linux newbie

[Bill McGonigle]

On Jan 12, 2007, at 10:27, mike miller wrote:

>> When I tried to install it (make clean modules) I got an error (no  
>> such file or directory) after the line:
>> Make -C /lib/modules/2.618-1.2798.fc6/build ........
>> I went to that directory and found a file named build but it was  
>> identified as a "broken link".  Every time I clicked on it, it  
>> would disappear until I refreshed the view.
>> There was another broken link in the same directory named "sources".

Here's the best way to figure out problems like this.

cd to the directory, ala:

   cd /lib/modules/2.618-1.2798.fc6/

do:

   ls -l

and you should see something like:

   total 1192
   lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root     47 Jan 11 19:58 build -> ../../../usr/ 
src/kernels/2.6.18-1.2798.fc6-i686/
   drwxr-xr-x 2 root root   4096 Dec 20 15:04 extra/
   drwxr-xr-x 9 root root   4096 Jan 11 19:58 kernel/
   -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 257316 Jan 11 19:58 modules.alias
   -rw-r--r-- 1 root root     69 Jan 11 19:58 modules.ccwmap
   -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 270117 Jan 11 19:58 modules.dep
   -rw-r--r-- 1 root root    813 Jan 11 19:58 modules.ieee1394map
   -rw-r--r-- 1 root root    375 Jan 11 19:58 modules.inputmap
   -rw-r--r-- 1 root root  12159 Jan 11 19:58 modules.isapnpmap
   -rw-r--r-- 1 root root     74 Jan 11 19:58 modules.ofmap
   -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 197387 Jan 11 19:58 modules.pcimap
   -rw-r--r-- 1 root root    841 Jan 11 19:58 modules.seriomap
   -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 114572 Jan 11 19:58 modules.symbols
   -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 303364 Jan 11 19:58 modules.usbmap
   lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root      5 Jan 11 19:58 source -> build/
   drwxr-xr-x 2 root root   4096 Dec 20 15:04 updates/
   drwxr-xr-x 2 root root   4096 Dec 20 15:04 weak-updates/

you'll also see 'build' in red or something indicating the link is  
broken, that is the linked destination doesn't exist.

So, figure out where that file comes from:

   yum whatprovides /usr/src/kernels/2.6.18-1.2798.fc6-i686/

and you'll see:

   kernel-devel.i686                        2.6.18-1.2798.fc6      core
   Matched from:
   /usr/src/kernels/2.6.18-1.2798.fc6-i686/

probably followed by lots of sub-file matches (ctrl-c to kill it) and  
this makes sense - you need the kernel development files to build a  
module, typically.

So try:

   yum -y install kernel-devel

and then try building again.  It wouldn't be surprising if you also  
need the kernel-headers package, so do the same as above for that one  
if you need to.  Sometimes you might find a system that doesn't have  
the compiler installed that you need to compile stuff; in that case  
you might need to do:

   yum -y install gcc

-Bill

-----
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