/bin ahead of the standard PATH, all the programs installed in Chapter 5 are picked up by the shell immediately after their installation. This, combined with turning off hashing, limits the risk that old programs are used from the host when the same programs are available in the chapter 5 environment.

Finally, to have the environment fully prepared for building the temporary tools, source the just-created user profile:

source ~/.bash_profile

4.5. About SBUs

Many people would like to know beforehand approximately how long it takes to compile and install each package. Because Linux From Scratch can be built on many different systems, it is impossible to provide accurate time estimates. The biggest package (Glibc) will take approximately 20 minutes on the fastest systems, but could take up to three days on slower systems! Instead of providing actual times, the Standard Build Unit (SBU) measure will be used instead.

The SBU measure works as follows. The first package to be compiled from this book is Binutils in Chapter 5. The time it takes to compile this package is what will be referred to as the Standard Build Unit or SBU. All other compile times will be expressed relative to this time.

For example, consider a package whose compilation time is 4.5 SBUs. This means that if a system took 10 minutes to compile and install the first pass of Binutils, it will take approximately 45 minutes to build this example package. Fortunately, most build times are shorter than the one for Binutils.

In general, SBUs are not entirely accurate because they depend on many factors, including the host system's version of GCC. They are provided here to give an estimate of how long it might take to install a package, but the numbers can vary by as much as dozens of minutes in some cases.

To view actual timings for a number of specific machines, we recommend The LinuxFromScratch SBU Home Page at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/~sbu/.

Note

For many modern systems with multiple processors (or cores) the compilation time for a package can be reduced by performing a "parallel make" by either setting an environment variable or telling the make program how many processors are available. For instance, a Core2Duo can support two simultaneous processes with:

export MAKEFLAGS='-j 2'

or just building with:

make -j2

When multiple processors are used in this way, the SBU units in the book will vary even more than they normally would. Analyzing the output of the build process will also be more difficult because the lines of different processes will be interleaved. If you run into a problem with a build step, revert back to a single processor build to properly analyze the error messages.

4.6. About the Test Suites

Most packages provide a test suite. Running the test suite for a newly built package is a good idea because it can provide a “sanity check” indicating that everything compiled correctly. A test suite that passes its set of checks usually proves that the package is functioning as the developer intended. It does not, however, guarantee that the package is totally bug free.

Some test suites are more important than others. For example, the test suites for the core toolchain packages—GCC, Binutils, and Glibc—are of the utmost importance due to their central role in a properly functioning system. The test suites for GCC and Glibc can take a very long time to complete, especially on slower hardware, but are strongly recommended.

Note

Experience has shown that there is little to be gained from running the test suites in Chapter 5. There can be no escaping the fact that the host system always exerts some influence on the tests in that chapter, often causing inexplicable failures. Because the tools built in Chapter 5 are temporary and eventually discarded, we do not recommend running the test suites in Chapter 5 for the average reader. The instructions for running those test suites are provided for the benefit of testers and developers, but they are strictly optional.

A common issue with running the test suites for Binutils and GCC is running out of pseudo terminals (PTYs). This can result in a high number of failing tests. This may happen for several reasons, but the most likely cause is that the host system does not have the devpts file system set up correctly. This issue is discussed in greater detail at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org//lfs/faq.html#no-ptys.

Sometimes package test suites will fail, but for reasons which the developers are aware of and have deemed non-critical. Consult the logs located at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/build-logs/6.8/ to verify whether or not these failures are expected. This site is valid for all tests throughout this book.

Chapter 5. Constructing a Temporary System

5.1. Introduction

This chapter shows how to build a minimal Linux system. This system will contain just enough tools to start constructing the final LFS system in Chapter 6 and allow a working environment with more user convenience than a minimum environment would.

There are two steps in building this minimal system. The first step is to build a new and host-independent toolchain (compiler, assembler, linker, libraries, and a few useful utilities). The second step uses this toolchain to build the other essential tools.

The files compiled in this chapter will be installed under the $LFS/tools directory to keep them separate from the files installed in the next chapter and the host production directories. Since the packages compiled here are temporary, we do not want them to pollute the soon-to-be LFS system.

5.2. Toolchain Technical Notes

This section explains some of the rationale and technical details behind the overall build method. It is not essential to immediately understand everything in this section. Most of this information will be clearer after performing an actual build. This section can be referred to at any time during the process.

The overall goal of Chapter 5 is to produce a temporary area that contains a known-good set of tools that can be isolated from the host system. By using chroot, the commands in the remaining chapters will be contained within that environment, ensuring a clean, trouble-free build of the target LFS system. The build process has been designed to minimize the risks for new readers and to provide the most educational value at the same time.

Important

Before continuing, be aware of the name of the working platform, often referred to as the target triplet. A simple way to determine the name of the target triplet is to run the config.guess script that comes with the source for many packages. Unpack the Binutils sources and run the script: ./config.guess and note the output. For example, for a modern 32-bit Intel processor the output will likely be i686-pc-linux-gnu.

Also be aware of the name of the platform's dynamic linker, often referred to as the dynamic loader (not to be confused with the standard linker ld that is part of Binutils). The dynamic linker provided by Glibc finds and loads the shared libraries needed by a program, prepares the program to run, and then runs it. The name of the dynamic linker for a 32-bit Intel machine will be ld-linux.so.2. A sure-fire way to determine the name of the dynamic linker is to inspect a random binary from the host system by running: readelf -l <name of binary> | grep interpreter and noting the output. The authoritative reference covering all platforms is in the shlib-versions file in the root of the Glibc source tree.

Some key technical points of how the Chapter 5 build method works:

  • Slightly adjusting the name of the working platform, by changing the "vendor" field target triplet by way of the LFS_TGT variable, ensures that the first build of Binutils and GCC produces a compatible cross-linker and cross-compiler. Instead of producing binaries for another architecture, the cross-linker and cross-compiler will produce binaries compatible with the current hardware.

  • The temporary libraries are cross-compiled. Because a cross-compiler by its nature cannot rely on anything from its host system, this method removes potential contamination of the target system by lessening the chance of headers or libraries from the host being incorporated into the new tools. Cross-compilation also allows for the possibility of building both 32-bit and 64-bit libraries on 64-bit capable hardware.

  • Careful manipulation of gcc's specs file tells the compiler which target dynamic linker will be used

Binutils is installed first because the configure runs of both GCC and Glibc perform various feature tests on the assembler and linker to determine which software features to enable or disable. This is more important than one might first realize. An incorrectly configured GCC or Glibc can result in a subtly broken toolchain, where the impact of such breakage might not show up until near the end of the build of an entire distribution. A test suite failure will usually highlight this error before too much additional work is performed.

Binutils installs its assembler and linker in two locations, /tools/bin and /tools/$LFS_TGT/bin. The tools in one location are hard linked to the other. An important facet of the linker is its library search order. Detailed information can be obtained from ld by passing it the --verbose flag. For example, an ld --verbose | grep SEARCH will illustrate the current search paths and their order. It shows which files are linked by ld by compiling a dummy program and passing the --verbose switch to the linker. For example, gcc dummy.c -Wl,--verbose 2>&1 | grep succeeded will show all the files successfully opened during the linking.

The next package installed is GCC. An example of what can be seen during its run of configure is:

checking what assembler to use... /tools/i686-lfs-linux-gnu/bin/as
checking what linker to use... /tools/i686-lfs-linux-gnu/bin/ld

This is important for the reasons mentioned above. It also demonstrates that GCC's configure script does not search the PATH directories to find which tools to use. However, during the actual operation of gcc itself, the same search paths are not necessarily used. To find out which standard linker gcc will use, run: gcc -print-prog-name=ld.

Detailed information can be obtained from gcc by passing it the -v command line option while compiling a dummy program. For example, gcc -v dummy.c will show detailed information about the preprocessor, compilation, and assembly stages, including gcc's included search paths and their order.

The next package installed is Glibc. The most important considerations for building Glibc are the compiler, binary tools, and kernel headers. The compiler is generally not an issue since Glibc will always use the compiler relating to the --host parameter passed to its configure script, e.g. in our case, i686-lfs-linux-gnu-gcc. The binary tools and kernel headers can be a bit more complicated. Therefore, take no risks and use the available configure switches to enforce the correct selections. After the run of configure, check the contents of the config.make file in the glibc-build directory for all important details. Note the use of CC="i686-lfs-gnu-gcc" to control which binary tools are used and the use of the -nostdinc and -isystem flags to control the compiler's include search path. These items highlight an important aspect of the Glibc package—it is very self-sufficient in terms of its build machinery and generally does not rely on toolchain defaults.

After the Glibc installation, change gcc's specs file to point to the new dynamic linker in /tools/lib. This last step is vital in ensuring that searching and linking take place only within the /tools prefix. A hard-wired path to a dynamic linker is embedded into every Executable and Link Format (ELF)-shared executable. This can be inspected by running: readelf -l <name of binary> | grep interpreter. Amending gcc's specs file ensures that every program compiled from here through the end of this chapter will use the new dynamic linker in /tools/lib.

For the second pass of GCC, its sources also need to be modified to tell GCC to use the new dynamic linker. Failure to do so will result in the GCC programs themselves having the name of the dynamic linker from the host system's /lib directory embedded into them, which would defeat the goal of getting away from the host.

During the second pass of Binutils, we are able to utilize the --with-lib-path configure switch to control ld's library search path. From this point onwards, the core toolchain is self-contained and self-hosted. The remainder of the Chapter 5 packages all build against the new Glibc in /tools.

Upon entering the chroot environment in Chapter 6, the first major package to be installed is Glibc, due to its self-sufficient nature mentioned above. Once this Glibc is installed into /usr, we will perform a quick changeover of the toolchain defaults, and then proceed in building the rest of the target LFS system.

5.3. General Compilation Instructions

When building packages there are several assumptions made within the instructions:

  • Several of the packages are patched before compilation, but only when the patch is needed to circumvent a problem. A patch is often needed in both this and the next chapter, but sometimes in only one or the other. Therefore, do not be concerned if instructions for a downloaded patch seem to be missing. Warning messages about offset or fuzz may also be encountered when applying a patch. Do not worry about these warnings, as the patch was still successfully applied.

  • During the compilation of most packages, there will be several warnings that scroll by on the screen. These are normal and can safely be ignored. These warnings are as they appear—warnings about deprecated, but not invalid, use of the C or C++ syntax. C standards change fairly often, and some packages still use the older standard. This is not a problem, but does prompt the warning.

    Important

    After installing each package, delete its source and build directories, unless specifically instructed otherwise. Deleting the sources prevents mis-configuration when the same package is reinstalled later.

  • Check one last time that the LFS environment variable is set up properly:

    echo $LFS

    Make sure the output shows the path to the LFS partition's mount point, which is /mnt/lfs, using our example.

  • Finally, two last important items must be emphasized:

    Important

    The build instructions assume that the bash shell is in use.

    Important

    Before issuing the build instructions for a package, the package should be unpacked as user lfs, and a cd into the created directory should be performed.

To re-emphasize the build process:

            1. Place all the sources and patches in a directory that will be accessible 
   from the chroot envronment such as /mnt/lfs/sources/.  Do not put 
   sources in /mnt/lfs/tools/.
2. Change to the sources directory.
3. For each package:
   a. Using the tar program, extract the package to be built.
   b. Change to the directory created when the package was extracted.
   c. Follow the book's instructions for building the package.
   d. Change back to the sources directory.
   e. Delete the extracted source directory and any <package>-build 
      directories that were created in the build process.

5.4. Binutils-2.21 - Pass 1

The Binutils package contains a linker, an assembler, and other tools for handling object files.

Approximate build time: 1 SBU
Required disk space: 248 MB

5.4.1. Installation of Cross Binutils

Note

Go back and re-read the notes in the previous section. Understanding the notes labeled important will save you a lot of problems later.

It is important that Binutils be the first package compiled because both Glibc and GCC perform various tests on the available linker and assembler to determine which of their own features to enable.

The Binutils documentation recommends building Binutils outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:

mkdir -v ../binutils-build
cd ../binutils-build

Note

In order for the SBU values listed in the rest of the book to be of any use, measure the time it takes to build this package from the configuration, up to and including the first install. To achieve this easily, wrap the three commands in a time command like this: time { ./configure ... && make && make install; }.

Note

The approximate build SBU values and required disk space in Chapter 5 does not include test suite data.

Now prepare Binutils for compilation:

../binutils-2.21/configure \
    --target=$LFS_TGT --prefix=/tools \
    --disable-nls --disable-werror

The meaning of the configure options:

--target=$LFS_TGT

Because the machine description in the LFS_TGT variable is slightly different than the value returned by the config.guess script, this switch will tell the configure script to adjust Binutil's build system for building a cross linker.

--prefix=/tools

This tells the configure script to prepare to install the Binutils programs in the /tools directory.

--disable-nls

This disables internationalization as i18n is not needed for the temporary tools.

--disable-werror

This prevents the build from stopping in the event that there are warnings from the host's compiler.

Continue with compiling the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. Ordinarily we would now run the test suite, but at this early stage the test suite framework (Tcl, Expect, and DejaGNU) is not yet in place. The benefits of running the tests at this point are minimal since the programs from this first pass will soon be replaced by those from the second.

If building on x86_64, create a symlink to ensure the sanity of the toolchain:

case $(uname -m) in
  x86_64) mkdir -v /tools/lib && ln -sv lib /tools/lib64 ;;
esac

Install the package:

make install

Details on this package are located in Section 6.12.2, “Contents of Binutils.”

5.5. GCC-4.5.2 - Pass 1

The GCC package contains the GNU compiler collection, which includes the C and C++ compilers.

Approximate build time: 5.0 SBU
Required disk space: 809 MB

5.5.1. Installation of Cross GCC

GCC now requires the GMP, MPFR and MPC packages. As these packages may not be included in your host distribution, they will be built with GCC. Unpack each package into the GCC source directory and rename the resulting directories so the GCC build procedures will automatically use them:

tar -jxf ../mpfr-3.0.0.tar.bz2
mv -v mpfr-3.0.0 mpfr
tar -jxf ../gmp-5.0.1.tar.bz2
mv -v gmp-5.0.1 gmp
tar -zxf ../mpc-0.8.2.tar.gz
mv -v mpc-0.8.2 mpc

The GCC documentation recommends building GCC outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:

mkdir -v ../gcc-build
cd ../gcc-build

Prepare GCC for compilation:

../gcc-4.5.2/configure \
    --target=$LFS_TGT --prefix=/tools \
    --disable-nls --disable-shared --disable-multilib \
    --disable-decimal-float --disable-threads \
    --disable-libmudflap --disable-libssp \
    --disable-libgomp --enable-languages=c \
    --with-gmp-include=$(pwd)/gmp --with-gmp-lib=$(pwd)/gmp/.libs \
    --without-ppl --without-cloog

The meaning of the configure options:

--disable-shared

This switch forces GCC to link its internal libraries statically. We do this to avoid possible issues with the host system.

--disable-decimal-float, --disable-threads, --disable-libmudflap, --disable-libssp, --disable-libgomp

These switches disable support for the decimal floating point extension, threading, libmudflap, libssp and libgomp respectively. These features will fail to compile when building a cross-compiler and are not necessary for the task of cross-compiling the temporary libc.

--disable-multilib

On x86_64, LFS does not yet support a multilib configuration. This switch is harmless for x86.

--enable-languages=c

This option ensures that only the C compiler is built. This is the only language needed now.

--with-gmp-include=...

This option tells GCC where the GMP headers are located.

--with-gmp-lib=...

This option tells GCC where the GMP library is located.

--without-ppl, --without-cloog

These switches prevent GCC from building against the PPL and CLooG libraries which may be present on the host system, but will not be available in the chroot environment.

Compile GCC by running:

make

Compilation is now complete. At this point, the test suite would normally be run, but, as mentioned before, the test suite framework is not in place yet. The benefits of running the tests at this point are minimal since the programs from this first pass will soon be replaced.

Install the package:

make install

Using --disable-shared means that the libgcc_eh.a file isn't created and installed. The Glibc package depends on this library as it uses -lgcc_eh within its build system. This dependency can be satisfied by creating a symlink to libgcc.a, since that file will end up containing the objects normally contained in libgcc_eh.a:

ln -vs libgcc.a `$LFS_TGT-gcc -print-libgcc-file-name | \
    sed 's/libgcc/&_eh/'`

Details on this package are located in Section 6.16.2, “Contents of GCC.”

5.6. Linux-2.6.37 API Headers

The Linux API Headers expose the kernel's API for use by Glibc.

Approximate build time: 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 485 MB

5.6.1. Installation of Linux API Headers

The Linux kernel needs to expose an Application Programming Interface (API) for the system's C library (Glibc in LFS) to use. This is done by way of sanitizing various C header files that are shipped in the Linux kernel source tarball.

Make sure there are no stale files and dependencies lying around from previous activity:

make mrproper

Now test and extract the user-visible kernel headers from the source. They are placed in an intermediate local directory and copied to the needed location because the extraction process removes any existing files in the target directory.

make headers_check
make INSTALL_HDR_PATH=dest headers_install
cp -rv dest/include/* /tools/include

Details on this package are located in Section 6.7.2, “Contents of Linux API Headers.”

5.7. Glibc-2.13

The Glibc package contains the main C library. This library provides the basic routines for allocating memory, searching directories, opening and closing files, reading and writing files, string handling, pattern matching, arithmetic, and so on.

Approximate build time: 6.9 SBU
Required disk space: 371 MB

5.7.1. Installation of Glibc

Fix a bug that prevents Glibc from building with GCC-4.5.2:

patch -Np1 -i ../glibc-2.13-gcc_fix-1.patch

The Glibc documentation recommends building Glibc outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:

mkdir -v ../glibc-build
cd ../glibc-build

Because Glibc no longer supports i386, its developers say to use the compiler flag -march=i486 when building it for x86 machines. There are several ways to accomplish that, but testing shows that the flag is best placed inside the build variable “CFLAGS”. Instead of overriding completely what Glibc's internal build system uses for CFLAGS, append the new flag to the existing contents of CFLAGS by making use of the special file configparms. The -mtune=native flag is also necessary to reset a reasonable value for -mtune that is changed when setting -march.

case `uname -m` in
  i?86) echo "CFLAGS += -march=i486 -mtune=native" > configparms ;;
esac

Next, prepare Glibc for compilation:

../glibc-2.13/configure --prefix=/tools \
    --host=$LFS_TGT --build=$(../glibc-2.13/scripts/config.guess) \
    --disable-profile --enable-add-ons \
    --enable-kernel=2.6.22.5 --with-headers=/tools/include \
    libc_cv_forced_unwind=yes libc_cv_c_cleanup=yes

The meaning of the configure options:

--host=$LFS_TGT, --build=$(../glibc-2.13/scripts/config.guess)

The combined effect of these switches is that Glibc's build system configures itself to cross-compile, using the cross-linker and cross-compiler in /tools.

--disable-profile

This builds the libraries without profiling information. Omit this option if profiling on the temporary tools is necessary.

--enable-add-ons

This tells Glibc to use the NPTL add-on as its threading library.

--enable-kernel=2.6.22.5

This tells Glibc to compile the library with support for 2.6.22.5 and later Linux kernels. Workarounds for older kernels are not enabled.

--with-headers=/tools/include

This tells Glibc to compile itself against the headers recently installed to the tools directory, so that it knows exactly what features the kernel has and can optimize itself accordingly.

libc_cv_forced_unwind=yes

The linker installed during Section 5.4, “Binutils-2.21 - Pass 1” was cross-compiled and as such cannot be used until Glibc has been installed. This means that the configure test for force-unwind support will fail, as it relies on a working linker. The libc_cv_forced_unwind=yes variable is passed in order to inform configure that force-unwind support is available without it having to run the test.

libc_cv_c_cleanup=yes

Simlarly, we pass libc_cv_c_cleanup=yes through to the configure script so that the test is skipped and C cleanup handling support is configured.

During this stage the following warning might appear:

configure: WARNING:
*** These auxiliary programs are missing or
*** incompatible versions: msgfmt
*** some features will be disabled.
*** Check the INSTALL file for required versions.

The missing or incompatible msgfmt program is generally harmless. This msgfmt program is part of the Gettext package which the host distribution should provide.

Compile the package:

make

This package does come with a test suite, however, it cannot be run at this time because we do not have a C++ compiler yet.

Note

The test suite also requires locale data to be installed in order to run successfully. Locale data provides information to the system regarding such things as the date, time, and currency formats accepted and output by system utilities. If the test suites are not being run in this chapter (as per the recommendation), there is no need to install the locales now. The appropriate locales will be installed in the next chapter. To install the Glibc locales anyway, use instructions from Section 6.9, “Glibc-2.13.”

Install the package:

make install

Details on this package are located in Section 6.9.4, “Contents of Glibc.”

5.8. Adjusting the Toolchain

Now that the temporary C libraries have been installed, all tools compiled in the rest of this chapter should be linked against these libraries. In order to accomplish this, the cross-compiler's specs file needs to be adjusted to point to the new dynamic linker in /tools.

This is done by dumping the compiler's “specs” file to a location where it will look for it by default. A simple sed substitution then alters the dynamic linker that GCC will use. The principle here is to find all references to the dynamic linker file in /lib or possibly /lib64 if the host system is 64-bit capable, and adjust them to point to the new location in /tools.

For the sake of accuracy, it is recommended to use a copy-and-paste method when issuing the following command. Be sure to visually inspect the specs file to verify that it has properly adjusted all references to the dynamic linker location. Refer to Section 5.2, “Toolchain Technical Notes,” for the default name of the dynamic linker, if necessary.

SPECS=`dirname $($LFS_TGT-gcc -print-libgcc-file-name)`/specs
$LFS_TGT-gcc -dumpspecs | sed \
  -e 's@/lib\(64\)\?/ld@/tools&@g' \
  -e "/^\*cpp:$/{n;s,$, -isystem /tools/include,}" > $SPECS 
echo "New specs file is: $SPECS"
unset SPECS

Caution

At this point, it is imperative to stop and ensure that the basic functions (compiling and linking) of the new toolchain are working as expected. To perform a sanity check, run the following commands:

echo 'main(){}' > dummy.c
$LFS_TGT-gcc -B/tools/lib dummy.c
readelf -l a.out | grep ': /tools'

If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be of the form:

[Requesting program interpreter: /tools/lib/ld-linux.so.2]

Note that /tools/lib, or /tools/lib64 for 64-bit machines appears as the prefix of the dynamic linker.

If the output is not shown as above or there was no output at all, then something is wrong. Investigate and retrace the steps to find out where the problem is and correct it. This issue must be resolved before continuing on. Something may have gone wrong with the specs file amendment above. In this case, redo the specs file amendment, being careful to copy-and-paste the commands.

Once all is well, clean up the test files:

rm -v dummy.c a.out

Note

Building Binutils in the next section will serve as an additional check that the toolchain has been built properly. If Binutils fails to build, it is an indication that something has gone wrong with the previous Binutils, GCC, or Glibc installations.

5.9. Binutils-2.21 - Pass 2

The Binutils package contains a linker, an assembler, and other tools for handling object files.

Approximate build time: 1.3 SBU
Required disk space: 259 MB

5.9.1. Installation of Binutils

Create a separate build directory again:

mkdir -v ../binutils-build
cd ../binutils-build

Prepare Binutils for compilation:

CC="$LFS_TGT-gcc -B/tools/lib/" \
   AR=$LFS_TGT-ar RANLIB=$LFS_TGT-ranlib \
   ../binutils-2.21/configure --prefix=/tools \
   --disable-nls --with-lib-path=/tools/lib

The meaning of the new configure options:

CC="$LFS_TGT-gcc -B/tools/lib/" AR=$LFS_TGT-ar RANLIB=$LFS_TGT-ranlib

Because this is really a native build of Binutils, setting these variables ensures that the build system uses the cross-compiler and associated tools instead of the ones on the host system.

--with-lib-path=/tools/lib

This tells the configure script to specify the library search path during the compilation of Binutils, resulting in /tools/lib being passed to the linker. This prevents the linker from searching through library directories on the host.

Compile the package:

make

Install the package:

make install

Now prepare the linker for the “Re-adjusting” phase in the next chapter:

make -C ld clean
make -C ld LIB_PATH=/usr/lib:/lib
cp -v ld/ld-new /tools/bin

The meaning of the make parameters:

-C ld clean

This tells the make program to remove all compiled files in the ld subdirectory.

-C ld LIB_PATH=/usr/lib:/lib

This option rebuilds everything in the ld subdirectory. Specifying the LIB_PATH Makefile variable on the command line allows us to override the default value of the temporary tools and point it to the proper final path. The value of this variable specifies the linker's default library search path. This preparation is used in the next chapter.

Details on this package are located in Section 6.12.2, “Contents of Binutils.”

5.10. GCC-4.5.2 - Pass 2

The GCC package contains the GNU compiler collection, which includes the C and C++ compilers.

Approximate build time: 9.0 SBU
Required disk space: 1003 MB

5.10.1. Installation of GCC

Versions of GCC later than 4.3 will treat this build as if it were a relocated compiler and disallow searching for startfiles in the location specified by --prefix. Since this will not be a relocated compiler, and the startfiles in /tools are crucial to building a working compiler linked to the libs in /tools, apply the following patch which partially reverts GCC to its old behavior:

patch -Np1 -i ../gcc-4.5.2-startfiles_fix-1.patch

Under normal circumstances the GCC fixincludes script is run in order to fix potentially broken header files. As GCC-4.5.2 and Glibc-2.13 have already been installed at this point, and their respective header files are known to not require fixing, the fixincludes script is not required. In fact, running this script may actually pollute the build environment by installing fixed headers from the host system into GCC's private include directory. The running of the fixincludes script can be suppressed by issuing the following commands:

cp -v gcc/Makefile.in{,.orig}
sed 's@\./fixinc\.sh@-c true@' gcc/Makefile.in.orig > gcc/Makefile.in

For x86 machines, a bootstrap build of GCC uses the -fomit-frame-pointer compiler flag. Non-bootstrap builds omit this flag by default, and the goal should be to produce a compiler that is exactly the same as if it were bootstrapped. Apply the following sed command to force the build to use the flag:

cp -v gcc/Makefile.in{,.tmp}
sed 's/^T_CFLAGS =$/& -fomit-frame-pointer/' gcc/Makefile.in.tmp \
  > gcc/Makefile.in

The following command will change the location of GCC's default dynamic linker to use the one installed in /tools. It also removes /usr/include from GCC's include search path. Doing this now rather than adjusting the specs file after installation ensures that the new dynamic linker is used during the actual build of GCC. That is, all of the binaries created during the build will link against the new Glibc. Issue:

for file in \
 $(find gcc/config -name linux64.h -o -name linux.h -o -name sysv4.h)
do
  cp -uv $file{,.orig}
  sed -e 's@/lib\(64\)\?\(32\)\?/ld@/tools&@g' \
  -e 's@/usr@/tools@g' $file.orig > $file
  echo '
#undef STANDARD_INCLUDE_DIR
#define STANDARD_INCLUDE_DIR 0
#define STANDARD_STARTFILE_PREFIX_1 ""
#define STANDARD_STARTFILE_PREFIX_2 ""' >> $file
  touch $file.orig
done

In case the above seems hard to follow, let's break it down a bit. First we find all the files under the gcc/config directory that are named either linux.h, linux64.h or sysv4.h. For each file found, we copy it to a file of the same name but with an added suffix of “.orig”. Then the first sed expression prepends “/tools” to every instance of “/lib/ld”, “/lib64/ld” or “/lib32/ld”, while the second one replaces hard-coded instances of “/usr”. Then we add our define statements which alter the include search path and the default startfile prefix to the end of the file. Finally, we use touch to update the timestamp on the copied files. When used in conjunction with cp -u, this prevents unexpected changes to the original files in case the commands are inadvertently run twice.

On x86_64, unsetting the multilib spec for GCC ensures that it won't attempt to link against libraries on the host:

case $(uname -m) in
  x86_64)
    for file in $(find gcc/config -name t-linux64) ; do \
      cp -v $file{,.orig}
      sed '/MULTILIB_OSDIRNAMES/d' $file.orig > $file
    done
  ;;
esac

As in the first build of GCC it requires the GMP, MPFR and MPC packages. Unpack the tarballs and move them into the required directory names:

tar -jxf ../mpfr-3.0.0.tar.bz2
mv -v mpfr-3.0.0 mpfr
tar -jxf ../gmp-5.0.1.tar.bz2
mv -v gmp-5.0.1 gmp
tar -zxf ../mpc-0.8.2.tar.gz
mv -v mpc-0.8.2 mpc

Create a separate build directory again:

mkdir -v ../gcc-build
cd ../gcc-build

Before starting to build GCC, remember to unset any environment variables that override the default optimization flags.

Now prepare GCC for compilation:

CC="$LFS_TGT-gcc -B/tools/lib/" \
    AR=$LFS_TGT-ar RANLIB=$LFS_TGT-ranlib \
    ../gcc-4.5.2/configure --prefix=/tools \
    --with-local-prefix=/tools --enable-clocale=gnu \
    --enable-shared --enable-threads=posix \
    --enable-__cxa_atexit --enable-languages=c,c++ \
    --disable-libstdcxx-pch --disable-multilib \
    --disable-bootstrap --disable-libgomp \
    --with-gmp-include=$(pwd)/gmp --with-gmp-lib=$(pwd)/gmp/.libs \
    --without-ppl --without-cloog

The meaning of the new configure options:

--enable-clocale=gnu

This option ensures the correct locale model is selected for the C++ libraries under all circumstances. If the configure script finds the de_DE locale installed, it will select the correct gnu locale model. However, if the de_DE locale is not installed, there is the risk of building Application Binary Interface (ABI)-incompatible C++ libraries because the incorrect generic locale model may be selected.

--enable-threads=posix

This enables C++ exception handling for multi-threaded code.

--enable-__cxa_atexit

This option allows use of __cxa_atexit, rather than atexit, to register C++ destructors for local statics and global objects. This option is essential for fully standards-compliant handling of destructors. It also affects the C++ ABI, and therefore results in C++ shared libraries and C++ programs that are interoperable with other Linux distributions.

--enable-languages=c,c++

This option ensures that both the C and C++ compilers are built.

--disable-libstdcxx-pch

Do not build the pre-compiled header (PCH) for libstdc++. It takes up a lot of space, and we have no use for it.

--disable-bootstrap

For native builds of GCC, the default is to do a "bootstrap" build. This does not just compile GCC, but compiles it several times. It uses the programs compiled in a first round to compile itself a second time, and then again a third time. The second and third iterations are compared to make sure it can reproduce itself flawlessly. This also implies that it was compiled correctly. However, the LFS build method should provide a solid compiler without the need to bootstrap each time.

Compile the package:

make

Install the package:

make install

As a finishing touch, create a symlink. Many programs and scripts run cc instead of gcc, which is used to keep programs generic and therefore usable on all kinds of UNIX systems where the GNU C compiler is not always installed. Running cc leaves the system administrator free to decide which C compiler to install:

ln -vs gcc /tools/bin/cc

Caution

At this point, it is imperative to stop and ensure that the basic functions (compiling and linking) of the new toolchain are working as expected. To perform a sanity check, run the following commands:

echo 'main(){}' > dummy.c
cc dummy.c
readelf -l a.out | grep ': /tools'

If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be of the form:

[Requesting program interpreter: /tools/lib/ld-linux.so.2]

Note that /tools/lib, or /tools/lib64 for 64-bit machines appears as the prefix of the dynamic linker.

If the output is not shown as above or there was no output at all, then something is wrong. Investigate and retrace the steps to find out where the problem is and correct it. This issue must be resolved before continuing on. First, perform the sanity check again, using gcc instead of cc. If this works, then the /tools/bin/cc symlink is missing. Install the symlink as per above. Next, ensure that the PATH is correct. This can be checked by running echo $PATH and verifying that /tools/bin is at the head of the list. If the PATH is wrong it could mean that you are not logged in as user lfs or that something went wrong back in Section 4.4, “Setting Up the Environment.”

Once all is well, clean up the test files:

rm -v dummy.c a.out

Details on this package are located in Section 6.16.2, “Contents of GCC.”

5.11. Tcl-8.5.9

The Tcl package contains the Tool Command Language.

Approximate build time: 0.5 SBU
Required disk space: 32 MB

5.11.1. Installation of Tcl

This package and the next two (Expect and DejaGNU) are installed to support running the test suites for GCC and Binutils. Installing three packages for testing purposes may seem excessive, but it is very reassuring, if not essential, to know that the most important tools are working properly. Even if the test suites are not run in this chapter (they are not mandatory), these packages are required to run the test suites in Chapter 6.

Prepare Tcl for compilation:

cd unix
./configure --prefix=/tools

Build the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the Tcl test suite anyway, issue the following command:

TZ=UTC make test

The Tcl test suite may experience failures under certain host conditions that are not fully understood. Therefore, test suite failures here are not surprising, and are not considered critical. The TZ=UTC parameter sets the time zone to Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), also known as Greenwich Mean Time (GMT), but only for the duration of the test suite run. This ensures that the clock tests are exercised correctly. Details on the TZ environment variable are provided in Chapter 7.

Install the package:

make install

Make the installed library writable so debugging symbols can be removed later:

chmod -v u+w /tools/lib/libtcl8.5.so

Install Tcl's headers. The next package, Expect, requires them to build.

make install-private-headers

Now make a necessary symbolic link:

ln -sv tclsh8.5 /tools/bin/tclsh

5.11.2. Contents of Tcl

Installed programs: tclsh (link to tclsh8.5) and tclsh8.5
Installed library: libtcl8.5.so, libtclstub8.5.a

Short Descriptions

tclsh8.5

The Tcl command shell

tclsh

A link to tclsh8.5

libtcl8.5.so

The Tcl library

libtclstub8.5.a

The Tcl Stub library

5.12. Expect-5.45

The Expect package contains a program for carrying out scripted dialogues with other interactive programs.

Approximate build time: 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 4.1 MB

5.12.1. Installation of Expect

First, force Expect's configure script to use /bin/stty instead of a /usr/local/bin/stty it may find on the host system. This will ensure that our test suite tools remain sane for the final builds of our toolchain:

cp -v configure{,.orig}
sed 's:/usr/local/bin:/bin:' configure.orig > configure

Now prepare Expect for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools --with-tcl=/tools/lib \
  --with-tclinclude=/tools/include

The meaning of the configure options:

--with-tcl=/tools/lib

This ensures that the configure script finds the Tcl installation in the temporary tools location instead of possibly locating an existing one on the host system.

--with-tclinclude=/tools/include

This explicitly tells Expect where to find Tcl's internal headers. Using this option avoids conditions where configure fails because it cannot automatically discover the location of Tcl's headers.

Build the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the Expect test suite anyway, issue the following command:

make test

Note that the Expect test suite is known to experience failures under certain host conditions that are not within our control. Therefore, test suite failures here are not surprising and are not considered critical.

Install the package:

make SCRIPTS="" install

The meaning of the make parameter:

SCRIPTS=""

This prevents installation of the supplementary Expect scripts, which are not needed.

5.12.2. Contents of Expect

Installed program: expect
Installed library: libexpect-5.45.a

Short Descriptions

expect

Communicates with other interactive programs according to a script

libexpect-5.45.a

Contains functions that allow Expect to be used as a Tcl extension or to be used directly from C or C++ (without Tcl)

5.13. DejaGNU-1.4.4

The DejaGNU package contains a framework for testing other programs.

Approximate build time: less than 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 6.1 MB

5.13.1. Installation of DejaGNU

The most recent version of this package was released in 2004. Apply some fixes that have accumulated since then:

patch -Np1 -i ../dejagnu-1.4.4-consolidated-1.patch

Prepare DejaGNU for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Build and install the package:

make install

To test the results, issue:

make check

5.13.2. Contents of DejaGNU

Installed program: runtest

Short Descriptions

runtest

A wrapper script that locates the proper expect shell and then runs DejaGNU

5.14. Ncurses-5.7

The Ncurses package contains libraries for terminal-independent handling of character screens.

Approximate build time: 0.7 SBU
Required disk space: 30 MB

5.14.1. Installation of Ncurses

Prepare Ncurses for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools --with-shared \
    --without-debug --without-ada --enable-overwrite

The meaning of the configure options:

--without-ada

This ensures that Ncurses does not build support for the Ada compiler which may be present on the host but will not be available once we enter the chroot environment.

--enable-overwrite

This tells Ncurses to install its header files into /tools/include, instead of /tools/include/ncurses, to ensure that other packages can find the Ncurses headers successfully.

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite, but it can only be run after the package has been installed. The tests reside in the test/ directory. See the README file in that directory for further details.

Install the package:

make install

Details on this package are located in Section 6.19.2, “Contents of Ncurses.”

5.15. Bash-4.2

The Bash package contains the Bourne-Again SHell.

Approximate build time: 0.5 SBU
Required disk space: 35 MB

5.15.1. Installation of Bash

Prepare Bash for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools --without-bash-malloc

The meaning of the configure options:

--without-bash-malloc

This option turns off the use of Bash's memory allocation (malloc) function which is known to cause segmentation faults. By turning this option off, Bash will use the malloc functions from Glibc which are more stable.

Compile the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the Bash test suite anyway, issue the following command:

make tests

Install the package:

make install

Make a link for the programs that use sh for a shell:

ln -vs bash /tools/bin/sh

Details on this package are located in Section 6.29.2, “Contents of Bash.”

5.16. Bzip2-1.0.6

The Bzip2 package contains programs for compressing and decompressing files. Compressing text files with bzip2 yields a much better compression percentage than with the traditional gzip.

Approximate build time: less than 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 4.8 MB

5.16.1. Installation of Bzip2

The Bzip2 package does not contain a configure script. Compile and test it with:

make

Install the package:

make PREFIX=/tools install

Details on this package are located in Section 6.36.2, “Contents of Bzip2.”

5.17. Coreutils-8.10

The Coreutils package contains utilities for showing and setting the basic system characteristics.

Approximate build time: 0.7 SBU
Required disk space: 88 MB

5.17.1. Installation of Coreutils

Prepare Coreutils for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools --enable-install-program=hostname

The meaning of the configure options:

--enable-install-program=hostname

This enables the hostname binary to be built and installed – it is disabled by default but is required by the Perl test suite.

Compile the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the Coreutils test suite anyway, issue the following command:

make RUN_EXPENSIVE_TESTS=yes check

The RUN_EXPENSIVE_TESTS=yes parameter tells the test suite to run several additional tests that are considered relatively expensive (in terms of CPU power and memory usage) on some platforms, but generally are not a problem on Linux.

Install the package:

make install

The above command refuses to install su because the program cannot be installed setuid root as a non-privileged user. By manually installing it with a different name, we can use it for running tests in the final system as a non-privileged user and we keep a possibly useful su from our host first in our PATH. Install it with:

cp -v src/su /tools/bin/su-tools

Details on this package are located in Section 6.22.2, “Contents of Coreutils.”

5.18. Diffutils-3.0

The Diffutils package contains programs that show the differences between files or directories.

Approximate build time: 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 6.1 MB

5.18.1. Installation of Diffutils

Prepare Diffutils for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the Diffutils test suite anyway, issue the following command:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Details on this package are located in Section 6.37.2, “Contents of Diffutils.”

5.19. File-5.05

The File package contains a utility for determining the type of a given file or files.

Approximate build time: 0.2 SBU
Required disk space: 9.5 MB

5.19.1. Installation of File

Prepare File for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the File test suite anyway, issue the following command:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Details on this package are located in Section 6.39.2, “Contents of File.”

5.20. Findutils-4.4.2

The Findutils package contains programs to find files. These programs are provided to recursively search through a directory tree and to create, maintain, and search a database (often faster than the recursive find, but unreliable if the database has not been recently updated).

Approximate build time: 0.3 SBU
Required disk space: 20 MB

5.20.1. Installation of Findutils

Prepare Findutils for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the Findutils test suite anyway, issue the following command:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Details on this package are located in Section 6.40.2, “Contents of Findutils.”

5.21. Gawk-3.1.8

The Gawk package contains programs for manipulating text files.

Approximate build time: 0.2 SBU
Required disk space: 19 MB

5.21.1. Installation of Gawk

Prepare Gawk for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the Gawk test suite anyway, issue the following command:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Details on this package are located in Section 6.38.2, “Contents of Gawk.”

5.22. Gettext-0.18.1.1

The Gettext package contains utilities for internationalization and localization. These allow programs to be compiled with NLS (Native Language Support), enabling them to output messages in the user's native language.

Approximate build time: 0.8 SBU
Required disk space: 82 MB

5.22.1. Installation of Gettext

For our temporary set of tools, we only need to build and install one binary from Gettext.

Prepare Gettext for compilation:

cd gettext-tools
./configure --prefix=/tools --disable-shared

The meaning of the configure option:

--disable-shared

We do not need to install any of the shared Gettext libraries at this time, therefore there is no need to build them.

Compile the package:

make -C gnulib-lib
make -C src msgfmt

As only one binary has been compiled, it is not possible to run the test suite without compiling additional support libraries from the Gettext package. It is therefore not recommended to attempt to run the test suite at this stage.

Install the msgfmt binary:

cp -v src/msgfmt /tools/bin

Details on this package are located in Section 6.42.2, “Contents of Gettext.”

5.23. Grep-2.7

The Grep package contains programs for searching through files.

Approximate build time: 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 6.7 MB

5.23.1. Installation of Grep

Prepare Grep for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools \
    --disable-perl-regexp

The meaning of the configure switches:

--disable-perl-regexp

This ensures that the grep program does not get linked against a Perl Compatible Regular Expression (PCRE) library that may be present on the host but will not be available once we enter the chroot environment.

Compile the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the Grep test suite anyway, issue the following command:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Details on this package are located in Section 6.27.2, “Contents of Grep.”

5.24. Gzip-1.4

The Gzip package contains programs for compressing and decompressing files.

Approximate build time: less than 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 3.3 MB

5.24.1. Installation of Gzip

Prepare Gzip for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the Gzip test suite anyway, issue the following command:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Details on this package are located in Section 6.45.2, “Contents of Gzip.”

5.25. M4-1.4.15

The M4 package contains a macro processor.

Approximate build time: 0.2 SBU
Required disk space: 11.6 MB

5.25.1. Installation of M4

Prepare M4 for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the M4 test suite anyway, issue the following command:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Details on this package are located in Section 6.24.2, “Contents of M4.”

5.26. Make-3.82

The Make package contains a program for compiling packages.

Approximate build time: 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 9.6 MB

5.26.1. Installation of Make

Prepare Make for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the Make test suite anyway, issue the following command:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Details on this package are located in Section 6.49.2, “Contents of Make.”

5.27. Patch-2.6.1

The Patch package contains a program for modifying or creating files by applying a “patch” file typically created by the diff program.

Approximate build time: less than 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 1.9 MB

5.27.1. Installation of Patch

Prepare Patch for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the Patch test suite anyway, issue the following command:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Details on this package are located in Section 6.53.2, “Contents of Patch.”

5.28. Perl-5.12.3

The Perl package contains the Practical Extraction and Report Language.

Approximate build time: 0.8 SBU
Required disk space: 106 MB

5.28.1. Installation of Perl

First apply the following patch to adapt some hard-wired paths to the C library:

patch -Np1 -i ../perl-5.12.3-libc-1.patch

Prepare Perl for compilation (make sure to get the 'Data/Dumper Fcntl IO' part of the command correct—they are all letters):

sh Configure -des -Dprefix=/tools \
                  -Dstatic_ext='Data/Dumper Fcntl IO'

The meaning of the configure options:

-Dstatic_ext='Data/Dumper Fcntl IO'

This tells Perl to build the minimum set of static extensions needed for installing and testing the Coreutils and Glibc packages in the next chapter.

Only a few of the utilities contained in this package, and one of its libraries, need to be built:

make perl utilities ext/Errno/pm_to_blib

Although Perl comes with a test suite, it is not recommended to run it at this point. Only part of Perl was built and running make test now will cause the rest of Perl to be built as well, which is unnecessary at this point. The test suite can be run in the next chapter if desired.

Install these tools and their libraries:

cp -v perl pod/pod2man /tools/bin
mkdir -pv /tools/lib/perl5/5.12.3
cp -Rv lib/* /tools/lib/perl5/5.12.3

Details on this package are located in Section 6.33.2, “Contents of Perl.”

5.29. Sed-4.2.1

The Sed package contains a stream editor.

Approximate build time: 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 8.0 MB

5.29.1. Installation of Sed

Prepare Sed for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the Sed test suite anyway, issue the following command:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Details on this package are located in Section 6.17.2, “Contents of Sed.”

5.30. Tar-1.25

The Tar package contains an archiving program.

Approximate build time: 0.3 SBU
Required disk space: 20.9 MB

5.30.1. Installation of Tar

Prepare Tar for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the Tar test suite anyway, issue the following command:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Details on this package are located in Section 6.58.2, “Contents of Tar.”

5.31. Texinfo-4.13a

The Texinfo package contains programs for reading, writing, and converting info pages.

Approximate build time: 0.2 SBU
Required disk space: 20 MB

5.31.1. Installation of Texinfo

Prepare Texinfo for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the Texinfo test suite anyway, issue the following command:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Details on this package are located in Section 6.59.2, “Contents of Texinfo.”

5.32. Xz-5.0.1

The Xz package contains programs for compressing and decompressing files. It provides capabilities for the lzma and the newer xz compression formats. Compressing text files with xz yields a better compression percentage than with the traditional gzip or bzip2 commands.

Approximate build time: 0.3 SBU
Required disk space: 14 MB

5.32.1. Installation of Xz-Utils

Prepare Xz for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, running the test suite is not mandatory for the temporary tools here in this chapter. To run the Xz test suite anyway, issue the following command:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Details on this package are located in Section 6.50.2, “Contents of Xz.”

5.33. Stripping

The steps in this section are optional, but if the LFS partition is rather small, it is beneficial to learn that unnecessary items can be removed. The executables and libraries built so far contain about 70 MB of unneeded debugging symbols. Remove those symbols with:

strip --strip-debug /tools/lib/*
strip --strip-unneeded /tools/{,s}bin/*

These commands will skip a number of files, reporting that it does not recognize their file format. Most of these are scripts instead of binaries.

Take care not to use --strip-unneeded on the libraries. The static ones would be destroyed and the toolchain packages would need to be built all over again.

To save nearly 25 MB more, remove the documentation:

rm -rf /tools/{,share}/{info,man}

At this point, you should have at least 850 MB of free space in $LFS that can be used to build and install Glibc in the next phase. If you can build and install Glibc, you can build and install the rest too.

5.34. Changing Ownership

Note

The commands in the remainder of this book must be performed while logged in as user root and no longer as user lfs. Also, double check that $LFS is set in root's environment.

Currently, the $LFS/tools directory is owned by the user lfs, a user that exists only on the host system. If the $LFS/tools directory is kept as is, the files are owned by a user ID without a corresponding account. This is dangerous because a user account created later could get this same user ID and would own the $LFS/tools directory and all the files therein, thus exposing these files to possible malicious manipulation.

To avoid this issue, you could add the lfs user to the new LFS system later when creating the /etc/passwd file, taking care to assign it the same user and group IDs as on the host system. Better yet, change the ownership of the $LFS/tools directory to user root by running the following command:

chown -R root:root $LFS/tools

Although the $LFS/tools directory can be deleted once the LFS system has been finished, it can be retained to build additional LFS systems of the same book version. How best to backup $LFS/tools is a matter of personal preference.

Caution

If you intend to keep the temporary tools for use in building future LFS systems, now is the time to back them up. Subsequent commands in chapter 6 will alter the tools currently in place, rendering them useless for future builds.

Part III. Building the LFS System

Chapter 6. Installing Basic System Software

6.1. Introduction

In this chapter, we enter the building site and start constructing the LFS system in earnest. That is, we chroot into the temporary mini Linux system, make a few final preparations, and then begin installing the packages.

The installation of this software is straightforward. Although in many cases the installation instructions could be made shorter and more generic, we have opted to provide the full instructions for every package to minimize the possibilities for mistakes. The key to learning what makes a Linux system work is to know what each package is used for and why you (or the system) may need it.

We do not recommend using optimizations. They can make a program run slightly faster, but they may also cause compilation difficulties and problems when running the program. If a package refuses to compile when using optimization, try to compile it without optimization and see if that fixes the problem. Even if the package does compile when using optimization, there is the risk it may have been compiled incorrectly because of the complex interactions between the code and build tools. Also note that the -march and -mtune options using values not specified in the book have not been tested. This may cause problems with the toolchain packages (Binutils, GCC and Glibc). The small potential gains achieved in using compiler optimizations are often outweighed by the risks. First-time builders of LFS are encouraged to build without custom optimizations. The subsequent system will still run very fast and be stable at the same time.

The order that packages are installed in this chapter needs to be strictly followed to ensure that no program accidentally acquires a path referring to /tools hard-wired into it. For the same reason, do not compile separate packages in parallel. Compiling in parallel may save time (especially on dual-CPU machines), but it could result in a program containing a hard-wired path to /tools, which will cause the program to stop working when that directory is removed.

Before the installation instructions, each installation page provides information about the package, including a concise description of what it contains, approximately how long it will take to build, and how much disk space is required during this building process. Following the installation instructions, there is a list of programs and libraries (along with brief descriptions of these) that the package installs.

Note

The SBU values and required disk space includes test suite data for all applicable packages in Chapter 6.

6.2. Preparing Virtual Kernel File Systems

Various file systems exported by the kernel are used to communicate to and from the kernel itself. These file systems are virtual in that no disk space is used for them. The content of the file systems resides in memory.

Begin by creating directories onto which the file systems will be mounted:

mkdir -v $LFS/{dev,proc,sys}

6.2.1. Creating Initial Device Nodes

When the kernel boots the system, it requires the presence of a few device nodes, in particular the console and null devices. The device nodes must be created on the hard disk so that they are available before udevd has been started, and additionally when Linux is started with init=/bin/bash. Create the devices by running the following commands:

mknod -m 600 $LFS/dev/console c 5 1
mknod -m 666 $LFS/dev/null c 1 3

6.2.2. Mounting and Populating /dev

The recommended method of populating the /dev directory with devices is to mount a virtual filesystem (such as tmpfs) on the /dev directory, and allow the devices to be created dynamically on that virtual filesystem as they are detected or accessed. Device creation is generally done during the boot process by Udev. Since this new system does not yet have Udev and has not yet been booted, it is necessary to mount and populate /dev manually. This is accomplished by bind mounting the host system's /dev directory. A bind mount is a special type of mount that allows you to create a mirror of a directory or mount point to some other location. Use the following command to achieve this:

mount -v --bind /dev $LFS/dev

6.2.3. Mounting Virtual Kernel File Systems

Now mount the remaining virtual kernel filesystems:

mount -vt devpts devpts $LFS/dev/pts
mount -vt tmpfs shm $LFS/dev/shm
mount -vt proc proc $LFS/proc
mount -vt sysfs sysfs $LFS/sys

6.3. Package Management

Package Management is an often requested addition to the LFS Book. A Package Manager allows tracking the installation of files making it easy to remove and upgrade packages. As well as the binary and library files, a package manager will handle the installation of configuration files. Before you begin to wonder, NO—this section will not talk about nor recommend any particular package manager. What it provides is a roundup of the more popular techniques and how they work. The perfect package manager for you may be among these techniques or may be a combination of two or more of these techniques. This section briefly mentions issues that may arise when upgrading packages.

Some reasons why no package manager is mentioned in LFS or BLFS include:

  • Dealing with package management takes the focus away from the goals of these books—teaching how a Linux system is built.

  • There are multiple solutions for package management, each having its strengths and drawbacks. Including one that satisfies all audiences is difficult.

There are some hints written on the topic of package management. Visit the Hints Project and see if one of them fits your need.

6.3.1. Upgrade Issues

A Package Manager makes it easy to upgrade to newer versions when they are released. Generally the instructions in the LFS and BLFS Book can be used to upgrade to the newer versions. Here are some points that you should be aware of when upgrading packages, especially on a running system.

  • If one of the toolchain packages (Glibc, GCC or Binutils) needs to be upgraded to a newer minor version, it is safer to rebuild LFS. Though you may be able to get by rebuilding all the packages in their dependency order, we do not recommend it. For example, if glibc-2.2.x needs to be updated to glibc-2.3.x, it is safer to rebuild. For micro version updates, a simple reinstallation usually works, but is not guaranteed. For example, upgrading from glibc-2.3.4 to glibc-2.3.5 will not usually cause any problems.

  • If a package containing a shared library is updated, and if the name of the library changes, then all the packages dynamically linked to the library need to be recompiled to link against the newer library. (Note that there is no correlation between the package version and the name of the library.) For example, consider a package foo-1.2.3 that installs a shared library with name libfoo.so.1. Say you upgrade the package to a newer version foo-1.2.4 that installs a shared library with name libfoo.so.2. In this case, all packages that are dynamically linked to libfoo.so.1 need to be recompiled to link against libfoo.so.2. Note that you should not remove the previous libraries until the dependent packages are recompiled.

6.3.2. Package Management Techniques

The following are some common package management techniques. Before making a decision on a package manager, do some research on the various techniques, particularly the drawbacks of the particular scheme.

6.3.2.1. It is All in My Head!

Yes, this is a package management technique. Some folks do not find the need for a package manager because they know the packages intimately and know what files are installed by each package. Some users also do not need any package management because they plan on rebuilding the entire system when a package is changed.

6.3.2.2. Install in Separate Directories

This is a simplistic package management that does not need any extra package to manage the installations. Each package is installed in a separate directory. For example, package foo-1.1 is installed in /usr/pkg/foo-1.1 and a symlink is made from /usr/pkg/foo to /usr/pkg/foo-1.1. When installing a new version foo-1.2, it is installed in /usr/pkg/foo-1.2 and the previous symlink is replaced by a symlink to the new version.

Environment variables such as PATH, LD_LIBRARY_PATH, MANPATH, INFOPATH and CPPFLAGS need to be expanded to include /usr/pkg/foo. For more than a few packages, this scheme becomes unmanageable.

6.3.2.3. Symlink Style Package Management

This is a variation of the previous package management technique. Each package is installed similar to the previous scheme. But instead of making the symlink, each file is symlinked into the /usr hierarchy. This removes the need to expand the environment variables. Though the symlinks can be created by the user to automate the creation, many package managers have been written using this approach. A few of the popular ones include Stow, Epkg, Graft, and Depot.

The installation needs to be faked, so that the package thinks that it is installed in /usr though in reality it is installed in the /usr/pkg hierarchy. Installing in this manner is not usually a trivial task. For example, consider that you are installing a package libfoo-1.1. The following instructions may not install the package properly:

./configure --prefix=/usr/pkg/libfoo/1.1
make
make install

The installation will work, but the dependent packages may not link to libfoo as you would expect. If you compile a package that links against libfoo, you may notice that it is linked to /usr/pkg/libfoo/1.1/lib/libfoo.so.1 instead of /usr/lib/libfoo.so.1 as you would expect. The correct approach is to use the DESTDIR strategy to fake installation of the package. This approach works as follows:

./configure --prefix=/usr
make
make DESTDIR=/usr/pkg/libfoo/1.1 install

Most packages support this approach, but there are some which do not. For the non-compliant packages, you may either need to manually install the package, or you may find that it is easier to install some problematic packages into /opt.

6.3.2.4. Timestamp Based

In this technique, a file is timestamped before the installation of the package. After the installation, a simple use of the find command with the appropriate options can generate a log of all the files installed after the timestamp file was created. A package manager written with this approach is install-log.

Though this scheme has the advantage of being simple, it has two drawbacks. If, during installation, the files are installed with any timestamp other than the current time, those files will not be tracked by the package manager. Also, this scheme can only be used when one package is installed at a time. The logs are not reliable if two packages are being installed on two different consoles.

6.3.2.5. Tracing Installation Scripts

In this approach, the commands that the installation scripts perform are recorded. There are two techniques that one can use:

The LD_PRELOAD environment variable can be set to point to a library to be preloaded before installation. During installation, this library tracks the packages that are being installed by attaching itself to various executables such as cp, install, mv and tracking the system calls that modify the filesystem. For this approach to work, all the executables need to be dynamically linked without the suid or sgid bit. Preloading the library may cause some unwanted side-effects during installation. Therefore, it is advised that one performs some tests to ensure that the package manager does not break anything and logs all the appropriate files.

The second technique is to use strace, which logs all system calls made during the execution of the installation scripts.

6.3.2.6. Creating Package Archives

In this scheme, the package installation is faked into a separate tree as described in the Symlink style package management. After the installation, a package archive is created using the installed files. This archive is then used to install the package either on the local machine or can even be used to install the package on other machines.

This approach is used by most of the package managers found in the commercial distributions. Examples of package managers that follow this approach are RPM (which, incidentally, is required by the Linux Standard Base Specification), pkg-utils, Debian's apt, and Gentoo's Portage system. A hint describing how to adopt this style of package management for LFS systems is located at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/fakeroot.txt.

Creation of package files that include dependency information is complex and is beyond the scope of LFS.

Slackware uses a tar based system for package archives. This system purposely does not handle package dependencies as more complex package managers do. For details of Slackware package management, see http://www.slackbook.org/html/package-management.html.

6.3.2.7. User Based Management

This scheme, unique to LFS, was devised by Matthias Benkmann, and is available from the Hints Project. In this scheme, each package is installed as a separate user into the standard locations. Files belonging to a package are easily identified by checking the user ID. The features and shortcomings of this approach are too complex to describe in this section. For the details please see the hint at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/more_control_and_pkg_man.txt.

6.3.3. Deploying LFS on Multiple Systems

One of the advantages of an LFS system is that there are no files that depend on the position of files on a disk system. Cloning an LFS build to another computer with an architecture similar to the base system is as simple as using tar on the LFS partition that contains the root directory (about 250MB uncompressed for a base LFS build), copying that file via network transfer or CD-ROM to the new system and expanding it. From that point, a few configuration files will have to be changed. Configuration files that may need to be updated include: /etc/hosts, /etc/fstab, /etc/passwd, /etc/group, /etc/shadow, /etc/ld.so.conf, /etc/scsi_id.config, /etc/sysconfig/network and /etc/sysconfig/network-devices/ifconfig.eth0/ipv4.

A custom kernel may need to be built for the new system depending on differences in system hardware and the original kernel configuration.

Finally the new system has to be made bootable via Section 8.4, “Using GRUB to Set Up the Boot Process”.

6.4. Entering the Chroot Environment

It is time to enter the chroot environment to begin building and installing the final LFS system. As user root, run the following command to enter the realm that is, at the moment, populated with only the temporary tools:

chroot "$LFS" /tools/bin/env -i \
    HOME=/root TERM="$TERM" PS1='\u:\w\$ ' \
    PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin:/tools/bin \
    /tools/bin/bash --login +h

The -i option given to the env command will clear all variables of the chroot environment. After that, only the HOME, TERM, PS1, and PATH variables are set again. The TERM=$TERM construct will set the TERM variable inside chroot to the same value as outside chroot. This variable is needed for programs like vim and less to operate properly. If other variables are needed, such as CFLAGS or CXXFLAGS, this is a good place to set them again.

From this point on, there is no need to use the LFS variable anymore, because all work will be restricted to the LFS file system. This is because the Bash shell is told that $LFS is now the root (/) directory.

Notice that /tools/bin comes last in the PATH. This means that a temporary tool will no longer be used once its final version is installed. This occurs when the shell does not “remember” the locations of executed binaries—for this reason, hashing is switched off by passing the +h option to bash.

Note that the bash prompt will say I have no name! This is normal because the /etc/passwd file has not been created yet.

Note

It is important that all the commands throughout the remainder of this chapter and the following chapters are run from within the chroot environment. If you leave this environment for any reason (rebooting for example), ensure that the virtual kernel filesystems are mounted as explained in Section 6.2.2, “Mounting and Populating /dev” and Section 6.2.3, “Mounting Virtual Kernel File Systems” and enter chroot again before continuing with the installation.

6.5. Creating Directories

It is time to create some structure in the LFS file system. Create a standard directory tree by issuing the following commands:

mkdir -pv /{bin,boot,etc/opt,home,lib,mnt,opt}
mkdir -pv /{media/{floppy,cdrom},sbin,srv,var}
install -dv -m 0750 /root
install -dv -m 1777 /tmp /var/tmp
mkdir -pv /usr/{,local/}{bin,include,lib,sbin,src}
mkdir -pv /usr/{,local/}share/{doc,info,locale,man}
mkdir -v  /usr/{,local/}share/{misc,terminfo,zoneinfo}
mkdir -pv /usr/{,local/}share/man/man{1..8}
for dir in /usr /usr/local; do
  ln -sv share/{man,doc,info} $dir
done
case $(uname -m) in
 x86_64) ln -sv lib /lib64 && ln -sv lib /usr/lib64 ;;
esac
mkdir -v /var/{lock,log,mail,run,spool}
mkdir -pv /var/{opt,cache,lib/{misc,locate},local}

Directories are, by default, created with permission mode 755, but this is not desirable for all directories. In the commands above, two changes are made—one to the home directory of user root, and another to the directories for temporary files.

The first mode change ensures that not just anybody can enter the /root directory—the same as a normal user would do with his or her home directory. The second mode change makes sure that any user can write to the /tmp and /var/tmp directories, but cannot remove another user's files from them. The latter is prohibited by the so-called “sticky bit,” the highest bit (1) in the 1777 bit mask.

6.5.1. FHS Compliance Note

The directory tree is based on the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard (FHS) (available at http://www.pathname.com/fhs/). In addition to the FHS, we create compatibility symlinks for the man, doc, and info directories since many packages still try to install their documentation into /usr/<directory> or /usr/local/<directory> as opposed to /usr/share/<directory> or /usr/local/share/<directory>. The FHS also stipulates the existence of /usr/local/games and /usr/share/games. The FHS is not precise as to the structure of the /usr/local/share subdirectory, so we create only the directories that are needed. However, feel free to create these directories if you prefer to conform more strictly to the FHS.

6.6. Creating Essential Files and Symlinks

Some programs use hard-wired paths to programs which do not exist yet. In order to satisfy these programs, create a number of symbolic links which will be replaced by real files throughout the course of this chapter after the software has been installed:

ln -sv /tools/bin/{bash,cat,echo,pwd,stty} /bin
ln -sv /tools/bin/perl /usr/bin
ln -sv /tools/lib/libgcc_s.so{,.1} /usr/lib
ln -sv /tools/lib/libstdc++.so{,.6} /usr/lib
ln -sv bash /bin/sh

A proper Linux system maintains a list of the mounted file systems in the file /etc/mtab. Normally, this file would be created when we mount a new file system. Since we will not be mounting any file systems inside our chroot environment, create an empty file for utilities that expect the presence of /etc/mtab:

touch /etc/mtab

In order for user root to be able to login and for the name “root” to be recognized, there must be relevant entries in the /etc/passwd and /etc/group files.

Create the /etc/passwd file by running the following command:

cat > /etc/passwd << "EOF"
root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash
bin:x:1:1:bin:/dev/null:/bin/false
nobody:x:99:99:Unprivileged User:/dev/null:/bin/false
EOF

The actual password for root (the “x” used here is just a placeholder) will be set later.

Create the /etc/group file by running the following command:

cat > /etc/group << "EOF"
root:x:0:
bin:x:1:
sys:x:2:
kmem:x:3:
tty:x:4:
tape:x:5:
daemon:x:6:
floppy:x:7:
disk:x:8:
lp:x:9:
dialout:x:10:
audio:x:11:
video:x:12:
utmp:x:13:
usb:x:14:
cdrom:x:15:
mail:x:34:
nogroup:x:99:
EOF

The created groups are not part of any standard—they are groups decided on in part by the requirements of the Udev configuration in this chapter, and in part by common convention employed by a number of existing Linux distributions. The Linux Standard Base (LSB, available at http://www.linuxbase.org) recommends only that, besides the group root with a Group ID (GID) of 0, a group bin with a GID of 1 be present. All other group names and GIDs can be chosen freely by the system administrator since well-written programs do not depend on GID numbers, but rather use the group's name.

To remove the “I have no name!” prompt, start a new shell. Since a full Glibc was installed in Chapter 5 and the /etc/passwd and /etc/group files have been created, user name and group name resolution will now work:

exec /tools/bin/bash --login +h

Note the use of the +h directive. This tells bash not to use its internal path hashing. Without this directive, bash would remember the paths to binaries it has executed. To ensure the use of the newly compiled binaries as soon as they are installed, the +h directive will be used for the duration of this chapter.

The login, agetty, and init programs (and others) use a number of log files to record information such as who was logged into the system and when. However, these programs will not write to the log files if they do not already exist. Initialize the log files and give them proper permissions:

touch /var/run/utmp /var/log/{btmp,lastlog,wtmp}
chgrp -v utmp /var/run/utmp /var/log/lastlog
chmod -v 664 /var/run/utmp /var/log/lastlog

The /var/run/utmp file records the users that are currently logged in. The /var/log/wtmp file records all logins and logouts. The /var/log/lastlog file records when each user last logged in. The /var/log/btmp file records the bad login attempts.

6.7. Linux-2.6.37 API Headers

The Linux API Headers expose the kernel's API for use by Glibc.

Approximate build time: 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 485 MB

6.7.1. Installation of Linux API Headers

The Linux kernel needs to expose an Application Programming Interface (API) for the system's C library (Glibc in LFS) to use. This is done by way of sanitizing various C header files that are shipped in the Linux kernel source tarball.

Make sure there are no stale files and dependencies lying around from previous activity:

make mrproper

Now test and extract the user-visible kernel headers from the source. They are placed in an intermediate local directory and copied to the needed location because the extraction process removes any existing files in the target directory. There are also some hidden files used by the kernel developers and not needed by LFS that are removed from the intermediate directory.

make headers_check
make INSTALL_HDR_PATH=dest headers_install
find dest/include \( -name .install -o -name ..install.cmd \) -delete
cp -rv dest/include/* /usr/include

6.7.2. Contents of Linux API Headers

Installed headers: /usr/include/asm/*.h, /usr/include/asm-generic/*.h, /usr/include/drm/*.h, /usr/include/linux/*.h, /usr/include/mtd/*.h, /usr/include/rdma/*.h, /usr/include/scsi/*.h, /usr/include/sound/*.h, /usr/include/video/*.h, /usr/include/xen/*.h
Installed directories: /usr/include/asm, /usr/include/asm-generic, /usr/include/drm, /usr/include/linux, /usr/include/mtd, /usr/include/rdma, /usr/include/scsi, /usr/include/sound, /usr/include/video, /usr/include/xen

Short Descriptions

/usr/include/asm/*.h

The Linux API ASM Headers

/usr/include/asm-generic/*.h

The Linux API ASM Generic Headers

/usr/include/drm/*.h

The Linux API DRM Headers

/usr/include/linux/*.h

The Linux API Linux Headers

/usr/include/mtd/*.h

The Linux API MTD Headers

/usr/include/rdma/*.h

The Linux API RDMA Headers

/usr/include/scsi/*.h

The Linux API SCSI Headers

/usr/include/sound/*.h

The Linux API Sound Headers

/usr/include/video/*.h

The Linux API Video Headers

/usr/include/xen/*.h

The Linux API Xen Headers

6.8. Man-pages-3.32

The Man-pages package contains over 1,900 man pages.

Approximate build time: less than 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 21 MB

6.8.1. Installation of Man-pages

Install Man-pages by running:

make install

6.8.2. Contents of Man-pages

Installed files: various man pages

Short Descriptions

man pages

Describe C programming language functions, important device files, and significant configuration files

6.9. Glibc-2.13

The Glibc package contains the main C library. This library provides the basic routines for allocating memory, searching directories, opening and closing files, reading and writing files, string handling, pattern matching, arithmetic, and so on.

Approximate build time: 16.9 SBU
Required disk space: 637 MB

6.9.1. Installation of Glibc

Note

Some packages outside of LFS suggest installing GNU libiconv in order to translate data from one encoding to another. The project's home page (http://www.gnu.org/software/libiconv/) says “This library provides an iconv() implementation, for use on systems which don't have one, or whose implementation cannot convert from/to Unicode.” Glibc provides an iconv() implementation and can convert from/to Unicode, therefore libiconv is not required on an LFS system.

The Glibc build system is self-contained and will install perfectly, even though the compiler specs file and linker are still pointing at /tools. The specs and linker cannot be adjusted before the Glibc install because the Glibc autoconf tests would give false results and defeat the goal of achieving a clean build.

When running make install, a script called test-installation.pl performs a small sanity test on our newly installed Glibc. However, because our toolchain still points to the /tools directory, the sanity test would be carried out against the wrong Glibc. We can force the script to check the Glibc we have just installed with the following:

DL=$(readelf -l /bin/sh | sed -n 's@.*interpret.*/tools\(.*\)]$@\1@p')
sed -i "s|libs -o|libs -L/usr/lib -Wl,-dynamic-linker=$DL -o|" \
        scripts/test-installation.pl
unset DL

In addition, there is a bug in the test-installation.pl script in that it tries to link a test program to a library that isn't installed by make install. Issue the following sed command to fix it:

sed -i -e 's/"db1"/& \&\& $name ne "nss_test1"/' scripts/test-installation.pl

The ldd shell script contains Bash-specific syntax. Change its default program interpreter to /bin/bash in case another /bin/sh is installed as described in the Shells chapter of the BLFS book:

sed -i 's|@BASH@|/bin/bash|' elf/ldd.bash.in

Fix a bug that prevents Glibc from building with GCC-4.5.2:

patch -Np1 -i ../glibc-2.13-gcc_fix-1.patch

Fix a stack imbalance that occurs under some conditions:

sed -i '195,213 s/PRIVATE_FUTEX/FUTEX_CLOCK_REALTIME/' \
nptl/sysdeps/unix/sysv/linux/x86_64/pthread_rwlock_timed{rd,wr}lock.S

The Glibc documentation recommends building Glibc outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:

mkdir -v ../glibc-build
cd ../glibc-build

As in Chapter 5, add the needed compiler flags to CFLAGS for x86 machines. Here, the optimization of the library is also set for the gcc compiler to enhance compilation speed (-pipe) and package performance (-O3).

case `uname -m` in
  i?86) echo "CFLAGS += -march=i486 -mtune=native -O3 -pipe" > configparms ;;
esac

Prepare Glibc for compilation:

../glibc-2.13/configure --prefix=/usr \
    --disable-profile --enable-add-ons \
    --enable-kernel=2.6.22.5 --libexecdir=/usr/lib/glibc

The meaning of the new configure options:

--libexecdir=/usr/lib/glibc

This changes the location of the pt_chown program from its default of /usr/libexec to /usr/lib/glibc.

Compile the package:

make

Important

In this section, the test suite for Glibc is considered critical. Do not skip it under any circumstance.

Before running the tests, copy a file from the source tree into our build tree to prevent a couple of test failures, then test the results:

cp -v ../glibc-2.13/iconvdata/gconv-modules iconvdata
make -k check 2>&1 | tee glibc-check-log
grep Error glibc-check-log

You will probably see an expected (ignored) failure in the posix/annexc test. In addition the Glibc test suite is somewhat dependent on the host system. This is a list of the most common issues:

  • The nptl/tst-clock2, nptl/tst-attr3, and rt/tst-cpuclock2 tests have been known to fail. The reason is not completely understood, but indications are that minor timing issues can trigger these failures.

  • The math tests sometimes fail when running on systems where the CPU is not a relatively new genuine Intel or authentic AMD processor.

  • If you have mounted the LFS partition with the noatime option, the atime test will fail. As mentioned in Section 2.4, “Mounting the New Partition”, do not use the noatime option while building LFS.

  • When running on older and slower hardware or on systems under load, some tests can fail because of test timeouts being exceeded. Modifying the make check command to set a TIMEOUTFACTOR is reported to help eliminate these errors (e.g. TIMEOUTFACTOR=16 make -k check).

Though it is a harmless message, the install stage of Glibc will complain about the absence of /etc/ld.so.conf. Prevent this warning with:

touch /etc/ld.so.conf

Install the package:

make install

The locales that can make the system respond in a different language were not installed by the above command. None of the locales are required, but if some of them are missing, test suites of the future packages would skip important testcases.

Individual locales can be installed using the localedef program. E.g., the first localedef command below combines the /usr/share/i18n/locales/cs_CZ charset-independent locale definition with the /usr/share/i18n/charmaps/UTF-8.gz charmap definition and appends the result to the /usr/lib/locale/locale-archive file. The following instructions will install the minimum set of locales necessary for the optimal coverage of tests:

mkdir -pv /usr/lib/locale
localedef -i cs_CZ -f UTF-8 cs_CZ.UTF-8
localedef -i de_DE -f ISO-8859-1 de_DE
localedef -i de_DE@euro -f ISO-8859-15 de_DE@euro
localedef -i de_DE -f UTF-8 de_DE.UTF-8
localedef -i en_HK -f ISO-8859-1 en_HK
localedef -i en_PH -f ISO-8859-1 en_PH
localedef -i en_US -f ISO-8859-1 en_US
localedef -i en_US -f UTF-8 en_US.UTF-8
localedef -i es_MX -f ISO-8859-1 es_MX
localedef -i fa_IR -f UTF-8 fa_IR
localedef -i fr_FR -f ISO-8859-1 fr_FR
localedef -i fr_FR@euro -f ISO-8859-15 fr_FR@euro
localedef -i fr_FR -f UTF-8 fr_FR.UTF-8
localedef -i it_IT -f ISO-8859-1 it_IT
localedef -i ja_JP -f EUC-JP ja_JP
localedef -i tr_TR -f UTF-8 tr_TR.UTF-8
localedef -i zh_CN -f GB18030 zh_CN.GB18030

In addition, install the locale for your own country, language and character set.

Alternatively, install all locales listed in the glibc-2.13/localedata/SUPPORTED file (it includes every locale listed above and many more) at once with the following time-consuming command:

make localedata/install-locales

Then use the localedef command to create and install locales not listed in the glibc-2.13/localedata/SUPPORTED file in the unlikely case you need them.

6.9.2. Configuring Glibc

The /etc/nsswitch.conf file needs to be created because, although Glibc provides defaults when this file is missing or corrupt, the Glibc defaults do not work well in a networked environment. The time zone also needs to be configured.

Create a new file /etc/nsswitch.conf by running the following:

cat > /etc/nsswitch.conf << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/nsswitch.conf

passwd: files
group: files
shadow: files

hosts: files dns
networks: files

protocols: files
services: files
ethers: files
rpc: files

# End /etc/nsswitch.conf
EOF

One way to determine the local time zone, run the following script:

tzselect

After answering a few questions about the location, the script will output the name of the time zone (e.g., America/Edmonton). There are also some other possible timezones listed in /usr/share/zoneinfo such as Canada/Eastern or EST5EDT that are not identified by the script but can be used.

Then create the /etc/localtime file by running:

cp -v --remove-destination /usr/share/zoneinfo/<xxx> \
    /etc/localtime

Replace <xxx> with the name of the time zone selected (e.g., Canada/Eastern).

The meaning of the cp option:

--remove-destination

This is needed to force removal of the already existing symbolic link. The reason for copying the file instead of using a symlink is to cover the situation where /usr is on a separate partition. This could be important when booted into single user mode.

6.9.3. Configuring the Dynamic Loader

By default, the dynamic loader (/lib/ld-linux.so.2) searches through /lib and /usr/lib for dynamic libraries that are needed by programs as they are run. However, if there are libraries in directories other than /lib and /usr/lib, these need to be added to the /etc/ld.so.conf file in order for the dynamic loader to find them. Two directories that are commonly known to contain additional libraries are /usr/local/lib and /opt/lib, so add those directories to the dynamic loader's search path.

Create a new file /etc/ld.so.conf by running the following:

cat > /etc/ld.so.conf << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/ld.so.conf

/usr/local/lib
/opt/lib

# End /etc/ld.so.conf
EOF

6.9.4. Contents of Glibc

Installed programs: catchsegv, gencat, getconf, getent, iconv, iconvconfig, ldconfig, ldd, lddlibc4, locale, localedef, mtrace, nscd, pcprofiledump, pt_chown, rpcgen, rpcinfo, sln, sprof, tzselect, xtrace, zdump, and zic
Installed libraries: ld.so, libBrokenLocale.{a,so}, libSegFault.so, libanl.{a,so}, libbsd-compat.a, libc.{a,so}, libc_nonshared.a, libcidn.so, libcrypt.{a,so}, libdl.{a,so}, libg.a, libieee.a, libm.{a,so}, libmcheck.a, libmemusage.so, libnsl.{a,so}, libnss_compat.so, libnss_dns.so, libnss_files.so, libnss_hesiod.so, libnss_nis.so, libnss_nisplus.so, libpcprofile.so, libpthread.{a,so}, libpthread_nonshared.a, libresolv.{a,so}, librpcsvc.a, librt.{a,so}, libthread_db.so, and libutil.{a,so}
Installed directories: /usr/include/arpa, /usr/include/bits, /usr/include/gnu, /usr/include/net, /usr/include/netash, /usr/include/netatalk, /usr/include/netax25, /usr/include/neteconet, /usr/include/netinet, /usr/include/netipx, /usr/include/netiucv, /usr/include/netpacket, /usr/include/netrom, /usr/include/netrose, /usr/include/nfs, /usr/include/protocols, /usr/include/rpc, /usr/include/rpcsvc, /usr/include/sys, /usr/lib/gconv, /usr/lib/glibc, /usr/lib/locale, /usr/share/i18n, /usr/share/zoneinfo

Short Descriptions

catchsegv

Can be used to create a stack trace when a program terminates with a segmentation fault

gencat

Generates message catalogues

getconf

Displays the system configuration values for file system specific variables

getent

Gets entries from an administrative database

iconv

Performs character set conversion

iconvconfig

Creates fastloading iconv module configuration files

ldconfig

Configures the dynamic linker runtime bindings

ldd

Reports which shared libraries are required by each given program or shared library

lddlibc4

Assists ldd with object files

locale

Prints various information about the current locale

localedef

Compiles locale specifications

mtrace

Reads and interprets a memory trace file and displays a summary in human-readable format

nscd

A daemon that provides a cache for the most common name service requests

pcprofiledump

Dumps information generated by PC profiling

pt_chown

A helper program for grantpt to set the owner, group and access permissions of a slave pseudo terminal

rpcgen

Generates C code to implement the Remote Procedure Call (RPC) protocol

rpcinfo

Makes an RPC call to an RPC server

sln

A statically linked ln program

sprof

Reads and displays shared object profiling data

tzselect

Asks the user about the location of the system and reports the corresponding time zone description

xtrace

Traces the execution of a program by printing the currently executed function

zdump

The time zone dumper

zic

The time zone compiler

ld.so

The helper program for shared library executables

libBrokenLocale

Used internally by Glibc as a gross hack to get broken programs (e.g., some Motif applications) running. See comments in glibc-2.13/locale/broken_cur_max.c for more information

libSegFault

The segmentation fault signal handler, used by catchsegv

libanl

An asynchronous name lookup library

libbsd-compat

Provides the portability needed in order to run certain Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD) programs under Linux

libc

The main C library

libcidn

Used internally by Glibc for handling internationalized domain names in the getaddrinfo() function

libcrypt

The cryptography library

libdl

The dynamic linking interface library

libg

Dummy library containing no functions. Previously was a runtime library for g++

libieee

Linking in this module forces error handling rules for math functions as defined by the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE). The default is POSIX.1 error handling

libm

The mathematical library

libmcheck

Turns on memory allocation checking when linked to

libmemusage

Used by memusage to help collect information about the memory usage of a program

libnsl

The network services library

libnss

The Name Service Switch libraries, containing functions for resolving host names, user names, group names, aliases, services, protocols, etc.

libpcprofile

Contains profiling functions used to track the amount of CPU time spent in specific source code lines

libpthread

The POSIX threads library

libresolv

Contains functions for creating, sending, and interpreting packets to the Internet domain name servers

librpcsvc

Contains functions providing miscellaneous RPC services

librt

Contains functions providing most of the interfaces specified by the POSIX.1b Realtime Extension

libthread_db

Contains functions useful for building debuggers for multi-threaded programs

libutil

Contains code for “standard” functions used in many different Unix utilities

6.10. Re-adjusting the Toolchain

Now that the final C libraries have been installed, it is time to adjust the toolchain again. The toolchain will be adjusted so that it will link any newly compiled program against these new libraries. This is a similar process used in the “Adjusting” phase in the beginning of Chapter 5, but with the adjustments reversed. In Chapter 5, the chain was guided from the host's /{,usr/}lib directories to the new /tools/lib directory. Now, the chain will be guided from that same /tools/lib directory to the LFS /{,usr/}lib directories.

First, backup the /tools linker, and replace it with the adjusted linker we made in chapter 5. We'll also create a link to its counterpart in /tools/$(gcc -dumpmachine)/bin:

mv -v /tools/bin/{ld,ld-old}
mv -v /tools/$(gcc -dumpmachine)/bin/{ld,ld-old}
mv -v /tools/bin/{ld-new,ld}
ln -sv /tools/bin/ld /tools/$(gcc -dumpmachine)/bin/ld

Next, amend the GCC specs file so that it points to the new dynamic linker. Simply deleting all instances of “/tools” should leave us with the correct path to the dynamic linker. Also adjust the specs file so that GCC knows where to find the correct headers and Glibc start files. A sed command accomplishes this:

gcc -dumpspecs | sed -e 's@/tools@@g' \
    -e '/\*startfile_prefix_spec:/{n;s@.*@/usr/lib/ @}' \
    -e '/\*cpp:/{n;s@$@ -isystem /usr/include@}' > \
    `dirname $(gcc --print-libgcc-file-name)`/specs

It is a good idea to visually inspect the specs file to verify the intended change was actually made.

It is imperative at this point to ensure that the basic functions (compiling and linking) of the adjusted toolchain are working as expected. To do this, perform the following sanity checks:

echo 'main(){}' > dummy.c
cc dummy.c -v -Wl,--verbose &> dummy.log
readelf -l a.out | grep ': /lib'

If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be (allowing for platform-specific differences in dynamic linker name):

[Requesting program interpreter: /lib/ld-linux.so.2]

Note that /lib is now the prefix of our dynamic linker.

Now make sure that we're setup to use the correct startfiles:

grep -o '/usr/lib.*/crt[1in].*succeeded' dummy.log

If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be:

/usr/lib/crt1.o succeeded
/usr/lib/crti.o succeeded
/usr/lib/crtn.o succeeded

Verify that the compiler is searching for the correct header files:

grep -B1 '^ /usr/include' dummy.log

This command should return successfully with the following output:

#include <...> search starts here:
 /usr/include

Next, verify that the new linker is being used with the correct search paths:

grep 'SEARCH.*/usr/lib' dummy.log |sed 's|; |\n|g'

If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command (allowing for platform-specific target triplets) will be:

SEARCH_DIR("/tools/i686-pc-linux-gnu/lib")
SEARCH_DIR("/usr/lib")
SEARCH_DIR("/lib");

Next make sure that we're using the correct libc:

grep "/lib.*/libc.so.6 " dummy.log

If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command (allowing for a lib64 directory on 64-bit hosts) will be:

attempt to open /lib/libc.so.6 succeeded

Lastly, make sure GCC is using the correct dynamic linker:

grep found dummy.log

If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be (allowing for platform-specific differences in dynamic linker name and a lib64 directory on 64-bit hosts):

found ld-linux.so.2 at /lib/ld-linux.so.2

If the output does not appear as shown above or is not received at all, then something is seriously wrong. Investigate and retrace the steps to find out where the problem is and correct it. The most likely reason is that something went wrong with the specs file adjustment. Any issues will need to be resolved before continuing on with the process.

Once everything is working correctly, clean up the test files:

rm -v dummy.c a.out dummy.log

6.11. Zlib-1.2.5

The Zlib package contains compression and decompression routines used by some programs.

Approximate build time: less than 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 2.8 MB

6.11.1. Installation of Zlib

First, fix a typo in the package header file:

sed -i 's/ifdef _LARGEFILE64_SOURCE/ifndef _LARGEFILE64_SOURCE/' zlib.h

Prepare Zlib for compilation:

CFLAGS='-mstackrealign -fPIC -O3' ./configure --prefix=/usr

The meaning of the new configure environment variable:

CFLAGS='-mstackrealign -fPIC -O3'

Setting CFLAGS overrides the default optimization in the package to prevent some run time errors. Note that the -mstackrealign may cause build failures in non-Intel architecture systems.

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

The shared library needs to be moved to /lib, and as a result the .so file in /usr/lib will need to be recreated:

mv -v /usr/lib/libz.so.* /lib
ln -sfv ../../lib/libz.so.1.2.5 /usr/lib/libz.so

6.11.2. Contents of Zlib

Installed libraries: libz.{a,so}

Short Descriptions

libz

Contains compression and decompression functions used by some programs

6.12. Binutils-2.21

The Binutils package contains a linker, an assembler, and other tools for handling object files.

Approximate build time: 2.1 SBU
Required disk space: 222 MB

6.12.1. Installation of Binutils

Verify that the PTYs are working properly inside the chroot environment by performing a simple test:

expect -c "spawn ls"

This command should output the following:

spawn ls

If, instead, the output includes the message below, then the environment is not set up for proper PTY operation. This issue needs to be resolved before running the test suites for Binutils and GCC:

The system has no more ptys.
Ask your system administrator to create more.

Suppress the installation of an outdated standards.info file as a newer one is installed later on in the Autoconf instructions:

rm -fv etc/standards.info
sed -i.bak '/^INFO/s/standards.info //' etc/Makefile.in

The Binutils documentation recommends building Binutils outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:

mkdir -v ../binutils-build
cd ../binutils-build

Prepare Binutils for compilation:

../binutils-2.21/configure --prefix=/usr \
    --enable-shared

Compile the package:

make tooldir=/usr

The meaning of the make parameter:

tooldir=/usr

Normally, the tooldir (the directory where the executables will ultimately be located) is set to $(exec_prefix)/$(target_alias). For example, x86_64 machines would expand that to /usr/x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu. Because this is a custom system, this target-specific directory in /usr is not required. $(exec_prefix)/$(target_alias) would be used if the system was used to cross-compile (for example, compiling a package on an Intel machine that generates code that can be executed on PowerPC machines).

Important

The test suite for Binutils in this section is considered critical. Do not skip it under any circumstances.

Test the results:

make check

Install the package:

make tooldir=/usr install

Install the libiberty header file that is needed by some packages:

cp -v ../binutils-2.21/include/libiberty.h /usr/include

6.12.2. Contents of Binutils

Installed programs: addr2line, ar, as, c++filt, gprof, ld, nm, objcopy, objdump, ranlib, readelf, size, strings, and strip
Installed libraries: libiberty.a, libbfd.{a,so}, and libopcodes.{a,so}
Installed directory: /usr/lib/ldscripts

Short Descriptions

addr2line

Translates program addresses to file names and line numbers; given an address and the name of an executable, it uses the debugging information in the executable to determine which source file and line number are associated with the address

ar

Creates, modifies, and extracts from archives

as

An assembler that assembles the output of gcc into object files

c++filt

Used by the linker to de-mangle C++ and Java symbols and to keep overloaded functions from clashing

gprof

Displays call graph profile data

ld

A linker that combines a number of object and archive files into a single file, relocating their data and tying up symbol references

nm

Lists the symbols occurring in a given object file

objcopy

Translates one type of object file into another

objdump

Displays information about the given object file, with options controlling the particular information to display; the information shown is useful to programmers who are working on the compilation tools

ranlib

Generates an index of the contents of an archive and stores it in the archive; the index lists all of the symbols defined by archive members that are relocatable object files

readelf

Displays information about ELF type binaries

size

Lists the section sizes and the total size for the given object files

strings

Outputs, for each given file, the sequences of printable characters that are of at least the specified length (defaulting to four); for object files, it prints, by default, only the strings from the initializing and loading sections while for other types of files, it scans the entire file

strip

Discards symbols from object files

libiberty

Contains routines used by various GNU programs, including getopt, obstack, strerror, strtol, and strtoul

libbfd

The Binary File Descriptor library

libopcodes

A library for dealing with opcodes—the “readable text” versions of instructions for the processor; it is used for building utilities like objdump.

6.13. GMP-5.0.1

The GMP package contains math libraries. These have useful functions for arbitrary precision arithmetic.

Approximate build time: 1.7 SBU
Required disk space: 39 MB

6.13.1. Installation of GMP

Note

If you are building for 32-bit x86, but you have a CPU which is capable of running 64-bit code and you have specified CFLAGS in the environment, the configure script will attempt to configure for 64-bits and fail. Avoid this by invoking the configure command below with

ABI=32 ./configure ...

Prepare GMP for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --enable-cxx --enable-mpbsd

The meaning of the new configure options:

--enable-cxx

This parameter enables C++ support

--enable-mpbsd

This builds the Berkeley MP compatibility library

Compile the package:

make

Important

The test suite for GMP in this section is considered critical. Do not skip it under any circumstances.

Test the results:

make check 2>&1 | tee gmp-check-log

Ensure that all 162 tests in the test suite passed. Check the results by issuing the following command:

awk '/tests passed/{total+=$2} ; END{print total}' gmp-check-log

Install the package:

make install

If desired, install the documentation:

mkdir -v /usr/share/doc/gmp-5.0.1
cp    -v doc/{isa_abi_headache,configuration} doc/*.html \
         /usr/share/doc/gmp-5.0.1

6.13.2. Contents of GMP

Installed Libraries: libgmp.{a,so}, libgmpxx.{a,so}, and libmp.{a,so}
Installed directory: /usr/share/doc/gmp-5.0.1

Short Descriptions

libgmp

Contains precision math functions.

libgmpxx

Contains C++ precision math functions.

libmp

Contains the Berkeley MP math functions.

6.14. MPFR-3.0.0

The MPFR package contains functions for multiple precision math.

Approximate build time: 1.1 SBU
Required disk space: 27.1 MB

6.14.1. Installation of MPFR

Prepare MPFR for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --enable-thread-safe \
  --docdir=/usr/share/doc/mpfr-3.0.0

Compile the package:

make

Important

The test suite for MPFR in this section is considered critical. Do not skip it under any circumstances.

Test the results and ensure that all tests passed:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Install the documentation:

make html
make install-html

6.14.2. Contents of MPFR

Installed Libraries: libmpfr.{a,so}
Installed directory: /usr/share/doc/mpfr-3.0.0

Short Descriptions

libmpfr

Contains multiple-precision math functions.

6.15. MPC-0.8.2

The MPC package contains a library for the arithmetic of complex numbers with arbitrarily high precision and correct rounding of the result.

Approximate build time: 0.3 SBU
Required disk space: 10.5 MB

6.15.1. Installation of MPC

Prepare MPC for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

6.15.2. Contents of MPC

Installed Libraries: libmpc.{a,so}

Short Descriptions

libmpc

Contains complex math functions

6.16. GCC-4.5.2

The GCC package contains the GNU compiler collection, which includes the C and C++ compilers.

Approximate build time: 44 SBU
Required disk space: 1.1 GB

6.16.1. Installation of GCC

Apply a sed substitution that will suppress the installation of libiberty.a. The version of libiberty.a provided by Binutils will be used instead:

sed -i 's/install_to_$(INSTALL_DEST) //' libiberty/Makefile.in

As in Section 5.10, “GCC-4.5.2 - Pass 2”, apply the following sed to force the build to use the -fomit-frame-pointer compiler flag in order to ensure consistent compiler builds:

case `uname -m` in
  i?86) sed -i 's/^T_CFLAGS =$/& -fomit-frame-pointer/' \
        gcc/Makefile.in ;;
esac

The fixincludes script is known to occasionally erroneously attempt to "fix" the system headers installed so far. As the headers up to this point are known to not require fixing, issue the following command to prevent the fixincludes script from running:

sed -i 's@\./fixinc\.sh@-c true@' gcc/Makefile.in

The GCC documentation recommends building GCC outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:

mkdir -v ../gcc-build
cd ../gcc-build

Prepare GCC for compilation:

../gcc-4.5.2/configure --prefix=/usr \
    --libexecdir=/usr/lib --enable-shared \
    --enable-threads=posix --enable-__cxa_atexit \
    --enable-clocale=gnu --enable-languages=c,c++ \
    --disable-multilib --disable-bootstrap --with-system-zlib

Note that for other languages, there are some prerequisites that are not available. See the BLFS Book for instructions on how to build all the GCC supported languages.

The meaning of the new configure option:

--with-system-zlib

This switch tells GCC to link to the system installed copy of the Zlib library, rather than its own internal copy.

Compile the package:

make

Important

In this section, the test suite for GCC is considered critical. Do not skip it under any circumstance.

One set of tests in the GCC test suite is known to exhaust the stack, so increase the stack size prior to running the tests:

ulimit -s 16384

Test the results, but do not stop at errors:

make -k check

To receive a summary of the test suite results, run:

../gcc-4.5.2/contrib/test_summary

For only the summaries, pipe the output through grep -A7 Summ.

Results can be compared with those located at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/build-logs/6.8/ and http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc-testresults/.

A few unexpected failures cannot always be avoided. The GCC developers are usually aware of these issues, but have not resolved them yet. In particular, the libmudflap tests are known be particularly problematic as a result of a bug in GCC (http://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=20003). Unless the test results are vastly different from those at the above URL, it is safe to continue.

Install the package:

make install

Some packages expect the C preprocessor to be installed in the /lib directory. To support those packages, create this symlink:

ln -sv ../usr/bin/cpp /lib

Many packages use the name cc to call the C compiler. To satisfy those packages, create a symlink:

ln -sv gcc /usr/bin/cc

Now that our final toolchain is in place, it is important to again ensure that compiling and linking will work as expected. We do this by performing the same sanity checks as we did earlier in the chapter:

echo 'main(){}' > dummy.c
cc dummy.c -v -Wl,--verbose &> dummy.log
readelf -l a.out | grep ': /lib'

If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be (allowing for platform-specific differences in dynamic linker name):

[Requesting program interpreter: /lib/ld-linux.so.2]

Now make sure that we're setup to use the correct startfiles:

grep -o '/usr/lib.*/crt[1in].*succeeded' dummy.log

If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be:

/usr/lib/gcc/i686-pc-linux-gnu/4.5.2/../../../crt1.o succeeded
/usr/lib/gcc/i686-pc-linux-gnu/4.5.2/../../../crti.o succeeded
/usr/lib/gcc/i686-pc-linux-gnu/4.5.2/../../../crtn.o succeeded

Depending on your machine architecture, the above may differ slightly, the difference usually being the name of the directory after /usr/lib/gcc. If your machine is a 64-bit system, you may also see a directory named lib64 towards the end of the string. The important thing to look for here is that gcc has found all three crt*.o files under the /usr/lib directory.

Verify that the compiler is searching for the correct header files:

grep -B4 '^ /usr/include' dummy.log

This command should return successfully with the following output:

#include <...> search starts here:
 /usr/local/include
 /usr/lib/gcc/i686-pc-linux-gnu/4.5.2/include
 /usr/lib/gcc/i686-pc-linux-gnu/4.5.2/include-fixed
 /usr/include

Again, note that the directory named after your target triplet may be different than the above, depending on your architecture.

Note

As of version 4.3.0, GCC now unconditionally installs the limits.h file into the private include-fixed directory, and that directory is required to be in place.

Next, verify that the new linker is being used with the correct search paths:

grep 'SEARCH.*/usr/lib' dummy.log |sed 's|; |\n|g'

If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command (allowing for platform-specific target triplets) will be:

SEARCH_DIR("/usr/i686-pc-linux-gnu/lib")
SEARCH_DIR("/usr/local/lib")
SEARCH_DIR("/lib")
SEARCH_DIR("/usr/lib");

A 64-bit system may see a few more directories. For example, here is the output from an x86_64 machine:

SEARCH_DIR("/usr/x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu/lib64")
SEARCH_DIR("/usr/local/lib64")
SEARCH_DIR("/lib64")
SEARCH_DIR("/usr/lib64")
SEARCH_DIR("/usr/x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu/lib")
SEARCH_DIR("/usr/local/lib")
SEARCH_DIR("/lib")
SEARCH_DIR("/usr/lib");

Next make sure that we're using the correct libc:

grep "/lib.*/libc.so.6 " dummy.log

If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command (allowing for a lib64 directory on 64-bit hosts) will be:

attempt to open /lib/libc.so.6 succeeded

Lastly, make sure GCC is using the correct dynamic linker:

grep found dummy.log

If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be (allowing for platform-specific differences in dynamic linker name and a lib64 directory on 64-bit hosts):

found ld-linux.so.2 at /lib/ld-linux.so.2

If the output does not appear as shown above or is not received at all, then something is seriously wrong. Investigate and retrace the steps to find out where the problem is and correct it. The most likely reason is that something went wrong with the specs file adjustment. Any issues will need to be resolved before continuing on with the process.

Once everything is working correctly, clean up the test files:

rm -v dummy.c a.out dummy.log

6.16.2. Contents of GCC

Installed programs: c++, cc (link to gcc), cpp, g++, gcc, gccbug, and gcov
Installed libraries: libgcc.a, libgcc_eh.a, libgcc_s.so, libgcov.a, libgomp.{a,so}, libmudflap.{a,so}, libmudflapth.{a,so}, libssp.{a,so}, libssp_nonshared.a, libstdc++.{a,so} and libsupc++.a
Installed directories: /usr/include/c++, /usr/lib/gcc, /usr/share/gcc-4.5.2

Short Descriptions

c++

The C++ compiler

cc

The C compiler

cpp

The C preprocessor; it is used by the compiler to expand the #include, #define, and similar statements in the source files

g++

The C++ compiler

gcc

The C compiler

gccbug

A shell script used to help create useful bug reports

gcov

A coverage testing tool; it is used to analyze programs to determine where optimizations will have the most effect

libgcc

Contains run-time support for gcc

libgcov

This library is linked in to a program when GCC is instructed to enable profiling

libgomp

GNU implementation of the OpenMP API for multi-platform shared-memory parallel programming in C/C++ and Fortran

libmudflap

Contains routines that support GCC's bounds checking functionality

libssp

Contains routines supporting GCC's stack-smashing protection functionality

libstdc++

The standard C++ library

libsupc++

Provides supporting routines for the C++ programming language

6.17. Sed-4.2.1

The Sed package contains a stream editor.

Approximate build time: 0.2 SBU
Required disk space: 8.3 MB

6.17.1. Installation of Sed

Prepare Sed for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --bindir=/bin --htmldir=/usr/share/doc/sed-4.2.1

The meaning of the new configure option:

--htmldir

This sets the directory where the HTML documentation will be installed to.

Compile the package:

make

Generate the HTML documentation:

make html

To test the results, issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Install the HTML documentation:

make -C doc install-html

6.17.2. Contents of Sed

Installed program: sed
Installed directory: /usr/share/doc/sed-4.2.1

Short Descriptions

sed

Filters and transforms text files in a single pass

6.18. Pkg-config-0.25

The pkg-config package contains a tool for passing the include path and/or library paths to build tools during the configure and make file execution.

Approximate build time: 0.3 SBU
Required disk space: 11.5 MB

6.18.1. Installation of Pkg-config

Note

Pkg-Config will use an included version of Popt to parse command line options. If an external version of Popt is desired, install that version using the BLFS Popt build instructions before installing Pkg-config.

Prepare Pkg-config for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

6.18.2. Contents of Pkg-config

Installed program: pkg-config

Short Descriptions

pkg-config

Returns meta information for the specified library or package.

6.19. Ncurses-5.7

The Ncurses package contains libraries for terminal-independent handling of character screens.

Approximate build time: 0.8 SBU
Required disk space: 35 MB

6.19.1. Installation of Ncurses

Prepare Ncurses for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --with-shared --without-debug --enable-widec

The meaning of the configure option:

--enable-widec

This switch causes wide-character libraries (e.g., libncursesw.so.5.7) to be built instead of normal ones (e.g., libncurses.so.5.7). These wide-character libraries are usable in both multibyte and traditional 8-bit locales, while normal libraries work properly only in 8-bit locales. Wide-character and normal libraries are source-compatible, but not binary-compatible.

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite, but it can only be run after the package has been installed. The tests reside in the test/ directory. See the README file in that directory for further details.

Install the package:

make install

Move the shared libraries to the /lib directory, where they are expected to reside:

mv -v /usr/lib/libncursesw.so.5* /lib

Because the libraries have been moved, one symlink points to a non-existent file. Recreate it:

ln -sfv ../../lib/libncursesw.so.5 /usr/lib/libncursesw.so

Many applications still expect the linker to be able to find non-wide-character Ncurses libraries. Trick such applications into linking with wide-character libraries by means of symlinks and linker scripts:

for lib in ncurses form panel menu ; do \
    rm -vf /usr/lib/lib${lib}.so ; \
    echo "INPUT(-l${lib}w)" >/usr/lib/lib${lib}.so ; \
    ln -sfv lib${lib}w.a /usr/lib/lib${lib}.a ; \
done
ln -sfv libncurses++w.a /usr/lib/libncurses++.a

Finally, make sure that old applications that look for -lcurses at build time are still buildable:

rm -vf /usr/lib/libcursesw.so
echo "INPUT(-lncursesw)" >/usr/lib/libcursesw.so
ln -sfv libncurses.so /usr/lib/libcurses.so
ln -sfv libncursesw.a /usr/lib/libcursesw.a
ln -sfv libncurses.a /usr/lib/libcurses.a

If desired, install the Ncurses documentation:

mkdir -v       /usr/share/doc/ncurses-5.7
cp -v -R doc/* /usr/share/doc/ncurses-5.7

Note

The instructions above don't create non-wide-character Ncurses libraries since no package installed by compiling from sources would link against them at runtime. If you must have such libraries because of some binary-only application or to be compliant with LSB, build the package again with the following commands:

make distclean
./configure --prefix=/usr --with-shared --without-normal \
  --without-debug --without-cxx-binding
make sources libs
cp -av lib/lib*.so.5* /usr/lib

6.19.2. Contents of Ncurses

Installed programs: captoinfo (link to tic), clear, infocmp, infotocap (link to tic), ncursesw5-config, reset (link to tset), tic, toe, tput, and tset
Installed libraries: libcursesw.{a,so} (symlink and linker script to libncursesw.{a,so}), libformw.{a,so}, libmenuw.{a,so}, libncurses++w.a, libncursesw.{a,so}, libpanelw.{a,so} and their non-wide-character counterparts without "w" in the library names.
Installed directories: /usr/share/tabset, /usr/share/terminfo

Short Descriptions

captoinfo

Converts a termcap description into a terminfo description

clear

Clears the screen, if possible

infocmp

Compares or prints out terminfo descriptions

infotocap

Converts a terminfo description into a termcap description

ncursesw5-config

Provides configuration information for ncurses

reset

Reinitializes a terminal to its default values

tic

The terminfo entry-description compiler that translates a terminfo file from source format into the binary format needed for the ncurses library routines. A terminfo file contains information on the capabilities of a certain terminal

toe

Lists all available terminal types, giving the primary name and description for each

tput

Makes the values of terminal-dependent capabilities available to the shell; it can also be used to reset or initialize a terminal or report its long name

tset

Can be used to initialize terminals

libcurses

A link to libncurses

libncurses

Contains functions to display text in many complex ways on a terminal screen; a good example of the use of these functions is the menu displayed during the kernel's make menuconfig

libform

Contains functions to implement forms

libmenu

Contains functions to implement menus

libpanel

Contains functions to implement panels

6.20. Util-linux-2.19

The Util-linux package contains miscellaneous utility programs. Among them are utilities for handling file systems, consoles, partitions, and messages.

Approximate build time: 0.6 SBU
Required disk space: 50 MB

6.20.1. FHS compliance notes

The FHS recommends using the /var/lib/hwclock directory instead of the usual /etc directory as the location for the adjtime file. To make the hwclock program FHS-compliant, run the following:

sed -e 's@etc/adjtime@var/lib/hwclock/adjtime@g' \
    -i $(grep -rl '/etc/adjtime' .)
mkdir -pv /var/lib/hwclock

6.20.2. Installation of Util-linux

./configure --enable-arch --enable-partx --enable-write

The meaning of the configure options:

--enable-arch

Enables building the arch program

--enable-partx

Enables building the addpart, delpart and partx programs

--enable-write

Enables building the write program

Compile the package:

make

This package does not come with a test suite.

Install the package:

make install

6.20.3. Contents of Util-linux

Installed programs: addpart, agetty, arch, blkid, blockdev, cal, cfdisk, chkdupexe, chrt, col, colcrt, colrm, column, ctrlaltdel, cytune, ddate, delpart, dmesg, fallocate, fdformat, fdisk, findfs, findmnt, flock, fsck, fsck.cramfs, fsck.minix, fsfreeze, fstrim, getopt, hexdump, hwclock, i386, ionice, ipcmk, ipcrm, ipcs, isosize, ldattach, line, linux32, linux64, logger, look, losetup, lsblk, lscpu, mcookie, mkfs, mkfs.bfs, mkfs.cramfs, mkfs.minix, mkswap, more, mount, namei, partx, pg, pivot_root, readprofile, rename, renice, rev, rtcwake, script, scriptreplay, setarch, setsid, setterm, sfdisk, swaplabel, swapoff (link to swapon), swapon, switch_root, tailf, taskset, tunelp, ul, umount, unshare, uuidd, uuidgen, wall, whereis, wipefs, and write
Installed libraries: libblkid.{a,so}, libmount.{a,so}, libuuid.{a,so}
Installed directories: /usr/share/getopt, /var/lib/hwclock

Short Descriptions

addpart

Informs the Linux kernel of new partitions

agetty

Opens a tty port, prompts for a login name, and then invokes the login program

arch

Reports the machine's architecture

blkid

A command line utility to locate and print block device attributes

blockdev

Allows users to call block device ioctls from the command line

cal

Displays a simple calendar

cfdisk

Manipulates the partition table of the given device

chkdupexe

Finds duplicate executables

chrt

Manipulates real-time attributes of a process

col

Filters out reverse line feeds

colcrt

Filters nroff output for terminals that lack some capabilities, such as overstriking and half-lines

colrm

Filters out the given columns

column

Formats a given file into multiple columns

ctrlaltdel

Sets the function of the Ctrl+Alt+Del key combination to a hard or a soft reset

cytune

Tunes the parameters of the serial line drivers for Cyclades cards

ddate

Gives the Discordian date or converts the given Gregorian date to a Discordian one

delpart

Asks the Linux kernel to remove a partition

dmesg

Dumps the kernel boot messages

fallocate

Preallocates space to a file

fdformat

Low-level formats a floppy disk

fdisk

Manipulates the paritition table of the given device

findfs

Finds a file system by label or Universally Unique Identifier (UUID)

findmnt

Is a command line interface to the libmount library for work with mountinfo, fstab and mtab files

flock

Acquires a file lock and then executes a command with the lock held

fsck

Is used to check, and optionally repair, file systems

fsck.cramfs

Performs a consistency check on the Cramfs file system on the given device

fsck.minix

Performs a consistency check on the Minix file system on the given device

fsfreeze

Is a very simple wrapper around FIFREEZE/FITHAW ioctl kernel driver operations

fstrim

Discards unused blocks on a mounted filesystem

getopt

Parses options in the given command line

hexdump

Dumps the given file in hexadecimal or in another given format

hwclock

Reads or sets the system's hardware clock, also called the Real-Time Clock (RTC) or Basic Input-Output System (BIOS) clock

i386

A symbolic link to setarch

ionice

Gets or sets the io scheduling class and priority for a program

ipcmk

Creates various IPC resources

ipcrm

Removes the given Inter-Process Communication (IPC) resource

ipcs

Provides IPC status information

isosize

Reports the size of an iso9660 file system

ldattach

Attaches a line discipline to a serial line

line

Copies a single line

linux32

A symbolic link to setarch

linux64

A symbolic link to setarch

logger

Enters the given message into the system log

look

Displays lines that begin with the given string

losetup

Sets up and controls loop devices

lsblk

Lists information about all or selected block devices in a tree-like format.

lscpu

Prints CPU architechture information

mcookie

Generates magic cookies (128-bit random hexadecimal numbers) for xauth

mkfs

Builds a file system on a device (usually a hard disk partition)

mkfs.bfs

Creates a Santa Cruz Operations (SCO) bfs file system

mkfs.cramfs

Creates a cramfs file system

mkfs.minix

Creates a Minix file system

mkswap

Initializes the given device or file to be used as a swap area

more

A filter for paging through text one screen at a time

mount

Attaches the file system on the given device to a specified directory in the file-system tree

namei

Shows the symbolic links in the given pathnames

partx

Tells the kernel about the presence and numbering of on-disk partitions

pg

Displays a text file one screen full at a time

pivot_root

Makes the given file system the new root file system of the current process

readprofile

Reads kernel profiling information

rename

Renames the given files, replacing a given string with another

renice

Alters the priority of running processes

rev

Reverses the lines of a given file

rtcwake

Used to enter a system sleep state until specified wakeup time

script

Makes a typescript of a terminal session

scriptreplay

Plays back typescripts using timing information

setarch

Changes reported architecture in a new program environment and sets personality flags

setsid

Runs the given program in a new session

setterm

Sets terminal attributes

sfdisk

A disk partition table manipulator

swaplabel

Allows to change swaparea UUID and label

swapoff

Disables devices and files for paging and swapping

swapon

Enables devices and files for paging and swapping and lists the devices and files currently in use

switch_root

Switches to another filesystem as the root of the mount tree

tailf

Tracks the growth of a log file. Displays the last 10 lines of a log file, then continues displaying any new entries in the log file as they are created

taskset

Retrieves or sets a process' CPU affinity

tunelp

Tunes the parameters of the line printer

ul

A filter for translating underscores into escape sequences indicating underlining for the terminal in use

umount

Disconnects a file system from the system's file tree

unshare

Runs a program with some namespaces unshared from parent

uuidd

A daemon used by the UUID library to generate time-based UUIDs in a secure and guranteed-unique fashion.

uuidgen

Creates new UUIDs. Each new UUID can reasonably be considered unique among all UUIDs created, on the local system and on other systems, in the past and in the future

wall

Displays the contents of a file or, by default, its standard input, on the terminals of all currently logged in users

whereis

Reports the location of the binary, source, and man page for the given command

wipefs

Wipes a filesystem signature from a device

write

Sends a message to the given user if that user has not disabled receipt of such messages

libblkid

Contains routines for device identification and token extraction

libuuid

Contains routines for generating unique identifiers for objects that may be accessible beyond the local system

6.21. E2fsprogs-1.41.14

The E2fsprogs package contains the utilities for handling the ext2 file system. It also supports the ext3 and ext4 journaling file systems.

Approximate build time: 0.5 SBU
Required disk space: 45 MB

6.21.1. Installation of E2fsprogs

The E2fsprogs documentation recommends that the package be built in a subdirectory of the source tree:

mkdir -v build
cd build

Prepare E2fsprogs for compilation:

../configure --prefix=/usr --with-root-prefix="" \
    --enable-elf-shlibs --disable-libblkid --disable-libuuid \
    --disable-uuidd --disable-fsck

The meaning of the configure options:

--with-root-prefix=""

Certain programs (such as the e2fsck program) are considered essential programs. When, for example, /usr is not mounted, these programs still need to be available. They belong in directories like /lib and /sbin. If this option is not passed to E2fsprogs' configure, the programs are installed into the /usr directory.

--enable-elf-shlibs

This creates the shared libraries which some programs in this package use.

--disable-*

This prevents E2fsprogs from building and installing the libuuid and libblkid libraries, the uuidd daemon, and the fsck wrapper, as Util-Linux installed all of them earlier.

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

One of the E2fsprogs tests will attempt to allocate 256 MB of memory. If you do not have significantly more RAM than this, it is recommended to enable sufficient swap space for the test. See Section 2.3, “Creating a File System on the Partition” and Section 2.4, “Mounting the New Partition” for details on creating and enabling swap space.

Install the binaries, documentation, and shared libraries:

make install

Install the static libraries and headers:

make install-libs

Make the installed static libraries writable so debugging symbols can be removed later:

chmod -v u+w /usr/lib/{libcom_err,libe2p,libext2fs,libss}.a

This package installs a gzipped .info file but doesn't update the system-wide dir file. Unzip this file and then update the system dir file using the following commands.

gunzip -v /usr/share/info/libext2fs.info.gz
install-info --dir-file=/usr/share/info/dir \
             /usr/share/info/libext2fs.info

If desired, create and install some additional documentation by issuing the following commands:

makeinfo -o      doc/com_err.info ../lib/et/com_err.texinfo
install -v -m644 doc/com_err.info /usr/share/info
install-info --dir-file=/usr/share/info/dir \
             /usr/share/info/com_err.info

6.21.2. Contents of E2fsprogs

Installed programs: badblocks, chattr, compile_et, debugfs, dumpe2fs, e2freefrag, e2fsck, e2image, e2initrd_helper, e2label, e2undo, filefrag, fsck.ext2, fsck.ext3, fsck.ext4, fsck.ext4dev, logsave, lsattr, mk_cmds, mke2fs, mkfs.ext2, mkfs.ext3, mkfs.ext4, mkfs.ext4dev, mklost+found, resize2fs, and tune2fs
Installed libraries: libcom_err.{a,so}, libe2p.{a,so}, libext2fs.{a,so} and libss.{a,so}
Installed directory: /usr/include/e2p, /usr/include/et, /usr/include/ext2fs, /usr/include/ss, /usr/share/et, /usr/share/ss

Short Descriptions

badblocks

Searches a device (usually a disk partition) for bad blocks

chattr

Changes the attributes of files on an ext2 file system; it also changes ext3 file systems, the journaling version of ext2 file systems

compile_et

An error table compiler; it converts a table of error-code names and messages into a C source file suitable for use with the com_err library

debugfs

A file system debugger; it can be used to examine and change the state of an ext2 file system

dumpe2fs

Prints the super block and blocks group information for the file system present on a given device

e2freefrag

Reports free space fragmentation information

e2fsck

Is used to check, and optionally repair ext2 file systems and ext3 file systems

e2image

Is used to save critical ext2 file system data to a file

e2initrd_helper

Prints the FS type of a given filesystem, given either a device name or label

e2label

Displays or changes the file system label on the ext2 file system present on a given device

e2undo

Replays the undo log undo_log for an ext2/ext3/ext4 filesystem found on a device. This can be used to undo a failed operation by an e2fsprogs program.

filefrag

Reports on how badly fragmented a particular file might be

fsck.ext2

By default checks ext2 file systems. This is a hard link to e2fsck.

fsck.ext3

By default checks ext3 file systems. This is a hard link to e2fsck.

fsck.ext4

By default checks ext4 file systems. This is a hard link to e2fsck.

fsck.ext4dev

By default checks ext4 development file systems. This is a hard link to e2fsck.

logsave

Saves the output of a command in a log file

lsattr

Lists the attributes of files on a second extended file system

mk_cmds

Converts a table of command names and help messages into a C source file suitable for use with the libss subsystem library

mke2fs

Creates an ext2 or ext3 file system on the given device

mkfs.ext2

By default creates ext2 file systems. This is a hard link to mke2fs.

mkfs.ext3

By default creates ext3 file systems. This is a hard link to mke2fs.

mkfs.ext4

By default creates ext4 file systems. This is a hard link to mke2fs.

mkfs.ext4dev

By default creates ext4 development file systems. This is a hard link to mke2fs.

mklost+found

Used to create a lost+found directory on an ext2 file system; it pre-allocates disk blocks to this directory to lighten the task of e2fsck

resize2fs

Can be used to enlarge or shrink an ext2 file system

tune2fs

Adjusts tunable file system parameters on an ext2 file system

libcom_err

The common error display routine

libe2p

Used by dumpe2fs, chattr, and lsattr

libext2fs

Contains routines to enable user-level programs to manipulate an ext2 file system

libss

Used by debugfs

6.22. Coreutils-8.10

The Coreutils package contains utilities for showing and setting the basic system characteristics.

Approximate build time: 3.2 SBU
Required disk space: 99 MB

6.22.1. Installation of Coreutils

A known issue with the uname program from this package is that the -p switch always returns unknown. The following patch fixes this behavior for Intel architectures:

case `uname -m` in
 i?86 | x86_64) patch -Np1 -i ../coreutils-8.10-uname-1.patch ;;
esac

POSIX requires that programs from Coreutils recognize character boundaries correctly even in multibyte locales. The following patch fixes this non-compliance and other internationalization-related bugs:

patch -Np1 -i ../coreutils-8.10-i18n-1.patch

Note

In the past, many bugs were found in this patch. When reporting new bugs to Coreutils maintainers, please check first if they are reproducible without this patch.

Now prepare Coreutils for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr \
    --enable-no-install-program=kill,uptime

The meaning of the configure options:

--enable-no-install-program=kill,uptime

The purpose of this switch is to prevent Coreutils from installing binaries that will be installed by other packages later.

Compile the package:

make

Skip down to “Install the package” if not running the test suite.

Now the test suite is ready to be run. First, run the tests that are meant to be run as user root:

make NON_ROOT_USERNAME=nobody check-root

We're going to run the remainder of the tests as the nobody user. Certain tests, however, require that the user be a member of more than one group. So that these tests are not skipped we'll add a temporary group and make the user nobody a part of it:

echo "dummy:x:1000:nobody" >> /etc/group

Fix some of the permissions so that the non-root user can compile and run the tests:

chown -Rv nobody . 

Now run the tests:

su-tools nobody -s /bin/bash -c "make RUN_EXPENSIVE_TESTS=yes check"

Remove the temporary group:

sed -i '/dummy/d' /etc/group

Install the package:

make install

Move programs to the locations specified by the FHS:

mv -v /usr/bin/{cat,chgrp,chmod,chown,cp,date,dd,df,echo} /bin
mv -v /usr/bin/{false,ln,ls,mkdir,mknod,mv,pwd,rm} /bin
mv -v /usr/bin/{rmdir,stty,sync,true,uname} /bin
mv -v /usr/bin/chroot /usr/sbin
mv -v /usr/share/man/man1/chroot.1 /usr/share/man/man8/chroot.8
sed -i s/\"1\"/\"8\"/1 /usr/share/man/man8/chroot.8

Some of the scripts in the LFS-Bootscripts package depend on head, sleep, and nice. As /usr may not be available during the early stages of booting, those binaries need to be on the root partition:

mv -v /usr/bin/{head,sleep,nice} /bin

6.22.2. Contents of Coreutils

Installed programs: base64, basename, cat, chcon, chgrp, chmod, chown, chroot, cksum, comm, cp, csplit, cut, date, dd, df, dir, dircolors, dirname, du, echo, env, expand, expr, factor, false, fmt, fold, groups, head, hostid, id, install, join, link, ln, logname, ls, md5sum, mkdir, mkfifo, mknod, mktemp, mv, nice, nl, nohup, nproc, od, paste, pathchk, pinky, pr, printenv, printf, ptx, pwd, readlink, rm, rmdir, runcon, seq, sha1sum, sha224sum, sha256sum, sha384sum, sha512sum, shred, shuf, sleep, sort, split, stat, stdbuf, stty, sum, sync, tac, tail, tee, test, timeout, touch, tr, true, truncate, tsort, tty, uname, unexpand, uniq, unlink, users, vdir, wc, who, whoami, and yes
Installed library: libstdbuf.so
Installed directory: /usr/lib/coreutils

Short Descriptions

base64

Encodes and decodes data according to the base64 (RFC 3548) specification

basename

Strips any path and a given suffix from a file name

cat

Concatenates files to standard output

chcon

Changes security context for files and directories

chgrp

Changes the group ownership of files and directories

chmod

Changes the permissions of each file to the given mode; the mode can be either a symbolic representation of the changes to make or an octal number representing the new permissions

chown

Changes the user and/or group ownership of files and directories

chroot

Runs a command with the specified directory as the / directory

cksum

Prints the Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC) checksum and the byte counts of each specified file

comm

Compares two sorted files, outputting in three columns the lines that are unique and the lines that are common

cp

Copies files

csplit

Splits a given file into several new files, separating them according to given patterns or line numbers and outputting the byte count of each new file

cut

Prints sections of lines, selecting the parts according to given fields or positions

date

Displays the current time in the given format, or sets the system date

dd

Copies a file using the given block size and count, while optionally performing conversions on it

df

Reports the amount of disk space available (and used) on all mounted file systems, or only on the file systems holding the selected files

dir

Lists the contents of each given directory (the same as the ls command)

dircolors

Outputs commands to set the LS_COLOR environment variable to change the color scheme used by ls

dirname

Strips the non-directory suffix from a file name

du

Reports the amount of disk space used by the current directory, by each of the given directories (including all subdirectories) or by each of the given files

echo

Displays the given strings

env

Runs a command in a modified environment

expand

Converts tabs to spaces

expr

Evaluates expressions

factor

Prints the prime factors of all specified integer numbers

false

Does nothing, unsuccessfully; it always exits with a status code indicating failure

fmt

Reformats the paragraphs in the given files

fold

Wraps the lines in the given files

groups

Reports a user's group memberships

head

Prints the first ten lines (or the given number of lines) of each given file

hostid

Reports the numeric identifier (in hexadecimal) of the host

id

Reports the effective user ID, group ID, and group memberships of the current user or specified user

install

Copies files while setting their permission modes and, if possible, their owner and group

join

Joins the lines that have identical join fields from two separate files

link

Creates a hard link with the given name to a file

ln

Makes hard links or soft (symbolic) links between files

logname

Reports the current user's login name

ls

Lists the contents of each given directory

md5sum

Reports or checks Message Digest 5 (MD5) checksums

mkdir

Creates directories with the given names

mkfifo

Creates First-In, First-Outs (FIFOs), a “named pipe” in UNIX parlance, with the given names

mknod

Creates device nodes with the given names; a device node is a character special file, a block special file, or a FIFO

mktemp

Creates temporary files in a secure manner; it is used in scripts

mv

Moves or renames files or directories

nice

Runs a program with modified scheduling priority

nl

Numbers the lines from the given files

nohup

Runs a command immune to hangups, with its output redirected to a log file

nproc

Prints the number of processing units available to a process

od

Dumps files in octal and other formats

paste

Merges the given files, joining sequentially corresponding lines side by side, separated by tab characters

pathchk

Checks if file names are valid or portable

pinky

Is a lightweight finger client; it reports some information about the given users

pr

Paginates and columnates files for printing

printenv

Prints the environment

printf

Prints the given arguments according to the given format, much like the C printf function

ptx

Produces a permuted index from the contents of the given files, with each keyword in its context

pwd

Reports the name of the current working directory

readlink

Reports the value of the given symbolic link

rm

Removes files or directories

rmdir

Removes directories if they are empty

runcon

Runs a command with specified security context

seq

Prints a sequence of numbers within a given range and with a given increment

sha1sum

Prints or checks 160-bit Secure Hash Algorithm 1 (SHA1) checksums

sha224sum

Prints or checks 224-bit Secure Hash Algorithm checksums

sha256sum

Prints or checks 256-bit Secure Hash Algorithm checksums

sha384sum

Prints or checks 384-bit Secure Hash Algorithm checksums

sha512sum

Prints or checks 512-bit Secure Hash Algorithm checksums

shred

Overwrites the given files repeatedly with complex patterns, making it difficult to recover the data

shuf

Shuffles lines of text

sleep

Pauses for the given amount of time

sort

Sorts the lines from the given files

split

Splits the given file into pieces, by size or by number of lines

stat

Displays file or filesystem status

stdbuf

Runs commands with altered buffering operations for its standard streams

stty

Sets or reports terminal line settings

sum

Prints checksum and block counts for each given file

sync

Flushes file system buffers; it forces changed blocks to disk and updates the super block

tac

Concatenates the given files in reverse

tail

Prints the last ten lines (or the given number of lines) of each given file

tee

Reads from standard input while writing both to standard output and to the given files

test

Compares values and checks file types

timeout

Runs a command with a time limit

touch

Changes file timestamps, setting the access and modification times of the given files to the current time; files that do not exist are created with zero length

tr

Translates, squeezes, and deletes the given characters from standard input

true

Does nothing, successfully; it always exits with a status code indicating success

truncate

Shrinks or expands a file to the specified size

tsort

Performs a topological sort; it writes a completely ordered list according to the partial ordering in a given file

tty

Reports the file name of the terminal connected to standard input

uname

Reports system information

unexpand

Converts spaces to tabs

uniq

Discards all but one of successive identical lines

unlink

Removes the given file

users

Reports the names of the users currently logged on

vdir

Is the same as ls -l

wc

Reports the number of lines, words, and bytes for each given file, as well as a total line when more than one file is given

who

Reports who is logged on

whoami

Reports the user name associated with the current effective user ID

yes

Repeatedly outputs “y” or a given string until killed

libstdbuf

Library used by stdbuf

6.23. Iana-Etc-2.30

The Iana-Etc package provides data for network services and protocols.

Approximate build time: less than 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 2.3 MB

6.23.1. Installation of Iana-Etc

The following command converts the raw data provided by IANA into the correct formats for the /etc/protocols and /etc/services data files:

make

This package does not come with a test suite.

Install the package:

make install

6.23.2. Contents of Iana-Etc

Installed files: /etc/protocols and /etc/services

Short Descriptions

/etc/protocols

Describes the various DARPA Internet protocols that are available from the TCP/IP subsystem

/etc/services

Provides a mapping between friendly textual names for internet services, and their underlying assigned port numbers and protocol types

6.24. M4-1.4.15

The M4 package contains a macro processor.

Approximate build time: 0.4 SBU
Required disk space: 14.2 MB

6.24.1. Installation of M4

Prepare M4 for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

6.24.2. Contents of M4

Installed program: m4

Short Descriptions

m4

copies the given files while expanding the macros that they contain. These macros are either built-in or user-defined and can take any number of arguments. Besides performing macro expansion, m4 has built-in functions for including named files, running Unix commands, performing integer arithmetic, manipulating text, recursion, etc. The m4 program can be used either as a front-end to a compiler or as a macro processor in its own right.

6.25. Bison-2.4.3

The Bison package contains a parser generator.

Approximate build time: 1.1 SBU
Required disk space: 19.2 MB

6.25.1. Installation of Bison

Prepare Bison for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

The configure system causes Bison to be built without support for internationalization of error messages if a bison program is not already in $PATH. The following addition will correct this:

echo '#define YYENABLE_NLS 1' >> lib/config.h

Compile the package:

make

To test the results (about 0.5 SBU), issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

6.25.2. Contents of Bison

Installed programs: bison and yacc
Installed library: liby.a
Installed directory: /usr/share/bison

Short Descriptions

bison

Generates, from a series of rules, a program for analyzing the structure of text files; Bison is a replacement for Yacc (Yet Another Compiler Compiler)

yacc

A wrapper for bison, meant for programs that still call yacc instead of bison; it calls bison with the -y option

liby.a

The Yacc library containing implementations of Yacc-compatible yyerror and main functions; this library is normally not very useful, but POSIX requires it

6.26. Procps-3.2.8

The Procps package contains programs for monitoring processes.

Approximate build time: 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 2.3 MB

6.26.1. Installation of Procps

Apply a patch to prevent an error message from being displayed when determining the kernel clock tick rate:

patch -Np1 -i ../procps-3.2.8-fix_HZ_errors-1.patch

Apply a patch to fix a unicode related issue in the watch program:

patch -Np1 -i ../procps-3.2.8-watch_unicode-1.patch

Fix a bug in the Makefile, which prevents procps from building with make-3.82:

sed -i -e 's@\*/module.mk@proc/module.mk ps/module.mk@' Makefile

Compile the package:

make

This package does not come with a test suite.

Install the package:

make install

6.26.2. Contents of Procps

Installed programs: free, kill, pgrep, pkill, pmap, ps, pwdx, skill, slabtop, snice, sysctl, tload, top, uptime, vmstat, w, and watch
Installed library: libproc.so

Short Descriptions

free

Reports the amount of free and used memory (both physical and swap memory) in the system

kill

Sends signals to processes

pgrep

Looks up processes based on their name and other attributes

pkill

Signals processes based on their name and other attributes

pmap

Reports the memory map of the given process

ps

Lists the current running processes

pwdx

Reports the current working directory of a process

skill

Sends signals to processes matching the given criteria

slabtop

Displays detailed kernel slap cache information in real time

snice

Changes the scheduling priority of processes matching the given criteria

sysctl

Modifies kernel parameters at run time

tload

Prints a graph of the current system load average

top

Displays a list of the most CPU intensive processes; it provides an ongoing look at processor activity in real time

uptime

Reports how long the system has been running, how many users are logged on, and the system load averages

vmstat

Reports virtual memory statistics, giving information about processes, memory, paging, block Input/Output (IO), traps, and CPU activity

w

Shows which users are currently logged on, where, and since when

watch

Runs a given command repeatedly, displaying the first screen-full of its output; this allows a user to watch the output change over time

libproc

Contains the functions used by most programs in this package

6.27. Grep-2.7

The Grep package contains programs for searching through files.

Approximate build time: 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 7.3 MB

6.27.1. Installation of Grep

Prepare Grep for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr \
    --bindir=/bin

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

6.27.2. Contents of Grep

Installed programs: egrep, fgrep, and grep

Short Descriptions

egrep

Prints lines matching an extended regular expression

fgrep

Prints lines matching a list of fixed strings

grep

Prints lines matching a basic regular expression

6.28. Readline-6.2

The Readline package is a set of libraries that offers command-line editing and history capabilities.

Approximate build time: 0.2 SBU
Required disk space: 13.8 MB

6.28.1. Installation of Readline

Reinstalling Readline will cause the old libraries to be moved to <libraryname>.old. While this is normally not a problem, in some cases it can trigger a linking bug in ldconfig. This can be avoided by issuing the following two seds:

sed -i '/MV.*old/d' Makefile.in
sed -i '/{OLDSUFF}/c:' support/shlib-install

Prepare Readline for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --libdir=/lib

Compile the package:

make SHLIB_LIBS=-lncurses

The meaning of the make option:

SHLIB_LIBS=-lncurses

This option forces Readline to link against the libncurses (really, libncursesw) library.

This package does not come with a test suite.

Install the package:

make install

Now move the static libraries to a more appropriate location:

mv -v /lib/lib{readline,history}.a /usr/lib

Next, remove the .so files in /lib and relink them into /usr/lib:

rm -v /lib/lib{readline,history}.so
ln -sfv ../../lib/libreadline.so.6 /usr/lib/libreadline.so
ln -sfv ../../lib/libhistory.so.6 /usr/lib/libhistory.so

If desired, install the documentation:

mkdir   -v       /usr/share/doc/readline-6.2
install -v -m644 doc/*.{ps,pdf,html,dvi} \
                 /usr/share/doc/readline-6.2

6.28.2. Contents of Readline

Installed libraries: libhistory.{a,so}, and libreadline.{a,so}
Installed directories: /usr/include/readline, /usr/share/readline, /usr/share/doc/readline-6.2

Short Descriptions

libhistory

Provides a consistent user interface for recalling lines of history

libreadline

Aids in the consistency of user interface across discrete programs that need to provide a command line interface

6.29. Bash-4.2

The Bash package contains the Bourne-Again SHell.

Approximate build time: 1.4 SBU
Required disk space: 35 MB

6.29.1. Installation of Bash

Prepare Bash for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --bindir=/bin \
    --htmldir=/usr/share/doc/bash-4.2 --without-bash-malloc \
    --with-installed-readline

The meaning of the configure options:

--htmldir

This option designates the directory into which HTML formatted documentation will be installed.

--with-installed-readline

This option tells Bash to use the readline library that is already installed on the system rather than using its own readline version.

Compile the package:

make

Skip down to “Install the package” if not running the test suite.

To prepare the tests, ensure that the nobody user can write to the sources tree:

chown -Rv nobody .

Now, run the tests as the nobody user:

su-tools nobody -s /bin/bash -c "make tests"

Install the package:

make install

Run the newly compiled bash program (replacing the one that is currently being executed):

exec /bin/bash --login +h

Note

The parameters used make the bash process an interactive login shell and continue to disable hashing so that new programs are found as they become available.

6.29.2. Contents of Bash

Installed programs: bash, bashbug, and sh (link to bash)
Installed directory: /usr/share/doc/bash-4.2

Short Descriptions

bash

A widely-used command interpreter; it performs many types of expansions and substitutions on a given command line before executing it, thus making this interpreter a powerful tool

bashbug

A shell script to help the user compose and mail standard formatted bug reports concerning bash

sh

A symlink to the bash program; when invoked as sh, bash tries to mimic the startup behavior of historical versions of sh as closely as possible, while conforming to the POSIX standard as well

6.30. Libtool-2.4

The Libtool package contains the GNU generic library support script. It wraps the complexity of using shared libraries in a consistent, portable interface.

Approximate build time: 3.7 SBU
Required disk space: 35 MB

6.30.1. Installation of Libtool

Prepare Libtool for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

To test the results (about 3.0 SBU), issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

6.30.2. Contents of Libtool

Installed programs: libtool and libtoolize
Installed libraries: libltdl.{a,so}
Installed directories: /usr/include/libltdl, /usr/share/libtool

Short Descriptions

libtool

Provides generalized library-building support services

libtoolize

Provides a standard way to add libtool support to a package

libltdl

Hides the various difficulties of dlopening libraries

6.31. GDBM-1.8.3

The GDBM package contains the GNU Database Manager. This is a disk file format database which stores key/data-pairs in single files. The actual data of any record being stored is indexed by a unique key, which can be retrieved in less time than if it was stored in a text file.

Approximate build time: 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 2.7 MB

6.31.1. Installation of GDBM

Prepare GDBM for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

This package does not come with a test suite.

Install the package:

make install

In addition, install the DBM and NDBM compatibility headers, as some packages outside of LFS may look for these older dbm routines:

make install-compat

Fix a minor installation issue by manually adding GDBM to the info table of contents:

install-info --dir-file=/usr/info/dir /usr/info/gdbm.info

6.31.2. Contents of GDBM

Installed libraries: libgdbm.{so,a} and libgdbm_compat.{so,a}

Short Descriptions

libgdbm

Contains functions to manipulate a hashed database

6.32. Inetutils-1.8

The Inetutils package contains programs for basic networking.

Approximate build time: 0.4 SBU
Required disk space: 17 MB

6.32.1. Installation of Inetutils

./configure --prefix=/usr --libexecdir=/usr/sbin \
    --localstatedir=/var --disable-ifconfig \
    --disable-logger --disable-syslogd --disable-whois \
    --disable-servers

The meaning of the configure options:

--disable-ifconfig

This option prevents Inetutils from installing the ifconfig program, which can be used to configure network interfaces. LFS uses ip from IPRoute2 to perform this task.

--disable-logger

This option prevents Inetutils from installing the logger program, which is used by scripts to pass messages to the System Log Daemon. Do not install it because Util-linux installed a version earlier.

--disable-syslogd

This option prevents Inetutils from installing the System Log Daemon, which is installed with the Sysklogd package.

--disable-whois

This option disables the building of the Inetutils whois client, which is out of date. Instructions for a better whois client are in the BLFS book.

--disable-servers

This disables the installation of the various network servers included as part of the Inetutils package. These servers are deemed not appropriate in a basic LFS system. Some are insecure by nature and are only considered safe on trusted networks. More information can be found at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/basicnet/inetutils.html. Note that better replacements are available for many of these servers.

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install
make -C doc html
make -C doc install-html docdir=/usr/share/doc/inetutils-1.8

Move some programs to their FHS-compliant place:

mv -v /usr/bin/{hostname,ping,ping6} /bin
mv -v /usr/bin/traceroute /sbin

6.32.2. Contents of Inetutils

Installed programs: ftp, hostname, ping, ping6, rcp, rexec, rlogin, rsh, talk, telnet, tftp, and traceroute

Short Descriptions

ftp

Is the file transfer protocol program

hostname

Reports or sets the name of the host

ping

Sends echo-request packets and reports how long the replies take

ping6

A version of ping for IPv6 networks

rcp

Performs remote file copy

rexec

executes commands on a remote host

rlogin

Performs remote login

rsh

Runs a remote shell

talk

Is used to chat with another user

telnet

An interface to the TELNET protocol

tftp

A trivial file transfer program

traceroute

Traces the route your packets take from the host you are working on to another host on a network, showing all the intermediate hops (gateways) along the way

6.33. Perl-5.12.3

The Perl package contains the Practical Extraction and Report Language.

Approximate build time: 5.5 SBU
Required disk space: 171 MB

6.33.1. Installation of Perl

First create a basic /etc/hosts file to be referenced in one of Perl's configuration files as well as the optional test suite:

echo "127.0.0.1 localhost $(hostname)" > /etc/hosts

This version of Perl now builds the Compress::Raw::Zlib module. By default Perl will use an internal copy of the Zlib source for the build. Issue the following command so that Perl will use the Zlib library installed on the system:

sed -i -e "s|BUILD_ZLIB\s*= True|BUILD_ZLIB = False|"           \
       -e "s|INCLUDE\s*= ./zlib-src|INCLUDE    = /usr/include|" \
       -e "s|LIB\s*= ./zlib-src|LIB        = /usr/lib|"         \
    cpan/Compress-Raw-Zlib/config.in

To have full control over the way Perl is set up, you can remove the “-des” options from the following command and hand-pick the way this package is built. Alternatively, use the command exactly as below to use the defaults that Perl auto-detects:

sh Configure -des -Dprefix=/usr \
                  -Dvendorprefix=/usr           \
                  -Dman1dir=/usr/share/man/man1 \
                  -Dman3dir=/usr/share/man/man3 \
                  -Dpager="/usr/bin/less -isR"  \
                  -Duseshrplib

The meaning of the configure options:

-Dvendorprefix=/usr

This ensures perl knows how to tell packages where they should install their perl modules.

-Dpager="/usr/bin/less -isR"

This corrects an error in the way that perldoc invokes the less program.

-Dman1dir=/usr/share/man/man1 -Dman3dir=/usr/share/man/man3

Since Groff is not installed yet, Configure thinks that we do not want man pages for Perl. Issuing these parameters overrides this decision.

-Duseshrplib

Build a shared libperl needed by some perl modules.

Compile the package:

make

To test the results (approximately 2.5 SBU), issue:

make test

Install the package:

make install

6.33.2. Contents of Perl

Installed programs: a2p, c2ph, config_data, corelist, cpan, cpan2dist, cpanp, cpanp-run-perl, dprofpp, enc2xs, find2perl, h2ph, h2xs, instmodsh, libnetcfg, perl, perl5.12.3 (link to perl), perlbug, perldoc, perlivp, perlthanks (link to perlbug), piconv, pl2pm, pod2html, pod2latex, pod2man, pod2text, pod2usage, podchecker, podselect, prove, psed (link to s2p), pstruct (link to c2ph), ptar, ptardiff, s2p, shasum, splain, and xsubpp
Installed libraries: Several hundred which cannot all be listed here
Installed directory: /usr/lib/perl5

Short Descriptions

a2p

Translates awk to Perl

c2ph

Dumps C structures as generated from cc -g -S

config_data

Queries or changes configuration of Perl modules

corelist

A commandline frontend to Module::CoreList

cpan

Interact with the Comprehensive Perl Archive Network (CPAN) from the command line

cpan2dist

The CPANPLUS distribution creator

cpanp

The CPANPLUS launcher

cpanp-run-perl

Perl script that is used to enable flushing of the output buffer after each write in spawned processes

dprofpp

Displays Perl profile data

enc2xs

Builds a Perl extension for the Encode module from either Unicode Character Mappings or Tcl Encoding Files

find2perl

Translates find commands to Perl

h2ph

Converts .h C header files to .ph Perl header files

h2xs

Converts .h C header files to Perl extensions

instmodsh

Shell script for examining installed Perl modules, and can even create a tarball from an installed module

libnetcfg

Can be used to configure the libnet Perl module

perl

Combines some of the best features of C, sed, awk and sh into a single swiss-army language

perl5.12.3

A hard link to perl

perlbug

Used to generate bug reports about Perl, or the modules that come with it, and mail them

perldoc

Displays a piece of documentation in pod format that is embedded in the Perl installation tree or in a Perl script

perlivp

The Perl Installation Verification Procedure; it can be used to verify that Perl and its libraries have been installed correctly

perlthanks

Used to generate thank you messages to mail to the Perl developers

piconv

A Perl version of the character encoding converter iconv

pl2pm

A rough tool for converting Perl4 .pl files to Perl5 .pm modules

pod2html

Converts files from pod format to HTML format

pod2latex

Converts files from pod format to LaTeX format

pod2man

Converts pod data to formatted *roff input

pod2text

Converts pod data to formatted ASCII text

pod2usage

Prints usage messages from embedded pod docs in files

podchecker

Checks the syntax of pod format documentation files

podselect

Displays selected sections of pod documentation

prove

Command line tool for running tests against the Test::Harness module.

psed

A Perl version of the stream editor sed

pstruct

Dumps C structures as generated from cc -g -S stabs

ptar

A tar-like program written in Perl

ptardiff

A Perl program that compares an extracted archive with an unextracted one

s2p

Translates sed scripts to Perl

shasum

Prints or checks SHA checksums

splain

Is used to force verbose warning diagnostics in Perl

xsubpp

Converts Perl XS code into C code

6.34. Autoconf-2.68

The Autoconf package contains programs for producing shell scripts that can automatically configure source code.

Approximate build time: 4.8 SBU
Required disk space: 12.4 MB

6.34.1. Installation of Autoconf

Prepare Autoconf for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

This takes a long time, about 4.7 SBUs. In addition, 6 tests are skipped that use Automake. For full test coverage, Autoconf can be re-tested after Automake has been installed.

Install the package:

make install

6.34.2. Contents of Autoconf

Installed programs: autoconf, autoheader, autom4te, autoreconf, autoscan, autoupdate, and ifnames
Installed directory: /usr/share/autoconf

Short Descriptions

autoconf

Produces shell scripts that automatically configure software source code packages to adapt to many kinds of Unix-like systems. The configuration scripts it produces are independent—running them does not require the autoconf program.

autoheader

A tool for creating template files of C #define statements for configure to use

autom4te

A wrapper for the M4 macro processor

autoreconf

Automatically runs autoconf, autoheader, aclocal, automake, gettextize, and libtoolize in the correct order to save time when changes are made to autoconf and automake template files

autoscan

Helps to create a configure.in file for a software package; it examines the source files in a directory tree, searching them for common portability issues, and creates a configure.scan file that serves as as a preliminary configure.in file for the package

autoupdate

Modifies a configure.in file that still calls autoconf macros by their old names to use the current macro names

ifnames

Helps when writing configure.in files for a software package; it prints the identifiers that the package uses in C preprocessor conditionals. If a package has already been set up to have some portability, this program can help determine what configure needs to check for. It can also fill in gaps in a configure.in file generated by autoscan

6.35. Automake-1.11.1

The Automake package contains programs for generating Makefiles for use with Autoconf.

Approximate build time: 18.3 SBU
Required disk space: 28.8 MB

6.35.1. Installation of Automake

Prepare Automake for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --docdir=/usr/share/doc/automake-1.11.1

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

This takes a long time, about 10 SBUs.

Install the package:

make install

6.35.2. Contents of Automake

Installed programs: acinstall, aclocal, aclocal-1.11.1, automake, automake-1.11.1, compile, config.guess, config.sub, depcomp, elisp-comp, install-sh, mdate-sh, missing, mkinstalldirs, py-compile, symlink-tree, and ylwrap
Installed directories: /usr/share/aclocal-1.11, /usr/share/automake-1.11, /usr/share/doc/automake-1.11.1

Short Descriptions

acinstall

A script that installs aclocal-style M4 files

aclocal

Generates aclocal.m4 files based on the contents of configure.in files

aclocal-1.11.1

A hard link to aclocal

automake

A tool for automatically generating Makefile.in files from Makefile.am files. To create all the Makefile.in files for a package, run this program in the top-level directory. By scanning the configure.in file, it automatically finds each appropriate Makefile.am file and generates the corresponding Makefile.in file

automake-1.11.1

A hard link to automake

compile

A wrapper for compilers

config.guess

A script that attempts to guess the canonical triplet for the given build, host, or target architecture

config.sub

A configuration validation subroutine script

depcomp

A script for compiling a program so that dependency information is generated in addition to the desired output

elisp-comp

Byte-compiles Emacs Lisp code

install-sh

A script that installs a program, script, or data file

mdate-sh

A script that prints the modification time of a file or directory

missing

A script acting as a common stub for missing GNU programs during an installation

mkinstalldirs

A script that creates a directory tree

py-compile

Compiles a Python program

symlink-tree

A script to create a symlink tree of a directory tree

ylwrap

A wrapper for lex and yacc

6.36. Bzip2-1.0.6

The Bzip2 package contains programs for compressing and decompressing files. Compressing text files with bzip2 yields a much better compression percentage than with the traditional gzip.

Approximate build time: less than 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 6.4 MB

6.36.1. Installation of Bzip2

Apply a patch that will install the documentation for this package:

patch -Np1 -i ../bzip2-1.0.6-install_docs-1.patch

The following command ensures installation of symbolic links are relative:

sed -i 's@\(ln -s -f \)$(PREFIX)/bin/@\1@' Makefile

Prepare Bzip2 for compilation with:

make -f Makefile-libbz2_so
make clean

The meaning of the make parameter:

-f Makefile-libbz2_so

This will cause Bzip2 to be built using a different Makefile file, in this case the Makefile-libbz2_so file, which creates a dynamic libbz2.so library and links the Bzip2 utilities against it.

Compile and test the package:

make

Install the programs:

make PREFIX=/usr install

Install the shared bzip2 binary into the /bin directory, make some necessary symbolic links, and clean up:

cp -v bzip2-shared /bin/bzip2
cp -av libbz2.so* /lib
ln -sv ../../lib/libbz2.so.1.0 /usr/lib/libbz2.so
rm -v /usr/bin/{bunzip2,bzcat,bzip2}
ln -sv bzip2 /bin/bunzip2
ln -sv bzip2 /bin/bzcat

6.36.2. Contents of Bzip2

Installed programs: bunzip2 (link to bzip2), bzcat (link to bzip2), bzcmp (link to bzdiff), bzdiff, bzegrep (link to bzgrep), bzfgrep (link to bzgrep), bzgrep, bzip2, bzip2recover, bzless (link to bzmore), and bzmore
Installed libraries: libbz2.{a,so}
Installed directory: /usr/share/doc/bzip2-1.0.6

Short Descriptions

bunzip2

Decompresses bzipped files

bzcat

Decompresses to standard output

bzcmp

Runs cmp on bzipped files

bzdiff

Runs diff on bzipped files

bzegrep

Runs egrep on bzipped files

bzfgrep

Runs fgrep on bzipped files

bzgrep

Runs grep on bzipped files

bzip2

Compresses files using the Burrows-Wheeler block sorting text compression algorithm with Huffman coding; the compression rate is better than that achieved by more conventional compressors using “Lempel-Ziv” algorithms, like gzip

bzip2recover

Tries to recover data from damaged bzipped files

bzless

Runs less on bzipped files

bzmore

Runs more on bzipped files

libbz2*

The library implementing lossless, block-sorting data compression, using the Burrows-Wheeler algorithm

6.37. Diffutils-3.0

The Diffutils package contains programs that show the differences between files or directories.

Approximate build time: 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 6.3 MB

6.37.1. Installation of Diffutils

Prepare Diffutils for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

6.37.2. Contents of Diffutils

Installed programs: cmp, diff, diff3, and sdiff

Short Descriptions

cmp

Compares two files and reports whether or in which bytes they differ

diff

Compares two files or directories and reports which lines in the files differ

diff3

Compares three files line by line

sdiff

Merges two files and interactively outputs the results

6.38. Gawk-3.1.8

The Gawk package contains programs for manipulating text files.

Approximate build time: 0.2 SBU
Required disk space: 19 MB

6.38.1. Installation of Gawk

Prepare Gawk for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --libexecdir=/usr/lib

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

If desired, install the documentation:

mkdir -v /usr/share/doc/gawk-3.1.8
cp    -v doc/{awkforai.txt,*.{eps,pdf,jpg}} \
         /usr/share/doc/gawk-3.1.8

6.38.2. Contents of Gawk

Installed programs: awk (link to gawk), gawk, gawk-3.1.8, grcat, igawk, pgawk, pgawk-3.1.8, and pwcat
Installed directories: /usr/lib/awk, /usr/share/awk

Short Descriptions

awk

A link to gawk

gawk

A program for manipulating text files; it is the GNU implementation of awk

gawk-3.1.8

A hard link to gawk

grcat

Dumps the group database /etc/group

igawk

Gives gawk the ability to include files

pgawk

The profiling version of gawk

pgawk-3.1.8

Hard link to pgawk

pwcat

Dumps the password database /etc/passwd

6.39. File-5.05

The File package contains a utility for determining the type of a given file or files.

Approximate build time: 0.2 SBU
Required disk space: 9.5 MB

6.39.1. Installation of File

Prepare File for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

6.39.2. Contents of File

Installed programs: file
Installed library: libmagic.{a,so}

Short Descriptions

file

Tries to classify each given file; it does this by performing several tests—file system tests, magic number tests, and language tests

libmagic

Contains routines for magic number recognition, used by the file program

6.40. Findutils-4.4.2

The Findutils package contains programs to find files. These programs are provided to recursively search through a directory tree and to create, maintain, and search a database (often faster than the recursive find, but unreliable if the database has not been recently updated).

Approximate build time: 0.5 SBU
Required disk space: 22 MB

6.40.1. Installation of Findutils

Prepare Findutils for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --libexecdir=/usr/lib/findutils \
    --localstatedir=/var/lib/locate

The meaning of the configure options:

--localstatedir

This option changes the location of the locate database to be in /var/lib/locate, which is FHS-compliant.

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Some of the scripts in the LFS-Bootscripts package depend on find. As /usr may not be available during the early stages of booting, this program needs to be on the root partition. The updatedb script also needs to be modified to correct an explicit path:

mv -v /usr/bin/find /bin
sed -i 's/find:=${BINDIR}/find:=\/bin/' /usr/bin/updatedb

6.40.2. Contents of Findutils

Installed programs: bigram, code, find, frcode, locate, oldfind, updatedb, and xargs
Installed directory: /usr/lib/findutils

Short Descriptions

bigram

Was formerly used to produce locate databases

code

Was formerly used to produce locate databases; it is the ancestor of frcode.

find

Searches given directory trees for files matching the specified criteria

frcode

Is called by updatedb to compress the list of file names; it uses front-compression, reducing the database size by a factor of four to five.

locate

Searches through a database of file names and reports the names that contain a given string or match a given pattern

oldfind

Older version of find, using a different algorithm

updatedb

Updates the locate database; it scans the entire file system (including other file systems that are currently mounted, unless told not to) and puts every file name it finds into the database

xargs

Can be used to apply a given command to a list of files

6.41. Flex-2.5.35

The Flex package contains a utility for generating programs that recognize patterns in text.

Approximate build time: 0.7 SBU
Required disk space: 28 MB

6.41.1. Installation of Flex

Apply a patch that fixes a bug in the C++ scanner generator, that causes scanner compilation to fail when using GCC-4.5.2:

patch -Np1 -i ../flex-2.5.35-gcc44-1.patch

Prepare Flex for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

To test the results (about 0.5 SBU), issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

There are some packages that expect to find the lex library in /usr/lib. Create a symlink to account for this:

ln -sv libfl.a /usr/lib/libl.a

A few programs do not know about flex yet and try to run its predecessor, lex. To support those programs, create a wrapper script named lex that calls flex in lex emulation mode:

cat > /usr/bin/lex << "EOF"
#!/bin/sh
# Begin /usr/bin/lex

exec /usr/bin/flex -l "$@"

# End /usr/bin/lex
EOF
chmod -v 755 /usr/bin/lex

If desired, install the flex.pdf documentation file:

mkdir -v /usr/share/doc/flex-2.5.35
cp    -v doc/flex.pdf \
         /usr/share/doc/flex-2.5.35

6.41.2. Contents of Flex

Installed programs: flex and lex
Installed libraries: libfl.a and libfl_pic.a

Short Descriptions

flex

A tool for generating programs that recognize patterns in text; it allows for the versatility to specify the rules for pattern-finding, eradicating the need to develop a specialized program

lex

A script that runs flex in lex emulation mode

libfl.a

The flex library

6.42. Gettext-0.18.1.1

The Gettext package contains utilities for internationalization and localization. These allow programs to be compiled with NLS (Native Language Support), enabling them to output messages in the user's native language.

Approximate build time: 5.8 SBU
Required disk space: 125 MB

6.42.1. Installation of Gettext

Prepare Gettext for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr \
            --docdir=/usr/share/doc/gettext-0.18.1.1

Compile the package:

make

To test the results (this takes a long time, around 3 SBUs), issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

6.42.2. Contents of Gettext

Installed programs: autopoint, config.charset, config.rpath, envsubst, gettext, gettext.sh, gettextize, hostname, msgattrib, msgcat, msgcmp, msgcomm, msgconv, msgen, msgexec, msgfilter, msgfmt, msggrep, msginit, msgmerge, msgunfmt, msguniq, ngettext, recode-sr-latin, and xgettext
Installed libraries: libasprintf.{a,so}, libgettextlib.so, libgettextpo.{a,so}, libgettextsrc.so, and preloadable_libintl.so
Installed directories: /usr/lib/gettext, /usr/share/doc/gettext-0.18.1.1, /usr/share/gettext

Short Descriptions

autopoint

Copies standard Gettext infrastructure files into a source package

config.charset

Outputs a system-dependent table of character encoding aliases

config.rpath

Outputs a system-dependent set of variables, describing how to set the runtime search path of shared libraries in an executable

envsubst

Substitutes environment variables in shell format strings

gettext

Translates a natural language message into the user's language by looking up the translation in a message catalog

gettext.sh

Primarily serves as a shell function library for gettext

gettextize

Copies all standard Gettext files into the given top-level directory of a package to begin internationalizing it

hostname

Displays a network hostname in various forms

msgattrib

Filters the messages of a translation catalog according to their attributes and manipulates the attributes

msgcat

Concatenates and merges the given .po files

msgcmp

Compares two .po files to check that both contain the same set of msgid strings

msgcomm

Finds the messages that are common to to the given .po files

msgconv

Converts a translation catalog to a different character encoding

msgen

Creates an English translation catalog

msgexec

Applies a command to all translations of a translation catalog

msgfilter

Applies a filter to all translations of a translation catalog

msgfmt

Generates a binary message catalog from a translation catalog

msggrep

Extracts all messages of a translation catalog that match a given pattern or belong to some given source files

msginit

Creates a new .po file, initializing the meta information with values from the user's environment

msgmerge

Combines two raw translations into a single file

msgunfmt

Decompiles a binary message catalog into raw translation text

msguniq

Unifies duplicate translations in a translation catalog

ngettext

Displays native language translations of a textual message whose grammatical form depends on a number

recode-sr-latin

Recodes Serbian text from Cyrillic to Latin script

xgettext

Extracts the translatable message lines from the given source files to make the first translation template

libasprintf

defines the autosprintf class, which makes C formatted output routines usable in C++ programs, for use with the <string> strings and the <iostream> streams

libgettextlib

a private library containing common routines used by the various Gettext programs; these are not intended for general use

libgettextpo

Used to write specialized programs that process .po files; this library is used when the standard applications shipped with Gettext (such as msgcomm, msgcmp, msgattrib, and msgen) will not suffice

libgettextsrc

A private library containing common routines used by the various Gettext programs; these are not intended for general use

preloadable_libintl

A library, intended to be used by LD_PRELOAD that assists libintl in logging untranslated messages.

6.43. Groff-1.21

The Groff package contains programs for processing and formatting text.

Approximate build time: 0.4 SBU
Required disk space: 78 MB

6.43.1. Installation of Groff

Groff expects the environment variable PAGE to contain the default paper size. For users in the United States, PAGE=letter is appropriate. Elsewhere, PAGE=A4 may be more suitable. While the default paper size is configured during compilation, it can be overridden later by echoing either “A4” or “letter” to the /etc/papersize file.

Prepare Groff for compilation:

PAGE=<paper_size> ./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

This package does not come with a test suite.

Install the package:

make install

Some documentation programs, such as xman, will not work properly without the following symlinks:

ln -sv eqn /usr/bin/geqn
ln -sv tbl /usr/bin/gtbl

6.43.2. Contents of Groff

Installed programs: addftinfo, afmtodit, chem, eqn, eqn2graph, gdiffmk, geqn (link to eqn), grap2graph, grn, grodvi, groff, groffer, grog, grolbp, grolj4, grops, grotty, gtbl (link to tbl), hpftodit, indxbib, lkbib, lookbib, mmroff, neqn, nroff, pdfroff, pfbtops, pic, pic2graph, post-grohtml, preconv, pre-grohtml, refer, roff2dvi, roff2html, roff2pdf, roff2ps, roff2text, roff2x, soelim, tbl, tfmtodit, and troff
Installed directories: /usr/lib/groff, /usr/share/doc/groff-1.21, /usr/share/groff

Short Descriptions

addftinfo

Reads a troff font file and adds some additional font-metric information that is used by the groff system

afmtodit

Creates a font file for use with groff and grops

chem

Groff preprocessor for producing chemical structure diagrams

eqn

Compiles descriptions of equations embedded within troff input files into commands that are understood by troff

eqn2graph

Converts a troff EQN (equation) into a cropped image

gdiffmk

Marks differences between groff/nroff/troff files

geqn

A link to eqn

grap2graph

Converts a grap diagram into a cropped bitmap image

grn

A groff preprocessor for gremlin files

grodvi

A driver for groff that produces TeX dvi format

groff

A front-end to the groff document formatting system; normally, it runs the troff program and a post-processor appropriate for the selected device

groffer

Displays groff files and man pages on X and tty terminals

grog

Reads files and guesses which of the groff options -e, -man, -me, -mm, -ms, -p, -s, and -t are required for printing files, and reports the groff command including those options

grolbp

Is a groff driver for Canon CAPSL printers (LBP-4 and LBP-8 series laser printers)

grolj4

Is a driver for groff that produces output in PCL5 format suitable for an HP LaserJet 4 printer

grops

Translates the output of GNU troff to PostScript

grotty

Translates the output of GNU troff into a form suitable for typewriter-like devices

gtbl

A link to tbl

hpftodit

Creates a font file for use with groff -Tlj4 from an HP-tagged font metric file

indxbib

Creates an inverted index for the bibliographic databases with a specified file for use with refer, lookbib, and lkbib

lkbib

Searches bibliographic databases for references that contain specified keys and reports any references found

lookbib

Prints a prompt on the standard error (unless the standard input is not a terminal), reads a line containing a set of keywords from the standard input, searches the bibliographic databases in a specified file for references containing those keywords, prints any references found on the standard output, and repeats this process until the end of input

mmroff

A simple preprocessor for groff

neqn

Formats equations for American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII) output

nroff

A script that emulates the nroff command using groff

pdfroff

Creates pdf documents using groff

pfbtops

Translates a PostScript font in .pfb format to ASCII

pic

Compiles descriptions of pictures embedded within troff or TeX input files into commands understood by TeX or troff

pic2graph

Converts a PIC diagram into a cropped image

post-grohtml

Translates the output of GNU troff to HTML

preconv

Converts encoding of input files to something GNU troff understands

pre-grohtml

Translates the output of GNU troff to HTML

refer

Copies the contents of a file to the standard output, except that lines between .[ and .] are interpreted as citations, and lines between .R1 and .R2 are interpreted as commands for how citations are to be processed

roff2dvi

Transforms roff files into DVI format

roff2html

Transforms roff files into HTML format

roff2pdf

Transforms roff files into PDFs

roff2ps

Transforms roff files into ps files

roff2text

Transforms roff files into text files

roff2x

Transforms roff files into other formats

soelim

Reads files and replaces lines of the form .so file by the contents of the mentioned file

tbl

Compiles descriptions of tables embedded within troff input files into commands that are understood by troff

tfmtodit

Creates a font file for use with groff -Tdvi

troff

Is highly compatible with Unix troff; it should usually be invoked using the groff command, which will also run preprocessors and post-processors in the appropriate order and with the appropriate options

6.44. GRUB-1.98

The GRUB package contains the GRand Unified Bootloader.

Approximate build time: 0.4 SBU
Required disk space: 27.6 MB

6.44.1. Installation of GRUB

Prepare GRUB for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr           \
             --sysconfdir=/etc       \
             --disable-grub-emu-usb  \
             --disable-grub-fstest   \
             --disable-efiemu

The --disable switches minimize what is built by disabling features and testing programs not really needed for LFS.

Compile the package:

make

This package does not come with a test suite.

Install the package:

make install

Using GRUB to make your LFS system bootable will be discussed in Section 8.4, “Using GRUB to Set Up the Boot Process”.

6.44.2. Contents of GRUB

Installed programs: grub-bin2h, grub-editenv, grub-install, grub-mkconfig, grub-mkdevicemap, grub-mkelfimage, grub-mkimage, grub-mkisofs, grub-mkpasswd-pbkdf2, grub-mkrelpath, grub-mkrescue, grub-probe, grub-reboot, grub-script-check, grub-set-default, grub-setup
Installed directories: /usr/lib/grub, /etc/grub.d, /usr/share/grub

Short Descriptions

grub-bin2h

Converts a binary file to a C header

grub-editenv

A tool to edit the environment block

grub-install

Install GRUB on your drive

grub-mkconfig

Generate a grub config file

grub-mkdevicemap

Generate a device map file automatically

grub-mkelfimage

Make a bootable image of GRUB

grub-mkimage

Make a bootable image of GRUB

grub-mkisofs

Creates a bootable ISO image

grub-mkpasswd-pbkdf2

Generates an encrypted PBKDF2 password for use in the boot menu

grub-mkrelpath

Makes a system pathname relative to its root

grub-mkrescue

Make a bootable image of GRUB suitable for a floppy disk or CDROM/DVD

grub-probe

Probe device information for a given path or device

grub-reboot

Sets the default boot entry for GRUB for the next boot only

grub-script-check

Checks GRUB configuration script for syntax errors

grub-set-default

Sets the default boot entry for GRUB

grub-setup

Set up images to boot from a device

6.45. Gzip-1.4

The Gzip package contains programs for compressing and decompressing files.

Approximate build time: less than 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 3.3 MB

6.45.1. Installation of Gzip

Prepare Gzip for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --bindir=/bin

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Move some programs that do not need to be on the root filesystem:

mv -v /bin/{gzexe,uncompress,zcmp,zdiff,zegrep} /usr/bin
mv -v /bin/{zfgrep,zforce,zgrep,zless,zmore,znew} /usr/bin

6.45.2. Contents of Gzip

Installed programs: gunzip, gzexe, gzip, uncompress, zcat, zcmp, zdiff, zegrep, zfgrep, zforce, zgrep, zless, zmore, and znew

Short Descriptions

gunzip

Decompresses gzipped files

gzexe

Creates self-decompressing executable files

gzip

Compresses the given files using Lempel-Ziv (LZ77) coding

uncompress

Decompresses compressed files

zcat

Decompresses the given gzipped files to standard output

zcmp

Runs cmp on gzipped files

zdiff

Runs diff on gzipped files

zegrep

Runs egrep on gzipped files

zfgrep

Runs fgrep on gzipped files

zforce

Forces a .gz extension on all given files that are gzipped files, so that gzip will not compress them again; this can be useful when file names were truncated during a file transfer

zgrep

Runs grep on gzipped files

zless

Runs less on gzipped files

zmore

Runs more on gzipped files

znew

Re-compresses files from compress format to gzip format—.Z to .gz

6.46. IPRoute2-2.6.37

The IPRoute2 package contains programs for basic and advanced IPV4-based networking.

Approximate build time: 0.2 SBU
Required disk space: 5.7 MB

6.46.1. Installation of IPRoute2

The arpd binary included in this package is dependent on Berkeley DB. Because arpd is not a very common requirement on a base Linux system, remove the dependency on Berkeley DB by applying the sed command below. If the arpd binary is needed, instructions for compiling Berkeley DB can be found in the BLFS Book at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/server/databases.html#db.

sed -i '/^TARGETS/s@arpd@@g' misc/Makefile

Fix a bug that causes the ip route get command to not produce any output:

sed -i '1289i\\tfilter.cloned = 2;' ip/iproute.c

Compile the package:

make DESTDIR=

The meaning of the make option:

DESTDIR=

This ensures that the IPRoute2 binaries will install into the correct directory. By default, DESTDIR is set to /usr.

This package comes with a test suite, but due to assumptions it makes, it is not possible to reliably run these tests from within the chroot environment. If you wish to run these tests after booting into your new LFS system, ensure you select /proc/config.gz CONFIG_IKCONFIG_PROC ("General setup" -> "Enable access to .config through /proc/config.gz") support into your kernel then run 'make alltests' from the testsuite/ subdirectory.

Install the package:

make DESTDIR= SBINDIR=/sbin MANDIR=/usr/share/man \
     DOCDIR=/usr/share/doc/iproute2-2.6.37 install

6.46.2. Contents of IPRoute2

Installed programs: ctstat (link to lnstat), genl, ifcfg, ifstat, ip, lnstat, nstat, routef, routel, rtacct, rtmon, rtpr, rtstat (link to lnstat), ss, and tc
Installed directories: /etc/iproute2, /lib/tc, /usr/share/doc/iproute2-2.6.37, /usr/lib/tc

Short Descriptions

ctstat

Connection status utility

genl

ifcfg

A shell script wrapper for the ip command. Note that it requires the arping and rdisk programs from the iputils package found at http://www.skbuff.net/iputils/.

ifstat

Shows the interface statistics, including the amount of transmitted and received packets by interface

ip

The main executable. It has several different functions:

ip link <device> allows users to look at the state of devices and to make changes

ip addr allows users to look at addresses and their properties, add new addresses, and delete old ones

ip neighbor allows users to look at neighbor bindings and their properties, add new neighbor entries, and delete old ones

ip rule allows users to look at the routing policies and change them

ip route allows users to look at the routing table and change routing table rules

ip tunnel allows users to look at the IP tunnels and their properties, and change them

ip maddr allows users to look at the multicast addresses and their properties, and change them

ip mroute allows users to set, change, or delete the multicast routing

ip monitor allows users to continously monitor the state of devices, addresses and routes

lnstat

Provides Linux network statistics. It is a generalized and more feature-complete replacement for the old rtstat program

nstat

Shows network statistics

routef

A component of ip route. This is for flushing the routing tables

routel

A component of ip route. This is for listing the routing tables

rtacct

Displays the contents of /proc/net/rt_acct

rtmon

Route monitoring utility

rtpr

Converts the output of ip -o back into a readable form

rtstat

Route status utility

ss

Similar to the netstat command; shows active connections

tc

Traffic Controlling Executable; this is for Quality Of Service (QOS) and Class Of Service (COS) implementations

tc qdisc allows users to setup the queueing discipline

tc class allows users to setup classes based on the queuing discipline scheduling

tc estimator allows users to estimate the network flow into a network

tc filter allows users to setup the QOS/COS packet filtering

tc policy allows users to setup the QOS/COS policies

6.47. Kbd-1.15.2

The Kbd package contains key-table files and keyboard utilities.

Approximate build time: less than 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 16.0 MB

6.47.1. Installation of Kbd

The behaviour of the Backspace and Delete keys is not consistent across the keymaps in the Kbd package. The following patch fixes this issue for i386 keymaps:

patch -Np1 -i ../kbd-1.15.2-backspace-1.patch

After patching, the Backspace key generates the character with code 127, and the Delete key generates a well-known escape sequence.

Prepare Kbd for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --datadir=/lib/kbd

The meaning of the configure options:

--datadir=/lib/kbd

This option puts keyboard layout data in a directory that will always be on the root partition instead of the default /usr/share/kbd.

Compile the package:

make

This package does not come with a test suite.

Install the package:

make install

Note

For some languages (e.g., Belarusian) the Kbd package doesn't provide a useful keymap where the stock “by” keymap assumes the ISO-8859-5 encoding, and the CP1251 keymap is normally used. Users of such languages have to download working keymaps separately.

Some of the scripts in the LFS-Bootscripts package depend on kbd_mode, loadkeys, openvt, and setfont. As /usr may not be available during the early stages of booting, those binaries need to be on the root partition:

mv -v /usr/bin/{kbd_mode,loadkeys,openvt,setfont} /bin

If desired, install the documentation:

mkdir -v /usr/share/doc/kbd-1.15.2
cp -R -v doc/* \
         /usr/share/doc/kbd-1.15.2

6.47.2. Contents of Kbd

Installed programs: chvt, deallocvt, dumpkeys, fgconsole, getkeycodes, kbd_mode, kbdrate, loadkeys, loadunimap, mapscrn, openvt, psfaddtable (link to psfxtable), psfgettable (link to psfxtable), psfstriptable (link to psfxtable), psfxtable, resizecons, setfont, setkeycodes, setleds, setmetamode, showconsolefont, showkey, unicode_start, and unicode_stop
Installed directory: /lib/kbd

Short Descriptions

chvt

Changes the foreground virtual terminal

deallocvt

Deallocates unused virtual terminals

dumpkeys

Dumps the keyboard translation tables

fgconsole

Prints the number of the active virtual terminal

getkeycodes

Prints the kernel scancode-to-keycode mapping table

kbd_mode

Reports or sets the keyboard mode

kbdrate

Sets the keyboard repeat and delay rates

loadkeys

Loads the keyboard translation tables

loadunimap

Loads the kernel unicode-to-font mapping table

mapscrn

An obsolete program that used to load a user-defined output character mapping table into the console driver; this is now done by setfont

openvt

Starts a program on a new virtual terminal (VT)

psfaddtable

A link to psfxtable

psfgettable

A link to psfxtable

psfstriptable

A link to psfxtable

psfxtable

Handle Unicode character tables for console fonts

resizecons

Changes the kernel idea of the console size

setfont

Changes the Enhanced Graphic Adapter (EGA) and Video Graphics Array (VGA) fonts on the console

setkeycodes

Loads kernel scancode-to-keycode mapping table entries; this is useful if there are unusual keys on the keyboard

setleds

Sets the keyboard flags and Light Emitting Diodes (LEDs)

setmetamode

Defines the keyboard meta-key handling

showconsolefont

Shows the current EGA/VGA console screen font

showkey

Reports the scancodes, keycodes, and ASCII codes of the keys pressed on the keyboard

unicode_start

Puts the keyboard and console in UNICODE mode. Don't use this program unless your keymap file is in the ISO-8859-1 encoding. For other encodings, this utility produces incorrect results.

unicode_stop

Reverts keyboard and console from UNICODE mode

6.48. Less-436

The Less package contains a text file viewer.

Approximate build time: less than 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 2.9 MB

6.48.1. Installation of Less

Prepare Less for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --sysconfdir=/etc

The meaning of the configure options:

--sysconfdir=/etc

This option tells the programs created by the package to look in /etc for the configuration files.

Compile the package:

make

This package does not come with a test suite.

Install the package:

make install

6.48.2. Contents of Less

Installed programs: less, lessecho, and lesskey

Short Descriptions

less

A file viewer or pager; it displays the contents of the given file, letting the user scroll, find strings, and jump to marks

lessecho

Needed to expand meta-characters, such as * and ?, in filenames on Unix systems

lesskey

Used to specify the key bindings for less

6.49. Make-3.82

The Make package contains a program for compiling packages.

Approximate build time: 0.3 SBU
Required disk space: 9.7 MB

6.49.1. Installation of Make

Prepare Make for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

6.49.2. Contents of Make

Installed program: make

Short Descriptions

make

Automatically determines which pieces of a package need to be (re)compiled and then issues the relevant commands

6.50. Xz-5.0.1

The Xz package contains programs for compressing and decompressing files. It provides capabilities for the lzma and the newer xz compression formats. Compressing text files with xz yields a better compression percentage than with the traditional gzip or bzip2 commands.

Approximate build time: 0.4 SBU
Required disk space: 13 MB

6.50.1. Installation of Xz

Prepare Xz for compilation with:

./configure --prefix=/usr --docdir=/usr/share/doc/xz-5.0.1

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

6.50.2. Contents of Xz

Installed programs: lzcat (link to xz), lzcmp (link to xzdiff), lzdiff (link to xzdiff), bzdiff, lzegrep (link to xzgrep), lzfgrep (link to xzgrep), lz (link to xz), lzmadec, lzmainfo, lzmore (link to xzmore), unlzma (link to xz), xzcat (link to xz), xzcmp (link to xzdiff), xzdec, xzdiff, xzegrep (link to xzgrep), xzfgrep (link to xzgrep), xzgrep, xzless, xzmore
Installed libraries: liblzma.{a,so}
Installed directories: /usr/include/lzma and /usr/share/doc/xz-5.0.1

Short Descriptions

lzcat

Decompresses to standard output

lzcmp

Runs cmp on LZMA compressed files

lzdiff

Runs diff on LZMA compressed files

lzegrep

Runs egrep on LZMA compressed files files

lzfgrep

Runs fgrep on LZMA compressed files

lzgrep

Runs grep on LZMA compressed files

lzless

Runs less on LZMA compressed files

lzma

Compresses or decompresses files using the LZMA format

lzmadec

A small and fast decoder for LZMA compressed files

lzmainfo

Shows information stored in the LZMA compressed file header

lzmore

Runs more on LZMA compressed files

unlzma

Decompresses files using the LZMA format

unxz

Decompresses files using the XZ format

xz

Compresses or decompresses files using the XZ format

xzcat

Decompresses to standard output

xzcmp

Runs cmp on XZ compressed files

xzdec

A small and fast decoder for XZ compressed files

xzdiff

Runs diff on XZ compressed files

xzegrep

Runs egrep on XZ compressed files files

xzfgrep

Runs fgrep on XZ compressed files

xzgrep

Runs grep on XZ compressed files

xzless

Runs less on XZ compressed files

xzmore

Runs more on XZ compressed files

liblzma*

The library implementing lossless, block-sorting data compression, using the Lempel-Ziv-Markov chain algorithm

6.51. Man-DB-2.5.9

The Man-DB package contains programs for finding and viewing man pages.

Approximate build time: 0.4 SBU
Required disk space: 22 MB

6.51.1. Installation of Man-DB

Prepare Man-DB for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --libexecdir=/usr/lib \
    --docdir=/usr/share/doc/man-db-2.5.9 --sysconfdir=/etc --disable-setuid \
    --with-browser=/usr/bin/lynx --with-vgrind=/usr/bin/vgrind \
    --with-grap=/usr/bin/grap

The meaning of the configure options:

--disable-setuid

This disables making the man program setuid to user man.

--with-...

These three parameters are used to set some default programs. lynx is a text-based web browser (see BLFS for installation instructions), vgrind converts program sources to Groff input, and grap is useful for typesetting graphs in Groff documents. The vgrind and grap programs are not normally needed for viewing manual pages. They are not part of LFS or BLFS, but you should be able to install them yourself after finishing LFS if you wish to do so.

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make -k check

Note that 2 tests are known to fail as they rely on warnings output from Groff, which changed slightly in Groff-1.21.

Install the package:

make install

6.51.2. Non-English Manual Pages in LFS

The following table shows the character set that Man-DB assumes manual pages installed under /usr/share/man/<ll> will be encoded with. In addition to this, Man-DB correctly determines if manual pages installed in that directory are UTF-8 encoded.

Table 6.1. Expected character encoding of legacy 8-bit manual pages

Language (code) Encoding Language (code) Encoding
Danish (da) ISO-8859-1 Croatian (hr) ISO-8859-2
German (de) ISO-8859-1 Hungarian (hu) ISO-8859-2
English (en) ISO-8859-1 Japanese (ja) EUC-JP
Spanish (es) ISO-8859-1 Korean (ko) EUC-KR
Estonian (et) ISO-8859-1 Lithuanian (lt) ISO-8859-13
Finnish (fi) ISO-8859-1 Latvian (lv) ISO-8859-13
French (fr) ISO-8859-1 Macedonian (mk) ISO-8859-5
Irish (ga) ISO-8859-1 Polish (pl) ISO-8859-2
Galician (gl) ISO-8859-1 Romanian (ro) ISO-8859-2
Indonesian (id) ISO-8859-1 Russian (ru) KOI8-R
Icelandic (is) ISO-8859-1 Slovak (sk) ISO-8859-2
Italian (it) ISO-8859-1 Slovenian (sl) ISO-8859-2
Norwegian Bokmal (nb) ISO-8859-1 Serbian Latin (sr@latin) ISO-8859-2
Dutch (nl) ISO-8859-1 Serbian (sr) ISO-8859-5
Norwegian Nynorsk (nn) ISO-8859-1 Turkish (tr) ISO-8859-9
Norwegian (no) ISO-8859-1 Ukrainian (uk) KOI8-U
Portuguese (pt) ISO-8859-1 Vietnamese (vi) TCVN5712-1
Swedish (sv) ISO-8859-1 Simplified Chinese (zh_CN) GBK
Belarusian (be) CP1251 Simplified Chinese, Singapore (zh_SG) GBK
Bulgarian (bg) CP1251 Traditional Chinese, Hong Kong (zh_HK) BIG5HKSCS
Czech (cs) ISO-8859-2 Traditional Chinese (zh_TW) BIG5
Greek (el) ISO-8859-7    

Note

Manual pages in languages not in the list are not supported.

6.51.3. Contents of Man-DB

Installed programs: accessdb, apropos (link to whatis), catman, lexgrog, man, mandb, manpath, whatis, and zsoelim
Installed directories: /usr/lib/man-db, /usr/share/doc/man-db

Short Descriptions

accessdb

Dumps the whatis database contents in human-readable form

apropos

Searches the whatis database and displays the short descriptions of system commands that contain a given string

catman

Creates or updates the pre-formatted manual pages

lexgrog

Displays one-line summary information about a given manual page

man

Formats and displays the requested manual page

mandb

Creates or updates the whatis database

manpath

Displays the contents of $MANPATH or (if $MANPATH is not set) a suitable search path based on the settings in man.conf and the user's environment

whatis

Searches the whatis database and displays the short descriptions of system commands that contain the given keyword as a separate word

zsoelim

Reads files and replaces lines of the form .so file by the contents of the mentioned file

6.52. Module-Init-Tools-3.12

The Module-Init-Tools package contains programs for handling kernel modules in Linux kernels greater than or equal to version 2.5.47.

Approximate build time: 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 8.6 MB

6.52.1. Installation of Module-Init-Tools

To avoid a problem with regenerating the man pages when not needed, first rewrite a file that just points to another man page:

echo '.so man5/modprobe.conf.5' > modprobe.d.5

The test suite of this package is geared towards the needs of its Maintainer. The command make check builds a specially wrapped version of modprobe which is useless for normal operation. To run this (about 0.2 SBU), issue the following commands (note that the make clean command is required to clean up the source tree before recompiling for normal use):

./configure
make check
./tests/runtests
make clean

Prepare Module-Init-Tools for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/ --enable-zlib-dynamic --mandir=/usr/share/man

Compile the package:

make

Install the package:

make INSTALL=install install

The meaning of the make parameter:

INSTALL=install

Normally, make install will not install the binaries if they already exist. This option overrides that behavior by calling install instead of using the default wrapper script.

6.52.2. Contents of Module-Init-Tools

Installed programs: depmod, insmod, insmod.static, lsmod, modinfo, modprobe, and rmmod

Short Descriptions

depmod

Creates a dependency file based on the symbols it finds in the existing set of modules; this dependency file is used by modprobe to automatically load the required modules

insmod

Installs a loadable module in the running kernel

insmod.static

A statically compiled version of insmod

lsmod

Lists currently loaded modules

modinfo

Examines an object file associated with a kernel module and displays any information that it can glean

modprobe

Uses a dependency file, created by depmod, to automatically load relevant modules

rmmod

Unloads modules from the running kernel

6.53. Patch-2.6.1

The Patch package contains a program for modifying or creating files by applying a “patch” file typically created by the diff program.

Approximate build time: less than 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 1.9 MB

6.53.1. Installation of Patch

Apply a patch to prevent the test suite from running a test that requires ed:

patch -Np1 -i ../patch-2.6.1-test_fix-1.patch

Prepare Patch for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

6.53.2. Contents of Patch

Installed program: patch

Short Descriptions

patch

Modifies files according to a patch file. A patch file is normally a difference listing created with the diff program. By applying these differences to the original files, patch creates the patched versions.

6.54. Psmisc-22.13

The Psmisc package contains programs for displaying information about running processes.

Approximate build time: less than 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 2.5 MB

6.54.1. Installation of Psmisc

Prepare Psmisc for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

This package does not come with a test suite.

Install the package:

make install

Finally, move the killall and fuser programs to the location specified by the FHS:

mv -v /usr/bin/fuser /bin
mv -v /usr/bin/killall /bin

6.54.2. Contents of Psmisc

Installed programs: fuser, killall, peekfd, prtstat, pstree, and pstree.x11 (link to pstree)

Short Descriptions

fuser

Reports the Process IDs (PIDs) of processes that use the given files or file systems

killall

Kills processes by name; it sends a signal to all processes running any of the given commands

peekfd

Peek at file descriptors of a running process, given its PID

prtstat

Prints information about a process

pstree

Displays running processes as a tree

pstree.x11

Same as pstree, except that it waits for confirmation before exiting

6.55. Shadow-4.1.4.3

The Shadow package contains programs for handling passwords in a secure way.

Approximate build time: 0.3 SBU
Required disk space: 30 MB

6.55.1. Installation of Shadow

Note

If you would like to enforce the use of strong passwords, refer to http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/postlfs/cracklib.html for installing CrackLib prior to building Shadow. Then add --with-libcrack to the configure command below.

Disable the installation of the groups program and its man pages, as Coreutils provides a better version:

sed -i 's/groups$(EXEEXT) //' src/Makefile.in
find man -name Makefile.in -exec sed -i 's/groups\.1 / /' {} \;

Fix an issue with the installation of Russian man pages:

sed -i 's/man_MANS = $(man_nopam) /man_MANS = /' man/ru/Makefile.in

Instead of using the default crypt method, use the more secure SHA-512 method of password encryption, which also allows passwords longer than 8 characters. It is also necessary to change the obsolete /var/spool/mail location for user mailboxes that Shadow uses by default to the /var/mail location used currently:

sed -i -e 's@#ENCRYPT_METHOD DES@ENCRYPT_METHOD SHA512@' \
       -e 's@/var/spool/mail@/var/mail@' etc/login.defs

Note

If you chose to build Shadow with Cracklib support, run the following:

sed -i 's@DICTPATH.*@DICTPATH\t/lib/cracklib/pw_dict@' \
    etc/login.defs

Prepare Shadow for compilation:

./configure --sysconfdir=/etc

Compile the package:

make

This package does not come with a test suite.

Install the package:

make install

Move a misplaced program to its proper location:

mv -v /usr/bin/passwd /bin

6.55.2. Configuring Shadow

This package contains utilities to add, modify, and delete users and groups; set and change their passwords; and perform other administrative tasks. For a full explanation of what password shadowing means, see the doc/HOWTO file within the unpacked source tree. If using Shadow support, keep in mind that programs which need to verify passwords (display managers, FTP programs, pop3 daemons, etc.) must be Shadow-compliant. That is, they need to be able to work with shadowed passwords.

To enable shadowed passwords, run the following command:

pwconv

To enable shadowed group passwords, run:

grpconv

Shadow's stock configuration for the useradd utility has a few caveats that need some explanation. First, the default action for the useradd utility is to create the user and a group of the same name as the user. By default the user ID (UID) and group ID (GID) numbers will begin with 1000. This means if you don't pass parameters to useradd, each user will be a member of a unique group on the system. If this behaviour is undesireable, you'll need to pass the -g parameter to useradd. The default parameters are stored in the /etc/default/useradd file. You may need to modify two parameters in this file to suit your particular needs.

/etc/default/useradd Parameter Explanations

GROUP=1000

This parameter sets the beginning of the group numbers used in the /etc/group file. You can modify it to anything you desire. Note that useradd will never reuse a UID or GID. If the number identified in this parameter is used, it will use the next available number after this. Note also that if you don't have a group 1000 on your system the first time you use useradd without the -g parameter, you'll get a message displayed on the terminal that says: useradd: unknown GID 1000. You may disregard this message and group number 1000 will be used.

CREATE_MAIL_SPOOL=yes

This parameter causes useradd to create a mailbox file for the newly created user. useradd will make the group ownership of this file to the mail group with 0660 permissions. If you would prefer that these mailbox files are not created by useradd, issue the following command:

sed -i 's/yes/no/' /etc/default/useradd

6.55.3. Setting the root password

Choose a password for user root and set it by running:

passwd root

6.55.4. Contents of Shadow

Installed programs: chage, chfn, chgpasswd, chpasswd, chsh, expiry, faillog, gpasswd, groupadd, groupdel, groupmems, groupmod, grpck, grpconv, grpunconv, lastlog, login, logoutd, newgrp, newusers, nologin, passwd, pwck, pwconv, pwunconv, sg (link to newgrp), su, useradd, userdel, usermod, vigr (link to vipw), and vipw
Installed directory: /etc/default

Short Descriptions

chage

Used to change the maximum number of days between obligatory password changes

chfn

Used to change a user's full name and other information

chgpasswd

Used to update group passwords in batch mode

chpasswd

Used to update user passwords in batch mode

chsh

Used to change a user's default login shell

expiry

Checks and enforces the current password expiration policy

faillog

Is used to examine the log of login failures, to set a maximum number of failures before an account is blocked, or to reset the failure count

gpasswd

Is used to add and delete members and administrators to groups

groupadd

Creates a group with the given name

groupdel

Deletes the group with the given name

groupmems

Allows a user to administer his/her own group membership list without the requirement of super user privileges.

groupmod

Is used to modify the given group's name or GID

grpck

Verifies the integrity of the group files /etc/group and /etc/gshadow

grpconv

Creates or updates the shadow group file from the normal group file

grpunconv

Updates /etc/group from /etc/gshadow and then deletes the latter

lastlog

Reports the most recent login of all users or of a given user

login

Is used by the system to let users sign on

logoutd

Is a daemon used to enforce restrictions on log-on time and ports

newgrp

Is used to change the current GID during a login session

newusers

Is used to create or update an entire series of user accounts

nologin

Displays a message that an account is not available. Designed to be used as the default shell for accounts that have been disabled

passwd

Is used to change the password for a user or group account

pwck

Verifies the integrity of the password files /etc/passwd and /etc/shadow

pwconv

Creates or updates the shadow password file from the normal password file

pwunconv

Updates /etc/passwd from /etc/shadow and then deletes the latter

sg

Executes a given command while the user's GID is set to that of the given group

su

Runs a shell with substitute user and group IDs

useradd

Creates a new user with the given name, or updates the default new-user information

userdel

Deletes the given user account

usermod

Is used to modify the given user's login name, User Identification (UID), shell, initial group, home directory, etc.

vigr

Edits the /etc/group or /etc/gshadow files

vipw

Edits the /etc/passwd or /etc/shadow files

6.56. Sysklogd-1.5

The Sysklogd package contains programs for logging system messages, such as those given by the kernel when unusual things happen.

Approximate build time: less than 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 0.5 MB

6.56.1. Installation of Sysklogd

Compile the package:

make

This package does not come with a test suite.

Install the package:

make BINDIR=/sbin install

6.56.2. Configuring Sysklogd

Create a new /etc/syslog.conf file by running the following:

cat > /etc/syslog.conf << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/syslog.conf

auth,authpriv.* -/var/log/auth.log
*.*;auth,authpriv.none -/var/log/sys.log
daemon.* -/var/log/daemon.log
kern.* -/var/log/kern.log
mail.* -/var/log/mail.log
user.* -/var/log/user.log
*.emerg *

# End /etc/syslog.conf
EOF

6.56.3. Contents of Sysklogd

Installed programs: klogd and syslogd

Short Descriptions

klogd

A system daemon for intercepting and logging kernel messages

syslogd

Logs the messages that system programs offer for logging. Every logged message contains at least a date stamp and a hostname, and normally the program's name too, but that depends on how trusting the logging daemon is told to be

6.57. Sysvinit-2.88dsf

The Sysvinit package contains programs for controlling the startup, running, and shutdown of the system.

Approximate build time: less than 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 1 MB

6.57.1. Installation of Sysvinit

When run-levels are changed (for example, when halting the system), init sends termination signals to those processes that init itself started and that should not be running in the new run-level. While doing this, init outputs messages like “Sending processes the TERM signal” which seem to imply that it is sending these signals to all currently running processes. To avoid this misinterpretation, modify the source so that these messages read like “Sending processes configured via /etc/inittab the TERM signal” instead:

sed -i 's@Sending processes@& configured via /etc/inittab@g' \
    src/init.c

A maintained version of the wall program was installed earlier by Util-linux. Suppress the installation of Sysvinit's version of this program and its man page:

sed -i -e 's/utmpdump wall/utmpdump/' \
       -e 's/mountpoint.1 wall.1/mountpoint.1/' src/Makefile

Compile the package:

make -C src

This package does not come with a test suite.

Install the package:

make -C src install

6.57.2. Configuring Sysvinit

Create a new file /etc/inittab by running the following:

cat > /etc/inittab << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/inittab

id:3:initdefault:

si::sysinit:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc sysinit

l0:0:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 0
l1:S1:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 1
l2:2:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 2
l3:3:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 3
l4:4:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 4
l5:5:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 5
l6:6:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 6

ca:12345:ctrlaltdel:/sbin/shutdown -t1 -a -r now

su:S016:once:/sbin/sulogin

1:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty1 9600
2:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty2 9600
3:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty3 9600
4:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty4 9600
5:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty5 9600
6:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty6 9600

# End /etc/inittab
EOF

6.57.3. Contents of Sysvinit

Installed programs: bootlogd, fstab-decode, halt, init, killall5, last, lastb (link to last), mesg, mountpoint, pidof (link to killall5), poweroff (link to halt), reboot (link to halt), runlevel, shutdown, sulogin, telinit (link to init), and utmpdump

Short Descriptions

bootlogd

Logs boot messages to a log file

fstab-decode

Run a command with fstab-encoded arguments

halt

Normally invokes shutdown with the -h option, except when already in run-level 0, then it tells the kernel to halt the system; it notes in the file /var/log/wtmp that the system is being brought down

init

The first process to be started when the kernel has initialized the hardware which takes over the boot process and starts all the proceses it is instructed to

killall5

Sends a signal to all processes, except the processes in its own session so it will not kill the shell running the script that called it

last

Shows which users last logged in (and out), searching back through the /var/log/wtmp file; it also shows system boots, shutdowns, and run-level changes

lastb

Shows the failed login attempts, as logged in /var/log/btmp

mesg

Controls whether other users can send messages to the current user's terminal

mountpoint

Checks if the directory is a mountpoint

pidof

Reports the PIDs of the given programs

poweroff

Tells the kernel to halt the system and switch off the computer (see halt)

reboot

Tells the kernel to reboot the system (see halt)

runlevel

Reports the previous and the current run-level, as noted in the last run-level record in /var/run/utmp

shutdown

Brings the system down in a secure way, signaling all processes and notifying all logged-in users

sulogin

Allows root to log in; it is normally invoked by init when the system goes into single user mode

telinit

Tells init which run-level to change to

utmpdump

Displays the content of the given login file in a more user-friendly format

6.58. Tar-1.25

The Tar package contains an archiving program.

Approximate build time: 1.9 SBU
Required disk space: 21.2 MB

6.58.1. Installation of Tar

Prepare Tar for compilation:

FORCE_UNSAFE_CONFIGURE=1 ./configure --prefix=/usr \
    --bindir=/bin --libexecdir=/usr/sbin

The meaning of the configure options:

FORCE_UNSAFE_CONFIGURE=1

This forces the test for mknod to be run as root. It is generally considered dangerous to run this test as the root user, but as it is being run on an only partially built system, overriding it is OK.

Compile the package:

make

To test the results (about 1 SBU), issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install
make -C doc install-html docdir=/usr/share/doc/tar-1.25

6.58.2. Contents of Tar

Installed programs: rmt and tar

Short Descriptions

rmt

Remotely manipulates a magnetic tape drive through an interprocess communication connection

tar

Creates, extracts files from, and lists the contents of archives, also known as tarballs

6.59. Texinfo-4.13a

The Texinfo package contains programs for reading, writing, and converting info pages.

Approximate build time: 0.3 SBU
Required disk space: 21 MB

6.59.1. Installation of Texinfo

Prepare Texinfo for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Optionally, install the components belonging in a TeX installation:

make TEXMF=/usr/share/texmf install-tex

The meaning of the make parameter:

TEXMF=/usr/share/texmf

The TEXMF makefile variable holds the location of the root of the TeX tree if, for example, a TeX package will be installed later.

The Info documentation system uses a plain text file to hold its list of menu entries. The file is located at /usr/share/info/dir. Unfortunately, due to occasional problems in the Makefiles of various packages, it can sometimes get out of sync with the info pages installed on the system. If the /usr/share/info/dir file ever needs to be recreated, the following optional commands will accomplish the task:

cd /usr/share/info
rm -v dir
for f in *
do install-info $f dir 2>/dev/null
done

6.59.2. Contents of Texinfo

Installed programs: info, infokey, install-info, makeinfo, pdftexi2dvi, texi2dvi, texi2pdf, and texindex
Installed directory: /usr/share/texinfo

Short Descriptions

info

Used to read info pages which are similar to man pages, but often go much deeper than just explaining all the available command line options. For example, compare man bison and info bison.

infokey

Compiles a source file containing Info customizations into a binary format

install-info

Used to install info pages; it updates entries in the info index file

makeinfo

Translates the given Texinfo source documents into info pages, plain text, or HTML

pdftexi2dvi

Used to format the given Texinfo document into a Portable Document Format (PDF) file

texi2dvi

Used to format the given Texinfo document into a device-independent file that can be printed

texi2pdf

Used to format the given Texinfo document into a Portable Document Format (PDF) file

texindex

Used to sort Texinfo index files

6.60. Udev-166

The Udev package contains programs for dynamic creation of device nodes.

Approximate build time: 0.2 SBU
Required disk space: 9.3 MB plus 37 MB for testfiles

6.60.1. Installation of Udev

The udev-config tarball contains LFS-specific files used to configure Udev. Unpack it into the Udev source directory:

tar -xvf ../udev-config-20100128.tar.bz2

The udev-testfiles tarball contains files needed to test udev. The file expands to an apparent size of about 37MB but the actual disk usage is less than 7MB.

tar -xvf ../udev-166-testfiles.tar.bz2 --strip-components=1

Create some devices and directories that Udev cannot handle due to them being required very early in the boot process, or by Udev itself:

install -dv /lib/{firmware,udev/devices/{pts,shm}}
mknod -m0666 /lib/udev/devices/null c 1 3

Prepare the package for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr \
    --sysconfdir=/etc --sbindir=/sbin \
    --with-rootlibdir=/lib --libexecdir=/lib/udev \
    --disable-extras --disable-introspection

The meaning of the new configure options

--with-rootlibdir=/lib

This controls where the libudev library is installed. The library needs to be in /lib because it's used by Udev at boot time, before /usr might be available, and the default --rootlibdir is /usr/lib.

--libexecdir=/lib/udev

This controls where Udev-internal rules and helper programs are installed.

--disable-extras

This option prevents Udev from installing helper programs and other extras which require more external libraries. These libraries are not part of the base LFS system. See the Udev README file for more information.

--disable-introspection

This option prevents Udev's instrospection feature, which requires packages not installed as part of the base LFS system. See the Udev README file for more information.

Compile the package:

make

Test the package.

make check

Install the package:

make install

Remove an empty documentation directory:

rmdir -v /usr/share/doc/udev

Now install the LFS-specific custom rules files:

cd udev-config-20100128
make install

Install the documentation that explains the LFS-specific rules files:

make install-doc

6.60.2. Contents of Udev

Installed programs: ata_id, cdrom_id, collect, create_floppy_devices, edd_id, firmware.sh, fstab_import, path_id, scsi_id, udevadm, udevd, usb_id, write_cd_rules, and write_net_rules
Installed libraries: libudev.{a,so}
Installed directories: /etc/udev, /lib/udev, /lib/firmware

Short Descriptions

ata_id

Provides Udev with a unique string and additional information (uuid, label) for an ATA drive

cdrom_id

Provides Udev with the capabilities of a CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive

collect

Given an ID for the current uevent and a list of IDs (for all target uevents), registers the current ID and indicates whether all target IDs have been registered

create_floppy_devices

Creates all possible floppy devices based on the CMOS type

edd_id

Provides Udev with the EDD ID for a BIOS disk drive

firmware.sh

Uploads firmware to devices

fstab_import

Finds an entry in /etc/fstab that matches the current device, and provides its information to Udev

path_id

Provides the shortest possible unique hardware path to a device

scsi_id

Provides Udev with a unique SCSI identifier based on the data returned from sending a SCSI INQUIRY command to the specified device

udevadm

Generic udev administration tool: controls the udevd daemon, provides info from the Udev database, monitors uevents, waits for uevents to finish, tests Udev configuration, and triggers uevents for a given device

udevd

A daemon that listens for uevents on the netlink socket, creates devices and runs the configured external programs in response to these uevents

usb_id

Provides Udev with information about USB devices

write_cd_rules

A script which generates Udev rules to provide stable names for optical drives (see also Section 7.10, “Creating Custom Symlinks to Devices”)

write_net_rules

A script which generates rules to provide stable names for network interfaces (see also Section 7.13, “Configuring the network Script”)

libudev

A library interface to udev device information

/etc/udev

Contains Udev configuration files, device permissions, and rules for device naming

6.61. Vim-7.3

The Vim package contains a powerful text editor.

Approximate build time: 1.0 SBU
Required disk space: 87 MB

Alternatives to Vim

If you prefer another editor—such as Emacs, Joe, or Nano—please refer to http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/postlfs/editors.html for suggested installation instructions.

6.61.1. Installation of Vim

First, change the default location of the vimrc configuration file to /etc:

echo '#define SYS_VIMRC_FILE "/etc/vimrc"' >> src/feature.h

Now prepare Vim for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --enable-multibyte

The meaning of the configure options:

--enable-multibyte

This switch enables support for editing files in multibyte character encodings. This is needed if using a locale with a multibyte character set. This switch is also helpful to be able to edit text files initially created in Linux distributions like Fedora that use UTF-8 as a default character set.

Compile the package:

make

To test the results, issue:

make test

However, this test suite outputs a lot of binary data to the screen, which can cause issues with the settings of the current terminal. This can be resolved by redirecting the output to a log file.

Install the package:

make install

Many users are used to using vi instead of vim. To allow execution of vim when users habitually enter vi, create a symlink for both the binary and the man page in the provided languages:

ln -sv vim /usr/bin/vi
for L in  /usr/share/man/{,*/}man1/vim.1; do
    ln -sv vim.1 $(dirname $L)/vi.1
done

By default, Vim's documentation is installed in /usr/share/vim. The following symlink allows the documentation to be accessed via /usr/share/doc/vim-7.3, making it consistent with the location of documentation for other packages:

ln -sv ../vim/vim73/doc /usr/share/doc/vim-7.3

If an X Window System is going to be installed on the LFS system, it may be necessary to recompile Vim after installing X. Vim comes with a GUI version of the editor that requires X and some additional libraries to be installed. For more information on this process, refer to the Vim documentation and the Vim installation page in the BLFS book at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/postlfs/editors.html#postlfs-editors-vim.

6.61.2. Configuring Vim

By default, vim runs in vi-incompatible mode. This may be new to users who have used other editors in the past. The “nocompatible” setting is included below to highlight the fact that a new behavior is being used. It also reminds those who would change to “compatible” mode that it should be the first setting in the configuration file. This is necessary because it changes other settings, and overrides must come after this setting. Create a default vim configuration file by running the following:

cat > /etc/vimrc << "EOF"
" Begin /etc/vimrc

set nocompatible
set backspace=2
syntax on
if (&term == "iterm") || (&term == "putty")
  set background=dark
endif

" End /etc/vimrc
EOF

The set nocompatible setting makes vim behave in a more useful way (the default) than the vi-compatible manner. Remove the “no” to keep the old vi behavior. The set backspace=2 setting allows backspacing over line breaks, autoindents, and the start of insert. The syntax on parameter enables vim's syntax highlighting. Finally, the if statement with the set background=dark setting corrects vim's guess about the background color of some terminal emulators. This gives the highlighting a better color scheme for use on the black background of these programs.

Documentation for other available options can be obtained by running the following command:

vim -c ':options'

Note

By default, Vim only installs spell files for the English language. To install spell files for your preferred language, download the *.spl and optionally, the *.sug files for your language and character encoding from ftp://ftp.vim.org/pub/vim/runtime/spell/ and save them to /usr/share/vim/vim73/spell/.

To use these spell files, some configuration in /etc/vimrc is needed, e.g.:

set spelllang=en,ru
set spell

For more information, see the appropriate README file located at the URL above.

6.61.3. Contents of Vim

Installed programs: ex (link to vim), rview (link to vim), rvim (link to vim), vi (link to vim), view (link to vim), vim, vimdiff (link to vim), vimtutor, and xxd
Installed directory: /usr/share/vim

Short Descriptions

ex

Starts vim in ex mode

rview

Is a restricted version of view; no shell commands can be started and view cannot be suspended

rvim

Is a restricted version of vim; no shell commands can be started and vim cannot be suspended

vi

Link to vim

view

Starts vim in read-only mode

vim

Is the editor

vimdiff

Edits two or three versions of a file with vim and show differences

vimtutor

Teaches the basic keys and commands of vim

xxd

Creates a hex dump of the given file; it can also do the reverse, so it can be used for binary patching

6.62. About Debugging Symbols

Most programs and libraries are, by default, compiled with debugging symbols included (with gcc's -g option). This means that when debugging a program or library that was compiled with debugging information included, the debugger can provide not only memory addresses, but also the names of the routines and variables.

However, the inclusion of these debugging symbols enlarges a program or library significantly. The following is an example of the amount of space these symbols occupy:

  • A bash binary with debugging symbols: 1200 KB

  • A bash binary without debugging symbols: 480 KB

  • Glibc and GCC files (/lib and /usr/lib) with debugging symbols: 87 MB

  • Glibc and GCC files without debugging symbols: 16 MB

Sizes may vary depending on which compiler and C library were used, but when comparing programs with and without debugging symbols, the difference will usually be a factor between two and five.

Because most users will never use a debugger on their system software, a lot of disk space can be regained by removing these symbols. The next section shows how to strip all debugging symbols from the programs and libraries.

6.63. Stripping Again

If the intended user is not a programmer and does not plan to do any debugging on the system software, the system size can be decreased by about 90 MB by removing the debugging symbols from binaries and libraries. This causes no inconvenience other than not being able to debug the software fully anymore.

Most people who use the command mentioned below do not experience any difficulties. However, it is easy to make a typo and render the new system unusable, so before running the strip command, it is a good idea to make a backup of the LFS system in its current state.

Before performing the stripping, take special care to ensure that none of the binaries that are about to be stripped are running. If unsure whether the user entered chroot with the command given in Section 6.4, “Entering the Chroot Environment,” first exit from chroot:

logout

Then reenter it with:

chroot $LFS /tools/bin/env -i \
    HOME=/root TERM=$TERM PS1='\u:\w\$ ' \
    PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin \
    /tools/bin/bash --login

Now the binaries and libraries can be safely stripped:

/tools/bin/find /{,usr/}{bin,lib,sbin} -type f \
  -exec /tools/bin/strip --strip-debug '{}' ';'

A large number of files will be reported as having their file format not recognized. These warnings can be safely ignored. These warnings indicate that those files are scripts instead of binaries.

If disk space is very tight, the --strip-all option can be used on the binaries in /{,usr/}{bin,sbin} to gain several more megabytes. Do not use this option on libraries—they will be destroyed.

6.64. Cleaning Up

From now on, when reentering the chroot environment after exiting, use the following modified chroot command:

chroot "$LFS" /usr/bin/env -i \
    HOME=/root TERM="$TERM" PS1='\u:\w\$ ' \
    PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin \
    /bin/bash --login

The reason for this is that the programs in /tools are no longer needed. Since they are no longer needed you can delete the /tools directory if so desired.

Note

Removing /tools will also remove the temporary copies of Tcl, Expect, and DejaGNU which were used for running the toolchain tests. If you need these programs later on, they will need to be recompiled and re-installed. The BLFS book has instructions for this (see http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/).

If the virtual kernel file systems have been unmounted, either manually or through a reboot, ensure that the virtual kernel file systems are mounted when reentering the chroot. This process was explained in Section 6.2.2, “Mounting and Populating /dev” and Section 6.2.3, “Mounting Virtual Kernel File Systems”.

Chapter 7. Setting Up System Bootscripts

7.1. Introduction

This chapter details how to install and configure the LFS-Bootscripts package. Most of these scripts will work without modification, but a few require additional configuration files because they deal with hardware-dependent information.

System-V style init scripts are employed in this book because they are widely used. For additional options, a hint detailing the BSD style init setup is available at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/bsd-init.txt. Searching the LFS mailing lists for “depinit” will also offer additional choices.

If using an alternative style of init scripts, skip this chapter and move on to Chapter 8.

7.2. LFS-Bootscripts-20100627

The LFS-Bootscripts package contains a set of scripts to start/stop the LFS system at bootup/shutdown.

Approximate build time: less than 0.1 SBU
Required disk space: 468 KB

7.2.1. Installation of LFS-Bootscripts

Install the package:

make install

7.2.2. Contents of LFS-Bootscripts

Installed scripts: checkfs, cleanfs, console, consolelog, functions, halt, ifdown, ifup, localnet, modules, mountfs, mountkernfs, network, rc, reboot, sendsignals, setclock, static, swap, sysctl, sysklogd, template, udev, and udev_retry
Installed directories: /etc/rc.d, /etc/sysconfig

Short Descriptions

checkfs

Checks the integrity of the file systems before they are mounted (with the exception of journal and network based file systems)

cleanfs

Removes files that should not be preserved between reboots, such as those in /var/run/ and /var/lock/; it re-creates /var/run/utmp and removes the possibly present /etc/nologin, /fastboot, and /forcefsck files

console

Loads the correct keymap table for the desired keyboard layout; it also sets the screen font

consolelog

Sets the kernel log level to control messages reaching the console.

functions

Contains common functions, such as error and status checking, that are used by several bootscripts

halt

Halts the system

ifdown

Assists the network script with stopping network devices

ifup

Assists the network script with starting network devices

localnet

Sets up the system's hostname and local loopback device

modules

Loads kernel modules listed in /etc/sysconfig/modules, using arguments that are also given there

mountfs

Mounts all file systems, except ones that are marked noauto or are network based

mountkernfs

Mounts virtual kernel file systems, such as proc

network

Sets up network interfaces, such as network cards, and sets up the default gateway (where applicable)

rc

The master run-level control script; it is responsible for running all the other bootscripts one-by-one, in a sequence determined by the name of the symbolic links being processed

reboot

Reboots the system

sendsignals

Makes sure every process is terminated before the system reboots or halts

setclock

Resets the kernel clock to local time in case the hardware clock is not set to UTC time

static

Provides the functionality needed to assign a static Internet Protocol (IP) address to a network interface

swap

Enables and disables swap files and partitions

sysctl

Loads system configuration values from /etc/sysctl.conf, if that file exists, into the running kernel

sysklogd

Starts and stops the system and kernel log daemons

template

A template to create custom bootscripts for other daemons

udev

Prepares the /dev directory and starts Udev

udev_retry

Retries failed udev uevents, and copies generated rules files from /dev/.udev to /etc/udev/rules.d if required

7.3. How Do These Bootscripts Work?

Linux uses a special booting facility named SysVinit that is based on a concept of run-levels. It can be quite different from one system to another, so it cannot be assumed that because things worked in one particular Linux distribution, they should work the same in LFS too. LFS has its own way of doing things, but it respects generally accepted standards.

SysVinit (which will be referred to as “init” from now on) works using a run-levels scheme. There are seven (numbered 0 to 6) run-levels (actually, there are more run-levels, but they are for special cases and are generally not used. See init(8) for more details), and each one of those corresponds to the actions the computer is supposed to perform when it starts up. The default run-level is 3. Here are the descriptions of the different run-levels as they are implemented:

0: halt the computer
1: single-user mode
2: multi-user mode without networking
3: multi-user mode with networking
4: reserved for customization, otherwise does the same as 3
5: same as 4, it is usually used for GUI login (like X's xdm or KDE's kdm)
6: reboot the computer

The command used to change run-levels is init <runlevel>, where <runlevel> is the target run-level. For example, to reboot the computer, a user could issue the init 6 command, which is an alias for the reboot command. Likewise, init 0 is an alias for the halt command.

There are a number of directories under /etc/rc.d that look like rc?.d (where ? is the number of the run-level) and rcsysinit.d, all containing a number of symbolic links. Some begin with a K, the others begin with an S, and all of them have two numbers following the initial letter. The K means to stop (kill) a service and the S means to start a service. The numbers determine the order in which the scripts are run, from 00 to 99—the lower the number the earlier it gets executed. When init switches to another run-level, the appropriate services are either started or stopped, depending on the runlevel chosen.

The real scripts are in /etc/rc.d/init.d. They do the actual work, and the symlinks all point to them. Killing links and starting links point to the same script in /etc/rc.d/init.d. This is because the scripts can be called with different parameters like start, stop, restart, reload, and status. When a K link is encountered, the appropriate script is run with the stop argument. When an S link is encountered, the appropriate script is run with the start argument.

There is one exception to this explanation. Links that start with an S in the rc0.d and rc6.d directories will not cause anything to be started. They will be called with the parameter stop to stop something. The logic behind this is that when a user is going to reboot or halt the system, nothing needs to be started. The system only needs to be stopped.

These are descriptions of what the arguments make the scripts do:

start

The service is started.

stop

The service is stopped.

restart

The service is stopped and then started again.

reload

The configuration of the service is updated. This is used after the configuration file of a service was modified, when the service does not need to be restarted.

status

Tells if the service is running and with which PIDs.

Feel free to modify the way the boot process works (after all, it is your own LFS system). The files given here are an example of how it can be done.

7.4. Configuring the setclock Script

The setclock script reads the time from the hardware clock, also known as the BIOS or the Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor (CMOS) clock. If the hardware clock is set to UTC, this script will convert the hardware clock's time to the local time using the /etc/localtime file (which tells the hwclock program which timezone the user is in). There is no way to detect whether or not the hardware clock is set to UTC, so this needs to be configured manually.

The setclock is run via udev when the kernel detects the hardware capability upon boot. It can also be run manually with the stop parameter to store the system time to the CMOS clock.

If you cannot remember whether or not the hardware clock is set to UTC, find out by running the hwclock --localtime --show command. This will display what the current time is according to the hardware clock. If this time matches whatever your watch says, then the hardware clock is set to local time. If the output from hwclock is not local time, chances are it is set to UTC time. Verify this by adding or subtracting the proper amount of hours for the timezone to the time shown by hwclock. For example, if you are currently in the MST timezone, which is also known as GMT -0700, add seven hours to the local time.

Change the value of the UTC variable below to a value of 0 (zero) if the hardware clock is not set to UTC time.

Create a new file /etc/sysconfig/clock by running the following:

cat > /etc/sysconfig/clock << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/sysconfig/clock

UTC=1

# Set this to any options you might need to give to hwclock, 
# such as machine hardware clock type for Alphas.
CLOCKPARAMS=

# End /etc/sysconfig/clock
EOF

A good hint explaining how to deal with time on LFS is available at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/time.txt. It explains issues such as time zones, UTC, and the TZ environment variable.

7.5. Configuring the Linux Console

This section discusses how to configure the console and consolelog bootscripts that set up the keyboard map, console font and console kernel log level. If non-ASCII characters (e.g., the copyright sign, the British pound sign and Euro symbol) will not be used and the keyboard is a U.S. one, much of this section can be skipped. Without the configuration file, the console bootscript will do nothing.

The console and consolelog scripts read the /etc/sysconfig/console file for configuration information. Decide which keymap and screen font will be used. Various language-specific HOWTOs can also help with this, see http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/HOWTO-INDEX/other-lang.html. If still in doubt, look in the /lib/kbd directory for valid keymaps and screen fonts. Read loadkeys(1) and setfont(8) manual pages to determine the correct arguments for these programs.

The /etc/sysconfig/console file should contain lines of the form: VARIABLE="value". The following variables are recognized:

LOGLEVEL

This variable specifies the log level for kernel messages sent to the console as set by dmesg. Valid levels are from "1" (no messages) to "8". The default level is "7".

KEYMAP

This variable specifies the arguments for the loadkeys program, typically, the name of keymap to load, e.g., “es”. If this variable is not set, the bootscript will not run the loadkeys program, and the default kernel keymap will be used.

KEYMAP_CORRECTIONS

This (rarely used) variable specifies the arguments for the second call to the loadkeys program. This is useful if the stock keymap is not completely satisfactory and a small adjustment has to be made. E.g., to include the Euro sign into a keymap that normally doesn't have it, set this variable to “euro2”.

FONT

This variable specifies the arguments for the setfont program. Typically, this includes the font name, “-m”, and the name of the application character map to load. E.g., in order to load the “lat1-16” font together with the “8859-1” application character map (as it is appropriate in the USA), set this variable to “lat1-16 -m 8859-1”. In UTF-8 mode, the kernel uses the application character map for conversion of composed 8-bit key codes in the keymap to UTF-8, and thus the argument of the "-m" parameter should be set to the encoding of the composed key codes in the keymap.

UNICODE

Set this variable to “1”, “yes” or “true” in order to put the console into UTF-8 mode. This is useful in UTF-8 based locales and harmful otherwise.

LEGACY_CHARSET

For many keyboard layouts, there is no stock Unicode keymap in the Kbd package. The console bootscript will convert an available keymap to UTF-8 on the fly if this variable is set to the encoding of the available non-UTF-8 keymap.

Some examples:

  • For a non-Unicode setup, only the KEYMAP and FONT variables are generally needed. E.g., for a Polish setup, one would use:

    cat > /etc/sysconfig/console << "EOF"
    # Begin /etc/sysconfig/console
    
    KEYMAP="pl2"
    FONT="lat2a-16 -m 8859-2"
    
    # End /etc/sysconfig/console
    EOF
  • As mentioned above, it is sometimes necessary to adjust a stock keymap slightly. The following example adds the Euro symbol to the German keymap:

    cat > /etc/sysconfig/console << "EOF"
    # Begin /etc/sysconfig/console
    
    KEYMAP="de-latin1"
    KEYMAP_CORRECTIONS="euro2"
    FONT="lat0-16 -m 8859-15"
    
    # End /etc/sysconfig/console
    EOF
  • The following is a Unicode-enabled example for Bulgarian, where a stock UTF-8 keymap exists:

    cat > /etc/sysconfig/console << "EOF"
    # Begin /etc/sysconfig/console
    
    UNICODE="1"
    KEYMAP="bg_bds-utf8"
    FONT="LatArCyrHeb-16"
    
    # End /etc/sysconfig/console
    EOF
  • Due to the use of a 512-glyph LatArCyrHeb-16 font in the previous example, bright colors are no longer available on the Linux console unless a framebuffer is used. If one wants to have bright colors without framebuffer and can live without characters not belonging to his language, it is still possible to use a language-specific 256-glyph font, as illustrated below:

    cat > /etc/sysconfig/console << "EOF"
    # Begin /etc/sysconfig/console
    
    UNICODE="1"
    KEYMAP="bg_bds-utf8"
    FONT="cyr-sun16"
    
    # End /etc/sysconfig/console
    EOF
  • The following example illustrates keymap autoconversion from ISO-8859-15 to UTF-8 and enabling dead keys in Unicode mode:

    cat > /etc/sysconfig/console << "EOF"
    # Begin /etc/sysconfig/console
    
    UNICODE="1"
    KEYMAP="de-latin1"
    KEYMAP_CORRECTIONS="euro2"
    LEGACY_CHARSET="iso-8859-15"
    FONT="LatArCyrHeb-16 -m 8859-15"
    
    # End /etc/sysconfig/console
    EOF
  • Some keymaps have dead keys (i.e., keys that don't produce a character by themselves, but put an accent on the character produced by the next key) or define composition rules (such as: “press Ctrl+. A E to get Æ” in the default keymap). Linux-2.6.37 interprets dead keys and composition rules in the keymap correctly only when the source characters to be composed together are not multibyte. This deficiency doesn't affect keymaps for European languages, because there accents are added to unaccented ASCII characters, or two ASCII characters are composed together. However, in UTF-8 mode it is a problem, e.g., for the Greek language, where one sometimes needs to put an accent on the letter “alpha”. The solution is either to avoid the use of UTF-8, or to install the X window system that doesn't have this limitation in its input handling.

  • For Chinese, Japanese, Korean and some other languages, the Linux console cannot be configured to display the needed characters. Users who need such languages should install the X Window System, fonts that cover the necessary character ranges, and the proper input method (e.g., SCIM, it supports a wide variety of languages).

Note

The /etc/sysconfig/console file only controls the Linux text console localization. It has nothing to do with setting the proper keyboard layout and terminal fonts in the X Window System, with ssh sessions or with a serial console. In such situations, limitations mentioned in the last two list items above do not apply.

7.6. Configuring the sysklogd Script

The sysklogd script invokes the syslogd program with the -m 0 option. This option turns off the periodic timestamp mark that syslogd writes to the log files every 20 minutes by default. If you want to turn on this periodic timestamp mark, edit the sysklogd script and make the changes accordingly. See man syslogd for more information.

7.7. Creating the /etc/inputrc File

The inputrc file handles keyboard mapping for specific situations. This file is the startup file used by Readline — the input-related library — used by Bash and most other shells.

Most people do not need user-specific keyboard mappings so the command below creates a global /etc/inputrc used by everyone who logs in. If you later decide you need to override the defaults on a per-user basis, you can create a .inputrc file in the user's home directory with the modified mappings.

For more information on how to edit the inputrc file, see info bash under the Readline Init File section. info readline is also a good source of information.

Below is a generic global inputrc along with comments to explain what the various options do. Note that comments cannot be on the same line as commands. Create the file using the following command:

cat > /etc/inputrc << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/inputrc
# Modified by Chris Lynn <roryo@roryo.dynup.net>

# Allow the command prompt to wrap to the next line
set horizontal-scroll-mode Off

# Enable 8bit input
set meta-flag On
set input-meta On

# Turns off 8th bit stripping
set convert-meta Off

# Keep the 8th bit for display
set output-meta On

# none, visible or audible
set bell-style none

# All of the following map the escape sequence of the value
# contained in the 1st argument to the readline specific functions
"\eOd": backward-word
"\eOc": forward-word

# for linux console
"\e[1~": beginning-of-line
"\e[4~": end-of-line
"\e[5~": beginning-of-history
"\e[6~": end-of-history
"\e[3~": delete-char
"\e[2~": quoted-insert

# for xterm
"\eOH": beginning-of-line
"\eOF": end-of-line

# for Konsole
"\e[H": beginning-of-line
"\e[F": end-of-line

# End /etc/inputrc
EOF

7.8. The Bash Shell Startup Files

The shell program /bin/bash (hereafter referred to as “the shell”) uses a collection of startup files to help create an environment to run in. Each file has a specific use and may affect login and interactive environments differently. The files in the /etc directory provide global settings. If an equivalent file exists in the home directory, it may override the global settings.

An interactive login shell is started after a successful login, using /bin/login, by reading the /etc/passwd file. An interactive non-login shell is started at the command-line (e.g., [prompt]$/bin/bash). A non-interactive shell is usually present when a shell script is running. It is non-interactive because it is processing a script and not waiting for user input between commands.

For more information, see info bash under the Bash Startup Files and Interactive Shells section.

The files /etc/profile and ~/.bash_profile are read when the shell is invoked as an interactive login shell.

The base /etc/profile below sets some environment variables necessary for native language support. Setting them properly results in:

  • The output of programs translated into the native language

  • Correct classification of characters into letters, digits and other classes. This is necessary for bash to properly accept non-ASCII characters in command lines in non-English locales

  • The correct alphabetical sorting order for the country

  • Appropriate default paper size

  • Correct formatting of monetary, time, and date values

Replace <ll> below with the two-letter code for the desired language (e.g., “en”) and <CC> with the two-letter code for the appropriate country (e.g., “GB”). <charmap> should be replaced with the canonical charmap for your chosen locale. Optional modifiers such as “@euro” may also be present.

The list of all locales supported by Glibc can be obtained by running the following command:

locale -a

Charmaps can have a number of aliases, e.g., “ISO-8859-1” is also referred to as “iso8859-1” and “iso88591”. Some applications cannot handle the various synonyms correctly (e.g., require that “UTF-8” is written as “UTF-8”, not “utf8”), so it is safest in most cases to choose the canonical name for a particular locale. To determine the canonical name, run the following command, where <locale name> is the output given by locale -a for your preferred locale (“en_GB.iso88591” in our example).

LC_ALL=<locale name> locale charmap

For the “en_GB.iso88591” locale, the above command will print:

ISO-8859-1

This results in a final locale setting of “en_GB.ISO-8859-1”. It is important that the locale found using the heuristic above is tested prior to it being added to the Bash startup files:

LC_ALL=<locale name> locale language
LC_ALL=<locale name> locale charmap
LC_ALL=<locale name> locale int_curr_symbol
LC_ALL=<locale name> locale int_prefix

The above commands should print the language name, the character encoding used by the locale, the local currency, and the prefix to dial before the telephone number in order to get into the country. If any of the commands above fail with a message similar to the one shown below, this means that your locale was either not installed in Chapter 6 or is not supported by the default installation of Glibc.

locale: Cannot set LC_* to default locale: No such file or directory

If this happens, you should either install the desired locale using the localedef command, or consider choosing a different locale. Further instructions assume that there are no such error messages from Glibc.

Some packages beyond LFS may also lack support for your chosen locale. One example is the X library (part of the X Window System), which outputs the following error message if the locale does not exactly match one of the character map names in its internal files:

Warning: locale not supported by Xlib, locale set to C

In several cases Xlib expects that the character map will be listed in uppercase notation with canonical dashes. For instance, "ISO-8859-1" rather than "iso88591". It is also possible to find an appropriate specification by removing the charmap part of the locale specification. This can be checked by running the locale charmap command in both locales. For example, one would have to change "de_DE.ISO-8859-15@euro" to "de_DE@euro" in order to get this locale recognized by Xlib.

Other packages can also function incorrectly (but may not necessarily display any error messages) if the locale name does not meet their expectations. In those cases, investigating how other Linux distributions support your locale might provide some useful information.

Once the proper locale settings have been determined, create the /etc/profile file:

cat > /etc/profile << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/profile

export LANG=<ll>_<CC>.<charmap><@modifiers>

# End /etc/profile
EOF

The “C” (default) and “en_US” (the recommended one for United States English users) locales are different. “C” uses the US-ASCII 7-bit character set, and treats bytes with the high bit set as invalid characters. That's why, e.g., the ls command substitutes them with question marks in that locale. Also, an attempt to send mail with such characters from Mutt or Pine results in non-RFC-conforming messages being sent (the charset in the outgoing mail is indicated as “unknown 8-bit”). So you can use the “C” locale only if you are sure that you will never need 8-bit characters.

UTF-8 based locales are not supported well by many programs. Work is in progress to document and, if possible, fix such problems, see http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/introduction/locale-issues.html.

7.9. Device and Module Handling on an LFS System

In Chapter 6, we installed the Udev package. Before we go into the details regarding how this works, a brief history of previous methods of handling devices is in order.

Linux systems in general traditionally use a static device creation method, whereby a great many device nodes are created under /dev (sometimes literally thousands of nodes), regardless of whether the corresponding hardware devices actually exist. This is typically done via a MAKEDEV script, which contains a number of calls to the mknod program with the relevant major and minor device numbers for every possible device that might exist in the world.

Using the Udev method, only those devices which are detected by the kernel get device nodes created for them. Because these device nodes will be created each time the system boots, they will be stored on a tmpfs file system (a virtual file system that resides entirely in system memory). Device nodes do not require much space, so the memory that is used is negligible.

7.9.1. History

In February 2000, a new filesystem called devfs was merged into the 2.3.46 kernel and was made available during the 2.4 series of stable kernels. Although it was present in the kernel source itself, this method of creating devices dynamically never received overwhelming support from the core kernel developers.

The main problem with the approach adopted by devfs was the way it handled device detection, creation, and naming. The latter issue, that of device node naming, was perhaps the most critical. It is generally accepted that if device names are allowed to be configurable, then the device naming policy should be up to a system administrator, not imposed on them by any particular developer(s). The devfs file system also suffers from race conditions that are inherent in its design and cannot be fixed without a substantial revision to the kernel. It was marked as deprecated for a long period – due to a lack of maintenance – and was finally removed from the kernel in June, 2006.

With the development of the unstable 2.5 kernel tree, later released as the 2.6 series of stable kernels, a new virtual filesystem called sysfs came to be. The job of sysfs is to export a view of the system's hardware configuration to userspace processes. With this userspace-visible representation, the possibility of seeing a userspace replacement for devfs became much more realistic.

7.9.2. Udev Implementation

7.9.2.1. Sysfs

The sysfs filesystem was mentioned briefly above. One may wonder how sysfs knows about the devices present on a system and what device numbers should be used for them. Drivers that have been compiled into the kernel directly register their objects with sysfs as they are detected by the kernel. For drivers compiled as modules, this registration will happen when the module is loaded. Once the sysfs filesystem is mounted (on /sys), data which the built-in drivers registered with sysfs are available to userspace processes and to udevd for device node creation.

7.9.2.2. Udev Bootscript

The S10udev initscript takes care of creating device nodes when Linux is booted. The script unsets the uevent handler from the default of /sbin/hotplug. This is done because the kernel no longer needs to call out to an external binary. Instead udevd will listen on a netlink socket for uevents that the kernel raises. Next, the bootscript copies any static device nodes that exist in /lib/udev/devices to /dev. This is necessary because some devices, directories, and symlinks are needed before the dynamic device handling processes are available during the early stages of booting a system, or are required by udevd itself. Creating static device nodes in /lib/udev/devices also provides an easy workaround for devices that are not supported by the dynamic device handling infrastructure. The bootscript then starts the Udev daemon, udevd, which will act on any uevents it receives. Finally, the bootscript forces the kernel to replay uevents for any devices that have already been registered and then waits for udevd to handle them.

7.9.2.3. Device Node Creation

To obtain the right major and minor number for a device, Udev relies on the information provided by sysfs in /sys. For example, /sys/class/tty/vcs/dev contains the string “7:0”. This string is used by udevd to create a device node with major number 7 and minor 0. The names and permissions of the nodes created under the /dev directory are determined by rules specified in the files within the /etc/udev/rules.d/ directory. These are numbered in a similar fashion to the LFS-Bootscripts package. If udevd can't find a rule for the device it is creating, it will default permissions to 660 and ownership to root:root. Documentation on the syntax of the Udev rules configuration files are available in /usr/share/doc/udev-166/writing_udev_rules/index.html

7.9.2.4. Module Loading

Device drivers compiled as modules may have aliases built into them. Aliases are visible in the output of the modinfo program and are usually related to the bus-specific identifiers of devices supported by a module. For example, the snd-fm801 driver supports PCI devices with vendor ID 0x1319 and device ID 0x0801, and has an alias of “pci:v00001319d00000801sv*sd*bc04sc01i*”. For most devices, the bus driver exports the alias of the driver that would handle the device via sysfs. E.g., the /sys/bus/pci/devices/0000:00:0d.0/modalias file might contain the string “pci:v00001319d00000801sv00001319sd00001319bc04sc01i00”. The default rules provided with Udev will cause udevd to call out to /sbin/modprobe with the contents of the MODALIAS uevent environment variable (which should be the same as the contents of the modalias file in sysfs), thus loading all modules whose aliases match this string after wildcard expansion.

In this example, this means that, in addition to snd-fm801, the obsolete (and unwanted) forte driver will be loaded if it is available. See below for ways in which the loading of unwanted drivers can be prevented.

The kernel itself is also able to load modules for network protocols, filesystems and NLS support on demand.

7.9.2.5. Handling Hotpluggable/Dynamic Devices

When you plug in a device, such as a Universal Serial Bus (USB) MP3 player, the kernel recognizes that the device is now connected and generates a uevent. This uevent is then handled by udevd as described above.

7.9.3. Problems with Loading Modules and Creating Devices

There are a few possible problems when it comes to automatically creating device nodes.

7.9.3.1. A kernel module is not loaded automatically

Udev will only load a module if it has a bus-specific alias and the bus driver properly exports the necessary aliases to sysfs. In other cases, one should arrange module loading by other means. With Linux-2.6.37, Udev is known to load properly-written drivers for INPUT, IDE, PCI, USB, SCSI, SERIO and FireWire devices.

To determine if the device driver you require has the necessary support for Udev, run modinfo with the module name as the argument. Now try locating the device directory under /sys/bus and check whether there is a modalias file there.

If the modalias file exists in sysfs, the driver supports the device and can talk to it directly, but doesn't have the alias, it is a bug in the driver. Load the driver without the help from Udev and expect the issue to be fixed later.

If there is no modalias file in the relevant directory under /sys/bus, this means that the kernel developers have not yet added modalias support to this bus type. With Linux-2.6.37, this is the case with ISA busses. Expect this issue to be fixed in later kernel versions.

Udev is not intended to load “wrapper” drivers such as snd-pcm-oss and non-hardware drivers such as loop at all.

7.9.3.2. A kernel module is not loaded automatically, and Udev is not intended to load it

If the “wrapper” module only enhances the functionality provided by some other module (e.g., snd-pcm-oss enhances the functionality of snd-pcm by making the sound cards available to OSS applications), configure modprobe to load the wrapper after Udev loads the wrapped module. To do this, add an “install” line in any /etc/modprobe.d/<filename>.conf file. For example:

install snd-pcm /sbin/modprobe -i snd-pcm ; \
    /sbin/modprobe snd-pcm-oss ; true

If the module in question is not a wrapper and is useful by itself, configure the S05modules bootscript to load this module on system boot. To do this, add the module name to the /etc/sysconfig/modules file on a separate line. This works for wrapper modules too, but is suboptimal in that case.

7.9.3.3. Udev loads some unwanted module

Either don't build the module, or blacklist it in a /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf file as done with the forte module in the example below:

blacklist forte

Blacklisted modules can still be loaded manually with the explicit modprobe command.

7.9.3.4. Udev creates a device incorrectly, or makes a wrong symlink

This usually happens if a rule unexpectedly matches a device. For example, a poorly-writen rule can match both a SCSI disk (as desired) and the corresponding SCSI generic device (incorrectly) by vendor. Find the offending rule and make it more specific, with the help of the udevadm info command.

7.9.3.5. Udev rule works unreliably

This may be another manifestation of the previous problem. If not, and your rule uses sysfs attributes, it may be a kernel timing issue, to be fixed in later kernels. For now, you can work around it by creating a rule that waits for the used sysfs attribute and appending it to the /etc/udev/rules.d/10-wait_for_sysfs.rules file (create this file if it does not exist). Please notify the LFS Development list if you do so and it helps.

7.9.3.6. Udev does not create a device

Further text assumes that the driver is built statically into the kernel or already loaded as a module, and that you have already checked that Udev doesn't create a misnamed device.

Udev has no information needed to create a device node if a kernel driver does not export its data to sysfs. This is most common with third party drivers from outside the kernel tree. Create a static device node in /lib/udev/devices with the appropriate major/minor numbers (see the file devices.txt inside the kernel documentation or the documentation provided by the third party driver vendor). The static device node will be copied to /dev by the S10udev bootscript.

7.9.3.7. Device naming order changes randomly after rebooting

This is due to the fact that Udev, by design, handles uevents and loads modules in parallel, and thus in an unpredictable order. This will never be “fixed”. You should not rely upon the kernel device names being stable. Instead, create your own rules that make symlinks with stable names based on some stable attributes of the device, such as a serial number or the output of various *_id utilities installed by Udev. See Section 7.10, “Creating Custom Symlinks to Devices” and Section 7.13, “Configuring the network Script” for examples.

7.9.4. Useful Reading

Additional helpful documentation is available at the following sites:

7.10. Creating Custom Symlinks to Devices

7.10.1. CD-ROM symlinks

Some software that you may want to install later (e.g., various media players) expect the /dev/cdrom and /dev/dvd symlinks to exist, and to point to a CD-ROM or DVD-ROM device. Also, it may be convenient to put references to those symlinks into /etc/fstab. Udev comes with a script that will generate rules files to create these symlinks for you, depending on the capabilities of each device, but you need to decide which of two modes of operation you wish to have the script use.

First, the script can operate in “by-path” mode (used by default for USB and FireWire devices), where the rules it creates depend on the physical path to the CD or DVD device. Second, it can operate in “by-id” mode (default for IDE and SCSI devices), where the rules it creates depend on identification strings stored in the CD or DVD device itself. The path is determined by Udev's path_id script, and the identification strings are read from the hardware by its ata_id or scsi_id programs, depending on which type of device you have.

There are advantages to each approach; the correct approach to use will depend on what kinds of device changes may happen. If you expect the physical path to the device (that is, the ports and/or slots that it plugs into) to change, for example because you plan on moving the drive to a different IDE port or a different USB connector, then you should use the “by-id” mode. On the other hand, if you expect the device's identification to change, for example because it may die, and you would replace it with a different device with the same capabilities and which is plugged into the same connectors, then you should use the “by-path” mode.

If either type of change is possible with your drive, then choose a mode based on the type of change you expect to happen more often.

Important

External devices (for example, a USB-connected CD drive) should not use by-path persistence, because each time the device is plugged into a new external port, its physical path will change. All externally-connected devices will have this problem if you write Udev rules to recognize them by their physical path; the problem is not limited to CD and DVD drives.

If you wish to see the values that the Udev scripts will use, then for the appropriate CD-ROM device, find the corresponding directory under /sys (e.g., this can be /sys/block/hdd) and run a command similar to the following:

udevadm test /sys/block/hdd

Look at the lines containing the output of various *_id programs. The “by-id” mode will use the ID_SERIAL value if it exists and is not empty, otherwise it will use a combination of ID_MODEL and ID_REVISION. The “by-path” mode will use the ID_PATH value.

If the default mode is not suitable for your situation, then the following modification can be made to the /lib/udev/rules.d/75-cd-aliases-generator.rules file, as follows (where mode is one of “by-id” or “by-path”):

sed -i -e 's/"write_cd_rules"/"write_cd_rules mode"/' \
    /lib/udev/rules.d/75-cd-aliases-generator.rules

Note that it is not necessary to create the rules files or symlinks at this time, because you have bind-mounted the host's /dev directory into the LFS system, and we assume the symlinks exist on the host. The rules and symlinks will be created the first time you boot your LFS system.

However, if you have multiple CD-ROM devices, then the symlinks generated at that time may point to different devices than they point to on your host, because devices are not discovered in a predictable order. The assignments created when you first boot the LFS system will be stable, so this is only an issue if you need the symlinks on both systems to point to the same device. If you need that, then inspect (and possibly edit) the generated /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-cd.rules file after booting, to make sure the assigned symlinks match what you need.

7.10.2. Dealing with duplicate devices

As explained in Section 7.9, “Device and Module Handling on an LFS System”, the order in which devices with the same function appear in /dev is essentially random. E.g., if you have a USB web camera and a TV tuner, sometimes /dev/video0 refers to the camera and /dev/video1 refers to the tuner, and sometimes after a reboot the order changes to the opposite one. For all classes of hardware except sound cards and network cards, this is fixable by creating udev rules for custom persistent symlinks. The case of network cards is covered separately in Section 7.13, “Configuring the network Script”, and sound card configuration can be found in BLFS.

For each of your devices that is likely to have this problem (even if the problem doesn't exist in your current Linux distribution), find the corresponding directory under /sys/class or /sys/block. For video devices, this may be /sys/class/video4linux/videoX. Figure out the attributes that identify the device uniquely (usually, vendor and product IDs and/or serial numbers work):

udevadm info -a -p /sys/class/video4linux/video0

Then write rules that create the symlinks, e.g.:

cat > /etc/udev/rules.d/83-duplicate_devs.rules << "EOF"

# Persistent symlinks for webcam and tuner
KERNEL=="video*", ATTRS{idProduct}=="1910", ATTRS{idVendor}=="0d81", \
    SYMLINK+="webcam"
KERNEL=="video*", ATTRS{device}=="0x036f", ATTRS{vendor}=="0x109e", \
    SYMLINK+="tvtuner"

EOF

The result is that /dev/video0 and /dev/video1 devices still refer randomly to the tuner and the web camera (and thus should never be used directly), but there are symlinks /dev/tvtuner and /dev/webcam that always point to the correct device.

7.11. Configuring the localnet Script

Part of the job of the localnet script is setting the system's hostname. This needs to be configured in the /etc/sysconfig/network file.

Create the /etc/sysconfig/network file and enter a hostname by running:

echo "HOSTNAME=<lfs>" > /etc/sysconfig/network

<lfs> needs to be replaced with the name given to the computer. Do not enter the Fully Qualified Domain Name (FQDN) here. That information will be put in the /etc/hosts file in the next section.

7.12. Customizing the /etc/hosts File

If a network card is to be configured, decide on the IP address, fully-qualified domain name (FQDN), and possible aliases for use in the /etc/hosts file. The syntax is:

IP_address myhost.example.org aliases

Unless the computer is to be visible to the Internet (i.e., there is a registered domain and a valid block of assigned IP addresses—most users do not have this), make sure that the IP address is in the private network IP address range. Valid ranges are:

Private Network Address Range      Normal Prefix
10.0.0.1 - 10.255.255.254           8
172.x.0.1 - 172.x.255.254           16
192.168.y.1 - 192.168.y.254         24

x can be any number in the range 16-31. y can be any number in the range 0-255.

A valid private IP address could be 192.168.1.1. A valid FQDN for this IP could be lfs.example.org.

Even if not using a network card, a valid FQDN is still required. This is necessary for certain programs to operate correctly.

Create the /etc/hosts file by running:

cat > /etc/hosts << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/hosts (network card version)

127.0.0.1 localhost
<192.168.1.1> <HOSTNAME.example.org> [alias1] [alias2 ...]

# End /etc/hosts (network card version)
EOF

The <192.168.1.1> and <HOSTNAME.example.org> values need to be changed for specific users or requirements (if assigned an IP address by a network/system administrator and the machine will be connected to an existing network). The optional alias name(s) can be omitted.

If a network card is not going to be configured, create the /etc/hosts file by running:

cat > /etc/hosts << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/hosts (no network card version)

127.0.0.1 <HOSTNAME.example.org> <HOSTNAME> localhost

# End /etc/hosts (no network card version)
EOF

7.13. Configuring the network Script

This section only applies if a network card is to be configured.

If a network card will not be used, there is likely no need to create any configuration files relating to network cards. If that is the case, remove the network symlinks from all run-level directories (/etc/rc.d/rc*.d).

7.13.1. Creating stable names for network interfaces

With Udev and modular network drivers, the network interface numbering is not persistent across reboots by default, because the drivers are loaded in parallel and, thus, in random order. For example, on a computer having two network cards made by Intel and Realtek, the network card manufactured by Intel may become eth0 and the Realtek card becomes eth1. In some cases, after a reboot the cards get renumbered the other way around. To avoid this, Udev comes with a script and some rules to assign stable names to network cards based on their MAC address.

Pre-generate the rules to ensure the same names get assigned to the same devices at every boot, including the first:

for NIC in /sys/class/net/* ; do
    INTERFACE=${NIC##*/} udevadm test --action=add $NIC
done

Now, inspect the /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules file, to find out which name was assigned to which network device:

cat /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules

The file begins with a comment block followed by two lines for each NIC. The first line for each NIC is a commented description showing its hardware IDs (e.g. its PCI vendor and device IDs, if it's a PCI card), along with its driver in parentheses, if the driver can be found. Neither the hardware ID nor the driver is used to determine which name to give an interface; this information is only for reference. The second line is the Udev rule that matches this NIC and actually assigns it a name.

All Udev rules are made up of several keys, separated by commas and optional whitespace. This rule's keys and an explanation of each of them are as follows:

  • SUBSYSTEM=="net" - This tells Udev to ignore devices that are not network cards.

  • ACTION=="add" - This tells Udev to ignore this rule for a uevent that isn't an add ("remove" and "change" uevents also happen, but don't need to rename network interfaces).

  • DRIVERS=="?*" - This exists so that Udev will ignore VLAN or bridge sub-interfaces (because these sub-interfaces do not have drivers). These sub-interfaces are skipped because the name that would be assigned would collide with their parent devices.

  • ATTR{address} - The value of this key is the NIC's MAC address.

  • ATTR{type}=="1" - This ensures the rule only matches the primary interface in the case of certain wireless drivers, which create multiple virtual interfaces. The secondary interfaces are skipped for the same reason that VLAN and bridge sub-interfaces are skipped: there would be a name collision otherwise.

  • KERNEL=="eth*" - This key was added to the Udev rule generator to handle machines that have multiple network interfaces, all with the same MAC address (the PS3 is one such machine). If the independent interfaces have different basenames, this key will allow Udev to tell them apart. This is generally not necessary for most Linux From Scratch users, but does not hurt.

  • NAME - The value of this key is the name that Udev will assign to this interface.

The value of NAME is the important part. Make sure you know which name has been assigned to each of your network cards before proceeding, and be sure to use that NAME value when creating your configuration files below.

7.13.2. Creating Network Interface Configuration Files

Which interfaces are brought up and down by the network script depends on the files and directories in the /etc/sysconfig/network-devices hierarchy. This directory should contain a sub-directory for each interface to be configured, such as ifconfig.xyz, where “xyz” is a network interface name. Inside this directory would be files defining the attributes to this interface, such as its IP address(es), subnet masks, and so forth.

The following command creates a sample ipv4 file for the eth0 device:

cd /etc/sysconfig/network-devices
mkdir -v ifconfig.eth0
cat > ifconfig.eth0/ipv4 << "EOF"
ONBOOT=yes
SERVICE=ipv4-static
IP=192.168.1.1
GATEWAY=192.168.1.2
PREFIX=24
BROADCAST=192.168.1.255
EOF

The values of these variables must be changed in every file to match the proper setup. If the ONBOOT variable is set to “yes” the network script will bring up the Network Interface Card (NIC) during booting of the system. If set to anything but “yes” the NIC will be ignored by the network script and not be brought up.

The SERVICE variable defines the method used for obtaining the IP address. The LFS-Bootscripts package has a modular IP assignment format, and creating additional files in the /etc/sysconfig/network-devices/services directory allows other IP assignment methods. This is commonly used for Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP), which is addressed in the BLFS book.

The GATEWAY variable should contain the default gateway IP address, if one is present. If not, then comment out the variable entirely.

The PREFIX variable needs to contain the number of bits used in the subnet. Each octet in an IP address is 8 bits. If the subnet's netmask is 255.255.255.0, then it is using the first three octets (24 bits) to specify the network number. If the netmask is 255.255.255.240, it would be using the first 28 bits. Prefixes longer than 24 bits are commonly used by DSL and cable-based Internet Service Providers (ISPs). In this example (PREFIX=24), the netmask is 255.255.255.0. Adjust the PREFIX variable according to your specific subnet.

7.13.3. Creating the /etc/resolv.conf File

If the system is going to be connected to the Internet, it will need some means of Domain Name Service (DNS) name resolution to resolve Internet domain names to IP addresses, and vice versa. This is best achieved by placing the IP address of the DNS server, available from the ISP or network administrator, into /etc/resolv.conf. Create the file by running the following:

cat > /etc/resolv.conf << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/resolv.conf

domain <Your Domain Name>
nameserver <IP address of your primary nameserver>
nameserver <IP address of your secondary nameserver>

# End /etc/resolv.conf
EOF

Replace <IP address of the nameserver> with the IP address of the DNS most appropriate for the setup. There will often be more than one entry (requirements demand secondary servers for fallback capability). If you only need or want one DNS server, remove the second nameserver line from the file. The IP address may also be a router on the local network.

Chapter 8. Making the LFS System Bootable

8.1. Introduction

It is time to make the LFS system bootable. This chapter discusses creating an fstab file, building a kernel for the new LFS system, and installing the GRUB boot loader so that the LFS system can be selected for booting at startup.

8.2. Creating the /etc/fstab File

The /etc/fstab file is used by some programs to determine where file systems are to be mounted by default, in which order, and which must be checked (for integrity errors) prior to mounting. Create a new file systems table like this:

cat > /etc/fstab << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/fstab

# file system  mount-point  type   options         dump  fsck
#                                                        order

/dev/<xxx>     /            <fff>  defaults        1     1
/dev/<yyy>     swap         swap   pri=1           0     0
proc           /proc        proc   defaults        0     0
sysfs          /sys         sysfs  defaults        0     0
devpts         /dev/pts     devpts gid=4,mode=620  0     0
tmpfs          /dev/shm     tmpfs  defaults        0     0
# End /etc/fstab
EOF

Replace <xxx>, <yyy>, and <fff> with the values appropriate for the system, for example, hda2, hda5, and ext3. For details on the six fields in this file, see man 5 fstab.

The /dev/shm mount point for tmpfs is included to allow enabling POSIX-shared memory. The kernel must have the required support built into it for this to work (more about this is in the next section). Please note that very little software currently uses POSIX-shared memory. Therefore, consider the /dev/shm mount point optional. For more information, see Documentation/filesystems/tmpfs.txt in the kernel source tree.

Filesystems with MS-DOS or Windows origin (i.e.: vfat, ntfs, smbfs, cifs, iso9660, udf) need the “iocharset” mount option in order for non-ASCII characters in file names to be interpreted properly. The value of this option should be the same as the character set of your locale, adjusted in such a way that the kernel understands it. This works if the relevant character set definition (found under File systems -> Native Language Support) has been compiled into the kernel or built as a module. The “codepage” option is also needed for vfat and smbfs filesystems. It should be set to the codepage number used under MS-DOS in your country. E.g., in order to mount USB flash drives, a ru_RU.KOI8-R user would need the following in the options portion of its mount line in /etc/fstab:

noauto,user,quiet,showexec,iocharset=koi8r,codepage=866

The corresponding options fragment for ru_RU.UTF-8 users is:

noauto,user,quiet,showexec,iocharset=utf8,codepage=866

Note

In the latter case, the kernel emits the following message:

FAT: utf8 is not a recommended IO charset for FAT filesystems,
    filesystem will be case sensitive!

This negative recommendation should be ignored, since all other values of the “iocharset” option result in wrong display of filenames in UTF-8 locales.

It is also possible to specify default codepage and iocharset values for some filesystems during kernel configuration. The relevant parameters are named “Default NLS Option” (CONFIG_NLS_DEFAULT), “Default Remote NLS Option” (CONFIG_SMB_NLS_DEFAULT), “Default codepage for FAT” (CONFIG_FAT_DEFAULT_CODEPAGE), and “Default iocharset for FAT” (CONFIG_FAT_DEFAULT_IOCHARSET). There is no way to specify these settings for the ntfs filesystem at kernel compilation time.

It is possible to make the ext3 filesystem reliable across power failures for some hard disk types. To do this, add the barrier=1 mount option to the appropriate entry in /etc/fstab. To check if the disk drive supports this option, run hdparm on the applicable disk drive. For example, if:

hdparm -I /dev/sda | grep NCQ

returns non-empty output, the option is supported.

Note: Logical Volume Management (LVM) based partitions cannot use the barrier option.

8.3. Linux-2.6.37

The Linux package contains the Linux kernel.

Approximate build time: 1.0 - 5.0 SBU
Required disk space: 540 - 800 MB

8.3.1. Installation of the kernel

Building the kernel involves a few steps—configuration, compilation, and installation. Read the README file in the kernel source tree for alternative methods to the way this book configures the kernel.

Prepare for compilation by running the following command:

make mrproper

This ensures that the kernel tree is absolutely clean. The kernel team recommends that this command be issued prior to each kernel compilation. Do not rely on the source tree being clean after un-tarring.

Configure the kernel via a menu-driven interface. For general information on kernel configuration see http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/kernel-configuration.txt. BLFS has some information regarding particular kernel configuration requirements of packages outside of LFS at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/longindex.html#kernel-config-index:

make LANG=<host_LANG_value> LC_ALL= menuconfig

The meaning of the make parameters:

LANG=<host_LANG_value> LC_ALL=

This establishes the locale setting to the one used on the host. This is needed for a proper menuconfig ncurses interface line drawing on UTF-8 linux text console.

Be sure to replace <host_LANG_value> by the value of the $LANG variable from your host. If not set, you could use instead the host's value of $LC_ALL or $LC_CTYPE.

Alternatively, make oldconfig may be more appropriate in some situations. See the README file for more information.

If desired, skip kernel configuration by copying the kernel config file, .config, from the host system (assuming it is available) to the unpacked linux-2.6.37 directory. However, we do not recommend this option. It is often better to explore all the configuration menus and create the kernel configuration from scratch.

Compile the kernel image and modules:

make

If using kernel modules, module configuration in /etc/modprobe.d may be required. Information pertaining to modules and kernel configuration is located in Section 7.9, “Device and Module Handling on an LFS System” and in the kernel documentation in the linux-2.6.37/Documentation directory. Also, modprobe.conf(5) may be of interest.

Install the modules, if the kernel configuration uses them:

make modules_install

After kernel compilation is complete, additional steps are required to complete the installation. Some files need to be copied to the /boot directory.

The path to the kernel image may vary depending on the platform being used. The filename below can be changed to suit your taste, but the stem of the filename should be vmlinux to be compatible with the automatic setup of the boot process described in the next section. The following command assumes an x86 architecture:

cp -v arch/x86/boot/bzImage /boot/vmlinux-2.6.37-lfs-6.8

System.map is a symbol file for the kernel. It maps the function entry points of every function in the kernel API, as well as the addresses of the kernel data structures for the running kernel. It is used as a resource when investigating kernel problems. Issue the following command to install the map file:

cp -v System.map /boot/System.map-2.6.37

The kernel configuration file .config produced by the make menuconfig step above contains all the configuration selections for the kernel that was just compiled. It is a good idea to keep this file for future reference:

cp -v .config /boot/config-2.6.37

Install the documentation for the Linux kernel:

install -d /usr/share/doc/linux-2.6.37
cp -r Documentation/* /usr/share/doc/linux-2.6.37

It is important to note that the files in the kernel source directory are not owned by root. Whenever a package is unpacked as user root (like we did inside chroot), the files have the user and group IDs of whatever they were on the packager's computer. This is usually not a problem for any other package to be installed because the source tree is removed after the installation. However, the Linux source tree is often retained for a long time. Because of this, there is a chance that whatever user ID the packager used will be assigned to somebody on the machine. That person would then have write access to the kernel source.

If the kernel source tree is going to be retained, run chown -R 0:0 on the linux-2.6.37 directory to ensure all files are owned by user root.

Warning

Some kernel documentation recommends creating a symlink from /usr/src/linux pointing to the kernel source directory. This is specific to kernels prior to the 2.6 series and must not be created on an LFS system as it can cause problems for packages you may wish to build once your base LFS system is complete.

Warning

The headers in the system's include directory should always be the ones against which Glibc was compiled, that is, the sanitised headers from this Linux kernel tarball. Therefore, they should never be replaced by either the raw kernel headers or any other kernel sanitized headers.

8.3.2. Configuring Linux Module Load Order

The /etc/modprobe.d/usb.conf file needs to be created so that if the USB drivers (ehci_hcd, ohci_hcd and uhci_hcd) have been built as modules, they will be loaded in the correct order; ehci_hcd needs to be loaded prior to ohci_hcd and uhci_hcd in order to avoid a warning being output at boot time.

Create a new file /etc/modprobe.d/usb.conf by running the following:

install -v -m755 -d /etc/modprobe.d
cat > /etc/modprobe.d/usb.conf << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/modprobe.d/usb.conf

install ohci_hcd /sbin/modprobe ehci_hcd ; /sbin/modprobe -i ohci_hcd ; true
install uhci_hcd /sbin/modprobe ehci_hcd ; /sbin/modprobe -i uhci_hcd ; true

# End /etc/modprobe.d/usb.conf
EOF

8.3.3. Contents of Linux

Installed files: config-2.6.37, vmlinux-2.6.37-lfs-6.8-2.6.37, and System.map-2.6.37
Installed directories: /lib/modules, /usr/share/doc/linux-2.6.37

Short Descriptions

config-2.6.37

Contains all the configuration selections for the kernel

vmlinux-2.6.37-lfs-6.8

The engine of the Linux system. When turning on the computer, the kernel is the first part of the operating system that gets loaded. It detects and initializes all components of the computer's hardware, then makes these components available as a tree of files to the software and turns a single CPU into a multitasking machine capable of running scores of programs seemingly at the same time

System.map-2.6.37

A list of addresses and symbols; it maps the entry points and addresses of all the functions and data structures in the kernel

8.4. Using GRUB to Set Up the Boot Process

8.4.1. Introduction

Boot loading can be a complex area, so a few cautionary words are in order. Be familiar with the current boot loader and any other operating systems present on the hard drive(s) that need to be bootable. Make sure that an emergency boot disk is ready to “rescue” the computer if the computer becomes unusable (un-bootable).

The procedure involves writing some special GRUB files to specific locations on the hard drive. We highly recommend creating a GRUB boot floppy diskette as a backup. Insert a blank floppy diskette and run the following commands:

cd /tmp
grub-mkrescue --output=grub-img.iso
dd if=grub-img.iso of=/dev/fd0 bs=1440 count=1

Alternatively, a boot CD can be created by using your host system's CD burning tools to burn the grub-img.iso on to a blank CD.

GRUB uses its own naming structure for drives and partitions in the form of (hdn,m), where n is the hard drive number and m is the partition number. The hard drive number starts from zero, but the partition number starts from one for normal partitions and five for extended partitions. Note that this is different from earlier versions where both numbers started from zero. For example, partition sda1 is (hd0,1) to GRUB and sdb3 is (hd1,3). In contrast to Linux, GRUB does not consider CD-ROM drives to be hard drives. For example, if using a CD on hdb and a second hard drive on hdc, that second hard drive would still be (hd1).

You can determine what GRUB thinks your disk devices are by running:

grub-mkdevicemap --device-map=device.map
cat device.map

The location of the boot partition is a choice of the user that affects the configuration. One recommendation is to have a separate small (suggested size is 100 MB) partition just for boot information. That way each build, whether LFS or some commercial distro, can access the same boot files and access can be made from any booted system. If you choose to do this, you will need to mount the separate partition, move all files in the current /boot directory (e.g. the linux kernel you just built in the previous section) to the new partition. You will then need to unmount the partition and remount it as /boot. If you do this, be sure to update /etc/fstab.

Using the current lfs partition will also work, but configuration for multiple systems is more difficult.

8.4.2. Setting Up the Configuration

Using the above information, determine the appropriate designator for the root partition (or boot partition, if a separate one is used). For the following example, it is assumed that the root (or separate boot) partition is sda2.

Install the GRUB files into /boot/grub:

grub-install --grub-setup=/bin/true /dev/sda

We use --grub-setup=/bin/true for now to prevent updating the Master Boot Record (MBR). In this way, we can test our installation before committing to a change that is hard to revert.

Generate /boot/grub/grub.cfg:

grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

Here grub-mkconfig uses the files in /etc/grub.d/ to determine the contents of this file. The configuration file will look something like:

#
# DO NOT EDIT THIS FILE
#
# It is automatically generated by /usr/sbin/grub-mkconfig using templates
# from /etc/grub.d and settings from /etc/default/grub
#

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/00_header ###
set default=0
set timeout=5
### END /etc/grub.d/00_header ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/10_linux ###
menuentry "GNU/Linux, Linux 2.6.37-lfs-6.8" {
        insmod ext2
        set root=(hd0,2)
        search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 915852a7-859e-45a6-9ff0-d3ebfdb5cea2
        linux   /boot/vmlinux-2.6.37-lfs-6.8 root=/dev/sda2 ro
}
menuentry "GNU/Linux, Linux 2.6.37-lfs-6.8" (recovery mode)" {
        insmod ext2
        set root=(hd0,2)
        search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 915852a7-859e-45a6-9ff0-d3ebfdb5cea2
        linux   /boot/vmlinux-2.6.37-lfs-6.8 root=/dev/sda2 ro single
}
menuentry "GNU/Linux, Linux 2.6.28-11-server" {
        insmod ext2
        set root=(hd0,2)
        search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 6b4c0339-5501-4a85-8351-e398e5252be8
        linux   /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-11-server root=UUID=6b4c0339-5501-4a85-8351-e398e5252be8 ro
        initrd  /boot/initrd.img-2.6.28-11-server
}
menuentry "GNU/Linux, Linux 2.6.28-11-server (recovery mode)" {
        insmod ext2
        set root=(hd0,2)
        search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 6b4c0339-5501-4a85-8351-e398e5252be8
        linux   /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-11-server root=UUID=6b4c0339-5501-4a85-8351-e398e5252be8 ro single
        initrd  /boot/initrd.img-2.6.28-11-server
}
### END /etc/grub.d/10_linux ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/30_os-prober ###
### END /etc/grub.d/30_os-prober ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/40_custom ###
# This file provides an easy way to add custom menu entries.  Simply type the
# menu entries you want to add after this comment.  Be careful not to change
# the 'exec tail' line above.
### END /etc/grub.d/40_custom ###

Note

  • Even though there is a warning not to edit the file, you can do so as long as you do not re-run grub-mkconfig.

  • The search lines are generally not useful for LFS systems as that command only sets an internal GRUB variable used to find the kernel image. The set root command provides the same capability without the overhead of searching.

  • The set root and insmod ext2 commands can be moved out of the menuentry sections to apply to all sections of the file. This leads to a simple section like:

menuentry "Linux 2.6.37-lfs-6.8" {
linux   /boot/vmlinux-2.6.37-lfs-6.8 root=/dev/sda2 ro
}
  • Passing a UUID to the kernel requires an initial ram disk (initrd) not built by LFS.

  • If the /boot partition is installed on a separate partition, the linux and initrd lines should not have the string /boot prefixed to the file names.

  • In this example the kernel files for a Ubuntu installation are also found in /boot.

8.4.3. Testing the Configuration

The core image of GRUB is also a Multiboot kernel, so if you already have GRUB Legacy loaded you can load GRUB-1.98 through your old boot loader. To accomplish this, you will need to exit the chroot environment now and re-enter it in the next section to finish the few remaining portions of the book.

/sbin/reboot
...
grub> root (hd0,1)
grub> kernel /boot/grub/core.img
grub> boot

Note that the GRUB commands above are assumed to be GRUB Legacy. At this point the GRUB prompt will appear (very similar to GRUB Legacy) and you can explore the interface or boot to one of the systems in the grub.cfg file.

8.4.4. Updating the Master Boot Record

If you tested the GRUB configuration as specified above, re-enter the chroot environment.

Warning

The following command will overwrite the current boot loader. Do not run the command if this is not desired, for example, if using a third party boot manager to manage the Master Boot Record (MBR).

Update the MBR with:

grub-setup '<DEVICE>'

Change the DEVICE above to your boot disk, normally '(hd0)' or /dev/sda. If using (hd0) be sure to escape the parentheses with backslashes or single quotes to prevent the shell from interpreting them as a sub-shell.

This program uses the following defaults and are correct if you did not deviate from the instructions above:

  • boot image - boot.img

  • core image - core.img

  • directory - /boot/grub

  • device map - device.map

  • default root setting - guessed

Note

The root setting is the default value if a 'set root' instruction is not found in grub.cfg. This is the partition that is searched for the kernel and other supporting files. It is different from the 'root=' parameter on the 'linux' line in the configuration line. The latter is the partition the kernel mounts as '/'. In the example grub.cfg above, both values point to /dev/sda2, but if there is a separate boot partition, they will be different.

Chapter 9. The End

9.1. The End

Well done! The new LFS system is installed! We wish you much success with your shiny new custom-built Linux system.

It may be a good idea to create an /etc/lfs-release file. By having this file, it is very easy for you (and for us if you need to ask for help at some point) to find out which LFS version is installed on the system. Create this file by running:

echo 6.8 > /etc/lfs-release

9.2. Get Counted

Now that you have finished the book, do you want to be counted as an LFS user? Head over to http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/cgi-bin/lfscounter.cgi and register as an LFS user by entering your name and the first LFS version you have used.

Let's reboot into LFS now.

9.3. Rebooting the System

Now that all of the software has been installed, it is time to reboot your computer. However, you should be aware of a few things. The system you have created in this book is quite minimal, and most likely will not have the functionality you would need to be able to continue forward. By installing a few extra packages from the BLFS book while still in our current chroot environment, you can leave yourself in a much better position to continue on once you reboot into your new LFS installation. Installing a text mode web browser, such as Lynx, you can easily view the BLFS book in one virtual terminal, while building packages in another. The GPM package will also allow you to perform copy/paste actions in your virtual terminals. Lastly, if you are in a situation where static IP configuration does not meet your networking requirements, installing packages such as Dhcpcd or PPP at this point might also be useful.

Now that we have said that, lets move on to booting our shiny new LFS installation for the first time! First exit from the chroot environment:

logout

Then unmount the virtual file systems:

umount -v $LFS/dev/pts
umount -v $LFS/dev/shm
umount -v $LFS/dev
umount -v $LFS/proc
umount -v $LFS/sys

Unmount the LFS file system itself:

umount -v $LFS

If multiple partitions were created, unmount the other partitions before unmounting the main one, like this:

umount -v $LFS/usr
umount -v $LFS/home
umount -v $LFS

Now, reboot the system with:

shutdown -r now

Assuming the GRUB boot loader was set up as outlined earlier, the menu is set to boot LFS 6.8 automatically.

When the reboot is complete, the LFS system is ready for use and more software may be added to suit your needs.

9.4. What Now?

Thank you for reading this LFS book. We hope that you have found this book helpful and have learned more about the system creation process.

Now that the LFS system is installed, you may be wondering “What next?” To answer that question, we have compiled a list of resources for you.

  • Maintenance

    Bugs and security notices are reported regularly for all software. Since an LFS system is compiled from source, it is up to you to keep abreast of such reports. There are several online resources that track such reports, some of which are shown below:

    • Freshmeat.net (http://freshmeat.net/)

      Freshmeat can notify you (via email) of new versions of packages installed on your system.

    • CERT (Computer Emergency Response Team)

      CERT has a mailing list that publishes security alerts concerning various operating systems and applications. Subscription information is available at http://www.us-cert.gov/cas/signup.html.

    • Bugtraq

      Bugtraq is a full-disclosure computer security mailing list. It publishes newly discovered security issues, and occasionally potential fixes for them. Subscription information is available at http://www.securityfocus.com/archive.

  • Beyond Linux From Scratch

    The Beyond Linux From Scratch book covers installation procedures for a wide range of software beyond the scope of the LFS Book. The BLFS project is located at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/.

  • LFS Hints

    The LFS Hints are a collection of educational documents submitted by volunteers in the LFS community. The hints are available at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/list.html.

  • Mailing lists

    There are several LFS mailing lists you may subscribe to if you are in need of help, want to stay current with the latest developments, want to contribute to the project, and more. See Chapter 1 - Mailing Lists for more information.

  • The Linux Documentation Project

    The goal of The Linux Documentation Project (TLDP) is to collaborate on all of the issues of Linux documentation. The TLDP features a large collection of HOWTOs, guides, and man pages. It is located at http://www.tldp.org/.

Part IV. Appendices

Appendix A. Acronyms and Terms

ABI

Application Binary Interface

ALFS

Automated Linux From Scratch

ALSA

Advanced Linux Sound Architecture

API

Application Programming Interface

ASCII

American Standard Code for Information Interchange

BIOS

Basic Input/Output System

BLFS

Beyond Linux From Scratch

BSD

Berkeley Software Distribution

chroot

change root

CMOS

Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor

COS

Class Of Service

CPU

Central Processing Unit

CRC

Cyclic Redundancy Check

CVS

Concurrent Versions System

DHCP

Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol

DNS

Domain Name Service

EGA

Enhanced Graphics Adapter

ELF

Executable and Linkable Format

EOF

End of File

EQN

equation

EVMS

Enterprise Volume Management System

ext2

second extended file system

ext3

third extended file system

ext4

fourth extended file system

FAQ

Frequently Asked Questions

FHS

Filesystem Hierarchy Standard

FIFO

First-In, First Out

FQDN

Fully Qualified Domain Name

FTP

File Transfer Protocol

GB

Gigabytes

GCC

GNU Compiler Collection

GID

Group Identifier

GMT

Greenwich Mean Time

GPG

GNU Privacy Guard

HTML

Hypertext Markup Language

IDE

Integrated Drive Electronics

IEEE

Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers

IO

Input/Output

IP

Internet Protocol

IPC

Inter-Process Communication

IRC

Internet Relay Chat

ISO

International Organization for Standardization

ISP

Internet Service Provider

KB

Kilobytes

LED

Light Emitting Diode

LFS

Linux From Scratch

LSB

Linux Standard Base

MB

Megabytes

MBR

Master Boot Record

MD5

Message Digest 5

NIC

Network Interface Card

NLS

Native Language Support

NNTP

Network News Transport Protocol

NPTL

Native POSIX Threading Library

OSS

Open Sound System

PCH

Pre-Compiled Headers

PCRE

Perl Compatible Regular Expression

PID

Process Identifier

PLFS

Pure Linux From Scratch

PTY

pseudo terminal

QA

Quality Assurance

QOS

Quality Of Service

RAM

Random Access Memory

RPC

Remote Procedure Call

RTC

Real Time Clock

SBU

Standard Build Unit

SCO

The Santa Cruz Operation

SGR

Select Graphic Rendition

SHA1

Secure-Hash Algorithm 1

SMP

Symmetric Multi-Processor

TLDP

The Linux Documentation Project

TFTP

Trivial File Transfer Protocol

TLS

Thread-Local Storage

UID

User Identifier

umask

user file-creation mask

USB

Universal Serial Bus

UTC

Coordinated Universal Time

UUID

Universally Unique Identifier

VC

Virtual Console

VGA

Video Graphics Array

VT

Virtual Terminal

Appendix B. Acknowledgments

We would like to thank the following people and organizations for their contributions to the Linux From Scratch Project.

  • Gerard Beekmans <gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS Creator, LFS Project Leader

  • Matthew Burgess <matthew AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS Project Leader, LFS Technical Writer/Editor

  • Bruce Dubbs <bdubbs AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS Release Manager, LFS Technical Writer/Editor

  • Jim Gifford <jim AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – CLFS Project Co-Leader

  • Bryan Kadzban <bryan AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS Technical Writer

  • Randy McMurchy <randy AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – BLFS Project Leader, LFS Editor

  • DJ Lucas <dj AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS and BLFS Editor

  • Ken Moffat <ken AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS and CLFS Editor

  • Ryan Oliver <ryan AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – CLFS Project Co-Leader

  • Countless other people on the various LFS and BLFS mailing lists who helped make this book possible by giving their suggestions, testing the book, and submitting bug reports, instructions, and their experiences with installing various packages.

Translators

  • Manuel Canales Esparcia <macana AT macana-es D0T com> – Spanish LFS translation project

  • Johan Lenglet <johan AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – French LFS translation project

  • Anderson Lizardo <lizardo AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – Portuguese LFS translation project

  • Thomas Reitelbach <tr AT erdfunkstelle D0T de> – German LFS translation project

Mirror Maintainers

North American Mirrors

  • Scott Kveton <scott AT osuosl D0T org> – lfs.oregonstate.edu mirror

  • William Astle <lost AT l-w D0T net> – ca.linuxfromscratch.org mirror

  • Eujon Sellers <jpolen@rackspace.com> – lfs.introspeed.com mirror

  • Justin Knierim <tim@idge.net> – lfs-matrix.net mirror

South American Mirrors

European Mirrors

  • Guido Passet <guido AT primerelay D0T net> – nl.linuxfromscratch.org mirror

  • Bastiaan Jacques <baafie AT planet D0T nl> – lfs.pagefault.net mirror

  • Sven Cranshoff <sven D0T cranshoff AT lineo D0T be> – lfs.lineo.be mirror

  • Scarlet Belgium – lfs.scarlet.be mirror

  • Sebastian Faulborn <info AT aliensoft D0T org> – lfs.aliensoft.org mirror

  • Stuart Fox <stuart AT dontuse D0T ms> – lfs.dontuse.ms mirror

  • Ralf Uhlemann <admin AT realhost D0T de> – lfs.oss-mirror.org mirror

  • Antonin Sprinzl <Antonin D0T Sprinzl AT tuwien D0T ac D0T at> – at.linuxfromscratch.org mirror

  • Fredrik Danerklint <fredan-lfs AT fredan D0T org> – se.linuxfromscratch.org mirror

  • Franck <franck AT linuxpourtous D0T com> – lfs.linuxpourtous.com mirror

  • Philippe Baqué <baque AT cict D0T fr> – lfs.cict.fr mirror

  • Vitaly Chekasin <gyouja AT pilgrims D0T ru> – lfs.pilgrims.ru mirror

  • Benjamin Heil <kontakt AT wankoo D0T org> – lfs.wankoo.org mirror

Asian Mirrors

  • Satit Phermsawang <satit AT wbac D0T ac D0T th> – lfs.phayoune.org mirror

  • Shizunet Co.,Ltd. <info AT shizu-net D0T jp> – lfs.mirror.shizu-net.jp mirror

  • Init World <http://www.initworld.com/> – lfs.initworld.com mirror

Australian Mirrors

  • Jason Andrade <jason AT dstc D0T edu D0T au> – au.linuxfromscratch.org mirror

Former Project Team Members

  • Christine Barczak <theladyskye AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS Book Editor

  • Archaic <archaic@linuxfromscratch.org> – LFS Technical Writer/Editor, HLFS Project Leader, BLFS Editor, Hints and Patches Project Maintainer

  • Nathan Coulson <nathan AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS-Bootscripts Maintainer

  • Timothy Bauscher

  • Robert Briggs

  • Ian Chilton

  • Jeroen Coumans <jeroen AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – Website Developer, FAQ Maintainer

  • Manuel Canales Esparcia <manuel AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS/BLFS/HLFS XML and XSL Maintainer

  • Alex Groenewoud – LFS Technical Writer

  • Marc Heerdink

  • Jeremy Huntwork <jhuntwork AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS Technical Writer, LFS LiveCD Maintainer

  • Mark Hymers

  • Seth W. Klein – FAQ maintainer

  • Nicholas Leippe <nicholas AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – Wiki Maintainer

  • Anderson Lizardo <lizardo AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – Website Backend-Scripts Maintainer

  • Dan Nicholson <dnicholson AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS and BLFS Editor

  • Alexander E. Patrakov <alexander AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS Technical Writer, LFS Internationalization Editor, LFS Live CD Maintainer

  • Simon Perreault

  • Scot Mc Pherson <scot AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS NNTP Gateway Maintainer

  • Greg Schafer <gschafer AT zip D0T com D0T au> – LFS Technical Writer and Architect of the Next Generation 64-bit-enabling Build Method

  • Jesse Tie-Ten-Quee – LFS Technical Writer

  • James Robertson <jwrober AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – Bugzilla Maintainer

  • Tushar Teredesai <tushar AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – BLFS Book Editor, Hints and Patches Project Leader

  • Jeremy Utley <jeremy AT linuxfromscratch D0T org> – LFS Technical Writer, Bugzilla Maintainer, LFS-Bootscripts Maintainer

  • Zack Winkles <zwinkles AT gmail D0T com> – LFS Technical Writer

Appendix C. Dependencies

Every package built in LFS relies on one or more other packages in order to build and install properly. Some packages even participate in circular dependencies, that is, the first package depends on the second which in turn depends on the first. Because of these dependencies, the order in which packages are built in LFS is very important. The purpose of this page is to document the dependencies of each package built in LFS.

For each package we build, we have listed three, and sometimes four, types of dependencies. The first lists what other packages need to be available in order to compile and install the package in question. The second lists what packages, in addition to those on the first list, need to be available in order to run the test suites. The third list of dependencies are packages that require this package to be built and installed in its final location before they are built and installed. In most cases, this is because these packages will hardcode paths to binaries within their scripts. If not built in a certain order, this could result in paths of /tools/bin/[binary] being placed inside scripts installed to the final system. This is obviously not desirable.

The last list of dependencies are optional packages that are not addressed in LFS, but could be useful to the user. These packages may have additional mandatory or optional dependencies of their own. For these dependencies, the recommeded practice is to install them after completion of the LFS book and then go back an rebuild the LFS package. In several cases, reinstallation is addressed in BLFS.

Autoconf

Installation depends on: Bash, Coreutils, Grep, M4, Make, Perl, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: Automake, Diffutils, Findutils, GCC, and Libtool
Must be installed before: Automake
Optional dependencies: Emacs

Automake

Installation depends on: Autoconf, Bash, Coreutils, Gettext, Grep, M4, Make, Perl, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: Binutils, Bison, Bzip2, DejaGNU, Diffutils, Expect, Findutils, Flex, GCC, Gettext, Gzip, Libtool, and Tar.
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Bash

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Bison, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, Patch, Readline, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: None
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: Xorg

Binutils

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, File, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Perl, Sed, Texinfo and Zlib
Test suite depends on: DejaGNU and Expect
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Bison

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, M4, Make, and Sed
Test suite depends on: Diffutils and Findutils
Must be installed before: Flex, Kbd, and Tar
Optional dependencies: Doxygen (test suite)

Bzip2

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Make, and Patch
Test suite depends on: None
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Coreutils

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, GMP, Grep, Make, Patch, Perl, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: Diffutils, E2fsprogs, Findutils, and Util-linux
Must be installed before: Bash, Diffutils, Findutils, Man-DB, and Udev
Optional dependencies: Perl Expect and IO:Tty modules (for test suite)

DejaGNU

Installation depends on: Bash, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Grep, Make, and Sed
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Diffutils

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Gawk, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: Diffutils, Perl
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Expect

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Patch, Sed, and Tcl
Test suite depends on: None
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

E2fsprogs

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Gzip, Make, Pkg-config, Sed, Texinfo, and Util-linux
Test suite depends on: None
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

File

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed, and Zlib
Test suite depends on: None
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Findutils

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: DejaGNU, Diffutils, and Expect
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Flex

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, M4, Make, Patch, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: Bison and Gawk
Must be installed before: IPRoute2, Kbd, and Man-DB
Optional dependencies: None

Gawk

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Patch, Sed and, Texinfo
Test suite depends on: Diffutils
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Gcc

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Findutils, Gawk, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, GMP, Grep, M4, Make, MPC, MPFR, Patch, Perl, Sed, Tar, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: DejaGNU and Expect
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: CLooG-PPL, GNAT and PPL

GDBM

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Grep, Make, and Sed
Test suite depends on: None
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Gettext

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: Diffutils, Perl, and Tcl
Must be installed before: Automake
Optional dependencies: None

Glibc

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Gettext, Grep, Gzip, Linux API Headers, Make, Perl, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: File
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

GMP

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, M4, Make, Sed and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: None
Must be installed before: MPFR, GCC
Optional dependencies: None

Grep

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Patch, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: Gawk
Must be installed before: Man-DB
Optional dependencies: Pcre, Xorg, and CUPS

Groff

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Bison, Coreutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Patch, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: Man-DB and Perl
Optional dependencies: GPL Ghostscript

GRUB

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Bison, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: None
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Gzip

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: Diffutils
Must be installed before: Man-DB
Optional dependencies: None

Iana-Etc

Installation depends on: Coreutils, Gawk, and Make
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: Perl
Optional dependencies: None

Inetutils

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, Patch, Sed, Texinfo, and Zlib
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: Tar
Optional dependencies: None

IProute2

Installation depends on: Bash, Bison, Coreutils, Flex, GCC, Glibc, Make, and Linux API Headers
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Kbd

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Bison, Coreutils, Flex, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Gzip, Make, Patch, and Sed
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Less

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, and Sed
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: Pcre

Libtool

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: Findutils
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Linux Kernel

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Findutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Gzip, Make, Module-Init-Tools, Ncurses, Perl, and Sed
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

M4

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: Diffutils
Must be installed before: Autoconf and Bison
Optional dependencies: libsigsegv

Make

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: Perl and Procps
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Man-DB

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Bzip2, Coreutils, Flex, GCC, GDBM, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Groff, Gzip, Less, Make, Sed, and Xz
Test suite depends on: Not run. Requires Man-DB test suite package
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Man-Pages

Installation depends on: Bash, Coreutils, and Make
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Module-Init-Tools

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Findutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Patch, Sed, and Zlib
Test suite depends on: Diffutils, File, Gawk, and Gzip
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

MPC

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, GMP, Make, MPFR, Sed and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: None
Must be installed before: GCC
Optional dependencies: None

MPFR

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, GMP, Make, Sed and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: None
Must be installed before: GCC
Optional dependencies: None

Ncurses

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Patch, and Sed
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: Bash, GRUB, Inetutils, Less, Procps, Psmisc, Readline, Texinfo, Util-linux, and Vim
Optional dependencies: None

Patch

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, and Sed
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: Ed

Perl

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Gawk, GCC, GDBM, Glibc, Grep, Groff, Make, Sed, and Zlib
Test suite depends on: Iana-Etc and Procps
Must be installed before: Autoconf
Optional dependencies: None

Pkg-config

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, and Sed
Test suite depends on: None
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Procps

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Glibc, Make, and Ncurses
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Psmisc

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, and Sed
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Readline

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, Patch, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: Bash
Optional dependencies: None

Sed

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: Diffutils and Gawk
Must be installed before: E2fsprogs, File, Libtool, and Shadow
Optional dependencies: Cracklib

Shadow

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Findutils, Gawk, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, and Sed
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Sysklogd

Installation depends on: Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Glibc, Make, and Patch
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Sysvinit

Installation depends on: Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Glibc, Make, and Sed
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Tar

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Bison, Coreutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Inetutils, Make, Sed, and Texinfo
Test suite depends on: Autoconf, Diffutils, Findutils, Gawk, and Gzip
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Tcl

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, and Sed
Test suite depends on: None
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Texinfo

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, Patch, and Sed
Test suite depends on: None
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Udev

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, and Sed
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Util-linux

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Findutils, Gawk, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, Sed, and Zlib
Test suite depends on: No test suite available
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: None

Vim

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, and Sed
Test suite depends on: None
Must be installed before: None
Optional dependencies: Xorg, GTK+2, LessTif, Python, Tcl, Ruby, and GPM

Xz

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, and Make.
Test suite depends on: None
Must be installed before: Man-DB
Optional dependencies: None

Zlib

Installation depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Glibc, Make, and Sed
Test suite depends on: None
Must be installed before: File, Module-Init-Tools, Perl, and Util-linux
Optional dependencies: None

Appendix D. Boot and sysconfig scripts version-20100627

The scripts in this appendix are listed by the directory where they normally reside. The order is /etc/rc.d/init.d, /etc/sysconfig, /etc/sysconfig/network-devices, and /etc/sysconfig/network-devices/services. Within each section, the files are listed in the order they are normally called.

D.1. /etc/rc.d/init.d/rc

The rc script is the first script called by init and initiates the boot process.

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/rc
#
# Description : Main Run Level Control Script
#
# Authors     : Gerard Beekmans  - gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}

# This sets a few default terminal options.
stty sane

# These 3 signals will not cause our script to exit
trap "" INT QUIT TSTP

[ "${1}" != "" ] && runlevel=${1}

if [ "${runlevel}" = "" ]; then
    echo "Usage: ${0} <runlevel>" >&2
    exit 1
fi

previous=${PREVLEVEL}
[ "${previous}" = "" ] && previous=N

if [ ! -d ${rc_base}/rc${runlevel}.d ]; then
    boot_mesg "${rc_base}/rc${runlevel}.d does not exist." ${WARNING}
    boot_mesg_flush
    exit 1
fi

# Attempt to stop all service started by previous runlevel,
# and killed in this runlevel
if [ "${previous}" != "N" ]; then
    for i in $(ls -v ${rc_base}/rc${runlevel}.d/K* 2> /dev/null)
    do
        check_script_status

        suffix=${i#$rc_base/rc$runlevel.d/K[0-9][0-9]}
        prev_start=$rc_base/rc$previous.d/S[0-9][0-9]$suffix
        sysinit_start=$rc_base/rcsysinit.d/S[0-9][0-9]$suffix

        if [ "${runlevel}" != "0" ] && [ "${runlevel}" != "6" ]; then
            if [ ! -f ${prev_start} ] && [ ! -f ${sysinit_start} ]; then
                boot_mesg -n "WARNING:\n\n${i} can't be" ${WARNING}
                boot_mesg -n " executed because it was not"
                boot_mesg -n " not started in the previous"
                boot_mesg -n " runlevel (${previous})."
                boot_mesg "" ${NORMAL}
                boot_mesg_flush
                continue
            fi
        fi
        ${i} stop
        error_value=${?}

        if [ "${error_value}" != "0" ]; then
            print_error_msg
        fi
    done
fi

#Start all functions in this runlevel
for i in $( ls -v ${rc_base}/rc${runlevel}.d/S* 2> /dev/null)
do
    if [ "${previous}" != "N" ]; then
        suffix=${i#$rc_base/rc$runlevel.d/S[0-9][0-9]}
        stop=$rc_base/rc$runlevel.d/K[0-9][0-9]$suffix
        prev_start=$rc_base/rc$previous.d/S[0-9][0-9]$suffix

        [ -f ${prev_start} ] && [ ! -f ${stop} ] && continue
    fi

    check_script_status

    case ${runlevel} in
        0|6)
            ${i} stop
            ;;
        *)
            ${i} start
            ;;
    esac
    error_value=${?}

    if [ "${error_value}" != "0" ]; then
        print_error_msg
    fi
done

# End $rc_base/init.d/rc

D.2. /etc/rc.d/init.d/functions

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/functions
#
# Description : Run Level Control Functions
#
# Authors     : Gerard Beekmans - gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       : With code based on Matthias Benkmann's simpleinit-msb
#        http://winterdrache.de/linux/newboot/index.html
#
########################################################################

## Environmental setup
# Setup default values for environment
umask 022
export PATH="/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin"

# Signal sent to running processes to refresh their configuration
RELOADSIG="HUP"

# Number of seconds between STOPSIG and FALLBACK when stopping processes
KILLDELAY="3"

## Screen Dimensions
# Find current screen size
if [ -z "${COLUMNS}" ]; then
    COLUMNS=$(stty size)
    COLUMNS=${COLUMNS##* }
fi

# When using remote connections, such as a serial port, stty size returns 0
if [ "${COLUMNS}" = "0" ]; then 
    COLUMNS=80
fi

## Measurements for positioning result messages
COL=$((${COLUMNS} - 8))
WCOL=$((${COL} - 2))

## Provide an echo that supports -e and -n
# If formatting is needed, $ECHO should be used
case "`echo -e -n test`" in
    -[en]*)
        ECHO=/bin/echo
        ;;
    *)
        ECHO=echo
        ;;
esac

## Set Cursor Position Commands, used via $ECHO
SET_COL="\\033[${COL}G"      # at the $COL char
SET_WCOL="\\033[${WCOL}G"    # at the $WCOL char
CURS_UP="\\033[1A\\033[0G"   # Up one line, at the 0'th char

## Set color commands, used via $ECHO
# Please consult `man console_codes for more information
# under the "ECMA-48 Set Graphics Rendition" section
#
# Warning: when switching from a 8bit to a 9bit font,
# the linux console will reinterpret the bold (1;) to
# the top 256 glyphs of the 9bit font.  This does
# not affect framebuffer consoles
NORMAL="\\033[0;39m"         # Standard console grey
SUCCESS="\\033[1;32m"        # Success is green
WARNING="\\033[1;33m"        # Warnings are yellow
FAILURE="\\033[1;31m"        # Failures are red
INFO="\\033[1;36m"           # Information is light cyan
BRACKET="\\033[1;34m"        # Brackets are blue

STRING_LENGTH="0"   # the length of the current message

#*******************************************************************************
# Function - boot_mesg()
#
# Purpose:      Sending information from bootup scripts to the console
#
# Inputs:       $1 is the message
#               $2 is the colorcode for the console
#
# Outputs:      Standard Output
#
# Dependencies: - sed for parsing strings.
#            - grep for counting string length.
#               
# Todo:         
#*******************************************************************************
boot_mesg()
{
    local ECHOPARM=""

    while true
    do
        case "${1}" in
            -n)
                ECHOPARM=" -n "
                shift 1
                ;;
            -*)
                echo "Unknown Option: ${1}"
                return 1
                ;;
            *)
                break
                ;;
        esac
    done

    ## Figure out the length of what is to be printed to be used
    ## for warning messages. 
    STRING_LENGTH=$((${#1} + 1))

    # Print the message to the screen
    ${ECHO} ${ECHOPARM} -e "${2}${1}"
    
}

boot_mesg_flush()
{
    # Reset STRING_LENGTH for next message
    STRING_LENGTH="0"
}

boot_log()
{
    # Left in for backwards compatibility
    :
}

echo_ok()
{
    ${ECHO} -n -e "${CURS_UP}${SET_COL}${BRACKET}[${SUCCESS}  OK  ${BRACKET}]"
    ${ECHO} -e "${NORMAL}"
        boot_mesg_flush
}

echo_failure()
{
    ${ECHO} -n -e "${CURS_UP}${SET_COL}${BRACKET}[${FAILURE} FAIL ${BRACKET}]"
    ${ECHO} -e "${NORMAL}"
        boot_mesg_flush
}

echo_warning()
{
    ${ECHO} -n -e "${CURS_UP}${SET_COL}${BRACKET}[${WARNING} WARN ${BRACKET}]"
    ${ECHO} -e "${NORMAL}"
        boot_mesg_flush
}

print_error_msg()
{
    echo_failure
    # $i is inherited by the rc script
    boot_mesg -n "FAILURE:\n\nYou should not be reading this error message.\n\n" ${FAILURE}
    boot_mesg -n " It means that an unforeseen error took"
    boot_mesg -n " place in ${i}, which exited with a return value of"
    boot_mesg " ${error_value}.\n"
    boot_mesg_flush
    boot_mesg -n "If you're able to track this"
    boot_mesg -n " error down to a bug in one of the files provided by"
    boot_mesg -n " the LFS book, please be so kind to inform us at"
    boot_mesg " lfs-dev@linuxfromscratch.org.\n"
    boot_mesg_flush
    boot_mesg -n "Press Enter to continue..." ${INFO}
    boot_mesg "" ${NORMAL}
    read ENTER
}

check_script_status()
{
    # $i is inherited by the rc script
    if [ ! -f ${i} ]; then
        boot_mesg "${i} is not a valid symlink." ${WARNING}
        echo_warning
        continue
    fi

    if [ ! -x ${i} ]; then
        boot_mesg "${i} is not executable, skipping." ${WARNING}
        echo_warning
        continue
    fi
}

evaluate_retval()
{
    error_value="${?}"

    if [ ${error_value} = 0 ]; then
        echo_ok
    else
        echo_failure
    fi

    # This prevents the 'An Unexpected Error Has Occurred' from trivial
    # errors.
    return 0
}

print_status()
{
    if [ "${#}" = "0" ]; then
        echo "Usage: ${0} {success|warning|failure}"
        return 1
    fi

    case "${1}" in

        success)
            echo_ok
            ;;

        warning)
            # Leave this extra case in because old scripts
            # may call it this way.
            case "${2}" in
                running)
                    ${ECHO} -e -n "${CURS_UP}"
                    ${ECHO} -e -n "\\033[${STRING_LENGTH}G   "
                    boot_mesg "Already running." ${WARNING}
                    echo_warning
                    ;;
                not_running)
                    ${ECHO} -e -n "${CURS_UP}"
                    ${ECHO} -e -n "\\033[${STRING_LENGTH}G   "
                    boot_mesg "Not running." ${WARNING}
                    echo_warning
                    ;;
                not_available)
                    ${ECHO} -e -n "${CURS_UP}"
                    ${ECHO} -e -n "\\033[${STRING_LENGTH}G   "
                    boot_mesg "Not available." ${WARNING}
                    echo_warning
                    ;;
                *)
                    # This is how it is supposed to
                    # be called
                    echo_warning
                    ;;
            esac
        ;;

        failure)
            echo_failure
        ;;

    esac

}

reloadproc()
{
    local pidfile=""
    local failure=0

    while true
    do
        case "${1}" in
            -p)
                pidfile="${2}"
                shift 2
                ;;
            -*)
                log_failure_msg "Unknown Option: ${1}"
                return 2
                ;;
            *)
                break
                ;;
        esac
    done

    if [ "${#}" -lt "1" ]; then
        log_failure_msg "Usage: reloadproc [-p pidfile] pathname"
        return 2
    fi

    # This will ensure compatibility with previous LFS Bootscripts
    if [ -n "${PIDFILE}" ];    then
        pidfile="${PIDFILE}"
    fi

    # Is the process running?
    if [ -z "${pidfile}" ];    then
        pidofproc -s "${1}"
    else
        pidofproc -s -p "${pidfile}" "${1}"
    fi

    # Warn about stale pid file
    if [ "$?" = 1 ]; then
        boot_mesg -n "Removing stale pid file: ${pidfile}. " ${WARNING}
        rm -f "${pidfile}"
    fi

    if [ -n "${pidlist}" ];    then
        for pid in ${pidlist}
        do
            kill -"${RELOADSIG}" "${pid}" || failure="1"
        done

        (exit ${failure})
        evaluate_retval

    else
        boot_mesg "Process ${1} not running." ${WARNING}
        echo_warning
    fi
}

statusproc()
{
    local pidfile=""
    local base=""
    local ret=""

    while true
    do
        case "${1}" in
            -p)
                pidfile="${2}"
                shift 2
                ;;
            -*)
                log_failure_msg "Unknown Option: ${1}"
                return 2
                ;;
            *)
                break
                ;;
        esac
    done

    if [ "${#}" != "1" ]; then
        shift 1
        log_failure_msg "Usage: statusproc [-p pidfile] pathname"
        return 2
    fi

    # Get the process basename
    base="${1##*/}"

    # This will ensure compatibility with previous LFS Bootscripts
    if [ -n "${PIDFILE}" ];    then
        pidfile="${PIDFILE}"
    fi

    # Is the process running?
    if [ -z "${pidfile}" ];    then
        pidofproc -s "${1}"
    else
        pidofproc -s -p "${pidfile}" "${1}"
    fi

    # Store the return status
    ret=$?

    if [ -n "${pidlist}" ];    then
        ${ECHO} -e "${INFO}${base} is running with Process"\
            "ID(s) ${pidlist}.${NORMAL}"
    else
        if [ -n "${base}" -a -e "/var/run/${base}.pid" ]; then
            ${ECHO} -e "${WARNING}${1} is not running but"\
                "/var/run/${base}.pid exists.${NORMAL}"
        else
            if [ -n "${pidfile}" -a -e "${pidfile}" ]; then
                ${ECHO} -e "${WARNING}${1} is not running"\
                    "but ${pidfile} exists.${NORMAL}"
            else
                ${ECHO} -e "${INFO}${1} is not running.${NORMAL}"
            fi
        fi
    fi

    # Return the status from pidofproc
    return $ret
}

# The below functions are documented in the LSB-generic 2.1.0

#*******************************************************************************
# Function - pidofproc [-s] [-p pidfile] pathname
#
# Purpose: This function returns one or more pid(s) for a particular daemon
#
# Inputs: -p pidfile, use the specified pidfile instead of pidof
#         pathname, path to the specified program
#
# Outputs: return 0 - Success, pid's in stdout
#          return 1 - Program is dead, pidfile exists
#          return 2 - Invalid or excessive number of arguments, 
#                     warning in stdout
#          return 3 - Program is not running
#
# Dependencies: pidof, echo, head
#
# Todo: Remove dependency on head
#       This replaces getpids
#       Test changes to pidof
#
#*******************************************************************************
pidofproc()
{
    local pidfile=""
    local lpids=""
    local silent=""
    pidlist=""
    while true
    do
        case "${1}" in
            -p)
                pidfile="${2}"
                shift 2
                ;;

            -s)
                # Added for legacy opperation of getpids
                # eliminates several '> /dev/null'
                silent="1"
                shift 1
                ;;
            -*)
                log_failure_msg "Unknown Option: ${1}"
                return 2
                ;;
            *)
                break
                ;;
        esac
    done

    if [ "${#}" != "1" ]; then
        shift 1
        log_failure_msg "Usage: pidofproc [-s] [-p pidfile] pathname"
        return 2
    fi

    if [ -n "${pidfile}" ]; then
        if [ ! -r "${pidfile}" ]; then
            return 3 # Program is not running
        fi

        lpids=`head -n 1 ${pidfile}`
        for pid in ${lpids}
        do
            if [ "${pid}" -ne "$$" -a "${pid}" -ne "${PPID}" ]; then
                kill -0 "${pid}" 2>/dev/null &&
                pidlist="${pidlist} ${pid}"
            fi
            
            if [ "${silent}" != "1" ]; then
                echo "${pidlist}"
            fi

            test -z "${pidlist}" && 
            # Program is dead, pidfile exists
            return 1
            # else
            return 0
        done

    else
        pidlist=`pidof -o $$ -o $PPID -x "$1"`
        if [ "${silent}" != "1" ]; then
            echo "${pidlist}"
        fi

        # Get provide correct running status
        if [ -n "${pidlist}" ]; then
            return 0
        else
            return 3
        fi

    fi

    if [ "$?" != "0" ]; then
        return 3 # Program is not running
    fi
}

#*******************************************************************************
# Function - loadproc [-f] [-n nicelevel] [-p pidfile] pathname [args]
#
# Purpose: This runs the specified program as a daemon
#
# Inputs: -f, run the program even if it is already running
#         -n nicelevel, specifies a nice level. See nice(1).
#         -p pidfile, uses the specified pidfile
#         pathname, pathname to the specified program
#         args, arguments to pass to specified program
#
# Outputs: return 0 - Success
#          return 2 - Invalid of excessive number of arguments, 
#                     warning in stdout
#          return 4 - Program or service status is unknown
#
# Dependencies: nice, rm
#
# Todo: LSB says this should be called start_daemon
#       LSB does not say that it should call evaluate_retval
#       It checks for PIDFILE, which is deprecated.
#         Will be removed after BLFS 6.0
#       loadproc returns 0 if program is already running, not LSB compliant
#
#*******************************************************************************
loadproc()
{
    local pidfile=""
    local forcestart=""
    local nicelevel="10"

# This will ensure compatibility with previous LFS Bootscripts
    if [ -n "${PIDFILE}" ];    then
        pidfile="${PIDFILE}"
    fi

  while true
    do
        case "${1}" in
            -f)
                forcestart="1"
                shift 1
                ;;
            -n)
                nicelevel="${2}"
                shift 2
                ;;
            -p)
                pidfile="${2}"
                shift 2
                ;;
            -*)
                log_failure_msg "Unknown Option: ${1}"
                return 2 #invalid or excess argument(s)
                ;;
            *)
                break
                ;;
        esac
    done

    if [ "${#}" = "0" ]; then
        log_failure_msg "Usage: loadproc [-f] [-n nicelevel] [-p pidfile] pathname [args]"
        return 2 #invalid or excess argument(s)
    fi

    if [ -z "${forcestart}" ]; then
        if [ -z "${pidfile}" ];    then
            pidofproc -s "${1}"
        else
            pidofproc -s -p "${pidfile}" "${1}"
        fi

        case "${?}" in
            0)
                log_warning_msg "Unable to continue: ${1} is running"
                return 0 # 4
                ;;
            1)
                boot_mesg "Removing stale pid file: ${pidfile}" ${WARNING}
                rm -f "${pidfile}"
                ;;
            3)
                ;;
            *)
                log_failure_msg "Unknown error code from pidofproc: ${?}"
                return 4
                ;;
        esac
    fi

    nice -n "${nicelevel}" "${@}"
    evaluate_retval # This is "Probably" not LSB compliant,
#                         but required to be compatible with older bootscripts
    return 0
}

#*******************************************************************************
# Function - killproc  [-p pidfile] pathname [signal]
#
# Purpose:
#
# Inputs: -p pidfile, uses the specified pidfile
#         pathname, pathname to the specified program
#         signal, send this signal to pathname
#
# Outputs: return 0 - Success
#          return 2 - Invalid of excessive number of arguments, 
#                     warning in stdout
#          return 4 - Unknown Status
#
# Dependencies: kill, rm
#
# Todo: LSB does not say that it should call evaluate_retval
#       It checks for PIDFILE, which is deprecated.
#         Will be removed after BLFS 6.0
#
#*******************************************************************************
killproc()
{
    local pidfile=""
    local killsig=TERM # default signal is SIGTERM
    pidlist=""

    # This will ensure compatibility with previous LFS Bootscripts
    if [ -n "${PIDFILE}" ];    then
        pidfile="${PIDFILE}"
    fi

    while true
    do
        case "${1}" in
            -p)
                pidfile="${2}"
                shift 2
                ;;
            -*)
                log_failure_msg "Unknown Option: ${1}"
                return 2
                ;;
            *)
                 break
                ;;
        esac
    done

    if [ "${#}" = "2" ]; then
        killsig="${2}"
    elif [ "${#}" != "1" ];    then
        shift 2
        log_failure_msg "Usage: killproc  [-p pidfile] pathname [signal]"
        return 2
    fi

    # Is the process running?
    if [ -z "${pidfile}" ];    then
        pidofproc -s "${1}"
    else
        pidofproc -s -p "${pidfile}" "${1}"
    fi

    # Remove stale pidfile
    if [ "$?" = 1 ]; then
        boot_mesg "Removing stale pid file: ${pidfile}." ${WARNING}
        rm -f "${pidfile}"
    fi

    # If running, send the signal
    if [ -n "${pidlist}" ]; then
    for pid in ${pidlist}
    do
        kill -${killsig} ${pid} 2>/dev/null

        # Wait up to 3 seconds, for ${pid} to terminate
        case "${killsig}" in
        TERM|SIGTERM|KILL|SIGKILL)
            # sleep in 1/10ths of seconds and
            # multiply KILLDELAY by 10
            local dtime="${KILLDELAY}0"
            while [ "${dtime}" != "0" ]
            do
                kill -0 ${pid} 2>/dev/null || break
                sleep 0.1
                dtime=$(( ${dtime} - 1))
            done
            # If ${pid} is still running, kill it
            kill -0 ${pid} 2>/dev/null && kill -KILL ${pid} 2>/dev/null
            ;;
        esac
    done

    # Check if the process is still running if we tried to stop it
    case "${killsig}" in
    TERM|SIGTERM|KILL|SIGKILL)
        if [ -z "${pidfile}" ];    then
            pidofproc -s "${1}"
        else
            pidofproc -s -p "${pidfile}" "${1}"
        fi

        # Program was terminated
        if [ "$?" != "0" ]; then
            # Remove the pidfile if necessary
            if [ -f "${pidfile}" ];    then
                rm -f "${pidfile}"
            fi
            echo_ok
            return 0
        else # Program is still running
            echo_failure
            return 4 # Unknown Status
        fi
        ;;
    *)
        # Just see if the kill returned successfully
        evaluate_retval
        ;;
    esac
    else # process not running
    print_status warning not_running
    fi
}


#*******************************************************************************
# Function - log_success_msg "message"
#
# Purpose: Print a success message
#
# Inputs: $@ - Message
#
# Outputs: Text output to screen
#
# Dependencies: echo
#
# Todo: logging
#
#*******************************************************************************
log_success_msg()
{
    ${ECHO} -n -e "${BOOTMESG_PREFIX}${@}"
    ${ECHO} -e "${SET_COL}""${BRACKET}""[""${SUCCESS}""  OK  ""${BRACKET}""]""${NORMAL}"
    return 0
}

#*******************************************************************************
# Function - log_failure_msg "message"
#
# Purpose: Print a failure message
#
# Inputs: $@ - Message
#
# Outputs: Text output to screen
#
# Dependencies: echo
#
# Todo: logging
#
#*******************************************************************************
log_failure_msg() {
    ${ECHO} -n -e "${BOOTMESG_PREFIX}${@}"
    ${ECHO} -e "${SET_COL}""${BRACKET}""[""${FAILURE}"" FAIL ""${BRACKET}""]""${NORMAL}"
    return 0
}

#*******************************************************************************
# Function - log_warning_msg "message"
#
# Purpose: print a warning message
#
# Inputs: $@ - Message
#
# Outputs: Text output to screen
#
# Dependencies: echo
#
# Todo: logging
#
#*******************************************************************************
log_warning_msg() {
    ${ECHO} -n -e "${BOOTMESG_PREFIX}${@}"
    ${ECHO} -e "${SET_COL}""${BRACKET}""[""${WARNING}"" WARN ""${BRACKET}""]""${NORMAL}"
    return 0
}

# End $rc_base/init.d/functions

D.3. /etc/rc.d/init.d/mountkernfs

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/mountkernfs
#
# Description : Mount proc and sysfs
#
# Authors     : Gerard Beekmans - gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}

case "${1}" in
    start)
        boot_mesg -n "Mounting kernel-based file systems:" ${INFO}

        if ! mountpoint /proc >/dev/null; then
            boot_mesg -n " /proc" ${NORMAL}
            mount -n /proc || failed=1
        fi

        if ! mountpoint /sys >/dev/null; then
            boot_mesg -n " /sys" ${NORMAL}
            mount -n /sys || failed=1
        fi

        boot_mesg "" ${NORMAL}

        (exit ${failed})
        evaluate_retval
        ;;

    *)
        echo "Usage: ${0} {start}"
        exit 1
        ;;
esac

# End $rc_base/init.d/mountkernfs

D.4. /etc/rc.d/init.d/consolelog

#!/bin/sh
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/consolelog

########################################################################
#
# Description : Set the kernel log level for the console
#
# Authors     : Dan Nicholson - dnicholson AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       : /proc must be mounted before this can run
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}

# set the default loglevel
LOGLEVEL=7
if [ -r /etc/sysconfig/console ]; then
    . /etc/sysconfig/console
fi

case "${1}" in
    start)
        case "$LOGLEVEL" in
        [1-8])
            boot_mesg "Setting the console log level to ${LOGLEVEL}..."
            dmesg -n $LOGLEVEL
            evaluate_retval
            ;;
        *)
            boot_mesg "Console log level '${LOGLEVEL}' is invalid" ${FAILURE}
            echo_failure
            ;;
        esac
        ;;
    status)
        # Read the current value if possible
        if [ -r /proc/sys/kernel/printk ]; then
            read level line < /proc/sys/kernel/printk
        else
            boot_mesg "Can't read the current console log level" ${FAILURE}
            echo_failure
        fi

        # Print the value
        if [ -n "$level" ]; then
            ${ECHO} -e "${INFO}The current console log level" \
                "is ${level}${NORMAL}"
        fi
        ;;

    *)
        echo "Usage: ${0} {start|status}"
        exit 1
        ;;
esac

# End $rc_base/init.d/consolelog

D.5. /etc/rc.d/init.d/modules

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/modules
#
# Description : Module auto-loading script
#
# Authors     : Zack Winkles
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}

# Assure that the kernel has module support.
[ -e /proc/ksyms -o -e /proc/modules ] || exit 0

case "${1}" in
    start)

        # Exit if there's no modules file or there are no
        # valid entries
        [ -r /etc/sysconfig/modules ] &&
            egrep -qv '^($|#)' /etc/sysconfig/modules ||
            exit 0

        boot_mesg -n "Loading modules:" ${INFO}

        # Only try to load modules if the user has actually given us
        # some modules to load.
        while read module args; do

            # Ignore comments and blank lines.
            case "$module" in
                ""|"#"*) continue ;;
            esac

            # Attempt to load the module, making
            # sure to pass any arguments provided.
            modprobe ${module} ${args} >/dev/null

            # Print the module name if successful,
            # otherwise take note.
            if [ $? -eq 0 ]; then
                boot_mesg -n " ${module}" ${NORMAL}
            else
                failedmod="${failedmod} ${module}"
            fi
        done < /etc/sysconfig/modules

        boot_mesg "" ${NORMAL}
        # Print a message about successfully loaded
        # modules on the correct line.
        echo_ok

        # Print a failure message with a list of any
        # modules that may have failed to load.
        if [ -n "${failedmod}" ]; then
            boot_mesg "Failed to load modules:${failedmod}" ${FAILURE}
            echo_failure
        fi
        ;;
    *)
        echo "Usage: ${0} {start}"
        exit 1
        ;;
esac

# End $rc_base/init.d/modules

D.6. /etc/rc.d/init.d/udev

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/udev
#
# Description : Udev cold-plugging script
#
# Authors     : Zack Winkles, Alexander E. Patrakov
#
# Version     : 00.02
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}

case "${1}" in
    start)
        boot_mesg "Populating /dev with device nodes..."
        if ! grep -q '[[:space:]]sysfs' /proc/mounts; then
            echo_failure
            boot_mesg -n "FAILURE:\n\nUnable to create" ${FAILURE}
            boot_mesg -n " devices without a SysFS filesystem"
            boot_mesg -n "\n\nAfter you press Enter, this system"
            boot_mesg -n " will be halted and powered off."
            boot_mesg -n "\n\nPress Enter to continue..." ${INFO}
            boot_mesg "" ${NORMAL}
            read ENTER
            /etc/rc.d/init.d/halt stop
        fi

        # Mount a temporary file system over /dev, so that any devices
        # made or removed during this boot don't affect the next one.
        # The reason we don't write to mtab is because we don't ever
        # want /dev to be unavailable (such as by `umount -a').
        if ! mountpoint /dev > /dev/null; then
            mount -n -t tmpfs tmpfs /dev -o mode=755
        fi
        if [ ${?} != 0 ]; then
            echo_failure
            boot_mesg -n "FAILURE:\n\nCannot mount a tmpfs" ${FAILURE}
            boot_mesg -n " onto /dev, this system will be halted."
            boot_mesg -n "\n\nAfter you press Enter, this system"
            boot_mesg -n " will be halted and powered off."
            boot_mesg -n "\n\nPress Enter to continue..." ${INFO}
            boot_mesg "" ${NORMAL}
            read ENTER
            /etc/rc.d/init.d/halt stop
        fi

        # Udev handles uevents itself, so we don't need to have
        # the kernel call out to any binary in response to them
        echo > /proc/sys/kernel/hotplug

        # Copy the only static device node that Udev >= 155 doesn't
        # handle to /dev
        cp -a /lib/udev/devices/null /dev

        # Start the udev daemon to continually watch for, and act on,
        # uevents
        /sbin/udevd --daemon

        # Now traverse /sys in order to "coldplug" devices that have
        # already been discovered
        /sbin/udevadm trigger --action=add

        # Now wait for udevd to process the uevents we triggered
        /sbin/udevadm settle
        evaluate_retval

        ;;

    *)
        echo "Usage ${0} {start}"
        exit 1
        ;;
esac

# End $rc_base/init.d/udev

D.7. /etc/rc.d/init.d/swap

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/swap
#
# Description : Swap Control Script
#
# Authors     : Gerard Beekmans - gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}

case "${1}" in
    start)
        boot_mesg "Activating all swap files/partitions..."
        swapon -a
        evaluate_retval
        ;;

    stop)
        boot_mesg "Deactivating all swap files/partitions..."
        swapoff -a
        evaluate_retval
        ;;

    restart)
        ${0} stop
        sleep 1
        ${0} start
        ;;

    status)
        boot_mesg "Retrieving swap status." ${INFO}
        echo_ok
        echo
        swapon -s
        ;;

    *)
        echo "Usage: ${0} {start|stop|restart|status}"
        exit 1
        ;;
esac

# End $rc_base/init.d/swap

D.8. /etc/rc.d/init.d/setclock

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/setclock
#
# Description : Setting Linux Clock
#
# Authors     : Gerard Beekmans - gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}
. /etc/sysconfig/clock

case "${UTC}" in
    yes|true|1)
        CLOCKPARAMS="${CLOCKPARAMS} --utc"
        ;;

    no|false|0)
        CLOCKPARAMS="${CLOCKPARAMS} --localtime"
        ;;

esac

case ${1} in
    start)
        boot_mesg "Setting system clock..."
        hwclock --hctosys ${CLOCKPARAMS} >/dev/null
        evaluate_retval
        ;;

    stop)
        boot_mesg "Setting hardware clock..."
        hwclock --systohc ${CLOCKPARAMS} >/dev/null
        evaluate_retval
        ;;

    *)
        echo "Usage: ${0} {start|stop}"
        ;;

esac

D.9. /etc/rc.d/init.d/checkfs

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/checkfs
#
# Description : File System Check
#
# Authors     : Gerard Beekmans - gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#               A. Luebke - luebke@users.sourceforge.net
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
# Based on checkfs script from LFS-3.1 and earlier.
#
# From man fsck
# 0    - No errors
# 1    - File system errors corrected
# 2    - System should be rebooted
# 4    - File system errors left uncorrected
# 8    - Operational error
# 16   - Usage or syntax error
# 32   - Fsck canceled by user request
# 128  - Shared library error
#
#########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}

case "${1}" in
    start)
        if [ -f /fastboot ]; then
            boot_mesg -n "/fastboot found, will not perform" ${INFO}
            boot_mesg " file system checks as requested."
            echo_ok
            exit 0
        fi

        boot_mesg "Mounting root file system in read-only mode..."
        mount -n -o remount,ro / >/dev/null
        evaluate_retval

        if [ ${?} != 0 ]; then
            echo_failure
            boot_mesg -n "FAILURE:\n\nCannot check root" ${FAILURE}
            boot_mesg -n " filesystem because it could not be mounted"
            boot_mesg -n " in read-only mode.\n\nAfter you"
            boot_mesg -n " press Enter, this system will be"
            boot_mesg -n " halted and powered off."
            boot_mesg -n "\n\nPress enter to continue..." ${INFO}
            boot_mesg "" ${NORMAL}
            read ENTER
            ${rc_base}/init.d/halt stop
        fi

        if [ -f /forcefsck ]; then
            boot_mesg -n "/forcefsck found, forcing file" ${INFO}
            boot_mesg " system checks as requested."
            echo_ok
            options="-f"
        else
            options=""
        fi

        boot_mesg "Checking file systems..."
        # Note: -a option used to be -p; but this fails e.g.
        # on fsck.minix
        fsck ${options} -a -A -C -T
        error_value=${?}

        if [ "${error_value}" = 0 ]; then
            echo_ok
        fi

        if [ "${error_value}" = 1 ]; then
            echo_warning
            boot_mesg -n "WARNING:\n\nFile system errors" ${WARNING}
            boot_mesg -n " were found and have been corrected."
            boot_mesg -n "  You may want to double-check that"
            boot_mesg -n " everything was fixed properly."
            boot_mesg "" ${NORMAL}
        fi

        if [ "${error_value}" = 2 -o "${error_value}" = 3 ]; then
            echo_warning
            boot_mesg -n "WARNING:\n\nFile system errors" ${WARNING}
            boot_mesg -n " were found and have been been"
            boot_mesg -n " corrected, but the nature of the"
            boot_mesg -n " errors require this system to be"
            boot_mesg -n " rebooted.\n\nAfter you press enter,"
            boot_mesg -n " this system will be rebooted"
            boot_mesg -n "\n\nPress Enter to continue..." ${INFO}
            boot_mesg "" ${NORMAL}
            read ENTER
            reboot -f
        fi

        if [ "${error_value}" -gt 3 -a "${error_value}" -lt 16 ]; then
            echo_failure
            boot_mesg -n "FAILURE:\n\nFile system errors" ${FAILURE}
            boot_mesg -n " were encountered that could not be"
            boot_mesg -n " fixed automatically.  This system"
            boot_mesg -n " cannot continue to boot and will"
            boot_mesg -n " therefore be halted until those"
            boot_mesg -n " errors are fixed manually by a"
            boot_mesg -n " System Administrator.\n\nAfter you"
            boot_mesg -n " press Enter, this system will be"
            boot_mesg -n " halted and powered off."
            boot_mesg -n "\n\nPress Enter to continue..." ${INFO}
            boot_mesg "" ${NORMAL}
            read ENTER
          ${rc_base}/init.d/halt stop
        fi

        if [ "${error_value}" -ge 16 ]; then
            echo_failure
            boot_mesg -n "FAILURE:\n\nUnexpected Failure" ${FAILURE}
            boot_mesg -n " running fsck.  Exited with error"
            boot_mesg -n " code: ${error_value}."
            boot_mesg "" ${NORMAL}
            exit ${error_value}
        fi
        ;;
    *)
        echo "Usage: ${0} {start}"
        exit 1
        ;;
esac

# End $rc_base/init.d/checkfs

D.10. /etc/rc.d/init.d/mountfs

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/mountfs
#
# Description : File System Mount Script
#
# Authors     : Gerard Beekmans - gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}

case "${1}" in
    start)
        boot_mesg "Remounting root file system in read-write mode..."
        mount -n -o remount,rw / >/dev/null
        evaluate_retval

        # Remove fsck-related file system watermarks.
        rm -f /fastboot /forcefsck

        boot_mesg "Recording existing mounts in /etc/mtab..."
        > /etc/mtab
        mount -f / || failed=1
        mount -f /proc || failed=1
        mount -f /sys || failed=1
        (exit ${failed})
        evaluate_retval

        # This will mount all filesystems that do not have _netdev in
        # their option list.  _netdev denotes a network filesystem.
        boot_mesg "Mounting remaining file systems..."
        mount -a -O no_netdev >/dev/null
        evaluate_retval
        ;;

    stop)
        boot_mesg "Unmounting all other currently mounted file systems..."
        umount -a -d -r >/dev/null
        evaluate_retval
        ;;

    *)
        echo "Usage: ${0} {start|stop}"
        exit 1
        ;;
esac

# End $rc_base/init.d/mountfs

D.11. /etc/rc.d/init.d/udev_retry

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/udev_retry
#
# Description : Udev cold-plugging script (retry)
#
# Authors     : Alexander E. Patrakov
#
# Version     : 00.02
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}

case "${1}" in
    start)
        boot_mesg "Retrying failed uevents, if any..."

        # From Debian: "copy the rules generated before / was mounted
        # read-write":
        for file in /dev/.udev/tmp-rules--*; do
            dest=${file##*tmp-rules--}
            [ "$dest" = '*' ] && break
            cat $file >> /etc/udev/rules.d/$dest
            rm -f $file
        done

        # Re-trigger the failed uevents in hope they will succeed now
        /sbin/udevadm trigger --type=failed --action=add
        
        # Now wait for udevd to process the uevents we triggered
        /sbin/udevadm settle
        evaluate_retval
        ;;

    *)
        echo "Usage ${0} {start}"
        exit 1
        ;;
esac

# End $rc_base/init.d/udev_retry

D.12. /etc/rc.d/init.d/cleanfs

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/cleanfs
#
# Description : Clean file system
#
# Authors     : Gerard Beekmans - gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}

# Function to create files/directory on boot.
create_files() {
    # Read in the configuration file.
    exec 9>&0 < /etc/sysconfig/createfiles
        while read name type perm usr grp dtype maj min junk
        do

            # Ignore comments and blank lines.
                   case "${name}" in
                ""|\#*) continue ;;
            esac

            # Ignore existing files.
            if [ ! -e "${name}" ]; then
                # Create stuff based on its type.
                case "${type}" in
                    dir)
                        mkdir "${name}"
                        ;;
                    file)
                        :> "${name}"
                        ;;
                    dev)
                        case "${dtype}" in
                            char)
                                mknod "${name}" c ${maj} ${min}
                                ;;
                            block)
                                mknod "${name}" b ${maj} ${min}
                                ;;
                            pipe)
                                mknod "${name}" p
                                ;;
                            *) 
                                boot_mesg -n "\nUnknown device type: ${dtype}" ${WARNING}
                                boot_mesg "" ${NORMAL}
                                ;;
                        esac
                        ;;
                    *)
                        boot_mesg -n "\nUnknown type: ${type}" ${WARNING}
                        boot_mesg "" ${NORMAL}
                        continue
                        ;;
                esac

                # Set up the permissions, too.
                chown ${usr}:${grp} "${name}"
                chmod ${perm} "${name}"
            fi
        done
    exec 0>&9 9>&-
}

case "${1}" in
    start)
        boot_mesg -n "Cleaning file systems:" ${INFO}

        boot_mesg -n " /tmp" ${NORMAL}
        cd /tmp &&
        find . -xdev -mindepth 1 ! -name lost+found \
            -delete || failed=1

        boot_mesg -n " /var/lock" ${NORMAL}
        cd /var/lock &&
        find . -type f -exec rm -f {} \; || failed=1

        boot_mesg " /var/run" ${NORMAL}
        cd /var/run &&
        find . ! -type d ! -name utmp \
            -exec rm -f {} \; || failed=1
        > /var/run/utmp
        if grep -q '^utmp:' /etc/group ; then
            chmod 664 /var/run/utmp
            chgrp utmp /var/run/utmp
        fi

        (exit ${failed})
        evaluate_retval

        if egrep -qv '^(#|$)' /etc/sysconfig/createfiles 2>/dev/null; then
            boot_mesg "Creating files and directories..."
            create_files
            evaluate_retval
        fi
        ;;
    *)
        echo "Usage: ${0} {start}"
        exit 1
        ;;
esac

# End $rc_base/init.d/cleanfs

D.13. /etc/rc.d/init.d/console

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/console
#
# Description : Sets keymap and screen font
#
# Authors     : Gerard Beekmans - gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#        Alexander E. Patrakov
#
# Version     : 00.03
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}

# Native English speakers probably don't have /etc/sysconfig/console at all
if [ -f /etc/sysconfig/console ]
then
    . /etc/sysconfig/console
else
        exit 0
fi

is_true() {
    [ "$1" = "1" ] || [ "$1" = "yes" ] || [ "$1" = "true" ]
}

failed=0

case "${1}" in
    start)
        boot_mesg "Setting up Linux console..."
        # There should be no bogus failures below this line!
        
        # Figure out if a framebuffer console is used
        [ -d /sys/class/graphics/fb0 ] && USE_FB=1 || USE_FB=0
        
        # Figure out the command to set the console into the
        # desired mode
        is_true "${UNICODE}" &&
            MODE_COMMAND="${ECHO} -en '\033%G' && kbd_mode -u" ||
            MODE_COMMAND="${ECHO} -en '\033%@\033(K' && kbd_mode -a"
        
        # On framebuffer consoles, font has to be set for each vt in
        # UTF-8 mode. This doesn't hurt in non-UTF-8 mode also.
        
        ! is_true "${USE_FB}" || [ -z "${FONT}" ] ||
            MODE_COMMAND="${MODE_COMMAND} && setfont ${FONT}"

        # Apply that command to all consoles mentioned in
        # /etc/inittab. Important: in the UTF-8 mode this should
        # happen before setfont, otherwise a kernel bug will
        # show up and the unicode map of the font will not be
        # used.
        # FIXME: Fedora Core also initializes two spare consoles
        # - do we want that?
        
        for TTY in `grep '^[^#].*respawn:/sbin/agetty' /etc/inittab |
            grep -o '\btty[[:digit:]]*\b'`
        do
            openvt -f -w -c ${TTY#tty} -- \
                /bin/sh -c "${MODE_COMMAND}" || failed=1
        done

        # Set the font (if not already set above) and the keymap
        is_true "${USE_FB}" || [ -z "${FONT}" ] ||
            setfont $FONT ||
            failed=1
        [ -z "${KEYMAP}" ] ||
            loadkeys ${KEYMAP} >/dev/null 2>&1 ||
            failed=1
        [ -z "${KEYMAP_CORRECTIONS}" ] ||
            loadkeys ${KEYMAP_CORRECTIONS} >/dev/null 2>&1 ||
            failed=1

        # Convert the keymap from $LEGACY_CHARSET to UTF-8
        [ -z "$LEGACY_CHARSET" ] ||
            dumpkeys -c "$LEGACY_CHARSET" |
            loadkeys -u >/dev/null 2>&1 ||
            failed=1

        # If any of the commands above failed, the trap at the
        # top would set $failed to 1
        ( exit $failed )
        evaluate_retval
        ;;
    *)
        echo $"Usage:" "${0} {start}"
        exit 1
        ;;
esac

# End $rc_base/init.d/console

D.14. /etc/rc.d/init.d/localnet

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/localnet
#
# Description : Loopback device
#
# Authors     : Gerard Beekmans  - gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}
. /etc/sysconfig/network

case "${1}" in
    start)
        boot_mesg "Bringing up the loopback interface..."
        ip addr add 127.0.0.1/8 label lo dev lo
        ip link set lo up
        evaluate_retval

        boot_mesg "Setting hostname to ${HOSTNAME}..."
        hostname ${HOSTNAME}
        evaluate_retval
        ;;

    stop)
        boot_mesg "Bringing down the loopback interface..."
        ip link set lo down
        evaluate_retval
        ;;

    restart)
        ${0} stop
        sleep 1
        ${0} start
        ;;

    status)
        echo "Hostname is: $(hostname)"
        ip link show lo
        ;;

    *)
        echo "Usage: ${0} {start|stop|restart|status}"
        exit 1
        ;;
esac

# End $rc_base/init.d/localnet

D.15. /etc/rc.d/init.d/sysctl

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/sysctl
#
# Description : File uses /etc/sysctl.conf to set kernel runtime
#               parameters
#
# Authors     : Nathan Coulson (nathan AT linuxfromscratch D0T org)
#               Matthew Burgress (matthew AT linuxfromscratch D0T org)
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}

case "${1}" in
    start)
        if [ -f "/etc/sysctl.conf" ]; then
            boot_mesg "Setting kernel runtime parameters..."
            sysctl -q -p
            evaluate_retval
        fi
        ;;

    status)
        sysctl -a    
        ;;

    *)
        echo "Usage: ${0} {start|status}"
        exit 1
        ;;
esac

# End $rc_base/init.d/sysctl

D.16. /etc/rc.d/init.d/sysklogd

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/sysklogd
#
# Description : Sysklogd loader
#
# Authors     : Gerard Beekmans - gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}

case "${1}" in
    start)
        boot_mesg "Starting system log daemon..."
        loadproc syslogd -m 0

        boot_mesg "Starting kernel log daemon..."
        loadproc klogd
        ;;

    stop)
        boot_mesg "Stopping kernel log daemon..."
        killproc klogd

        boot_mesg "Stopping system log daemon..."
        killproc syslogd
        ;;

    reload)
        boot_mesg "Reloading system log daemon config file..."
        reloadproc syslogd
        ;;

    restart)
        ${0} stop
        sleep 1
        ${0} start
        ;;

    status)
        statusproc syslogd
        statusproc klogd
        ;;

    *)
        echo "Usage: ${0} {start|stop|reload|restart|status}"
        exit 1
        ;;
esac

# End $rc_base/init.d/sysklogd

D.17. /etc/rc.d/init.d/network

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/network
#
# Description : Network Control Script
#
# Authors     : Gerard Beekmans - gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#        Nathan Coulson - nathan AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#        Kevin P. Fleming - kpfleming@linuxfromscratch.org
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}
. /etc/sysconfig/network

case "${1}" in
    start)
        # Start all network interfaces
        for file in ${network_devices}/ifconfig.*
        do
            interface=${file##*/ifconfig.}

            # skip if $file is * (because nothing was found)
            if [ "${interface}" = "*" ]
            then
                continue
            fi

            IN_BOOT=1 ${network_devices}/ifup ${interface}
        done
        ;;

    stop)
        # Reverse list
        FILES=""
        for file in ${network_devices}/ifconfig.*
        do
            FILES="${file} ${FILES}"
        done

        # Stop all network interfaces
        for file in ${FILES}
        do
            interface=${file##*/ifconfig.}

            # skip if $file is * (because nothing was found)
            if [ "${interface}" = "*" ]
            then
                continue
            fi

            IN_BOOT=1 ${network_devices}/ifdown ${interface}
        done
        ;;

    restart)
        ${0} stop
        sleep 1
        ${0} start
        ;;

    *)
        echo "Usage: ${0} {start|stop|restart}"
        exit 1
        ;;
esac

# End /etc/rc.d/init.d/network

D.18. /etc/rc.d/init.d/sendsignals

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/sendsignals
#
# Description : Sendsignals Script
#
# Authors     : Gerard Beekmans - gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}

case "${1}" in
    stop)
        boot_mesg "Sending all processes the TERM signal..."
        killall5 -15
        error_value=${?}

        sleep ${KILLDELAY}

        if [ "${error_value}" = 0 -o "${error_value}" = 2 ]; then
            echo_ok
        else
            echo_failure
        fi

        boot_mesg "Sending all processes the KILL signal..."
        killall5 -9
        error_value=${?}

        sleep ${KILLDELAY}

        if [ "${error_value}" = 0 -o "${error_value}" = 2 ]; then
            echo_ok
        else
            echo_failure
        fi
        ;;

    *)
        echo "Usage: ${0} {stop}"
        exit 1
        ;;

esac

# End $rc_base/init.d/sendsignals

D.19. /etc/rc.d/init.d/reboot

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/reboot
#
# Description : Reboot Scripts
#
# Authors     : Gerard Beekmans - gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}

case "${1}" in
    stop)
        boot_mesg "Restarting system..."
        reboot -d -f -i
        ;;

    *)
        echo "Usage: ${0} {stop}"
        exit 1
        ;;

esac

# End $rc_base/init.d/reboot

D.20. /etc/rc.d/init.d/halt

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/halt
#
# Description : Halt Script
#
# Authors     : Gerard Beekmans - gerard AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}

case "${1}" in
    stop)
        halt -d -f -i -p
        ;;
    *)
        echo "Usage: {stop}"
        exit 1
        ;;
esac

# End $rc_base/init.d/halt

D.21. /etc/rc.d/init.d/template

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $rc_base/init.d/
#
# Description :
#
# Authors     :
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc
. ${rc_functions}

case "${1}" in
    start)
        boot_mesg "Starting..."
        loadproc
        ;;

    stop)
        boot_mesg "Stopping..."
        killproc
        ;;

    reload)
        boot_mesg "Reloading..."
        reloadproc
        ;;

    restart)
        ${0} stop
        sleep 1
        ${0} start
        ;;

    status)
        statusproc
        ;;

    *)
        echo "Usage: ${0} {start|stop|reload|restart|status}"
        exit 1
        ;;
esac

# End $rc_base/init.d/

D.22. /etc/sysconfig/rc

            ########################################################################
# Begin /etc/sysconfig/rc
#
# Description : rc script configuration
#
# Authors     :
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

rc_base=/etc/rc.d
rc_functions=${rc_base}/init.d/functions
network_devices=/etc/sysconfig/network-devices

# End /etc/sysconfig/rc

D.23. /etc/sysconfig/modules

            ########################################################################
# Begin /etc/sysconfig/modules
#
# Description : Module auto-loading configuration
#
# Authors     :
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       : The syntax of this file is as follows:
#          <module> [<arg1> <arg2> ...]
#
# Each module should be on it's own line, and any options that you want
# passed to the module should follow it.  The line deliminator is either
# a space or a tab.
########################################################################

# End /etc/sysconfig/modules

D.24. /etc/sysconfig/createfiles

            ########################################################################
# Begin /etc/sysconfig/createfiles
#
# Description : Createfiles script config file
#
# Authors     :
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       : The syntax of this file is as follows:
#         if type is equal to "file" or "dir"
#          <filename> <type> <permissions> <user> <group>
#         if type is equal to "dev"
#          <filename> <type> <permissions> <user> <group> <devtype> <major> <minor>
#
#         <filename> is the name of the file which is to be created
#         <type> is either file, dir, or dev.
#               file creates a new file
#               dir creates a new directory
#               dev creates a new device
#         <devtype> is either block, char or pipe
#               block creates a block device
#               char creates a character deivce
#               pipe creates a pipe, this will ignore the <major> and <minor> fields
#         <major> and <minor> are the major and minor numbers used for the device.
########################################################################

# End /etc/sysconfig/createfiles

D.25. /etc/sysconfig/network-devices/ifup

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $network_devices/ifup
#
# Description : Interface Up
#
# Authors     : Nathan Coulson - nathan AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#               Kevin P. Fleming - kpfleming@linuxfromscratch.org
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       : the IFCONFIG variable is passed to the scripts found
#               in the services directory, to indicate what file the
#               service should source to get environmental variables.
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc 
. ${rc_functions} 

# Collect a list of configuration files for our interface
if [ -n "${2}" ]; then
    for file in ${@#$1} # All parameters except $1
  do
        FILES="${FILES} ${network_devices}/ifconfig.${1}/${file}"
    done
elif [ -d "${network_devices}/ifconfig.${1}" ]; then
    FILES=`echo ${network_devices}/ifconfig.${1}/*`
else 
    FILES="${network_devices}/ifconfig.${1}"
fi

boot_mesg "Bringing up the ${1} interface..."
boot_mesg_flush

# Process each configruation file
for file in ${FILES}; do
    # skip backup files
    if [ "${file}" != "${file%""~""}" ]; then
        continue
    fi

    if [ ! -f "${file}" ]; then
        boot_mesg "${file} is not a network configuration file or directory." ${WARNING}
        echo_warning
        continue
    fi

    (
        . ${file}

        # Will not process this service if started by boot, and ONBOOT
        # is not set to yes
        if [ "${IN_BOOT}" = "1" -a "${ONBOOT}" != "yes" ]; then
            continue
        fi
        # Will not process this service if started by hotplug, and 
        # ONHOTPLUG is not set to yes
        if [ "${IN_HOTPLUG}" = "1" -a "${ONHOTPLUG}" != "yes" \
                    -a "${HOSTNAME}" != "(none)" ]; then continue
        fi

        if [ -n "${SERVICE}" -a -x "${network_devices}/services/${SERVICE}" ]; then
            if [ -z "${CHECK_LINK}" -o "${CHECK_LINK}" = "y" \
                            -o "${CHECK_LINK}" = "yes" -o "${CHECK_LINK}" = "1" ]; then
                if ip link show ${1} > /dev/null 2>&1; then
                    link_status=`ip link show ${1}`
                    if [ -n "${link_status}" ]; then
                        if ! echo "${link_status}" | grep -q UP; then
                            ip link set ${1} up
                        fi
                    fi
                else
                    boot_mesg "Interface ${1} doesn't exist." ${WARNING}
                    echo_warning
                    continue
                fi
            fi
            IFCONFIG=${file} ${network_devices}/services/${SERVICE} ${1} up
        else
            boot_mesg "Unable to process ${file}.  Either" ${FAILURE}
            boot_mesg " the SERVICE variable was not set,"
            boot_mesg " or the specified service cannot be executed."
            echo_failure
            continue
        fi
    )
done

# End $network_devices/ifup

D.26. /etc/sysconfig/network-devices/ifdown

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $network_devices/ifdown
#
# Description : Interface Down
#
# Authors     : Nathan Coulson - nathan AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#               Kevin P. Fleming - kpfleming@linuxfromscratch.org
#
# Version     : 00.01
#
# Notes       : the IFCONFIG variable is passed to the scripts found
#               in the services directory, to indicate what file the
#               service should source to get environmental variables.
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc 
. ${rc_functions} 

# Collect a list of configuration files for our interface
if [ -n "${2}" ]; then
    for file in ${@#$1}; do # All parameters except $1
        FILES="${FILES} ${network_devices}/ifconfig.${1}/${file}"
    done
elif [ -d "${network_devices}/ifconfig.${1}" ]; then
    FILES=`echo ${network_devices}/ifconfig.${1}/*`
else
    FILES="${network_devices}/ifconfig.${1}"
fi

# Reverse the order configuration files are processed in
for file in ${FILES}; do
    FILES2="${file} ${FILES2}"
done
FILES=${FILES2}

# Process each configuration file
for file in ${FILES}; do
    # skip backup files
    if [ "${file}" != "${file%""~""}" ]; then
        continue
    fi

    if [ ! -f "${file}" ]; then
        boot_mesg "${file} is not a network configuration file or directory." ${WARNING}
        echo_warning
        continue
    fi
    (
        . ${file}

        # Will not process this service if started by boot, and ONBOOT
        # is not set to yes
        if [ "${IN_BOOT}" = "1" -a "${ONBOOT}" != "yes" ]; then
            continue
        fi

        # Will not process this service if started by hotplug, and 
        # ONHOTPLUG is not set to yes
        if [ "${IN_HOTPLUG}" = "1" -a "${ONHOTPLUG}" != "yes" ]; then
            continue
        fi
    
        # This will run the service script, if SERVICE is set
        if [ -n "${SERVICE}" -a -x "${network_devices}/services/${SERVICE}" ]; then
            if ip link show ${1} > /dev/null 2>&1
            then
                IFCONFIG=${file} ${network_devices}/services/${SERVICE} ${1} down
            else
                boot_mesg "Interface ${1} doesn't exist." ${WARNING}
                echo_warning
            fi
        else
            boot_mesg -n "Unable to process ${file}.  Either" ${FAILURE}
            boot_mesg -n " the SERVICE variable was not set,"
            boot_mesg " or the specified service cannot be executed."
            echo_failure
            continue
        fi
    )
done

if [ -z "${2}" ]; then
    link_status=`ip link show $1 2>/dev/null`
    if [ -n "${link_status}" ]; then
        if echo "${link_status}" | grep -q UP; then
            boot_mesg "Bringing down the ${1} interface..."
            ip link set ${1} down
            evaluate_retval
        fi
    fi
fi

# End $network_devices/ifdown

D.27. /etc/sysconfig/network-devices/services/ipv4-static

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $network_devices/services/ipv4-static
#
# Description : IPV4 Static Boot Script
#
# Authors     : Nathan Coulson - nathan AT linuxfromscratch D0T org
#        Kevin P. Fleming - kpfleming@linuxfromscratch.org
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc 
. ${rc_functions} 
. ${IFCONFIG}

if [ -z "${IP}" ]; then
    boot_mesg "IP variable missing from ${IFCONFIG}, cannot continue." ${FAILURE}
    echo_failure
    exit 1
fi

if [ -z "${PREFIX}" -a -z "${PEER}" ]; then
    boot_mesg -n "PREFIX variable missing from ${IFCONFIG}," ${WARNING}
    boot_mesg " assuming 24."
    echo_warning
    PREFIX=24
    args="${args} ${IP}/${PREFIX}"
elif [ -n "${PREFIX}" -a -n "${PEER}" ]; then
    boot_mesg "PREFIX and PEER both specified in ${IFCONFIG}, cannot continue." ${FAILURE}
    echo_failure
    exit 1
elif [ -n "${PREFIX}" ]; then
    args="${args} ${IP}/${PREFIX}"
elif [ -n "${PEER}" ]; then
    args="${args} ${IP} peer ${PEER}"
fi

if [ -n "${BROADCAST}" ]; then
    args="${args} broadcast ${BROADCAST}"
fi

case "${2}" in
    up)
        boot_mesg "Adding IPv4 address ${IP} to the ${1} interface..."
        ip addr add ${args} dev ${1}
        evaluate_retval
    
        if [ -n "${GATEWAY}" ]; then
            if ip route | grep -q default; then
                boot_mesg "Gateway already setup; skipping." ${WARNING}
                echo_warning
            else
                boot_mesg "Setting up default gateway..."
                ip route add default via ${GATEWAY} dev ${1}
                evaluate_retval
             fi
        fi
    ;;
    
    down)
        if [ -n "${GATEWAY}" ];    then
            boot_mesg "Removing default gateway..."
            ip route del default
            evaluate_retval
        fi
    
        boot_mesg "Removing IPv4 address ${IP} from the ${1} interface..."
        ip addr del ${args} dev ${1}
        evaluate_retval
    ;;
    
    *)
        echo "Usage: ${0} [interface] {up|down}"
        exit 1
    ;;
esac

# End $network_devices/services/ipv4-static

D.28. /etc/sysconfig/network-devices/services/ipv4-static-route

#!/bin/sh
########################################################################
# Begin $network_devices/services/ipv4-static-route
#
# Description : IPV4 Static Route Script
#
# Authors     : Kevin P. Fleming - kpfleming@linuxfromscratch.org
#
# Version     : 00.00
#
# Notes       :
#
########################################################################

. /etc/sysconfig/rc 
. ${rc_functions} 
. ${IFCONFIG}

case "${TYPE}" in
    ("" | "network")
        need_ip=1
        need_gateway=1
    ;;

    ("default")
        need_gateway=1
        args="${args} default"
        desc="default"
    ;;

    ("host")
        need_ip=1
    ;;

    ("unreachable")
        need_ip=1
        args="${args} unreachable"
        desc="unreachable "
    ;;

    (*)
        boot_mesg "Unknown route type (${TYPE}) in ${IFCONFIG}, cannot continue." ${FAILURE}
        echo_failure
        exit 1
    ;;
esac

if [ -n "${need_ip}" ]; then
    if [ -z "${IP}" ]; then
        boot_mesg "IP variable missing from ${IFCONFIG}, cannot continue." ${FAILURE}
        echo_failure
        exit 1
    fi

    if [ -z "${PREFIX}" ]; then
        boot_mesg "PREFIX variable missing from ${IFCONFIG}, cannot continue." ${FAILURE}
        echo_failure
        exit 1
    fi
    
    args="${args} ${IP}/${PREFIX}"
    desc="${desc}${IP}/${PREFIX}"
fi

if [ -n "${need_gateway}" ]; then
    if [ -z "${GATEWAY}" ]; then
        boot_mesg "GATEWAY variable missing from ${IFCONFIG}, cannot continue." ${FAILURE}
        echo_failure
        exit 1
    fi
    args="${args} via ${GATEWAY}"
fi

if [ -n "${SOURCE}" ]; then
        args="${args} src ${SOURCE}"
fi

case "${2}" in
    up)
        boot_mesg "Adding '${desc}' route to the ${1} interface..."
        ip route add ${args} dev ${1}
        evaluate_retval
    ;;
    
    down)
        boot_mesg "Removing '${desc}' route from the ${1} interface..."
        ip route del ${args} dev ${1}
        evaluate_retval
    ;;
    
    *)
        echo "Usage: ${0} [interface] {up|down}"
        exit 1
    ;;
esac

# End $network_devices/services/ipv4-static-route

Appendix E. Udev configuration rules

The rules from udev-config-20100128.tar.bz2 in this appendix are listed for convenience. Installation is normally done via instructions in Section 6.60, “Udev-166”.

E.1. 55-lfs.rules

            # /etc/udev/rules.d/55-lfs.rules: Rule definitions for LFS.

# Core kernel devices

# This causes the system clock to be set as soon as /dev/rtc becomes available.
SUBSYSTEM=="rtc", ACTION=="add", MODE="0644", RUN+="/etc/rc.d/init.d/setclock start"
KERNEL=="rtc", ACTION=="add", MODE="0644", RUN+="/etc/rc.d/init.d/setclock start"

# Comms devices

KERNEL=="ippp[0-9]*",       GROUP="dialout"
KERNEL=="isdn[0-9]*",       GROUP="dialout"
KERNEL=="isdnctrl[0-9]*",   GROUP="dialout"
KERNEL=="dcbri[0-9]*",      GROUP="dialout"

Appendix F. LFS Licenses

This book is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 License.

Computer instructions may be extracted from the book under the MIT License.

F.1. Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Legal Code

Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0

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License

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F.2. The MIT License

Copyright © 1999-2011 Gerard Beekmans

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

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