Need Suggestion(modifying kernel source)

Need Suggestion(modifying kernel source)

[chiranjeevi vaka]

Hi all,

I am a graduate student doing research in linux TCP/IP
stack modification. My job is replacing the TCP layer
Sliding window protocol with Credit based mechanism.

The major problem I am getting is, as and when I do a
small change, to test that change, I have to compile
the whole kernel make boot floppy and reboot the
kernel with that floppy and test the code. This way is
takinbg too much time. I donno how linux kernel
developers will make changes to kernel and test them. 

Is there any other way to do this. Like using some
debugger or writing some modules. If I want to write a
module for this I can't create the whole linux TCP/IP
stack as a seperate module as it is monolithic kernel.
Can you suggest me in this issue. If it is any thing
to deal with the kernel debugger can you give me
proper links so that I can get more information about
that.


Thanking you in advance
Muali

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Re: Need Suggestion(modifying kernel source)

[Vincent Bernat]

OoO En cette soirée bien amorcée du lundi 04 mars 2002, vers 22:23,
chiranjeevi vaka <cvaka_kernel@yahoo.com> disait:

> The major problem I am getting is, as and when I do a
> small change, to test that change, I have to compile
> the whole kernel make boot floppy and reboot the
> kernel with that floppy and test the code. This way is
> takinbg too much time. I donno how linux kernel
> developers will make changes to kernel and test them. 

http://user-mode-linux.sourceforge.net
-- 
BOFH excuse #306: CPU-angle has to be adjusted because of vibrations
coming from the nearby road

Re: Need Suggestion(modifying kernel source)

[Mike Fedyk]

On Mon, Mar 04, 2002 at 10:44:00PM +0100, Vincent Bernat wrote:
> OoO En cette soir?e bien amorc?e du lundi 04 mars 2002, vers 22:23,
> chiranjeevi vaka <cvaka_kernel@yahoo.com> disait:
> 
> > The major problem I am getting is, as and when I do a
> > small change, to test that change, I have to compile
> > the whole kernel make boot floppy and reboot the
> > kernel with that floppy and test the code. This way is
> > takinbg too much time. I donno how linux kernel
> > developers will make changes to kernel and test them. 
> 
> http://user-mode-linux.sourceforge.net

Also, you should be able to compile again without "make clean" to only
compile the changed C files and link.  This is possible with kbuild2.4, but
kbuild2.5 should take out the trickyness.

Can someone point out the procedure for kbuild2.4?

Re: Need Suggestion(modifying kernel source)

[Alan Cox]

> The major problem I am getting is, as and when I do a
> small change, to test that change, I have to compile
> the whole kernel make boot floppy and reboot the
> kernel with that floppy and test the code. This way is
> takinbg too much time. I donno how linux kernel
> developers will make changes to kernel and test them. 

Tweak the file concerned , make bzImage make modules
On the target box with the other machine NFS mounted
make modules_install; cp the kernel and reboot the
test box

> Can you suggest me in this issue. If it is any thing
> to deal with the kernel debugger can you give me
> proper links so that I can get more information about
> that.

Search for "kdb" "linux"

Also look at usermode linux (on sourceforge), then you can run a Linux
inside of Linux

Re: Need Suggestion(modifying kernel source)

[pjd]

chiranjeevi vaka wrote:
> 
> The major problem I am getting is, as and when I do a
> small change, to test that change, I have to compile
> the whole kernel make boot floppy and reboot the
> kernel with that floppy and test the code. This way is
> takinbg too much time. I donno how linux kernel
> developers will make changes to kernel and test them. 

A possibility that no one has mentioned is to have a diskless
target machine, booting with TFTP and using an NFS root filesystem.
Boot NILO (www.nilo.org) on a floppy, and configure it to load
the kernel off a TFTP server, which would also be the machine you
compile and run kgdb on.

One advantage is that no matter how badly you crash the target
machine you won't corrupt the filesystem.

............................................................................
 Peter Desnoyers 
 162 Pleasant St.         (617) 661-1979          pjd@fred.cambridge.ma.us
 Cambridge, Mass. 02139