[uml-user] Suggestion for installing modules

[Cameron K. <cam...@pa...>]

Hi all,

I was writing a laboratory tutorial today on managing the Linux kernel
for both hardware and UML systems.

It struck me that the documentation suggests in order to install
modules, to mount the filesystem using loopback, and then use make
modules_install MOD_INST_DIR(or whatever it is)=/foo/bar/

Since a large part (for me) of using UML is so they don't need root
access, I decided I needed another way (I didn't want to have to
mount them myself, and a "user" in fstab entry seemed unclean.

So I came up with this. I'd appreciate any comments.

Configure the kernel with modules enabled, but build in whatever you
need to boot the system into the kernel, and build normally.

	make menuconfig ARCH=um
	#The -s means I only see warnings and errors, and is useful
	#if you're working over slow ssh links ;^)
	make -s dep clean linux modules ARCH=um
	strip -s cow/cameron/src/linux/linux
	cp cow/cameron/src/linux/linux cow/cameron/linux-foo

Boot your system using your new kernel
	
	#I have my own script that does COW things and switch things
	LINUX=cow/cameron/linux-foo ./slackware foobar
	
Now (notice we haven't needed root on the host so far), mount (using
hostfs) the directory where your kernel source is.

	mkdir /mnt/mods
	mount none /mnt/mods -t hostfs -o \
		/uml/slackware-8.1/cow/cameron/src/linux/
	cd /mnt/mods
	make modules_install ARCH=um	#Yes, you DO need ARCH=um here
	depmod -a			#Just to check
	umount /mnt/mods
	shutdown -r now			#Optional

I hope someone can find this useful.

-- 
Cameron Kerr
-- 
Email:   cam...@pa...
Website: http://homepages.paradise.net.nz/~cameronk/