On Wed, 23 Jan 2002, Earl Brannigan wrote:
Since I got into Linux (about 1997) I've built many kernels, all of which were built using the good old reliable make - the same way available on all distros I've used (until Debian), thus the de-facto standard way (my definition of 'proper' in this context). This is not possible under Debian, you have to learn another way (make-kpkg).
Erm, you can do it the old fashioned way, this is indeed what i did when i first used debian and never had any problems doing it. All make-kpkg does in reality is do the make modules, bzimage, etc for you. Then it packages the kernel and will update symlinks and make sure it is added to the bootloader etc. in the correct manner when you install it. In reality it is only a script to make sure you don't make mistakes (a good thing IMHO) like forgetting to run lilo or put the new modules in the correct place etc. the other nice thing is that when you want to upgrade to a newer major kernel version then Debian will sort it out for you and all the package dependancies.
Anyhow, i am not flaming, or even turning up the radiators, I just wondered what problems you have had with debian kernels. If anything Debian kernels are more pure than other kernels as they don't have lots of random patches applied as default (like Redhat) so they should work better out of the box and you can add the other bits you feel like.
Adam