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dragos240
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Joined: 19 Apr 2009
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 Posted: Sun Oct 04, 2009 12:51 pm Post subject: How do I build initrd? |
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| How do I build the initrd, I got the kernel, but it doesn't explain how to get the initrd. Some help would be appreciated. |
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Jaglover
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Joined: 29 May 2005
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Location: Saint Amant, Acadiana
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dragos240
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Joined: 19 Apr 2009
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| Posted: Sun Oct 04, 2009 1:20 pm Post subject: |
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| Jaglover wrote: | | Why would you need initrd? Do you have some exotic hardware which comes with binary blobs? |
Oh, so you ONLY need the kernel? I thought you needed an initrd to boot (my experience in most linux distros) |
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Jaglover
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Location: Saint Amant, Acadiana
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| Posted: Sun Oct 04, 2009 1:22 pm Post subject: |
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| Yep, build support for your HDD controller, partition table and root partition filesystem into kernel (not as modules) and that's it. |
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dragos240
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Joined: 19 Apr 2009
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| Posted: Sun Oct 04, 2009 1:32 pm Post subject: |
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| Jaglover wrote: | | Yep, build support for your HDD controller, partition table and root partition filesystem into kernel (not as modules) and that's it. |
Thanks! |
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Hu
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Joined: 06 Mar 2007
Posts: 21773
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| Posted: Sun Oct 04, 2009 5:06 pm Post subject: |
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| dragos240 wrote: | | Oh, so you ONLY need the kernel? I thought you needed an initrd to boot (my experience in most linux distros) |
Most Linux distributions ship a kernel+initrd so that they can support a wide variety of hardware without including every possible driver statically in the kernel. Since you can build your own kernel for Gentoo, you can tailor it to the hardware you need, build in drivers for that, and exclude everything else. Gentoo supports an initrd, and you may need it for configurations where the root filesystem cannot be autodiscovered by the kernel. For example, a laptop with an encrypted root filesystem needs an initrd to prepare the mapping before the kernel can try to run the real init process.
For simplicity, try without an initrd. If that works, you are done. If not, ask for help and someone can tell you whether your goal requires an initrd or if you made a mistake, such as specifying the root device incorrectly. |
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disi
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Joined: 28 Nov 2003
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Location: Out There ...
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Veldrin
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Joined: 27 Jul 2004
Posts: 1945
Location: Zurich, Switzerland
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| Posted: Mon Oct 05, 2009 10:27 am Post subject: |
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in gentoo, the simplest way to create a initrd+kernel is to use genkernel.
Works flawless, and it still supports customization like bootsplash.
But as mentioned, initrd are only needed on some special setups (or if used in a binary distro).
cheers
V. |
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Installing Gentoo
