Linux From Scratch

Version 5.1-pre1

Gerard Beekmans

This book describes the process of creating a Linux system from scratch, using nothing but the sources of the required software.

Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are met:

Redistributions in any form must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
Neither the name of "Linux From Scratch" nor the names of its contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this material without specific prior written permission.
Any material derived from Linux From Scratch must contain a reference to the "Linux From Scratch" project.

THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.

Dedication

This book is dedicated to my loving and supportive wife Beverly Beekmans.

Table of Contents

Preface

Foreword

Audience

Who would want to read this book
Who would not want to read this book

Prerequisites

Structure

Part I - Introduction
Part II - Preparing for the build
Part III - Building the LFS system
Part IV - Appendices

I. Part I - Introduction

1. Introduction

How things are going to be done
Conventions used in this book
Book version
Changelog
Resources
Acknowledgments

2. Important information

About $LFS
About SBUs
About the test suites
How to ask for help

II. Part II - Preparing for the build

3. Preparing a new partition

Introduction
Creating a new partition
Creating a file system on the new partition
Mounting the new partition

4. The materials: packages and patches

Introduction
All the packages
Needed patches

5. Constructing a temporary system

Introduction
Toolchain technical notes
Creating the $LFS/tools directory
Adding the user lfs
Setting up the environment
Installing Binutils-2.14 - Pass 1
Installing GCC-3.3.2 - Pass 1
Installing Linux-2.4.24 headers
Installing Glibc-2.3.3
"Locking in" Glibc
Installing Tcl-8.4.5
Installing Expect-5.40.0
Installing DejaGnu-1.4.4
Installing GCC-3.3.2 - Pass 2
Installing Binutils-2.14 - Pass 2
Installing Gawk-3.1.3
Installing Coreutils-5.0
Installing Bzip2-1.0.2
Installing Gzip-1.3.5
Installing Diffutils-2.8.1
Installing Findutils-4.1.20
Installing Make-3.80
Installing Grep-2.5.1
Installing Sed-4.0.9
Installing Gettext-0.14.1
Installing Ncurses-5.3
Installing Patch-2.5.4
Installing Tar-1.13.25
Installing Texinfo-4.6
Installing Bash-2.05b
Installing Util-linux-2.12
Installing Perl-5.8.3
Stripping

III. Part III - Building the LFS system

6. Installing basic system software

Introduction
Entering the chroot environment
Changing ownership
Creating directories
Mounting the proc and devpts file systems
Creating essential symlinks
Creating the passwd, group and log files
Creating devices with Makedev-1.7
Installing Linux-2.4.24 headers
Installing Man-pages-1.65
Installing Glibc-2.3.3
Re-adjusting the toolchain
Installing Binutils-2.14
Installing GCC-3.3.2
Installing Coreutils-5.0
Installing Zlib-1.2.1
Installing Lfs-Utils-0.4.2
Installing Findutils-4.1.20
Installing Gawk-3.1.3
Installing Ncurses-5.3
Installing Vim-6.2
Installing M4-1.4
Installing Bison-1.875
Installing Less-381
Installing Groff-1.19
Installing Sed-4.0.9
Installing Flex-2.5.4a
Installing Gettext-0.14.1
Installing Net-tools-1.60
Installing Inetutils-1.4.2
Installing Perl-5.8.3
Installing Texinfo-4.6
Installing Autoconf-2.59
Installing Automake-1.8.2
Installing Bash-2.05b
Installing File-4.07
Installing Libtool-1.5.2
Installing Bzip2-1.0.2
Installing Diffutils-2.8.1
Installing Ed-0.2
Installing Kbd-1.12
Installing E2fsprogs-1.34
Installing Grep-2.5.1
Installing Grub-0.94
Installing Gzip-1.3.5
Installing Man-1.5m2
Installing Make-3.80
Installing Modutils-2.4.26
Installing Patch-2.5.4
Installing Procinfo-18
Installing Procps-3.1.15
Installing Psmisc-21.4
Installing Shadow-4.0.4.1
Installing Sysklogd-1.4.1
Installing Sysvinit-2.85
Installing Tar-1.13.25
Installing Util-linux-2.12
Installing GCC-2.95.3
Revised chroot command
Installing LFS-Bootscripts-1.12
About debugging symbols

7. Setting up system boot scripts

Introduction
How does the booting process with these scripts work?
Configuring the setclock script
Do I need the loadkeys script?
Configuring the sysklogd script
Configuring the localnet script
Creating the /etc/hosts file
Configuring the network script

8. Making the LFS system bootable

Introduction
Creating the /etc/fstab file
Installing Linux-2.4.24
Making the LFS system bootable

9. The End

The End
Get Counted
Rebooting the system
What now?

IV. Part IV - Appendices

A. Index of packages
B. Index of programs and library files

Preface

Foreword

Having used a number of different Linux distributions, I was never fully satisfied with any of them. I didn't like the arrangement of the bootscripts. I didn't like the way certain programs were configured by default. Much more of that sort of thing bothered me. Finally I realized that if I wanted full satisfaction from my Linux system I would have to build my own system from scratch, using only the source code. I resolved not to use pre-compiled packages of any kind, nor CD-ROM or boot disk that would install some basic utilities. I would use my current Linux system to develop my own.

This wild idea seemed very difficult at the time and often seemed an impossible task. After sorting out all kinds of problems, such as dependencies and compile-time errors, a custom-built Linux system was created that was fully operational. I called this system a Linux From Scratch system, or LFS for short.

I hope you will have a great time working on your own LFS!

--
Gerard Beekmans
gerard@linuxfromscratch.org

Audience

Who would want to read this book

There are many reasons why somebody would want to read this book. The principal reason being to install a Linux system straight from the source code. A question many people raise is "Why go through all the hassle of manually building a Linux system from scratch when you can just download and install an existing one?". That is a good question and is the impetus for this section of the book.

One important reason for LFS's existence is to help people learn how a Linux system works from the inside out. Building an LFS system helps demonstrate to you what makes Linux tick, how things work together and depend on each other. One of the best things that this learning experience provides is the ability to customize Linux to your own tastes and needs.

A key benefit of LFS is that you have more control of your system without relying on someone else's Linux implementation. With LFS, you are in the driver's seat and dictate every aspect of your system, such as the directory layout and bootscript setup. You also dictate where, why and how programs are installed.

Another benefit of LFS is the ability to create a very compact Linux system. When installing a regular distribution, you are usually forced to install several programs which you are likely never to use. They're just sitting there wasting precious disk space (or worse, CPU cycles). It isn't difficult to build an LFS system less than 100 MB. Does that still sound like a lot? A few of us have been working on creating a very small embedded LFS system. We successfully built a system that was just enough to run the Apache web server with approximately 8MB of disk space used. Further stripping could bring that down to 5 MB or less. Try that with a regular distribution.

We could compare distributed Linux to a hamburger you buy at a fast-food restaurant -- you have no idea what you are eating. LFS, on the other hand, doesn't give you a hamburger, but the recipe to make a hamburger. This allows you to review it, to omit unwanted ingredients, and to add your own ingredients which enhance the flavor of your burger. When you are satisfied with the recipe, you go on to preparing it. You make it just the way you like it: broil it, bake it, deep-fry it, barbecue it, or eat it tar-tar (raw).

Another analogy that we can use is that of comparing LFS with a finished house. LFS will give you the skeletal plan of a house, but it's up to you to build it. You have the freedom to adjust your plans as you go.

One last advantage of a custom built Linux system is security. By compiling the entire system from source code, you are empowered to audit everything and apply all the security patches you feel are needed. You don't have to wait for somebody else to compile binary packages that fix a security hole. Unless you examine the patch and implement it yourself you have no guarantee that the new binary package was built correctly and actually fixes the problem (adequately).

There are too many good reasons to build your own LFS system for them all to be listed here. This section is only the tip of the iceberg. As you continue in your LFS experience, you will find on your own the power that information and knowledge truly bring.

Who would not want to read this book

There are probably some who, for whatever reason, would feel that they do not want to read this book. If you do not wish to build your own Linux system from scratch, then you probably don't want to read this book. Our goal is to help you build a complete and usable foundation-level system. If you only want to know what happens while your computer boots, then we recommend the "From Power Up To Bash Prompt" HOWTO. The HOWTO builds a bare system which is similar to that of this book, but it focuses strictly on creating a system capable of booting to a BASH prompt.

While you decide which to read, consider your objective. If you wish to build a Linux system while learning a bit along the way, then this book is probably your best choice. If your objective is strictly educational and you do not have any plans for your finished system, then the "From Power Up To Bash Prompt" HOWTO is probably a better choice.

The "From Power Up To Bash Prompt" HOWTO is located at http://axiom.anu.edu.au/~okeefe/p2b/ or on The Linux Documentation Project's website at http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/From-PowerUp-To-Bash-Prompt-HOWTO.html.

Prerequisites

This book assumes that its reader has a good deal of knowledge about using and installing Linux software. Before you begin building your LFS system, you should read the following HOWTOs:

Software-Building-HOWTO

This is a comprehensive guide to building and installing "generic" Unix software distributions under Linux. This HOWTO is available at http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Software-Building-HOWTO.html.
The Linux Users' Guide

This guide covers the usage of assorted Linux software and is available at http://espc22.murdoch.edu.au/~stewart/guide/guide.html.
The Essential Pre-Reading Hint

This is an LFS Hint written specifically for new users of Linux. It is mostly a list of links to excellent sources of information on a wide range of topics. Any person attempting to install LFS, should at least have an understanding of many of the topics in this hint. It is available at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/essential_prereading.txt

Structure

This book is divided into the following four parts:

Part I - Introduction

Part I explains a few important things on how to proceed with the installation, and gives meta information about the book (version, changelog, acknowledgments, associated mailing lists, and so on).

Part II - Preparing for the build

Part II describes how to prepare for the building process: making a partition, downloading the packages, and compiling temporary tools.

Part III - Building the LFS system

Part III guides you through the building of the LFS system: compiling and installing all the packages one by one, setting up the boot scripts, and installing the kernel. The resulting basic Linux system is the foundation upon which you can build other software, to extend your system in the way you like.

Part IV - Appendices

Part IV consists of two appendices. The first is an alphabetical list of all the installed packages, and the second an alphabetical list of all the installed programs and libraries, mentioning which package installed it.

I. Part I - Introduction

Table of Contents
1. Introduction
2. Important information

Chapter 1. Introduction

How things are going to be done

You are going to build your LFS system by using a previously installed Linux distribution (such as Debian, Mandrake, Red Hat, or SuSE). This existing Linux system (the host) will be used as a starting point, because you will need programs like a compiler, linker and shell to build the new system. Normally all the required tools are available if you selected "development" as one of the options when you installed your distribution.

In Chapter 3 you will first create a new Linux native partition and file system, the place where your new LFS system will be compiled and installed. Then in Chapter 4 you download all the packages and patches required to build an LFS system, and store them on the new file system.

Chapter 5 then discusses the installation of a number of packages that will form the basic development suite (or toolchain) which is used to build the actual system in Chapter 6. Some of these packages are needed to resolve circular dependencies -- for example, to compile a compiler you need a compiler.

The first thing to be done in Chapter 5 is build a first pass of the toolchain, made up of Binutils and GCC. The programs from these packages will be linked statically in order for them to be usable independently of the host system. The second thing to do is build Glibc, the C library. Glibc will be compiled by the toolchain programs we just built in the first pass. The third thing to do is build a second pass of the toolchain. This time the toolchain will be dynamically linked against the newly built Glibc. The remaining Chapter 5 packages are all built using this second pass toolchain and dynamically linked against the new host-independent Glibc. When this is done, the LFS installation process will no longer depend on the host distribution, with the exception of the running kernel.

You may be thinking that "this seems like a lot of work, just to get away from my host distribution". Well, a full technical explanation is provided at the start of Chapter 5, including some notes on the differences between statically and dynamically linked programs.

In Chapter 6 your real LFS system will be built. The chroot (change root) program is used to enter a virtual environment and start a new shell whose root directory will be set to the LFS partition. This is very similar to rebooting and instructing the kernel to mount the LFS partition as the root partition. The reason that you don't actually reboot, but instead chroot, is that creating a bootable system requires additional work which isn't necessary just yet. But the major advantage is that chrooting allows you to continue using the host while LFS is being built. While waiting for package compilation to complete, you can simply switch to a different VC (Virtual Console) or X desktop and continue using the computer as you normally would.

To finish the installation, the bootscripts are set up in Chapter 7, the kernel and bootloader are set up in Chapter 8, and Chapter 9 contains some pointers to help you after you finish the book. Then, finally, you're ready to reboot your computer into your new LFS system.

This is the process in a nutshell. Detailed information on the steps you will take are discussed in the chapters and package descriptions as you progress through them. If something isn't completely clear now, don't worry, everything will fall into place soon.

Please read Chapter 2 carefully as it explains a few important things you should be aware of before you begin to work through Chapter 5 and beyond.

Conventions used in this book

To make things easy to follow, there are a number of conventions used throughout the book. Following are some examples:

./configure --prefix=/usr

This form of text is designed to be typed exactly as seen unless otherwise noted in the surrounding text. It is also used in the explanation sections to identify which of the commands is being referenced.

install-info: unknown option `--dir-file=/mnt/lfs/usr/info/dir'

This form of text (fixed width text) is showing screen output, probably as the result of commands issued, and is also used to show filenames, such as /etc/ld.so.conf.

Emphasis

This form of text is used for several purposes in the book, mainly to emphasize important points, and to give examples of what to type.

http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/

This form of text is used for hyperlinks, both within the book and to external pages such as HOWTOs, download locations and websites.

cat > $LFS/etc/group << "EOF"
root:x:0:
bin:x:1:
......
EOF

This type of section is used mainly when creating configuration files. The first command tells the system to create the file $LFS/etc/group from whatever is typed on the following lines until the sequence EOF is encountered. Therefore, this whole section is generally typed as seen.

Book version

This is version 5.1-pre1 of the Linux From Scratch book, dated February 1st, 2004. If this book is more than three months old, a newer and better version is probably already available. To find out, check one of the mirrors listed on http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/.

Changelog

5.1-pre1 - February 1st, 2004

Upgraded to:
- autoconf-2.59
- automake-1.8.2
- dejagnu-1.4.4
- expect-5.40.0
- file-4.07
- gcc-3.3.2
- gettext-0.14.1
- glibc-2.3.3
- grub-0.94
- kbd-1.12
- man-pages-1.64
- lfs-utils-0.4.2
- libtool-1.5.2
- linux-2.4.24
- man-pages-1.65
- modutils-2.4.26
- perl-5.8.3
- procps-3.1.15
- psmisc-21.4
- sed-4.0.9
- shadow-4.0.4.1
- tcl-8.4.5
- zlib-1.2.1
Added:
- coreutils-5.0-posixver-2.patch
- gcc-3.3.2-no_fixincludes-1.patch
- inetutils-1.4.2-no_server_man_pages-1.patch
- kbd-1.12-more-programs-1.patch
Removed:
- gawk-3.1.3-libexecdir.patch
- gcc-3.3.1-no_fixincludes-2.patch
- gcc-3.3.1-suppress-libiberty.patch
- glibc-2.3.2-sscanf-1.patch
- grub-0.93-gcc33-1.patch
- kbd-1.08-more-programs.patch
- man-1.5m2-manpath.patch
- man-1.5m2-pager.patch
- ncurses-5.3-vsscanf.patch
- procps-3.1.11-locale-fix.patch
- shadow-4.0.3-newgrp-fix.patch
- zlib-1.1.4-vsnprintf.patch
February 1st, 2004 [gerard]: LFS-5.1-PRE1 release.
February 1st, 2004 [gerard]: Applied Anderson's patch fixing: wrong official download location for file, fix TCLs tcl-package entity, remove redundant download locations for e2fsprogs and psmisc, and fix incorrect extensions for gcc, groff, kbd, libtool, man and man-pages. Closed bugs #750, #751 and #754.
February 1st, 2004 [matt]: Upgraded to expect-5.40.0
February 1st, 2004 [gerard]: Added two additional mirror sites for the Glibc tarball: mirror.averse.net (http & ftp) and ftp.lfs-matrix.de (ftp only).
February 1st, 2004 [gerard]: Applied Matthew's patch to upgrade to dejagnu-1.4.4, gettext-0.14.1, grub-0.94, libtool-1.5.2 and man-pages-1.65.
January 27th, 2004 [alex]: Chapters 5 + 6 - Replaced 'build time' and 'disk space' texts with entities for esy change.
January 26th, 2004 [alex]: Chapter 1 - Resources: Added links to the Wiki and the LFS-References page.
January 25th, 2004 [greg]: Chapter 5 - Adding the user lfs: Added "-k /dev/null" to the useradd command to prevent /etc/skel files from coming across.
January 21st, 2004 [alex]: Chapters 2 and 6 - Making a few extra cross references.
January 19th, 2004 [greg]: Upgraded to Glibc-2.3.3, Kbd-1.12, Perl-5.8.3 and Shadow-4.0.4.1.
January 19th, 2004 [alex]: Chapter 2 - Added a reference to Bruce's pages on build times and SBUs.
January 17th, 2004 [greg]: Chapter 7 - Creating the /etc/hosts file: Amended example domain names to comply with RFC 2606. Closes 742.
January 16th, 2004 [greg]: Expanded the Locking in Glibc and Re-adjusting the toolchain sanity checks to also catch missing cc->gcc symlink and provide more help for when things go wrong.
January 16th, 2004 [greg]: Implemented changes to make the running of the Chapter 5 test suites strictly optional i.e. the default action for the average reader is to not run them. Closes 719.
January 14th, 2004 [alex]: Cleaned up stale files and entities after the big move.
January 13th, 2004 [greg]: Chapter 8 - Installation of the kernel: Added command to keep a copy of the kernel .config file.
January 13th, 2004 [greg]: Moved log file creation from Shadow to "Creating the passwd and group files" and renamed that section accordingly. Closes 741.
January 13th, 2004 [greg]: Upgraded to Automake-1.8.2, Kbd-1.11 and Sed-4.0.9.
January 12th, 2004 [alex]: Moved all the information in appendix A (the program descriptions and download locations) to chapter 6, dividing each package page in roughly three sections: Statistics, Instructions, and Short descriptions.
January 9th, 2004 [greg]: Chapter 7 - Configuring the network script: Added instructions to create /etc/resolv.conf. Closes 733.
January 9th, 2004 [greg]: Chapter 8 - Making the LFS system bootable: Added --no-mem-option to Grub command line in menu.lst to disable Grub's insistence on passing mem= to the kernel. Closes 737.
January 7th, 2004 [greg]: Chapter 5 - Util-linux: Added command to install the arch program which is needed by Perl for consistency. Upgraded to Kbd-1.10.
January 6th, 2004 [greg]: Chapter 6 - Gawk: Removed the Gawk Libexecdir Patch. Closes Bug 303.
January 6th, 2004 [greg]: Upgraded to File-4.07, Linux-2.4.24 and Procps-3.1.15.
December 17th, 2003 [greg]: Chapter 6 - Vim: Added commands to run the Vim test suite. Closes Bug 722.
December 17th, 2003 [greg]: Upgraded to Autoconf-2.59, Automake-1.8 and Gettext-0.13.1.
December 17th, 2003 [greg]: Chapter 6 - Kbd: Updated to new patch that also installs the man pages for the additional programs. Closes Bug 726.
December 17th, 2003 [greg]: Chapter 6 - Zlib: Added chmod command to fix static library permissions. Closes Bug 728.
December 12th, 2003 [greg]: Glibc: Moved ld.so.conf creation to immediately before make install in both chapters.
December 11th, 2003 [greg]: Chapter 6 - Inetutils: Added patch to prevent unnecessary man pages from being installed. Closes Bug 723.
December 11th, 2003 [greg]: Chapter 6 - Creating directories: Stopped creation of /usr/share/{dict,nls}. Closes Bug 721.
December 11th, 2003 [greg]: Chapter 5 - Setting up the environment: Fixed Bash startup files to handle HOME and PS1.
December 3rd, 2003 [greg]: Upgraded to Gettext-0.13, Man-pages-1.64, Linux-2.4.23 and Psmisc-21.4.
November 26th, 2003 [greg]: Upgraded to Lfs-Utils-0.4.2, Tcl-8.4.5 and Zlib-1.2.1. Obsoletes the Zlib Vsnprintf patch.
November 23rd, 2003 [greg]: Upgraded to Lfs-Utils-0.4.1 and improved its build commands.
November 20th, 2003 [greg]: Rolled back the following patches to sed substitutions: GCC Suppress-Libiberty Patch, Grub Gcc33 Patch, Man Manpath Patch and Man Pager Patch. Closes Bug 461.
November 19th, 2003 [greg]: Chapter 5 - Setting up the environment: Reworked the Bash startup files to enforce a clean environment. Closes Bug 714.
November 17th, 2003 [jeremy]: Upgraded Man-pages to 1.63.
November 16th, 2003 [greg]: Chapter 6 - Sysvinit: Simplified the sed to demonstrate yet another sed variation.
November 17th, 2003 [jeremy]: Chapter 6 - Perl: Added fix for perldoc less invocation problem. Closes bug 716.
November 16th, 2003 [greg]: Chapter 6 - Texinfo: Added note about how to recreate the /usr/share/info/dir file if needed. Closes Bug 485.
November 14th, 2003 [greg]: Removed unnecessary Ncurses Vsscanf Patch. Closes Bug 704.
November 14th, 2003 [gerard]: Adjusted libexecdir location for these packages: Glibc - /usr/bin to /usr/lib, Findutils - /usr/bin to /usr/lib/locate, Gawk - /usr/bin to /usr/lib/gawk, Tar - /usr/bin to /usr/sbin. Closes Bug #678.
November 14th, 2003 [greg]: Chapter 6 - Coreutils: Stopped moving these binaries into /bin: dir, dircolors, du, mkfifo, shred, vdir. Closes Bug 679.
November 14th, 2003 [greg]: Chapter 6 - Shadow: Added command to create /etc/default directory to allow the -D option of useradd to work properly.
November 14th, 2003 [greg]: Chapter 6 - Coreutils and Util-linux: Pruned the number of "kill" binaries installed. Use the one from Procps. Partially addresses Bug 307.
November 13th, 2003 [greg]: Chapter 6 - Ed: Streamlined build commands. Closes Bug 693.
November 13th, 2003 [greg]: Upgraded to Perl-5.8.2 and streamlined build commands for Perl's Chapter 5 static extensions. Closes Bug 690.
November 13th, 2003 [gerard]: Upgraded to Lfs-Utils-0.4 and Man-pages-1.62
November 13th, 2003 [gerard]: Renamed GCC no_fixincludes-2.patch to no_fixincludes-1.patch which was the name it is supposed to be.
November 13th, 2003 [alex]: Chapter 6 - Vim: Changed from creating a local /root/.vimrc to a system-wide /etc/vimrc file .
November 12th, 2003 [greg]: Removed unnecessary Automake symlink.
November 12th, 2003 [greg]: Removed unnecessary Procps Locale Patch. Closes Bug 705.
November 12th, 2003 [greg]: Upgraded to Autoconf-2.58, Automake-1.7.9, File-4.06, Modutils-2.4.26, Procps-3.1.14 and Sed-4.0.8.
November 12th, 2003 [greg]: Upgraded to GCC-3.3.2.

Release of version 5.0 on November 5th, 2003.

Resources

FAQ

If during the building of your LFS system you encounter any errors, or have any questions, or think you found a typo in the book, then please first consult the FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/faq/.

IRC

Several members of the LFS community offer assistance on our community IRC (Internet Relay Chat) server. Before you utilize this mode of support, we ask that you've at least checked the LFS FAQ (see above) and the mailing list archives (see below) for the answer to your question. You can find the IRC server at irc.linuxfromscratch.org port 6667. The support channel is named #LFS-support.

Mailing lists

The linuxfromscratch.org server is hosting a number of mailing lists used for the development of the LFS project. These lists include, among others, the main development and support lists.

For information on which lists are available, how to subscribe to them, their archive locations, and so on, visit http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/mail.html.

News server

All the mailing lists hosted at linuxfromscratch.org are also accessible via the NNTP server. All messages posted to a mailing list are copied to the correspondent newsgroup, and vice versa.

The news server can be reached at news.linuxfromscratch.org.

Wiki

For more information on a package, updated versions, tweaks, personal experiences, and so on, see the LFS Wiki at http://wiki.linuxfromscratch.org/. You can add information there yourself too, to help others.

References

If you need still more detailed information on the packages, you will find useful pointers on this page: http://www.109bean.org.uk/LFS-references.html.

Mirror sites

The LFS project has a number of mirrors set up world-wide to make accessing the website and downloading the required packages more convenient. Please visit the website at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/ for a list of current mirrors.

Contact information

Please direct all your questions and comments to one of the LFS mailing lists (see above).

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank the following people and organizations for their contributions to the Linux From Scratch Project.

Current Project Team Members

Gerard Beekmans <gerard@linuxfromscratch.org> -- Linux-From-Scratch initiator, LFS Project organizer.
Matthew Burgess <matthew@linuxfromscratch.org> -- LFS General Package maintainer, LFS Book editor.
Craig Colton <meerkats@bellsouth.net> -- LFS, ALFS, BLFS and Hints Project logo creator.
Jeroen Coumans <jeroen@linuxfromscratch.org> -- Website developer, FAQ maintainer.
Bruce Dubbs <bdubbs@linuxfromscratch.org> -- LFS Quality Assurance Team leader, BLFS Book editor.
Alex Groenewoud <alex@linuxfromscratch.org> -- LFS Book editor.
Mark Hymers <markh@linuxfromscratch.org> -- CVS maintainer, BLFS Book creator, former LFS Book editor.
James Iwanek <iwanek@linuxfromscratch.org> -- System Administration Team member.
Nicholas Leippe <nicholas@linuxfromscratch.org> -- Wiki maintainer.
Anderson Lizardo <lizardo@linuxfromscratch.org> -- Website backend scripts creator and maintainer.
Bill Maltby <bill@linuxfromscratch.org> -- LFS Project organizer.
Scot Mc Pherson <scot@linuxfromscratch.org> -- LFS NNTP gateway maintainer.
Ryan Oliver <ryan@linuxfromscratch.org> -- Testing Team leader, co-creator of PLFS.
James Robertson <jwrober@linuxfromscratch.org> -- Bugzilla maintainer, Wiki developer, LFS Book editor.
Greg Schafer <greg@linuxfromscratch.org> -- Toolchain maintainer, LFS Book editor, co-creator of PLFS.
Tushar Teredesai <tushar@linuxfromscratch.org> -- BLFS Book editor, Hints and Patches Projects maintainer.
Jeremy Utley <jeremy@linuxfromscratch.org> -- LFS Book editor, Bugzilla maintainer.
Countless other people on the various LFS and BLFS mailing lists who are making this book happen by giving their suggestions, testing the book and submitting bug reports, instructions and their experiences with installing various packages.

Translators

Manuel Canales Esparcia <macana@lfs-es.org> -- Spanish LFS translation project.
Johan Lenglet <johan@linuxfromscratch.org> -- French LFS translation project.
Anderson Lizardo <lizardo@linuxfromscratch.org> -- Portuguese LFS translation project.

Mirror Maintainers

Jason Andrade <jason@dstc.edu.au> -- au.linuxfromscratch.org mirror.
William Astle <lost@l-w.net> -- ca.linuxfromscratch.org mirror.
Baque <baque@cict.fr> -- lfs.cict.fr mirror.
Stephan Brendel <stevie@stevie20.de> -- lfs.netservice-neuss.de mirror.
Ian Chilton <ian@ichilton.co.uk> -- us.linuxfromscratch.org, linuxfromscratch.co.uk mirrors.
Fredrik Danerklint <fredan-lfs@fredan.org> -- se.linuxfromscratch.org mirror.
David D.W. Downey <pgpkeys@aeternamtech.com> -- lfs.learnbyexample.com mirror.
Eduardo B. Fonseca <ebf@aedsolucoes.com.br> -- br.linuxfromscratch.org mirror.
Hagen Herrschaft <hrx@hrxnet.de> -- de.linuxfromscratch.org mirror.
Tim Jackson <tim@idge.net> -- linuxfromscratch.idge.net mirror.
Barna Koczka <barna@siker.hu> -- hu.linuxfromscratch.org mirror.
Roel Neefs -- linuxfromscratch.rave.org mirror.
Simon Nicoll <sime@dot-sime.com> -- uk.linuxfromscratch.org mirror.
Ervin S. Odisho <ervin@activalink.net> -- lfs.activalink.net mirror.
Guido Passet <guido@primerelay.net> -- nl.linuxfromscratch.org mirror.
Mikhail Pastukhov <miha@xuy.biz> -- lfs.130th.net mirror.
Jeremy Polen <jpolen@rackspace.com> -- us2.linuxfromscratch.org mirror.
UK Mirror Service -- linuxfromscratch.mirror.co.uk mirror.
Thomas Skyt <thomas@sofagang.dk> -- dk.linuxfromscratch.org mirror.
Antonin Sprinzl <Antonin.Sprinzl@tuwien.ac.at> -- at.linuxfromscratch.org mirror.
Dag Stenstad <dag@stenstad.net> for providing no.linuxfromscratch.org and Ian Chilton for running it.
Parisian sysadmins <archive@doc.cs.univ-paris8.fr> -- www2.fr.linuxfromscratch.org mirror.
Jesse Tie-Ten-Quee <highos@linuxfromscratch.org> for providing and running the linuxfromscratch.org server.
Alexander Velin <velin@zadnik.org> -- bg.linuxfromscratch.org mirror.
Martin Voss <Martin.Voss@ada.de> -- lfs.linux-matrix.net mirror.
Pui Yong <pyng@spam.averse.net> -- sg.linuxfromscratch.org mirror.

Donators

Dean Benson <dean@vipersoft.co.uk> for several monetary contributions.
DREAMWVR.COM for their past sponsorship of donating various resources to the LFS and related sub projects.
Hagen Herrschaft <hrx@hrxnet.de> for donating a 2.2 GHz P4 system, now running under the name of lorien.
O'Reilly for donating books on SQL and PHP.
VA Software who, on behalf of Linux.com, donated a VA Linux 420 (former StartX SP2) workstation.
Mark Stone for donating shadowfax, the first linuxfromscratch.org server, a 750 MHz P3 with 512 MB RAM and two 9 GB SCSI drives. When the server moved it was renamed to belgarath.
Jesse Tie-Ten-Quee <highos@linuxfromscratch.org> for donating a Yamaha CDRW 8824E CD-writer.
Countless other people on the various LFS mailing lists who are making this book better by giving their suggestions, submitting bug reports, and throwing in their criticism.

Former Team Members and Contributors

Timothy Bauscher <timothy@linuxfromscratch.org> -- LFS Book editor, Hints Project maintainer.
Robert Briggs for originally donating the linuxfromscratch.org and linuxfromscratch.com domain names.
Ian Chilton <ian@ichilton.co.uk> for maintaining the Hints project.
Marc Heerdink <gimli@linuxfromscratch.org> -- LFS Book editor.
Seth W. Klein <sklein@linuxfromscratch.org> -- LFS FAQ creator.
Garrett LeSage <garrett@linuxart.com> -- Original LFS banner creator.
Simon Perreault <nomis80@videotron.ca> -- Hints Project maintainer.
Geert Poels <Geert.Poels@skynet.be> -- Original BLFS banner creator; based on the LFS banner by Garrett LeSage.
Frank Skettino <bkenoah@oswd.org> for the initial design of the old website -- have a look at http://www.oswd.org/.
Jesse Tie-Ten-Quee <highos@linuxfromscratch.org> for answering countless questions on IRC and having a great deal of patience.

Chapter 2. Important information

About $LFS

Please read the following paragraphs carefully. Throughout this book the variable LFS will be used frequently. $LFS must at all times be replaced with the directory where the partition that contains the LFS system is mounted. How to create and where to mount the partition will be explained in full detail in Chapter 3. For the moment let's assume that the LFS partition is mounted on /mnt/lfs.

When you are told to run a command like ./configure --prefix=$LFS/tools, you actually have to execute ./configure --prefix=/mnt/lfs/tools.

It's important that this is done no matter where it is read; be it in commands entered in a shell, or in a file edited or created.

A possible solution is to set the environment variable LFS. This way $LFS can be entered literally instead of replacing it with /mnt/lfs. This is accomplished by running:

export LFS=/mnt/lfs

Now, if you are told to run a command such as ./configure --prefix=$LFS/tools, then you may type it literally. Your shell will replace "$LFS" with "/mnt/lfs" when it processes the command line (that is, when you hit Enter after having typed the command).

About SBUs

Most people would like to know beforehand how long it approximately takes to compile and install each package. But "Linux from Scratch" is built on so many different systems, it is not possible to give actual times that are anywhere near accurate: the biggest package (Glibc) won't take more than twenty minutes on the fastest systems, but will take something like three days on the slowest -- no kidding. So instead of giving actual times, we've come up with the idea of using the Static Binutils Unit (abbreviated to SBU).

It works like this: the first package you compile in this book is the statically linked Binutils in Chapter 5, and the time it takes to compile this package is what we call the "Static Binutils Unit" or "SBU". All other compile times will be expressed relative to this time.

For example, the time it takes to build the static version of GCC is 4.4 SBUs. This means that if on your system it took 10 minutes to compile and install the static Binutils, then you know it will take approximately 45 minutes to build the static GCC. Fortunately, most build times are much shorter than the one of Binutils.

Note that if the system compiler on your host is GCC-2 based, the SBUs listed may end up being somewhat understated. This is because the SBU is based on the very first package, compiled with the old GCC, while the rest of the system is compiled with the newer GCC-3.3.2 which is known to be approximately 30% slower.

Also note that SBUs don't work well for SMP-based machines. But if you're so lucky as to have multiple processors, chances are that your system is so fast that you won't mind.

If you wish to see actual timings for specific machines, have a look at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/~bdubbs/.

About the test suites

Most packages provide a test suite. Running the test suite for a newly built package is generally a good idea, as it can provide a nice sanity check that everything compiled correctly. A test suite that passes its set of checks usually proves that the package is functioning mostly as the developer intended. It does not, however, guarantee that the package is totally bug free.

Some test suites are more important than others. For example, the test suites for the core toolchain packages -- GCC, Binutils, and Glibc (the C library) -- are of the utmost importance due to their central role in a properly functioning system. But be warned, the test suites for GCC and Glibc can take a very long time to complete, especially on slower hardware.

Experience has shown us that there is little to be gained from running the test suites in Chapter 5. There can be no escaping the fact that the host system always exerts influence on the tests in that chapter, often causing weird and inexplicable failures. Not only that, the tools built in Chapter 5 are temporary and eventually discarded. For the average reader of this book we recommend not to run the test suites in Chapter 5. The instructions for running those test suites are still provided for the benefit of testers and developers, but they are strictly optional for everyone else.

As you progress through the book and encounter the commands to run the various test suites, we'll guide you on the relative importance of the test suite in question, so that you can decide for yourself whether to run that one or not.

Note: A common problem when running the test suites for Binutils and GCC is running out of pseudo terminals (PTYs for short). The symptom is an unusually high number of failing tests. This can happen for a number of reasons. Most likely is that the host system doesn't have the devpts file system set up correctly. We'll discuss this in more detail later on in Chapter 5.

How to ask for help

If you encounter a problem while using this book, and your problem is not listed in the FAQ (http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/faq/), you will find that most of the people on Internet Relay Chat (IRC) and on the mailing lists are willing to help you. An overview of the LFS mailing lists can be found via Chapter 1 - Mailing lists. To assist us in diagnosing and solving your problem, include as much relevant information as possible in your request for help.

Things to mention

Apart from a brief explanation of the problem you're having, the essential things to include in your request are:

the version of the book you are using (being 5.1-pre1),
the host distribution and version you are using to create LFS from,
the package or section giving you problems,
the exact error message or symptom you are receiving,
whether you have deviated from the book at all.

(Note that saying that you've deviated from the book doesn't mean that we won't help you. After all, LFS is about choice. It'll just help us to see other possible causes of your problem.)

Configure problems

When something goes wrong during the stage where the configure script is run, look through the config.log file. This file may contain errors encountered during configure which weren't printed to the screen. Include those relevant lines if you decide to ask for help.

Compile problems

To help us find the cause of the problem, both screen output and the contents of various files are useful. The screen output from both the ./configure script and the make run can be useful. Don't blindly include the whole thing but on the other hand, don't include too little. As an example, here is some screen output from make:

gcc -DALIASPATH=\"/mnt/lfs/usr/share/locale:.\"
-DLOCALEDIR=\"/mnt/lfs/usr/share/locale\" -DLIBDIR=\"/mnt/lfs/usr/lib\"
-DINCLUDEDIR=\"/mnt/lfs/usr/include\" -DHAVE_CONFIG_H -I. -I.
-g -O2 -c getopt1.c
gcc -g -O2 -static -o make ar.o arscan.o commands.o dir.o expand.o file.o
function.o getopt.o implicit.o job.o main.o misc.o read.o remake.o rule.o
signame.o variable.o vpath.o default.o remote-stub.o version.o opt1.o
-lutil job.o: In function `load_too_high':
/lfs/tmp/make-3.79.1/job.c:1565: undefined reference to `getloadavg'
collect2: ld returned 1 exit status
make[2]: *** [make] Error 1
make[2]: Leaving directory `/lfs/tmp/make-3.79.1'
make[1]: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
make[1]: Leaving directory `/lfs/tmp/make-3.79.1'
make: *** [all-recursive-am] Error 2

In this case, many people just include the bottom section where it says:

make [2]: *** [make] Error 1

and onwards. This isn't enough for us to diagnose the problem because it only tells us that something went wrong, not what went wrong. The whole section, as in the example above, is what should be included to be helpful, because it includes the command that was executed and the command's error message(s).

An excellent article on asking for help on the Internet in general has been written by Eric S. Raymond. It is available online at http://catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html. Read and follow the hints in that document and you are much more likely to get a response to start with and also to get the help you actually need.

Test suite problems

Many packages provide a test suite which, depending on the importance of the package, we may encourage you to run. Sometimes packages will generate false or expected failures. If you encounter these, you can check the LFS Wiki page at http://wiki.linuxfromscratch.org/ to see whether we have already noted and investigated them. If we already know about them, then usually there is no need to be concerned.

II. Part II - Preparing for the build

Table of Contents
3. Preparing a new partition
4. The materials: packages and patches
5. Constructing a temporary system

Chapter 3. Preparing a new partition

Introduction

In this chapter the partition which will host the LFS system is prepared. We will create the partition itself, make a file system on it, and mount it.

Creating a new partition

In order to build our new Linux system, we will need some space: an empty disk partition. If you don't have a free partition, and no room on any of your hard disks to make one, then you could build LFS on the same partition as the one on which your current distribution is installed. This procedure is not recommended for your first LFS install, but if you are short on disk space, and you feel brave, take a look at the hint at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/lfs_next_to_existing_systems.txt.

For a minimal system you will need a partition of around 1.2 GB. This is enough to store all the source tarballs and compile all the packages. But if you intend to use the LFS system as your primary Linux system, you will probably want to install additional software, and will need more space than this, probably around 2 or 3 GB.

As we almost never have enough RAM in our box, it is a good idea to use a small disk partition as swap space -- this space is used by the kernel to store seldom-used data to make room in memory for more urgent stuff. The swap partition for your LFS system can be the same one as for your host system, so you won't have to create another if your host system already uses a swap partition.

Start a disk partitioning program such as cfdisk or fdisk with an argument naming the hard disk upon which the new partition must be created -- for example /dev/hda for the primary IDE disk. Create a Linux native partition and a swap partition, if needed. Please refer to the man pages of cfdisk or fdisk if you don't yet know how to use the programs.

Remember the designation of your new partition -- something like hda5. This book will refer to it as the LFS partition. If you (now) also have a swap partition, remember its designation too. These names will later be needed for the /etc/fstab file.

Creating a file system on the new partition

Now that we have a blank partition, we can create a file system on it. Most widely used in the Linux world is the second extended file system (ext2), but with the high-capacity hard disks of today the so-called journaling file systems are becoming increasingly popular. Here we will create an ext2 file system, but build instructions for other file systems can be found at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/stable/postlfs/filesystems.html.

To create an ext2 file system on the LFS partition run the following:

mke2fs /dev/xxx

Replace xxx with the name of the LFS partition (something like hda5).

If you created a (new) swap partition you need to initialize it as a swap partition too (also known as formatting, like you did above with mke2fs) by running:

mkswap /dev/yyy

Replace yyy with the name of the swap partition.

Mounting the new partition

Now that we've created a file system, we want to be able to access the partition. For that, we need to mount it, and have to choose a mount point. In this book we assume that the file system is mounted under /mnt/lfs, but it doesn't matter what directory you choose.

Choose a mount point and assign it to the LFS environment variable by running:

export LFS=/mnt/lfs

Now create the mount point and mount the LFS file system by running:

mkdir -p $LFS
mount /dev/xxx $LFS

Replace xxx with the designation of the LFS partition.

If you have decided to use multiple partitions for LFS (say one for / and another for /usr), mount them like this:

mkdir -p $LFS
mount /dev/xxx $LFS
mkdir $LFS/usr
mount /dev/yyy $LFS/usr

Of course, replace xxx and yyy with the appropriate partition names.

You should also ensure that this new partition is not mounted with permissions that are too restrictive (such as the nosuid, nodev or noatime options). You can run the mount command without any parameters to see with what options the LFS partition is mounted. If you see nosuid, nodev or noatime, you will need to remount it.

Now that we've made ourselves a place to work in, we're ready to download the packages.

Chapter 4. The materials: packages and patches

Introduction

Below is a list of packages you need to download for building a basic Linux system. The listed version numbers correspond to versions of the software that are known to work, and this book is based upon them. Unless you are an experienced LFS builder, we highly recommend not to try out newer versions, as the build commands for one version may not work with a newer version. Also, there is often a good reason for not using the latest version due to known problems that haven't been worked around yet.

All the URLs, when possible, refer to the project's page at http://www.freshmeat.net/. The Freshmeat pages will give you easy access to the official download sites as well as project websites, mailing lists, FAQs, changelogs and more.

We can't guarantee that these download locations are always available. In case a download location has changed since this book was published, please try to google for the package. Should you remain unsuccessful with this, you can consult the book's errata page at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org//lfs/print/ or, better yet, try one of the alternative means of downloading listed on http://www.linuxfromscratch.org//lfs/packages.html.

You'll need to store all the downloaded packages and patches somewhere that is conveniently available throughout the entire build. You'll also need a working directory in which to unpack the sources and build them. A scheme that works well is to use $LFS/sources as the place to store the tarballs and patches, and as a working directory. This way everything you need will be located on the LFS partition and available during all stages of the building process.

So you may want to execute, as root, the following command before starting your download session:

mkdir $LFS/sources

And make this directory writable (and sticky) for your normal user -- as you won't do the downloading as root, we guess:

chmod a+wt $LFS/sources

All the packages

Download or otherwise obtain the following packages:

Note: 1) File (4.07) may not be available by the time you read this. The site admins of the master download location are known to occasionally remove old versions when new ones are released. Please refer to the File section for an alternate download location.

Note: 2) As of this writing, the Glibc maintainers have decided in their wisdom not to make available new release tarballs for download. The only way to obtain the current Glibc release from pristine upstream sources is to pull it from the Glibc CVS repository. The following commands will download the current release and make a tarball from it:
cvs -z 9 -d :pserver:anoncvs@sources.redhat.com:/cvs/glibc \
    export -d glibc-2.3.3-20031202 -D "2003-12-02 UTC" libc
tar jcvf glibc-2.3.3-20031202.tar.bz2 glibc-2.3.3-20031202
Alternatively, we've made our own tarball available which you can download courtesy of the generous LFS mirror sites. Please refer to the Glibc section for the download links.

Needed patches

Besides all those packages, you'll also need several patches. These correct tiny mistakes in the packages that should be fixed by the maintainer, or just make some small modifications to bend things our way. You'll need the following:

In addition to the above required patches, there exist a number of optional ones created by the LFS community. Most of these solve slight problems, or enable some functionality that's not enabled by default. Feel free to examine the patches database, located at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/, and pick any additional patches you wish to use.

Chapter 5. Constructing a temporary system

Introduction

In this chapter we will compile and install a minimal Linux system. This system will contain just enough tools to be able to start constructing the final LFS system in the next chapter.

The building of this minimal system is done in two steps: first we build a brand-new and host-independent toolchain (compiler, assembler, linker and libraries), and then use this to build all the other essential tools.

The files compiled in this chapter will be installed under the $LFS/tools directory to keep them separate from the files installed in the next chapter. Since the packages compiled here are merely temporary, we don't want them to pollute the soon-to-be LFS system.

The build instructions assume that you are using the bash shell. It is also expected that you have already unpacked a source package (while logged in as user lfs -- explained shortly) and performed a cd into the source directory of a package before issuing its build commands.

Several of the packages are patched before compilation, but only when the patch is needed to circumvent a problem. Often the patch is needed in both this and the next chapter, but sometimes in only one of them. Therefore, don't worry when instructions for a downloaded patch seem to be missing. When applying a patch you'll occasionally see a warning message about offset or fuzz. These warnings are nothing to worry about as the patch was still successfully applied.

During the installation of most packages you will see all kinds of compiler warnings scroll by on your screen. These are normal and can be safely ignored. They are just what they say they are: warnings -- mostly about deprecated, but not invalid, use of the C or C++ syntax. It's just that C standards have changed rather often and some packages still use the older standard, which is not really a problem.

Unless told not to, you should normally delete the source and build directories after installing each package -- for cleanness sake and to save space.

Before continuing, make sure the LFS environment variable is set up properly by executing the following:

echo $LFS

Make sure the output shows the path to your LFS partition's mount point, which is /mnt/lfs if you followed our example.

Toolchain technical notes

This section attempts to explain some of the rationale and technical details behind the overall build method. It's not essential that you understand everything here immediately. Most of it will make sense once you have performed an actual build. Feel free to refer back here at any time.

The overall goal of Chapter 5 is to provide a sane, temporary environment that we can chroot into, and from which we can produce a clean, trouble-free build of the target LFS system in Chapter 6. Along the way, we attempt to divorce ourselves from the host system as much as possible, and in so doing build a self-contained and self-hosted toolchain. It should be noted that the build process has been designed in such a way so as to minimize the risks for new readers and provide maximum educational value at the same time. In other words, more advanced techniques could be used to build the system.

Important: Before continuing, you really should be aware of the name of your working platform, often also referred to as the target triplet. For many folks the target triplet will probably be i686-pc-linux-gnu. A simple way to determine your target triplet is to run the config.guess script that comes with the source for many packages. Unpack the Binutils sources and run the script: ./config.guess and note the output.

You'll also need to be aware of the name of your platform's dynamic linker, often also referred to as the dynamic loader, not to be confused with the standard linker ld that is part of Binutils. The dynamic linker is provided by Glibc and has the job of finding and loading the shared libraries needed by a program, preparing the program to run and then running it. For most folks the name of the dynamic linker will be ld-linux.so.2. On platforms that are less prevalent, the name might be ld.so.1 and newer 64 bit platforms might even have something completely different. You should be able to determine the name of your platform's dynamic linker by looking in the /lib directory on your host system. A surefire way is to inspect a random binary from your host system by running: readelf -l <name of binary> | grep interpreter and noting the output. The authoritative reference covering all platforms is in the shlib-versions file in the root of the Glibc source tree.

Some key technical points of how the Chapter 5 build method works:

Similar in principle to cross compiling whereby tools installed into the same prefix work in cooperation and thus utilize a little GNU "magic".
Careful manipulation of the standard linker's library search path to ensure programs are linked only against libraries we choose.
Careful manipulation of gcc's specs file to tell the compiler which target dynamic linker will be used.

Binutils is installed first because both GCC and Glibc perform various feature tests on the assembler and linker during their respective runs of ./configure to determine which software features to enable or disable. This is more important than one might first realize. An incorrectly configured GCC or Glibc can result in a subtly broken toolchain where the impact of such breakage might not show up until near the end of the build of a whole distribution. Thankfully, a test suite failure will usually alert us before too much time is wasted.

Binutils installs its assembler and linker into two locations, /tools/bin and /tools/$TARGET_TRIPLET/bin. In reality, the tools in one location are hard linked to the other. An important facet of the linker is its library search order. Detailed information can be obtained from ld by passing it the --verbose flag. For example: ld --verbose | grep SEARCH will show you the current search paths and their order. You can see what files are actually linked by ld by compiling a dummy program and passing the --verbose switch to the linker. For example: gcc dummy.c -Wl,--verbose 2>&1 | grep succeeded will show you all the files successfully opened during the linking.

The next package installed is GCC and during its run of ./configure you'll see, for example:

checking what assembler to use... /tools/i686-pc-linux-gnu/bin/as
checking what linker to use... /tools/i686-pc-linux-gnu/bin/ld

This is important for the reasons mentioned above. It also demonstrates that GCC's configure script does not search the $PATH directories to find which tools to use. However, during the actual operation of gcc itself, the same search paths are not necessarily used. You can find out which standard linker gcc will use by running: gcc -print-prog-name=ld. Detailed information can be obtained from gcc by passing it the -v flag while compiling a dummy program. For example: gcc -v dummy.c will show you detailed information about the preprocessor, compilation and assembly stages, including gcc's include search paths and their order.

The next package installed is Glibc. The most important considerations for building Glibc are the compiler, binary tools and kernel headers. The compiler is generally no problem as Glibc will always use the gcc found in a $PATH directory. The binary tools and kernel headers can be a little more troublesome. Therefore we take no risks and use the available configure switches to enforce the correct selections. After the run of ./configure you can check the contents of the config.make file in the glibc-build directory for all the important details. You'll note some interesting items like the use of CC="gcc -B/tools/bin/" to control which binary tools are used, and also the use of the -nostdinc and -isystem flags to control the compiler's include search path. These items help to highlight an important aspect of the Glibc package: it is very self-sufficient in terms of its build machinery and generally does not rely on toolchain defaults.

After the Glibc installation, we make some adjustments to ensure that searching and linking take place only within our /tools prefix. We install an adjusted ld, which has a hard-wired search path limited to /tools/lib. Then we amend gcc's specs file to point to our new dynamic linker in /tools/lib. This last step is vital to the whole process. As mentioned above, a hard-wired path to a dynamic linker is embedded into every ELF shared executable. You can inspect this by running: readelf -l <name of binary> | grep interpreter. By amending gcc's specs file, we are ensuring that every program compiled from here through the end of this chapter will use our new dynamic linker in /tools/lib.

The need to use the new dynamic linker is also the reason why we apply the Specs patch for the second pass of GCC. Failure to do so will result in the GCC programs themselves having the name of the dynamic linker from the host system's /lib directory embedded into them, which would defeat our goal of getting away from the host.

During the second pass of Binutils, we are able to utilize the --with-lib-path configure switch to control ld's library search path. From this point onwards, the core toolchain is self-contained and self-hosted. The remainder of the Chapter 5 packages all build against the new Glibc in /tools and all is well.

Upon entering the chroot environment in Chapter 6, the first major package we install is Glibc, due to its self-sufficient nature that we mentioned above. Once this Glibc is installed into /usr, we perform a quick changeover of the toolchain defaults, then proceed for real in building the rest of the target LFS system.

Notes on static linking

Most programs have to perform, beside their specific task, many rather common and sometimes trivial operations. These include allocating memory, searching directories, reading and writing files, string handling, pattern matching, arithmetic and many other tasks. Instead of obliging each program to reinvent the wheel, the GNU system provides all these basic functions in ready-made libraries. The major library on any Linux system is Glibc.

There are two primary ways of linking the functions from a library to a program that uses them: statically or dynamically. When a program is linked statically, the code of the used functions is included in the executable, resulting in a rather bulky program. When a program is dynamically linked, what is included is a reference to the dynamic linker, the name of the library, and the name of the function, resulting in a much smaller executable. (A third way is to use the programming interface of the dynamic linker. See the dlopen man page for more information.)

Dynamic linking is the default on Linux and has three major advantages over static linking. First, you need only one copy of the executable library code on your hard disk, instead of having many copies of the same code included into a whole bunch of programs -- thus saving disk space. Second, when several programs use the same library function at the same time, only one copy of the function's code is required in core -- thus saving memory space. Third, when a library function gets a bug fixed or is otherwise improved, you only need to recompile this one library, instead of having to recompile all the programs that make use of the improved function.

If dynamic linking has several advantages, why then do we statically link the first two packages in this chapter? The reasons are threefold: historical, educational, and technical. Historical, because earlier versions of LFS statically linked every program in this chapter. Educational, because knowing the difference is useful. Technical, because we gain an element of independence from the host in doing so, meaning that those programs can be used independently of the host system. However, it's worth noting that an overall successful LFS build can still be achieved when the first two packages are built dynamically.

Creating the $LFS/tools directory

All programs compiled in this chapter will be installed under $LFS/tools to keep them separate from the programs compiled in the next chapter. The programs compiled here are only temporary tools and won't be a part of the final LFS system and by keeping them in a separate directory, we can later easily throw them away.

Later on you might wish to search through the binaries of your system to see what files they make use of or link against. To make this searching easier you may want to choose a unique name for the directory in which the temporary tools are stored. Instead of the simple "tools" you could use something like "tools-for-lfs". However, you'll need to be careful to adjust all references to "tools" throughout the book -- including those in any patches, notably the GCC Specs Patch.

Create the required directory by running the following:

mkdir $LFS/tools

The next step is to create a /tools symlink on your host system. It will point to the directory we just created on the LFS partition:

ln -s $LFS/tools /

Note: The above command is correct. The ln command has a few syntactic variations, so be sure to check the info page before reporting what you may think is an error.

The created symlink enables us to compile our toolchain so that it always refers to /tools, meaning that the compiler, assembler and linker will work both in this chapter (when we are still using some tools from the host) and in the next (when we are chrooted to the LFS partition).

Adding the user lfs

When logged in as root, making a single mistake can damage or even wreck your system. Therefore we recommend that you build the packages in this chapter as an unprivileged user. You could of course use your own user name, but to make it easier to set up a clean work environment we'll create a new user lfs and use this one during the installation process. As root, issue the following command to add the new user:

useradd -s /bin/bash -m -k /dev/null lfs

The meaning of the switches:

-s /bin/bash: This makes bash the default shell for user lfs.
-m -k /dev/null: These create a home directory for lfs, while preventing the files from a possible /etc/skel being copied into it.

If you want to be able to log in as lfs, then give this new user a password:

passwd lfs

Now grant this new user lfs full access to $LFS/tools by giving it ownership of the directory:

chown lfs $LFS/tools

If you made a separate working directory as suggested, give user lfs ownership of this directory too:

chown lfs $LFS/sources

Next, login as user lfs. This can be done via a virtual console, through a display manager, or with the following substitute user command:

su - lfs

The "-" instructs su to start a login shell.

Setting up the environment

We're going to set up a good working environment by creating two new startup files for the bash shell. While logged in as user lfs, issue the following command to create a new .bash_profile:

cat > ~/.bash_profile << "EOF"
exec env -i HOME=$HOME TERM=$TERM PS1='\u:\w\$ ' /bin/bash
EOF

Normally, when you log on as user lfs, the initial shell is a login shell which reads the /etc/profile of your host (probably containing some settings of environment variables) and then .bash_profile. The exec env -i ... /bin/bash command in the latter file replaces the running shell with a new one with a completely empty environment, except for the HOME, TERM and PS1 variables. This ensures that no unwanted and potentially hazardous environment variables from the host system leak into our build environment. The technique used here is a little strange, but it achieves the goal of enforcing a clean environment.

The new instance of the shell is a non-login shell, which doesn't read the /etc/profile or .bash_profile files, but reads the .bashrc file instead. Create this latter file now:

cat > ~/.bashrc << "EOF"
set +h
umask 022
LFS=/mnt/lfs
LC_ALL=POSIX
PATH=/tools/bin:/bin:/usr/bin
export LFS LC_ALL PATH
EOF

The set +h command turns off bash's hash function. Normally hashing is a useful feature: bash uses a hash table to remember the full pathnames of executable files to avoid searching the PATH time and time again to find the same executable. However, we'd like the new tools to be used as soon as they are installed. By switching off the hash function, our "interactive" commands (make, patch, sed, cp and so forth) will always use the newest available version during the build process.

Setting the user file-creation mask to 022 ensures that newly created files and directories are only writable for their owner, but readable and executable for anyone.

The LFS variable should of course be set to the mount point you chose.

The LC_ALL variable controls the localization of certain programs, making their messages follow the conventions of a specified country. If your host system uses a version of Glibc older than 2.2.4, having LC_ALL set to something other than "POSIX" or "C" during this chapter may cause trouble if you exit the chroot environment and wish to return later. By setting LC_ALL to "POSIX" (or "C", the two are equivalent) we ensure that everything will work as expected in the chroot environment.

We prepend /tools/bin to the standard PATH so that, as we move along through this chapter, the tools we build will get used during the rest of the building process.

Finally, to have our environment fully prepared for building the temporary tools, source the just-created profile:

source ~/.bash_profile

Installing Binutils-2.14 - Pass 1

Approximate build time:  1.0 SBU
Required disk space:     194 MB

Official download location for Binutils (2.14):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/binutils/

For its installation Binutils depends on: Bash, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Perl, Sed, Texinfo.

Installation of Binutils

It is important that Binutils be the first package to get compiled, because both Glibc and GCC perform various tests on the available linker and assembler to determine which of their own features to enable.

This package is known to behave badly when you have changed its default optimization flags (including the -march and -mcpu options). Therefore, if you have defined any environment variables that override default optimizations, such as CFLAGS and CXXFLAGS, we recommend unsetting or modifying them when building Binutils.

The Binutils documentation recommends building Binutils outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:

mkdir ../binutils-build
cd ../binutils-build

Note: If you want the SBU values listed in the rest of the book to be of any use, you will have to measure the time it takes to build this package. To achieve this easily, you could do something like: time { ./configure ... && ... && ... && make install; }.

Now prepare Binutils for compilation:

../binutils-2.14/configure --prefix=/tools --disable-nls

The meaning of the configure options:

--prefix=/tools: This tells the configure script to prepare to install the Binutils programs in the /tools directory.
--disable-nls: This disables internationalization (a word often shortened to i18n). We don't need this for our static programs and nls often causes problems when linking statically.

Continue with compiling the package:

make configure-host
make LDFLAGS="-all-static"

The meaning of the make parameters:

configure-host: This forces all the subdirectories to be configured immediately. A statically linked build will fail without it. We therefore use this option to work around the problem.
LDFLAGS="-all-static": This tells the linker that all the Binutils programs should be linked statically. However, strictly speaking, "-all-static" is first passed to the libtool program which then passes "-static" on to the linker.

Compilation is now complete. This is the point where we would normally run the test suite. But as discussed earlier, we don't recommend running the test suites for the temporary tools here in this chapter. However, even if we still wanted to run the Binutils test suite, we're unable do so at this early stage because the test suite framework is not yet in place. Not only that, the programs from this first pass will soon be overwritten by those installed in the second pass.

And install the package:

make install

Now prepare the linker for the "locking in" of Glibc later on:

make -C ld clean
make -C ld LDFLAGS="-all-static" LIB_PATH=/tools/lib

The meaning of the make parameters:

-C ld clean: This tells the make program to remove all the compiled files, but only in the ld subdirectory.
-C ld LDFLAGS="-all-static" LIB_PATH=/tools/lib: This option rebuilds everything in the ld subdirectory. Specifying the LIB_PATH makefile variable on the command line allows us to override the default value and have it point to our temporary tools location. The value of this variable specifies the linker's default library search path. You'll see how this preparation is used later on in the chapter.

Warning

Do not yet remove the Binutils build and source directories. You will need them again in their current state a bit further on in this chapter.

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Binutils in Chapter 6.

Installing GCC-3.3.2 - Pass 1

Approximate build time:  4.4 SBU
Required disk space:     300 MB

Official download location for GCC (3.3.2):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/gcc/

For its installation GCC depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Findutils, Gawk, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Perl, Sed, Texinfo.

Installation of GCC

Unpack only the GCC-core tarball, as we won't be needing a C++ compiler for the moment.

The GCC documentation recommends building GCC outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:

mkdir ../gcc-build
cd ../gcc-build

Prepare GCC for compilation:

../gcc-3.3.2/configure --prefix=/tools \
    --with-local-prefix=/tools \
    --disable-nls --enable-shared \
    --enable-languages=c

The meaning of the configure options:

--with-local-prefix=/tools: The purpose of this switch is to remove /usr/local/include from gcc's include search path. This is not absolutely essential; however, we want to try to minimize the influence of the host system, thus making this a sensible thing to do.
--enable-shared: This switch may seem counter-intuitive at first. But using it allows the building of libgcc_s.so.1 and libgcc_eh.a, and having libgcc_eh.a available ensures that the configure script for Glibc (the next package we compile) produces the proper results. Note that the gcc binaries will still be linked statically, as this is controlled by the -static value of BOOT_LDFLAGS further on.
--enable-languages=c: This option ensures that only the C compiler is built. The option is only needed when you have downloaded and unpacked the full GCC tarball.

Continue with compiling the package:

make BOOT_LDFLAGS="-static" bootstrap

The meaning of the make parameters:

BOOT_LDFLAGS="-static": This tells GCC to link its programs statically.
bootstrap: This target doesn't just compile GCC, but compiles it several times. It uses the programs compiled in a first round to compile itself a second time, and then again a third time. It then compares these second and third compiles to make sure it can reproduce itself flawlessly, which most probably means that it was compiled correctly.

Compilation is now complete. This is the point where we would normally run the test suite. But as discussed earlier, we don't recommend running the test suites for the temporary tools here in this chapter. However, even if we still wanted to run the GCC test suite, we're unable do so at this early stage because the test suite framework is not yet in place. Not only that, the programs from this first pass will soon be overwritten by those installed in the second pass.

And install the package:

make install

As a finishing touch we'll create the /tools/bin/cc symlink. Many programs and scripts run cc instead of gcc, a thing meant to keep programs generic and therefore usable on all kinds of Unix systems. Not everybody has the GNU C compiler installed. Simply running cc leaves the system administrator free to decide what C compiler to install, as long as there's a symlink pointing to it:

ln -s gcc /tools/bin/cc

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of GCC in Chapter 6.

Installing Linux-2.4.24 headers

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     186 MB

Installation of the kernel headers

As some packages need to refer to the kernel header files, we're going to unpack the kernel archive now, set it up, and copy the required files to a place where gcc can later find them.

Prepare for the header installation with:

make mrproper

This ensures that the kernel tree is absolutely clean. The kernel team recommends that this command be issued prior to each kernel compilation. You shouldn't rely on the source tree being clean after untarring.

Create the include/linux/version.h file:

make include/linux/version.h

Create the platform-specific include/asm symlink:

make symlinks

Install the platform-specific header files:

mkdir /tools/include/asm
cp include/asm/* /tools/include/asm
cp -R include/asm-generic /tools/include

Install the cross-platform kernel header files:

cp -R include/linux /tools/include

There are a few kernel header files which make use of the autoconf.h header file. Since we do not yet configure the kernel, we need to create this file ourselves in order to avoid compilation failures. Create an empty autoconf.h file:

touch /tools/include/linux/autoconf.h

Installing Glibc-2.3.3

Approximate build time:  11.8 SBU
Required disk space:     800 MB

For its installation Glibc depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Gettext, Grep, Make, Perl, Sed, Texinfo.

Installation of Glibc

Basically, compiling Glibc in any other way than the book suggests is putting the stability of your system at risk.

The Glibc documentation recommends building Glibc outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:

mkdir ../glibc-build
cd ../glibc-build

Next, prepare Glibc for compilation:

../glibc-2.3.3-20031202/configure --prefix=/tools \
    --disable-profile --enable-add-ons=linuxthreads \
    --with-binutils=/tools/bin --with-headers=/tools/include \
    --without-gd --without-cvs

The meaning of the configure options:

--disable-profile: This disables the building of the libraries with profiling information. Omit this option if you plan to do profiling.
--enable-add-ons=linuxthreads: This tells Glibc to use the Linuxthreads add-on as its threading library.
--with-binutils=/tools/bin and --with-headers=/tools/include: Strictly speaking these switches are not required. But they ensure nothing can go wrong with regard to what kernel headers and Binutils programs get used during the Glibc build.
--without-gd: This switch ensures that we don't build the memusagestat program, which strangely enough insists on linking against the host's libraries (libgd, libpng, libz, and so forth).
--without-cvs: This is meant to prevent the Makefiles from attempting automatic CVS commits when using a CVS snapshot. But it's not actually needed these days. We use it because it silences an annoying but harmless warning about a missing autoconf program.

During this stage you might see the following warning:

configure: WARNING:
*** These auxiliary programs are missing or incompatible versions: msgfmt
*** some features will be disabled.
*** Check the INSTALL file for required versions.

The missing or incompatible msgfmt program is generally harmless, but it's believed it can sometimes cause problems when running the test suite.

Compile the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, we don't recommend running the test suites for the temporary system here in this chapter. If you still want to run the Glibc test suite anyway, the following command will do so:

make check

The Glibc test suite is highly dependent on certain functions of your host system, in particular the kernel. Additionally, here in this chapter some tests can be adversely affected by existing tools or environmental issues on the host system. Of course, these won't be a problem when we run the Glibc test suite inside the chroot environment of Chapter 6. In general, the Glibc test suite is always expected to pass. However, as mentioned above, some failures are unavoidable in certain circumstances. Here is a list of the most common issues we are aware of:

The math tests sometimes fail when running on systems where the CPU is not a relatively new genuine Intel or authentic AMD. Certain optimization settings are also known to be a factor here.
The gettext test sometimes fails due to host system issues. The exact reasons are not yet clear.
The atime test sometimes fails when the LFS partition is mounted with the noatime option, or due to other file system quirks.
The shm test might fail when the host system is running the devfs file system but doesn't have the tmpfs file system mounted at /dev/shm due to lack of support for tmpfs in the kernel.
When running on older and slower hardware, some tests might fail due to test timeouts being exceeded.

In summary, don't worry too much if you see Glibc test suite failures here in this chapter. The Glibc in Chapter 6 is the one we'll ultimately end up using so that is the one we would really like to see pass. But please keep in mind, even in Chapter 6 some failures could still occur -- the math tests for example. When experiencing a failure, make a note of it, then continue by reissuing the make check. The test suite should pick up where it left off and continue on. You can circumvent this stop-start sequence by issuing a make -k check. But if you do that, be sure to log the output so that you can later peruse the log file and examine the total number of failures.

Though it is a harmless message, the install stage of Glibc will complain about the absence of /tools/etc/ld.so.conf. Fix this annoying little warning with:

mkdir /tools/etc
touch /tools/etc/ld.so.conf

Now install the package:

make install

Different countries and cultures have varying conventions for how to communicate. These conventions range from very simple ones, such as the format for representing dates and times, to very complex ones, such as the language spoken. The "internationalization" of GNU programs works by means of locales.

Note: If you are not running the test suites here in this chapter as per our recommendation, there is little point in installing the locales now. We'll be installing the locales in the next chapter.

If you still want to install the Glibc locales anyway, the following command will do so:

make localedata/install-locales

An alternative to running the previous command is to install only those locales which you need or want. This can be achieved by using the localedef command. Information on this can be found in the INSTALL file in the Glibc source. However, there are a number of locales that are essential for the tests of future packages to pass, in particular, the libstdc++ tests from GCC. The following instructions, instead of the install-locales target above, will install the minimum set of locales necessary for the tests to run successfully:

mkdir -p /tools/lib/locale
localedef -i de_DE -f ISO-8859-1 de_DE
localedef -i de_DE@euro -f ISO-8859-15 de_DE@euro
localedef -i en_HK -f ISO-8859-1 en_HK
localedef -i en_PH -f ISO-8859-1 en_PH
localedef -i en_US -f ISO-8859-1 en_US
localedef -i es_MX -f ISO-8859-1 es_MX
localedef -i fr_FR -f ISO-8859-1 fr_FR
localedef -i fr_FR@euro -f ISO-8859-15 fr_FR@euro
localedef -i it_IT -f ISO-8859-1 it_IT
localedef -i ja_JP -f EUC-JP ja_JP

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Glibc in Chapter 6.

"Locking in" Glibc

Now that the temporary C libraries have been installed, we want all the tools compiled in the rest of this chapter to be linked against these libraries. To accomplish this, we need to adjust the linker and the compiler's specs file.

First install the adjusted linker by running the following from within the binutils-build directory:

make -C ld install

The linker was adjusted a little while back, at the end of the first pass of Binutils. From this point onwards everything will link only against the libraries in /tools/lib.

Note: If you somehow missed the earlier warning to retain the Binutils source and build directories from the first pass or otherwise accidentally deleted them or just don't have access to them, don't worry, all is not lost. Just ignore the above command. The result is a small chance of the subsequent testing programs linking against libraries on the host. This is not ideal, but it's not a major problem. The situation is corrected when we install the second pass of Binutils a bit further on.

Now that the adjusted linker is installed, you have to remove the Binutils build and source directories.

The next thing to do is to amend our GCC specs file so that it points to the new dynamic linker. A simple sed will accomplish this:

SPECFILE=/tools/lib/gcc-lib/*/*/specs &&
sed -e 's@ /lib/ld-linux.so.2@ /tools/lib/ld-linux.so.2@g' \
    $SPECFILE > tempspecfile &&
mv -f tempspecfile $SPECFILE &&
unset SPECFILE

We recommend that you cut-and-paste the above rather than try and type it all in. Or you can edit the specs file by hand if you want to: just replace the occurrence of "/lib/ld-linux.so.2" with "/tools/lib/ld-linux.so.2". Be sure to visually inspect the specs file to verify the intended change was actually made.

Important: If you are working on a platform where the name of the dynamic linker is something other than ld-linux.so.2, you must substitute ld-linux.so.2 with the name of your platform's dynamic linker in the above commands. Refer back to the Section called Toolchain technical notes if necessary.

Lastly, there is a possibility that some include files from the host system have found their way into GCC's private include dir. This can happen because of GCC's "fixincludes" process which runs as part of the GCC build. We'll explain more about this further on in this chapter. For now, run the following commands to eliminate this possibility:

rm -f /tools/lib/gcc-lib/*/*/include/{pthread.h,bits/sigthread.h}

Caution

It is imperative at this point to stop and ensure that the basic functions (compiling and linking) of the new toolchain are working as expected. For this we are going to perform a simple sanity check:

echo 'main(){}' > dummy.c
cc dummy.c
readelf -l a.out | grep ': /tools'

If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be:

[Requesting program interpreter: /tools/lib/ld-linux.so.2]

(Of course allowing for platform specific differences in dynamic linker name). Note especially that /tools/lib appears as the prefix of our dynamic linker. If you did not receive the output as shown above, or received no output at all, then something is seriously wrong. You will need to investigate and retrace your steps to find out where the problem is and correct it. There is no point in continuing until this is done. First, redo the sanity check using gcc instead of cc. If this works it means the /tools/bin/cc symlink is missing. Revisit the Section called Installing GCC-3.3.2 - Pass 1 and fix the symlink. Second, ensure your $PATH is correct. You can check this by running echo $PATH and verifying that /tools/bin is at the head of the list. If the $PATH is wrong it could mean you're not logged in as user lfs or something went wrong back in the Section called Setting up the environment. Third, something may have gone wrong with the specs file amendment above. In this case redo the specs file amendment ensuring to cut-and-paste the commands as was recommended.

Once you are satisfied that all is well, clean up the test files:

rm dummy.c a.out

This completes the installation of the self-contained toolchain, and it can now be used to build the rest of the temporary tools.

Installing Tcl-8.4.5

The Tcl package contains the Tool Command Language.

Approximate build time:  0.9 SBU 
Required disk space:     23 MB

Official download location for Tcl (8.4.5):
http://download.sourceforge.net/tcl/
ftp://download.sourceforge.net/pub/sourceforge/tcl/

For its installation Tcl depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Tcl

This package and the next two are only installed to be able to run the test suites for GCC and Binutils. Installing three packages just for testing purposes may seem like overkill, but it is very reassuring, if not essential, to know that our most important tools are working properly. Even if you are not running the test suites here in this chapter as per our recommendation, these packages are still required for the test suites in the next chapter.

Prepare Tcl for compilation:

cd unix
./configure --prefix=/tools

Build the package:

make

As discussed earlier, we don't recommend running the test suites for the temporary tools here in this chapter. If you still want to run the Tcl test suite anyway, the following command will do so. However, you should be aware that the Tcl test suite is sometimes known to experience failures under certain host conditions that are not fully understood. Therefore, test suite failures here are not surprising, but are not considered critical:

TZ=UTC make test

The meaning of the make parameter:

TZ=UTC: This sets the time zone to Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) also known as Greenwich Mean Time (GMT), but only for the duration of the test suite run. This ensures the clock tests are exercised correctly. More information on the TZ environment variable will be given later on in Chapter 7.

Sometimes package test suites will give false failures. You can consult the LFS Wiki at http://wiki.linuxfromscratch.org/ to verify that these failures are normal. This applies to all tests throughout the book.

Install the package:

make install

Warning

Do not remove the tcl8.4.5 source directory yet, as the next package will need its internal headers.

Make a necessary symbolic link:

ln -s tclsh8.4 /tools/bin/tclsh

Contents of Tcl

Installed programs: tclsh (link to tclsh8.4), tclsh8.4

Installed library: libtcl8.4.so

Short descriptions

tclsh8.4 is the Tcl command shell.

libtcl8.4.so is the Tcl library.

Installing Expect-5.40.0

The Expect package contains a program for doing scripted dialogues with other interactive programs.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU 
Required disk space:     3.9 MB

Official download location for Expect (5.40.0):
http://expect.nist.gov/src/
And for the Expect Spawn Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/expect-5.40.0-spawn.patch

For its installation Expect depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed, Tcl.

Installation of Expect

First apply a patch:

patch -Np1 -i ../expect-5.40.0-spawn.patch

This fixes a bug in Expect that can result in bogus failures during the GCC test suite run.

Now prepare Expect for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools --with-tcl=/tools/lib --with-x=no

The meaning of the configure options:

--with-tcl=/tools/lib: This ensures that the configure script finds the Tcl installation in our temporary tools location. We don't want it to find an existing one that may possibly reside on the host system.
--with-x=no: This tells the configure script not to search for Tk (the Tcl GUI component) or the X Window System libraries, both of which may possibly reside on the host system.

Build the package:

make

As discussed earlier, we don't recommend running the test suites for the temporary tools here in this chapter. If you still want to run the Expect test suite anyway, the following command will do so. However, you should be aware that the Expect test suite is sometimes known to experience failures under certain host conditions that are not fully understood. Therefore, test suite failures here are not surprising, but are not considered critical:

make test

And install:

make SCRIPTS="" install

The meaning of the make parameter:

SCRIPTS="": This prevents installation of the supplementary expect scripts which are not needed.

You can now remove the source directories of both Tcl and Expect.

Contents of Expect

Installed program: expect

Installed library: libexpect5.39.a

Short description

expect "talks" to other interactive programs according to a script.

Installing DejaGnu-1.4.4

The DejaGnu package contains a framework for testing other programs.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU 
Required disk space:     8.6 MB

Official download location for DejaGnu (1.4.4):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/dejagnu/

For its installation Dejagnu depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of DejaGnu

Prepare DejaGnu for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Build and install the package:

make install

Contents of DejaGnu

Installed program: runtest

Short description

runtest is the wrapper script that finds the proper expect shell and then runs DejaGnu.

Installing GCC-3.3.2 - Pass 2

Approximate build time:  11.0 SBU
Required disk space:     274 MB

Official download location for GCC (3.3.2):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gcc/
And for the GCC No-Fixincludes Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/gcc-3.3.2-no_fixincludes-1.patch
And for the GCC Specs Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/gcc-3.3.2-specs-1.patch

For its installation GCC depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Findutils, Gawk, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Perl, Sed, Texinfo.

Re-installation of GCC

The tools required to test GCC and Binutils are installed now (Tcl, Expect and DejaGnu). We can continue on rebuilding GCC and Binutils, link them against the new Glibc, and test them properly (if performing the test suites in this chapter). One thing to note, however, is that these test suites are highly dependent on properly functioning pseudo terminals (PTYs) which are provided by your host distribution. These days, PTYs are most commonly implemented via the devpts file system. You can quickly check if your host system is set up correctly in this regard by performing a simple test:

expect -c "spawn ls"

If you receive the message:

The system has no more ptys.  Ask your system administrator to create more.

Your host distribution is not set up for proper PTY operation. In this case there is no point in running the test suites for GCC and Binutils until you are able to resolve the issue. You can consult the LFS Wiki at http://wiki.linuxfromscratch.org/ for more information on how to get PTYs working.

This time we will build both the C and the C++ compilers, so you'll have to unpack all three GCC tarballs (-core, -g++, and -testsuite) in one and the same working directory. They will all unfold into a single gcc-3.3.2/ subdirectory.

First correct one problem and make an essential adjustment:

patch -Np1 -i ../gcc-3.3.2-no_fixincludes-1.patch
patch -Np1 -i ../gcc-3.3.2-specs-1.patch

The first patch disables the GCC "fixincludes" script. We mentioned this briefly earlier, but a slightly more in-depth explanation of the fixincludes process is warranted here. Under normal circumstances, the GCC fixincludes script scans your system for header files that need to be fixed. It might find that some Glibc header files on your host system need to be fixed, fix them and put them in the GCC private include directory. Then, later on in Chapter 6, after we've installed the newer Glibc, this private include directory would be searched before the system include directory, resulting in GCC finding the fixed headers from the host system, which would most likely not match the Glibc version actually used for the LFS system.

The last patch changes GCC's default location of the dynamic linker (typically ld-linux.so.2). It also removes /usr/include from GCC's include search path. Patching now rather than adjusting the specs file after installation ensures that our new dynamic linker gets used during the actual build of GCC. That is, all the final (and temporary) binaries created during the build will link against the new Glibc.

Important: The above patches are critical in ensuring a successful overall build. Do not forget to apply them.

Create a separate build directory again:

mkdir ../gcc-build
cd ../gcc-build

Before starting to build GCC, remember to unset any environment variables that override the default optimization flags.

Now prepare GCC for compilation:

../gcc-3.3.2/configure --prefix=/tools \
    --with-local-prefix=/tools \
    --enable-clocale=gnu --enable-shared \
    --enable-threads=posix --enable-__cxa_atexit \
    --enable-languages=c,c++

The meaning of the new configure options:

--enable-threads=posix: This enables C++ exception handling for multi-threaded code.
--enable-__cxa_atexit: This option allows use of __cxa_atexit, rather than atexit, to register C++ destructors for local statics and global objects and is essential for fully standards-compliant handling of destructors. It also affects the C++ ABI and therefore results in C++ shared libraries and C++ programs that are interoperable with other Linux distributions.
--enable-clocale=gnu: This option ensures the correct locale model is selected for the C++ libraries under all circumstances. If the configure script finds the de_DE locale installed, it will select the correct model of gnu. However, people who don't install the de_DE locale, run the risk of building ABI incompatible C++ libraries due to the wrong locale model of generic being selected.
--enable-languages=c,c++: This option is needed to ensure that both C and C++ compilers are built.

Compile the package:

make

There is no need to use the bootstrap target now, as the compiler we're using to compile this GCC was built from the exact same version of the GCC sources we used earlier.

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, we don't recommend running the test suites for the temporary tools here in this chapter. If you still want to run the GCC test suite anyway, the following command will do so:

make -k check

The -k flag is used to make the test suite run through to completion and not stop at the first failure. The GCC test suite is very comprehensive and is almost guaranteed to generate a few failures. To get a summary of the test suite results, run this:

../gcc-3.3.2/contrib/test_summary | more

You can compare your results to those posted to the gcc-testresults mailing list for similar configurations to your own. For an example of how current GCC-3.3.2 should look on i686-pc-linux-gnu, see http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc-testresults/2004-01/msg00826.html.

Note that the results contain:

* 1 XPASS (unexpected pass) for g++
* 1 FAIL (unexpected failure) for gcc
* 24 XPASS's for libstdc++

The unexpected pass for g++ is due to the use of --enable-__cxa_atexit. Apparently not all platforms supported by GCC have support for "__cxa_atexit" in their C libraries, so this test is not always expected to pass.

The 24 unexpected passes for libstdc++ are due to the use of --enable-clocale=gnu, which is the correct choice on Glibc-based systems of versions 2.2.5 and above. The underlying locale support in the GNU C library is superior to that of the otherwise selected "generic" model (which may be applicable if for instance you were using Newlibc, Sun-libc or whatever libc). The libstdc++ test suite is apparently expecting the "generic" model, hence those tests are not always expected to pass.

Unexpected failures often cannot be avoided. The GCC developers are usually aware of them but haven't yet gotten around to fixing them. In short, unless your results are vastly different from those at the above URL, it is safe to continue on.

And finally install the package:

make install

Note: At this point it is strongly recommended to repeat the sanity check we performed earlier in the chapter. Refer back to the Section called "Locking in" Glibc and repeat the check. If the results are wrong, then most likely you forgot to apply the above mentioned GCC Specs patch.

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of GCC in Chapter 6.

Installing Binutils-2.14 - Pass 2

Approximate build time:  1.5 SBU
Required disk space:     108 MB

Official download location for Binutils (2.14):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/binutils/

For its installation Binutils depends on: Bash, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Perl, Sed, Texinfo.

Re-installation of Binutils

Create a separate build directory again:

mkdir ../binutils-build
cd ../binutils-build

Now prepare Binutils for compilation:

../binutils-2.14/configure --prefix=/tools \
    --enable-shared --with-lib-path=/tools/lib

The meaning of the new configure option:

--with-lib-path=/tools/lib: This tells the configure script to specify the default library search path. We don't want the library search path to contain library directories from the host system.

Before starting to build Binutils, remember to unset any environment variables that override the default optimization flags.

Compile the package:

make

Compilation is now complete. As discussed earlier, we don't recommend running the test suites for the temporary tools here in this chapter. If you still want to run the Binutils test suite anyway, the following command will do so:

make check

There should be no unexpected failures here, expected failures are fine. Unfortunately, there is no easy way to view the test results summary like there was for the previous GCC package. However, if a failure occurs here, it should be easy to spot. The output shown will contain something like:

make[1]: *** [check-binutils] Error 2

And install the package:

make install

Now prepare Binutils for the re-adjusting of the toolchain in the next chapter:

make -C ld clean
make -C ld LIB_PATH=/usr/lib:/lib

Warning

Do not yet remove the Binutils source and build directories. We'll need these directories again in the next chapter in the state they are in now.

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Binutils in Chapter 6.

Installing Gawk-3.1.3

Approximate build time:  0.2 SBU
Required disk space:     17 MB

Official download location for Gawk (3.1.3):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/gawk/

For its installation Gawk depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Gawk

Prepare Gawk for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the package:

make

As discussed earlier, we don't recommend running the test suites for the temporary tools here in this chapter. If you still want to run the Gawk test suite anyway, the following command will do so:

make check

And install it:

make install

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Gawk in Chapter 6.

Installing Coreutils-5.0

Approximate build time:  0.9 SBU
Required disk space:     69 MB

Official download location for Coreutils (5.0):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/coreutils/
And for the Coreutils Posixver Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/coreutils-5.0-posixver-2.patch

For its installation Coreutils depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Perl, Sed.

Installation of Coreutils

Coreutils has an issue when compiled against Glibc-2.3.3. Without the patch below, some of the Coreutils utilities (head, tail, sort etc) will reject their traditional syntax which has been in use for approximately 30 years. The old syntax is so pervasive that compatibility must be preserved until the many places where it is used can be updated. More details are provided in the comments inside the patch itself. Use of this patch is by no means compulsory but opting not to use it means you'll have deal with the consequences yourself, i.e. patch the many software packages that use the old syntax. Apply the patch:

patch -Np1 -i ../coreutils-5.0-posixver-2.patch

Now prepare Coreutils for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the package:

make

As discussed earlier, we don't recommend running the test suites for the temporary tools here in this chapter. If you still want to run the Coreutils test suite anyway, the following command will do so:

make RUN_EXPENSIVE_TESTS=yes check

The meaning of the make parameter:

RUN_EXPENSIVE_TESTS=yes: This tells the test suite to run several additional tests that are considered relatively expensive on some platforms. However, they are generally not a problem on Linux.

And install the package:

make install

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Coreutils in Chapter 6.

Installing Bzip2-1.0.2

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     2.5 MB

Official download location for Bzip2 (1.0.2):
ftp://sources.redhat.com/pub/bzip2/

For its installation Bzip2 depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Make.

Installation of Bzip2

The Bzip2 package doesn't contain a configure script. Compile and install it with a straightforward:

make PREFIX=/tools install

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Bzip2 in Chapter 6.

Installing Gzip-1.3.5

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     2.6 MB

Official download location for Gzip (1.3.5):
ftp://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/gzip/

For its installation Gzip depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Gzip

Prepare Gzip for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the package:

make

And install it:

make install

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Gzip in Chapter 6.

Installing Diffutils-2.8.1

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     7.5 MB

Official download location for Diffutils (2.8.1):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/diffutils/

For its installation Diffutils depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Diffutils

Prepare Diffutils for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the package:

make

And install it:

make install

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Diffutils in Chapter 6.

Installing Findutils-4.1.20

Approximate build time:  0.2 SBU
Required disk space:     7.6 MB

Official download location for Findutils (4.1.20):
ftp://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/findutils/

For its installation Findutils depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Findutils

Prepare Findutils for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the package:

make

As discussed earlier, we don't recommend running the test suites for the temporary tools here in this chapter. If you still want to run the Findutils test suite anyway, the following command will do so:

make check

And install the package:

make install

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Findutils in Chapter 6.

Installing Make-3.80

Approximate build time:  0.2 SBU
Required disk space:     8.8 MB

Official download location for Make (3.80):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/make/

For its installation Make depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Sed.

Installation of Make

Prepare Make for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the program:

make

As discussed earlier, we don't recommend running the test suites for the temporary tools here in this chapter. If you still want to run the Make test suite anyway, the following command will do so:

make check

Then install it and its documentation:

make install

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Make in Chapter 6.

Installing Grep-2.5.1

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     5.8 MB

Official download location for Grep (2.5.1):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/grep/

For its installation Grep depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Make, Sed, Texinfo.

Installation of Grep

Prepare Grep for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools \
    --disable-perl-regexp --with-included-regex

The meaning of the configure options:

--disable-perl-regexp: This makes sure that grep does not get linked against a PCRE library that may be present on the host and would not be available once we enter the chroot environment.
--with-included-regex: This ensures that Grep uses its internal regular expression code. Without this switch, Grep will use the code from Glibc, which is known to be slightly buggy.

Compile the programs:

make

As discussed earlier, we don't recommend running the test suites for the temporary tools here in this chapter. If you still want to run the Grep test suite anyway, the following command will do so:

make check

Then install them and their documentation:

make install

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Grep in Chapter 6.

Installing Sed-4.0.9

Approximate build time:  0.2 SBU
Required disk space:     5.2 MB

Official download location for Sed (4.0.9):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/sed/

For its installation Sed depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Texinfo.

Installation of Sed

Prepare Sed for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the program:

make

As discussed earlier, we don't recommend running the test suites for the temporary tools here in this chapter. If you still want to run the Sed test suite anyway, the following command will do so:

make check

Then install it and its documentation:

make install

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Sed in Chapter 6.

Installing Gettext-0.14.1

Approximate build time:  7.2 SBU
Required disk space:     55 MB

Official download location for Gettext (0.14.1):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gettext/

For its installation Gettext depends on: Bash, Binutils, Bison, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Gettext

Prepare Gettext for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the programs:

make

As discussed earlier, we don't recommend running the test suites for the temporary tools here in this chapter. If you still want to run the Gettext test suite anyway, the following command will do so. However, you should be aware that the Gettext test suite is known to experience failures under certain host conditions -- for example, when it finds a Java compiler on the host (Note: an experimental patch to disable Java is available from the patches project). Not only that, the Gettext test suite takes an excessive amount of time to run and is not considered critical:

make check

And install the package:

make install

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Gettext in Chapter 6.

Installing Ncurses-5.3

Approximate build time:  0.7 SBU
Required disk space:     26 MB

Official download location for Ncurses (5.3):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/ncurses/
And for the Ncurses Etip Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/ncurses-5.3-etip-2.patch

For its installation Ncurses depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Ncurses

Fix a minor problem related to the etip.h header file:

patch -Np1 -i ../ncurses-5.3-etip-2.patch

Now prepare Ncurses for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools --with-shared \
    --without-debug --without-ada --enable-overwrite

The meaning of the configure options:

--without-ada: This tells Ncurses not to build its Ada bindings, even if an Ada compiler is installed on the host. This must be done because once we enter the chroot environment, Ada will no longer be available.
--enable-overwrite: This tells Ncurses to install its header files into /tools/include instead of /tools/include/ncurses to ensure that other packages can find the Ncurses headers successfully.

Compile the programs and libraries:

make

Then install them and their documentation:

make install

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Ncurses in Chapter 6.

Installing Patch-2.5.4

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     1.9 MB

Official download location for Patch (2.5.4):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/patch/

For its installation Patch depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Patch

Prepare Patch for compilation:

CPPFLAGS=-D_GNU_SOURCE ./configure --prefix=/tools

The preprocessor flag -D_GNU_SOURCE is only needed on the PowerPC platform. On other architectures you can leave it out.

Compile the program:

make

Then install it and its documentation:

make install

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Patch in Chapter 6.

Installing Tar-1.13.25

Approximate build time:  0.2 SBU
Required disk space:     10 MB

Official download location for Tar (1.13.25):
ftp://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/tar/

For its installation Tar depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Tar

Prepare Tar for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the programs:

make

As discussed earlier, we don't recommend running the test suites for the temporary tools here in this chapter. If you still want to run the Tar test suite anyway, the following command will do so:

make check

Then install them and their documentation:

make install

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Tar in Chapter 6.

Installing Texinfo-4.6

Approximate build time:  0.2 SBU
Required disk space:     16 MB

Official download location for Texinfo (4.6):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/texinfo/

For its installation Texinfo depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, Sed.

Installation of Texinfo

Prepare Texinfo for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the programs:

make

As discussed earlier, we don't recommend running the test suites for the temporary tools here in this chapter. If you still want to run the Texinfo test suite anyway, the following command will do so:

make check

Then install them and their documentation:

make install

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Texinfo in Chapter 6.

Installing Bash-2.05b

Approximate build time:  1.2 SBU 
Required disk space:     27 MB

Official download location for Bash (2.05b):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/bash/
And for the Bash Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/bash-2.05b-2.patch

For its installation Bash depends on: Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, Sed.

Installation of Bash

Bash contains several known bugs. Fix these with the following patch:

patch -Np1 -i ../bash-2.05b-2.patch

Now prepare Bash for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/tools

Compile the program:

make

As discussed earlier, we don't recommend running the test suites for the temporary tools here in this chapter. If you still want to run the Bash test suite anyway, the following command will do so:

make tests

Then install it and its documentation:

make install

And make a link for the programs that use sh for a shell:

ln -s bash /tools/bin/sh

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Bash in Chapter 6.

Installing Util-linux-2.12

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     8 MB

Official download location for Util-linux (2.12):
http://ftp.cwi.nl/aeb/util-linux/

For its installation Util-linux depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, Sed, Zlib.

Installation of Util-linux

Util-linux doesn't use the freshly installed headers and libraries from the /tools directory. This is fixed by altering the configure script:

cp configure configure.backup
sed "s@/usr/include@/tools/include@g" configure.backup > configure

Prepare Util-linux for compilation:

./configure

Compile some support routines:

make -C lib

And, since you'll need only a couple of the utilities contained in this package, build just those:

make -C mount  mount umount
make -C text-utils  more
make -C sys-utils  arch

Now copy these programs to the temporary tools directory:

cp mount/{,u}mount text-utils/more sys-utils/arch /tools/bin

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Util-linux in Chapter 6.

Installing Perl-5.8.3

Approximate build time:  0.8 SBU
Required disk space:     74 MB

Official download location for Perl (5.8.3):
http://www.cpan.org/src/
And for the Perl Libc Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/perl-5.8.3-libc-1.patch

For its installation Perl depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Perl

First adapt some hard-wired paths to the C library:

patch -Np1 -i ../perl-5.8.3-libc-1.patch

Now prepare Perl for compilation (make sure to get the 'IO Fcntl' right, they are all letters):

./configure.gnu --prefix=/tools -Dstatic_ext='IO Fcntl'

The meaning of the configure option:

-Dstatic_ext='IO Fcntl': This tells Perl to build the minimum set of static extensions needed for running the Coreutils test suite in the next chapter.

Compile only the required tools:

make perl utilities

Then copy these tools and their libraries:

cp perl pod/pod2man /tools/bin
mkdir -p /tools/lib/perl5/5.8.3
cp -R lib/* /tools/lib/perl5/5.8.3

The details on this package are found in the Section called Contents of Perl in Chapter 6.

Stripping

The steps in this section are optional. If your LFS partition is rather small, you will be glad to learn that you can throw away some unnecessary things. The executables and libraries you have built so far contain about 130 MB of unneeded debugging symbols. Remove those symbols like this:

strip --strip-unneeded /tools/{,s}bin/*
strip --strip-debug /tools/lib/*

The first of the above commands will skip some twenty files, reporting that it doesn't recognize their file format. Most of them are scripts instead of binaries.

Take care not to use --strip-unneeded on the libraries -- they would be destroyed and you would have to build Glibc all over again.

To save another couple of megabytes, you can throw away all the documentation:

rm -rf /tools/{,share/}{doc,info,man}

You will now need to have at least 850 MB of free space on your LFS file system to be able to build and install Glibc in the next phase. If you can build and install Glibc, you can build and install the rest too.

III. Part III - Building the LFS system

Table of Contents
6. Installing basic system software
7. Setting up system boot scripts
8. Making the LFS system bootable
9. The End

Chapter 6. Installing basic system software

Introduction

In this chapter we enter the building site, and start constructing our LFS system in earnest. That is, we chroot into our temporary mini Linux system, create some auxiliary things, and then start installing all the packages, one by one.

The installation of all this software is pretty straightforward, and you will probably think it would be much shorter to give here the generic installation instructions and explain in full only the installation of those packages that require an alternate method. Although we agree with that, we nevertheless choose to give the full instructions for each and every package, simply to minimize the possibilities for mistakes.

The key to learning what makes a Linux system work is to know what each package is used for and why the user (or the system) needs it. For this purpose for every installed package a summary of its content is given followed by concise descriptions of each program and library it installed.

If you plan to use compiler optimizations in this chapter, take a look at the optimization hint at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/optimization.txt. Compiler optimizations can make a program run slightly faster, but they may also cause compilation difficulties and even problems when running the program. If a package refuses to compile when using optimization, try to compile it without optimization and see if the problem goes away. Even if the package does compile when using optimization, there is the risk it may have been compiled incorrectly due to complex interactions between the code and build tools. In short, the small potential gains achieved in using compiler optimization are generally outweighed by the risk. First time builders of LFS are encouraged to build without custom optimizations. Your system will still be very fast and very stable at the same time.

The order in which packages are installed in this chapter has to be strictly followed, to ensure that no program gets a path referring to /tools hard-wired into it. For the same reason, do not compile packages in parallel. Compiling in parallel may save you some time (especially on dual-CPU machines), but it could result in a program containing a hard-wired path to /tools, which will cause the program to stop working when that directory is removed.

Before the installation instructions each installation page gives some information about the package: a concise description of what it contains, how long it will approximately take to build it, how much disk space it needs during this building process, the official download location of the package (in case you just want to update a few of them), and which other packages it needs in order to be built successfully. After the installation instructions follows a list of programs and libraries that the package installs, together with a series of short descriptions of these.

Entering the chroot environment

It is time to enter the chroot environment in order to begin installing the packages we need. Before you can chroot, however, you need to become root, since only root can execute the chroot command.

Just like earlier, ensure the LFS environment variable is set up properly by running echo $LFS and ensuring it shows the path to your LFS partition's mount point, which is /mnt/lfs if you followed our example.

Become root and run the following command to enter the chroot environment:

chroot $LFS /tools/bin/env -i \
    HOME=/root TERM=$TERM PS1='\u:\w\$ ' \
    PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin:/tools/bin \
    /tools/bin/bash --login +h

The -i option given to the env command will clear all variables of the chroot environment. After that, only the HOME, TERM, PS1 and PATH variables are set again. The TERM=$TERM construct will set the TERM variable inside chroot to the same value as outside chroot; this variable is needed for programs like vim and less to operate properly. If you need other variables present, such as CFLAGS or CXXFLAGS, this is a good place to set them again.

From this point on there's no need to use the LFS variable anymore, because everything you do will be restricted to the LFS file system -- since what the shell thinks is / is actually the value of $LFS, which was passed to the chroot command.

Notice that /tools/bin comes last in the PATH. This means that a temporary tool will not be used any more as soon as its final version is installed. Well, at least when the shell doesn't remember the locations of executed binaries -- for this reason hashing is switched off by passing the +h option to bash.

You have to make sure all the commands in the rest of this chapter and in the following chapters are run from within the chroot environment. If you ever leave this environment for any reason (rebooting for example), you must remember to again enter chroot and mount the proc and devpts file systems (discussed later) before continuing with the installations.

Note that the bash prompt will say "I have no name!" This is normal, as the /etc/passwd file has not been created yet.

Changing ownership

Right now the /tools directory is owned by the user lfs, a user that exists only on your host system. Although you will probably want to delete the /tools directory once you have finished your LFS system, you may want to keep it around, for example to build more LFS systems. But if you keep the /tools directory as it is, you end up with files owned by a user ID without a corresponding account. This is dangerous because a user account created later on could get this same user ID and would suddenly own the /tools directory and all the files therein, thus exposing these files to possible malicious manipulation.

To avoid this issue, you could add the lfs user to your new LFS system later on when creating the /etc/passwd file, taking care to assign it the same user and group IDs as on your host system. Alternatively, you can (and the book assumes you do) assign the contents of the /tools directory to user root by running the following command:

chown -R 0:0 /tools

The command uses "0:0" instead of "root:root", because chown is unable to resolve the name "root" until the password file has been created.

Creating directories

Let's now create some structure in our LFS file system. Let's create a directory tree. Issuing the following commands will create a more or less standard tree:

mkdir -p /{bin,boot,dev/{pts,shm},etc/opt,home,lib,mnt,proc}
mkdir -p /{root,sbin,tmp,usr/local,var,opt}
for dirname in /usr /usr/local
    do
    mkdir $dirname/{bin,etc,include,lib,sbin,share,src}
    ln -s share/{man,doc,info} $dirname
    mkdir $dirname/share/{doc,info,locale,man}
    mkdir $dirname/share/{misc,terminfo,zoneinfo}
    mkdir $dirname/share/man/man{1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8}
done
mkdir /var/{lock,log,mail,run,spool}
mkdir -p /var/{tmp,opt,cache,lib/misc,local}
mkdir /opt/{bin,doc,include,info}
mkdir -p /opt/{lib,man/man{1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8}}

Directories are, by default, created with permission mode 755, but this isn't desirable for all directories. We will make two changes: one to the home directory of root, and another to the directories for temporary files.

chmod 0750 /root
chmod 1777 /tmp /var/tmp

The first mode change ensures that not just anybody can enter the /root directory -- the same as a normal user would do with his or her home directory. The second mode change makes sure that any user can write to the /tmp and /var/tmp directories, but cannot remove other users' files from them. The latter is prohibited by the so-called "sticky bit" -- the highest bit in the 1777 bit mask.

FHS compliance note

We have based our directory tree on the FHS standard (available at http://www.pathname.com/fhs/). Besides the above created tree this standard stipulates the existence of /usr/local/games and /usr/share/games, but we don't much like these for a base system. However, feel free to make your system FHS-compliant. As to the structure of the /usr/local/share subdirectory, the FHS isn't precise, so we created here the directories that we think are needed.

Mounting the proc and devpts file systems

In order for certain programs to function properly, the proc and devpts file systems must be available within the chroot environment. Since kernel version 2.4 a file system can be mounted as many times and in as many places as you like, thus it's not a problem that these file systems are already mounted on your host system -- especially so because they are virtual file systems.

The proc file system is the process information pseudo file system through which the kernel provides information about the status of the system.

The proc file system is mounted on /proc by running the following command:

mount proc /proc -t proc

You might get warning messages from the mount command, such as these:

warning: can't open /etc/fstab: No such file or directory
not enough memory

Ignore these, they're just due to the fact that the system isn't installed completely yet and some files are missing. The mount itself will be successful and that's all we care about at this point.

The devpts file system was mentioned earlier and is now the most common way for pseudo terminals (PTYs) to be implemented.

The devpts file system is mounted on /dev/pts by running:

mount devpts /dev/pts -t devpts

Should this command fail with an error to the effect of:

filesystem devpts not supported by kernel

The most likely cause is that your host system's kernel was compiled without support for the devpts file system. You can check which file systems your kernel supports by peeking into its internals with a command such as cat /proc/filesystems. If a file system type named devfs is listed there, then we'll be able to work around the problem by mounting the host's devfs file system on top of the new /dev structure which we'll create later on in the section on Makedev. If devfs was not listed, do not worry because there is yet a third way to get PTYs working inside the chroot environment. We'll cover this shortly in the aforementioned Makedev section.

Remember, if for any reason you stop working on your LFS, and start again later, it's important to check that these file systems are still mounted inside the chroot environment, otherwise problems are likely to occur.

Creating essential symlinks

Some programs hard-wire paths to programs which don't exist yet. In order to satisfy these programs, we create a number of symbolic links which will be replaced by real files throughout the course of this chapter when we're installing all the software.

ln -s /tools/bin/{bash,cat,pwd,stty} /bin
ln -s /tools/bin/perl /usr/bin
ln -s /tools/lib/libgcc_s.so.1 /usr/lib
ln -s bash /bin/sh

Creating the passwd, group and log files

In order for root to be able to login and for the name "root" to be recognized, there need to be relevant entries in the /etc/passwd and /etc/group files.

Create the /etc/passwd file by running the following command:

cat > /etc/passwd << "EOF"
root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash
EOF

The actual password for root (the "x" here is just a placeholder) will be set later.

Create the /etc/group file by running the following command:

cat > /etc/group << "EOF"
root:x:0:
bin:x:1:
sys:x:2:
kmem:x:3:
tty:x:4:
tape:x:5:
daemon:x:6:
floppy:x:7:
disk:x:8:
lp:x:9:
dialout:x:10:
audio:x:11:
EOF

The created groups aren't part of any standard -- they are the groups that the MAKEDEV script in the next section uses. Besides the group "root", the LSB (http://www.linuxbase.org) recommends only a group "bin", with a GID of 1, be present. All other group names and GIDs can be chosen freely by the user, as well-written packages don't depend on GID numbers but use the group's name.

To get rid of the "I have no name!" prompt, we will start a new shell. Since we installed a full Glibc in Chapter 5, and have just created the /etc/passwd and /etc/group files, user name and group name resolution will now work.

exec /tools/bin/bash --login +h

Note the use of the +h directive. This tells bash not to use its internal path hashing. Without this directive, bash would remember the paths to binaries it has executed. Since we want to use our newly compiled binaries as soon as they are installed, we turn off this function for the duration of this chapter.

The login, agetty and init programs (and some others) use a number of log files to record information such as who was logged into the system and when. These programs, however, won't write to the log files if they don't already exist. Initialize the log files and give them their proper permissions:

touch /var/run/utmp /var/log/{btmp,lastlog,wtmp}
chmod 644 /var/run/utmp /var/log/{btmp,lastlog,wtmp}

The /var/run/utmp file records the users that are currently logged in. The /var/log/wtmp file records all logins and logouts. The /var/log/lastlog file records for each user when he or she last logged in. The /var/log/btmp file records the bad login attempts.

Creating devices with Makedev-1.7

The MAKEDEV package contains a script for making device nodes.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     50 KB

Official download location for MAKEDEV (1.7):
http://downloads.linuxfromscratch.org/

For its installation MAKEDEV depends on: Bash, Coreutils.

Making devices

Note that unpacking the MAKEDEV-1.7.bz2 file doesn't create a directory for you to cd into, as the file contains only a shell script.

Install the MAKEDEV script:

bzcat MAKEDEV-1.7.bz2 > /dev/MAKEDEV
chmod 754 /dev/MAKEDEV

Run the script to create the device files:

cd /dev
./MAKEDEV -v generic-nopty

The meaning of the arguments:

-v: This tells the script to run in verbose mode.
generic-nopty: This instructs MAKEDEV to create a generic selection of commonly used device special files, except for the ptyXX and ttyXX range of files. We don't need those files because we are going to use Unix98 PTYs via the devpts file system.

If it turns out that some special device zzz that you need is missing, try running ./MAKEDEV -v zzz. Alternatively, you may create devices via the mknod program. Please refer to its man and info pages if you need more information.

If you wish your system to be FHS-compliant, then the MAKEDEV script has to remain present in the /dev directory. This way it is always available for making extra device nodes.

Additionally, if you were unable to mount the devpts file system earlier in the Section called Mounting the proc and devpts file systems, now is the time to try the alternatives. If your kernel supports the devfs file system, run the following command to mount devfs:

mount -t devfs devfs /dev

This will mount the devfs file system over the top of the new static /dev structure. This poses no problems, as the device nodes created are still present, they are just hidden by the new devfs file system.

If this still doesn't work, the only option left is to use the MAKEDEV script to create the ptyXX and ttyXX range of files that would otherwise not be needed. Ensure you are still in the /dev directory then run ./MAKEDEV -v pty. The downside of this is, we are creating an extra 512 device special files which will not be needed when we finally boot into the finished LFS system.

Contents of MAKEDEV

Installed script: MAKEDEV

Short description

MAKEDEV is a script for creating the necessary static device nodes, usually residing in the /dev directory.

Installing Linux-2.4.24 headers

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     186 MB

Installation of the kernel headers

We won't be compiling a new kernel yet -- we'll do that when we have finished the installation of all the packages. But as some packages need the kernel header files, we're going to unpack the kernel archive now, set it up and copy the header files so they can be found by these packages.

It is important to note that the files in the kernel source directory are not owned by root. Whenever you unpack a package as user root (like we do here inside chroot), the files end up having the user and group IDs of whatever they were on the packager's computer. This is usually not a problem for any other package you install because you remove the source tree after the installation. But the Linux kernel source tree is often kept around for a long time, so there's a chance that whatever user ID the packager used will be assigned to somebody on your machine and then that person would have write access to the kernel source.

In light of this, you might want to run chown -R 0:0 on the linux-2.4.24 directory to ensure all files are owned by user root.

Prepare for header installation:

make mrproper

Create the include/linux/version.h file:

make include/linux/version.h

Create the platform-specific include/asm symlink:

make symlinks

Install the platform specific-header files:

cp -HR include/asm /usr/include
cp -R include/asm-generic /usr/include

Install the cross-platform kernel header files:

cp -R include/linux /usr/include

touch /usr/include/linux/autoconf.h

Why we copy the kernel headers and don't symlink them

In the past it was common practice to symlink the /usr/include/{linux,asm} directories to /usr/src/linux/include/{linux,asm}. This was a bad practice, as the following extract from a post by Linus Torvalds to the Linux Kernel Mailing List points out:

I would suggest that people who compile new kernels should: 

 - not have a single symbolic link in sight (except the one that the 
   kernel build itself sets up, namely the "linux/include/asm" symlink 
   that is only used for the internal kernel compile itself) 

And yes, this is what I do. My /usr/src/linux still has the old 2.2.13 
header files, even though I haven't run a 2.2.13 kernel in a _loong_ 
time. But those headers were what Glibc was compiled against, so those 
headers are what matches the library object files. 

And this is actually what has been the suggested environment for at 
least the last five years. I don't know why the symlink business keeps 
on living on, like a bad zombie. Pretty much every distribution still 
has that broken symlink, and people still remember that the linux 
sources should go into "/usr/src/linux" even though that hasn't been 
true in a _loong_ time.

The essential part is where Linus states that the header files should be the ones which Glibc was compiled against. These are the headers that should be used when you later compile other packages, as they are the ones that match the object-code library files. By copying the headers, we ensure that they remain available if later you upgrade your kernel.

Note, by the way, that it is perfectly all right to have the kernel sources in /usr/src/linux, as long as you don't have the /usr/include/{linux,asm} symlinks.

Installing Man-pages-1.65

The Man-pages package contains over 1200 manual pages.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     15 MB

Official download location for Man-pages (1.65):
ftp://ftp.win.tue.nl/pub/linux-local/manpages/

For its installation Man-pages depends on: Bash, Coreutils, Make.

Installation of Man-pages

Install Man-pages by running:

make install

Contents of Man-pages

Installed files: various manual pages

Short description

Examples of provided manual pages are the pages describing all the C and C++ functions, important device files, and important configuration files.

Installing Glibc-2.3.3

The Glibc package contains the main C library. This library provides all the basic routines for allocating memory, searching directories, opening and closing files, reading and writing them, string handling, pattern matching, arithmetic, and so on.

Approximate build time:  12.3 SBU
Required disk space:     784 MB

For its installation Glibc depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Gettext, Grep, Make, Perl, Sed, Texinfo.

Installation of Glibc

The Glibc build system is very well self-contained and will install perfectly, even though our compiler specs file and linker are still pointing at /tools. We cannot adjust the specs and linker before the Glibc install, because the Glibc autoconf tests would then give bogus results and thus defeat our goal of achieving a clean build.

Before starting to build Glibc, remember to unset any environment variables that override the default optimization flags.

The Glibc documentation recommends building Glibc outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:

mkdir ../glibc-build
cd ../glibc-build

Now prepare Glibc for compilation:

../glibc-2.3.3-20031202/configure --prefix=/usr \
    --disable-profile --enable-add-ons=linuxthreads \
    --libexecdir=/usr/lib --with-headers=/usr/include \
    --without-cvs

The meaning of the new configure options:

--libexecdir=/usr/lib: This changes the location of the pt_chown program from its default of /usr/libexec to /usr/lib. The use of libexec is considered not to be FHS-compliant because the FHS doesn't even mention it.
--with-headers=/usr/include: This ensures that the kernel headers in /usr/include are used for this build. If you don't pass this switch then the headers from /tools/include are used which of course is not ideal (although they should be identical). Using this switch has the advantage that you will be informed immediately should you have forgotten to install the kernel headers into /usr/include.

Compile the package:

make

Important: The test suite for Glibc in this section is considered critical. Our advice is to not skip it under any circumstance.

Test the results:

make check

The test suite notes from the Section called Installing Glibc-2.3.3 in Chapter 5 are still very much appropriate here. Be sure to refer back there should you have any doubts.

Though it is a harmless message, the install stage of Glibc will complain about the absence of /etc/ld.so.conf. Fix this annoying little warning with:

touch /etc/ld.so.conf

And install the package:

make install

The locales that can make your system respond in a different language weren't installed by the above command. Do it with this:

make localedata/install-locales

mkdir -p /usr/lib/locale
localedef -i de_DE -f ISO-8859-1 de_DE
localedef -i de_DE@euro -f ISO-8859-15 de_DE@euro
localedef -i en_HK -f ISO-8859-1 en_HK
localedef -i en_PH -f ISO-8859-1 en_PH
localedef -i en_US -f ISO-8859-1 en_US
localedef -i es_MX -f ISO-8859-1 es_MX
localedef -i fr_FR -f ISO-8859-1 fr_FR
localedef -i fr_FR@euro -f ISO-8859-15 fr_FR@euro
localedef -i it_IT -f ISO-8859-1 it_IT
localedef -i ja_JP -f EUC-JP ja_JP

Finally, build the linuxthreads man pages:

make -C ../glibc-2.3.3-20031202/linuxthreads/man

And install these pages:

make -C ../glibc-2.3.3-20031202/linuxthreads/man install

Configuring Glibc

We need to create the /etc/nsswitch.conf file, because, although Glibc provides defaults when this file is missing or corrupt, the Glibc defaults don't work well with networking. Also, our time zone needs to be set up.

Create a new file /etc/nsswitch.conf by running the following:

cat > /etc/nsswitch.conf << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/nsswitch.conf

passwd: files
group: files
shadow: files

publickey: files

hosts: files dns
networks: files

protocols: db files
services: db files
ethers: db files
rpc: db files

netgroup: db files

# End /etc/nsswitch.conf
EOF

To find out what time zone you're in, run the following script:

tzselect

When you've answered a few questions about your location, the script will output the name of your time zone, something like EST5EDT or Canada/Eastern. Then create the /etc/localtime file by running:

cp --remove-destination /usr/share/zoneinfo/Canada/Eastern /etc/localtime

The meaning of the option:

--remove-destination: This is needed to force removal of the already existing symbolic link. The reason why we copy instead of symlink is to cover the situation where /usr is on a separate partition. This could matter, for example, when booted into single user mode.

Of course, instead of Canada/Eastern, fill in the name of the time zone that the tzselect script gave you.

Configuring Dynamic Loader

By default, the dynamic loader (/lib/ld-linux.so.2) searches through /lib and /usr/lib for dynamic libraries that are needed by programs when you run them. However, if there are libraries in directories other than /lib and /usr/lib, you need to add them to the /etc/ld.so.conf file for the dynamic loader to find them. Two directories that are commonly known to contain additional libraries are /usr/local/lib and /opt/lib, so we add those directories to the dynamic loader's search path.

Create a new file /etc/ld.so.conf by running the following:

cat > /etc/ld.so.conf << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/ld.so.conf

/usr/local/lib
/opt/lib

# End /etc/ld.so.conf
EOF

Contents of Glibc

Installed programs: catchsegv, gencat, getconf, getent, glibcbug, iconv, iconvconfig, ldconfig, ldd, lddlibc4, locale, localedef, mtrace, nscd, nscd_nischeck, pcprofiledump, pt_chown, rpcgen, rpcinfo, sln, sprof, tzselect, xtrace, zdump and zic

Installed libraries: ld.so, libBrokenLocale.[a,so], libSegFault.so, libanl.[a,so], libbsd-compat.a, libc.[a,so], libc_nonshared.a, libcrypt.[a,so], libdl.[a,so], libg.a, libieee.a, libm.[a,so], libmcheck.a, libmemusage.so, libnsl.a, libnss_compat.so, libnss_dns.so, libnss_files.so, libnss_hesiod.so, libnss_nis.so, libnss_nisplus.so, libpcprofile.so, libpthread.[a,so], libresolv.[a,so], librpcsvc.a, librt.[a,so], libthread_db.so and libutil.[a,so]

Short descriptions

catchsegv can be used to create a stack trace when a program terminates with a segmentation fault.

gencat generates message catalogues.

getconf displays the system configuration values for file system specific variables.

getent gets entries from an administrative database.

glibcbug creates a bug report and mails it to the bug email address.

iconv performs character set conversion.

iconvconfig creates fastloading iconv module configuration file.

ldconfig configures the dynamic linker runtime bindings.

ldd reports which shared libraries are required by each given program or shared library.

lddlibc4 assists ldd with object files.

locale is a Perl program that tells the compiler to enable or disable the use of POSIX locales for built-in operations.

localedef compiles locale specifications.

mtrace...

nscd is a name service cache daemon providing a cache for the most common name service requests.

nscd_nischeck checks whether or not secure mode is necessary for NIS+ lookup.

pcprofiledump dumps information generated by PC profiling.

pt_chown is a helper program for grantpt to set the owner, group and access permissions of a slave pseudo terminal.

rpcgen generates C code to implement the RPC protocol.

rpcinfo makes an RPC call to an RPC server.

sln is used to make symbolic links. The program is statically linked, so it is useful for making symbolic links to dynamic libraries if the dynamic linking system for some reason is nonfunctional.

sprof reads and displays shared object profiling data.

tzselect asks the user about the location of the system and reports the corresponding time zone description.

xtrace traces the execution of a program by printing the currently executed function.

zdump is the time zone dumper.

zic is the time zone compiler.

ld.so is the helper program for shared library executables.

libBrokenLocale is used by programs, such as Mozilla, to solve broken locales.

libSegFault is a segmentation fault signal handler. It tries to catch segfaults.

libanl is an asynchronous name lookup library.

libbsd-compat provides the portability needed in order to run certain BSD programs under Linux.

libc is the main C library -- a collection of commonly used functions.

libcrypt is the cryptography library.

libdl is the dynamic linking interface library.

libg is a runtime library for g++.

libieee is the IEEE floating point library.

libm is the mathematical library.

libmcheck contains code run at boot.

libmemusage is used by memusage to help collect information about the memory usage of a program.

libnsl is the network services library.

libnss* are the Name Service Switch libraries, containing functions for resolving host names, user names, group names, aliases, services, protocols,and the like.

libpcprofile contains profiling functions used to track the amount of CPU time spent in which source code lines.

libpthread is the POSIX threads library.

libresolv contains functions for creating, sending, and interpreting packets to the Internet domain name servers.

librpcsvccontains functions providing miscellaneous RPC services.

librt contains functions providing most of the interfaces specified by the POSIX.1b Realtime Extension.

libthread_db contains functions useful for building debuggers for multi-threaded programs.

libutil contains code for "standard" functions used in many different Unix utilities.

Re-adjusting the toolchain

Now that the new C libraries have been installed, it's time to re-adjust our toolchain. We'll adjust it so that it will link any newly compiled program against the new C libraries. Basically, this is the reverse of what we did in the "locking in" stage in the beginning of the previous chapter.

The first thing to do is to adjust the linker. For this we retained the source and build directories from the second pass over Binutils. Install the adjusted linker by running the following from within the binutils-build directory:

make -C ld INSTALL=/tools/bin/install install

Note: If you somehow missed the earlier warning to retain the Binutils source and build directories from the second pass in Chapter 5, or otherwise accidentally deleted them or just don't have access to them, don't worry, all is not lost. Just ignore the above command. The result will be that the next package, Binutils, will link against the Glibc libraries in /tools rather than /usr. This is not ideal, however, our testing has shown that the resulting Binutils program binaries should be identical.

From now on every compiled program will link only against the libraries in /usr/lib and /lib. The extra INSTALL=/tools/bin/install is needed because the Makefile created during the second pass still contains the reference to /usr/bin/install, which we obviously haven't installed yet. Some host distributions contain a ginstall symbolic link which takes precedence in the Makefile and thus can cause a problem here. The above command takes care of this also.

You can now remove the Binutils source and build directories.

The next thing to do is to amend our GCC specs file so that it points to the new dynamic linker. Just like earlier on, we use a sed to accomplish this:

SPECFILE=/tools/lib/gcc-lib/*/*/specs &&
sed -e 's@ /tools/lib/ld-linux.so.2@ /lib/ld-linux.so.2@g' \
    $SPECFILE > newspecfile &&
mv -f newspecfile $SPECFILE &&
unset SPECFILE

Again, cutting and pasting the above is recommended. And just like before, it is a good idea to visually inspect the specs file to verify the intended change was actually made.

Important: If you are working on a platform where the name of the dynamic linker is something other than ld-linux.so.2, you must substitute ld-linux.so.2 with the name of your platform's dynamic linker in the above commands. Refer back to the Section called Toolchain technical notes in Chapter 5 if necessary.

Caution

It is imperative at this point to stop and ensure that the basic functions (compiling and linking) of the adjusted toolchain are working as expected. For this we are going to perform a simple sanity check:

echo 'main(){}' > dummy.c
cc dummy.c
readelf -l a.out | grep ': /lib'

If everything is working correctly, there should be no errors, and the output of the last command will be:

[Requesting program interpreter: /lib/ld-linux.so.2]

(Of course allowing for platform specific differences in dynamic linker name). Note especially that /lib now appears as the prefix of our dynamic linker. If you did not receive the output as shown above, or received no output at all, then something is seriously wrong. You will need to investigate and retrace your steps to find out where the problem is and correct it. There is no point in continuing until this is done. Most likely something went wrong with the specs file amendment above.

Once you are satisfied that all is well, clean up the test files:

rm dummy.c a.out

Installing Binutils-2.14

The Binutils package contains a linker, an assembler, and other tools for handling object files.

Approximate build time:  1.4 SBU
Required disk space:     167 MB

Official download location for Binutils (2.14):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/binutils/

For its installation Binutils depends on: Bash, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Perl, Sed, Texinfo.

Installation of Binutils

Now is an appropriate time to verify that your pseudo terminals (PTYs) are working properly inside the chroot environment. We will again quickly check that everything is set up correctly by performing a simple test:

expect -c "spawn ls"

If you receive the message:

The system has no more ptys.  Ask your system administrator to create more.

Your chroot environment is not set up for proper PTY operation. In this case there is no point in running the test suites for Binutils and GCC until you are able to resolve the issue. Please refer back to the Section called Mounting the proc and devpts file systems and the Makedev section and perform the recommended steps to fix the problem.

The Binutils documentation recommends building Binutils outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:

mkdir ../binutils-build
cd ../binutils-build

Now prepare Binutils for compilation:

../binutils-2.14/configure --prefix=/usr --enable-shared

Compile the package:

make tooldir=/usr

Normally, the tooldir (the directory where the executables end up) is set to $(exec_prefix)/$(target_alias), which expands into, for example, /usr/i686-pc-linux-gnu. Since we only build for our own system, we don't need this target specific directory in /usr. That setup would be used if the system was used to cross-compile (for example compiling a package on an Intel machine that generates code that can be executed on PowerPC machines).

Important: The test suite for Binutils in this section is considered critical. Our advice is to not skip it under any circumstances.

Test the results:

make check

The test suite notes from the Section called Installing Binutils-2.14 - Pass 2 in Chapter 5 are still very much appropriate here. Be sure to refer back there should you have any doubts.

Install the package:

make tooldir=/usr install

Install the libiberty header file that is needed by some packages:

cp ../binutils-2.14/include/libiberty.h /usr/include

Contents of Binutils

Installed programs: addr2line, ar, as, c++filt, gprof, ld, nm, objcopy, objdump, ranlib, readelf, size, strings and strip

Installed libraries: libiberty.a, libbfd.[a,so] and libopcodes.[a,so]

Short descriptions

addr2line translates program addresses to file names and line numbers. Given an address and the name of an executable, it uses the debugging information in the executable to figure out which source file and line number are associated with the address.

ar creates, modifies, and extracts from archives. An archive is a single file holding a collection of other files in a structure that makes it possible to retrieve the original individual files (called members of the archive).

as is an assembler. It assembles the output of gcc into object files.

c++filt is used by the linker to demangle C++ and Java symbols, to keep overloaded functions from clashing.

gprof displays call graph profile data.

ld is a linker. It combines a number of object and archive files into a single file, relocating their data and tying up symbol references.

nm lists the symbols occurring in a given object file.

objcopy is used to translate one type of object file into another.

objdump displays information about the given object file, with options controlling what particular information to display. The information shown is mostly only useful to programmers who are working on the compilation tools.

ranlib generates an index of the contents of an archive, and stores it in the archive. The index lists all the symbols defined by archive members that are relocatable object files.

readelf displays information about elf type binaries.

size lists the section sizes -- and the grand total -- for the given object files.

strings outputs for each file given the sequences of printable characters that are of at least the specified length (defaulting to 4) For object files it prints by default only the strings from the initializing and loading sections. For other types of files it scans the whole file.

strip discards symbols from object files.

libiberty contains routines used by various GNU programs, including getopt, obstack, strerror, strtol and strtoul.

libbfd is the Binary File Descriptor library.

libopcodes is a library for dealing with opcodes. It is used for building utilities like objdump. Opcodes are the "readable text" versions of instructions for the processor.

Installing GCC-3.3.2

The GCC package contains the GNU compiler collection, among them the C and C++ compilers.

Approximate build time:  11.7 SBU
Required disk space:     294 MB

Official download location for GCC (3.3.2):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/gcc/
And for the GCC No-Fixincludes Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/gcc-3.3.2-no_fixincludes-1.patch

For its installation GCC depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Findutils, Gawk, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Perl, Sed, Texinfo.

Installation of GCC

Unpack the GCC-core and the GCC-g++ tarball -- they will unfold into the same directory. You should likewise extract the GCC-testsuite package. The full GCC package contains even more compilers. Instructions for building these can be found at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/stable/general/gcc.html.

Note: Be careful not to apply the GCC Specs patch from Chapter 5 here.

First apply the No-Fixincludes patch that we also used in the previous chapter:

patch -Np1 -i ../gcc-3.3.2-no_fixincludes-1.patch

Now apply a sed substitution that will suppress the installation of libiberty.a. We want to use the version of libiberty.a provided by Binutils:

sed -i 's/install_to_$(INSTALL_DEST) //' libiberty/Makefile.in

The GCC documentation recommends building GCC outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:

mkdir ../gcc-build
cd ../gcc-build

Now prepare GCC for compilation:

../gcc-3.3.2/configure --prefix=/usr \
    --enable-shared --enable-threads=posix \
    --enable-__cxa_atexit --enable-clocale=gnu \
    --enable-languages=c,c++

Compile the package:

make

Important: The test suite for GCC in this section is considered critical. Our advice is to not skip it under any circumstance.

Test the results, but don't stop at errors (you'll remember the few known ones):

make -k check

The test suite notes from the Section called Installing GCC-3.3.2 - Pass 2 in Chapter 5 are still very much appropriate here. Be sure to refer back there should you have any doubts.

And install the package:

make install

Some packages expect the C PreProcessor to be installed in the /lib directory. To honor those packages, create this symlink:

ln -s ../usr/bin/cpp /lib

Many packages use the name cc to call the C compiler. To satisfy those packages, create a symlink:

ln -s gcc /usr/bin/cc

Note: At this point it is strongly recommended to repeat the sanity check we performed earlier in this chapter. Refer back to the Section called Re-adjusting the toolchain and repeat the check. If the results are wrong, then most likely you erroneously applied the GCC Specs patch from Chapter 5.

Contents of GCC

Installed programs: c++, cc (link to gcc), cc1, cc1plus, collect2, cpp, g++, gcc, gccbug, and gcov

Installed libraries: libgcc.a, libgcc_eh.a, libgcc_s.so, libstdc++.[a,so] and libsupc++.a

Short descriptions

cpp is the C preprocessor. It is used by the compiler to have the #include and #define and such statements expanded in the source files.

g++ is the C++ compiler.

gcc is the C compiler. It is used to translate the source code of a program into assembly code.

gccbug is a shell script used to help create good bug reports.

gcov is a coverage testing tool. It is used to analyze programs to find out where optimizations will have the most effect.

libgcc* contains run-time support for gcc.

libstdc++ is the standard C++ library. It contains many frequently-used functions.

libsupc++ provides supporting routines for the c++ programming language.

Installing Coreutils-5.0

The Coreutils package contains utilities for showing and setting the basic system characteristics.

Approximate build time:  0.9 SBU
Required disk space:     69 MB

Official download location for Coreutils (5.0):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/coreutils/
And for the Coreutils Hostname Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/coreutils-5.0-hostname-2.patch
And for the Coreutils Posixver Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/coreutils-5.0-posixver-2.patch
And for the Coreutils Uname Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/coreutils-5.0-uname.patch

For its installation Coreutils depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Perl, Sed.

Installation of Coreutils

Apply the same "Posixver" patch we used previously:

patch -Np1 -i ../coreutils-5.0-posixver-2.patch

Normally the functionality of uname is somewhat broken, in that the -p switch always returns "unknown". The following patch fixes this behaviour for Intel architectures:

patch -Np1 -i ../coreutils-5.0-uname.patch

We do not want Coreutils to install its version of the hostname program, because it is inferior to the version provided by Net-tools. Prevent its installation by applying a patch:

patch -Np1 -i ../coreutils-5.0-hostname-2.patch

Now prepare Coreutils for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

The su program from Coreutils wasn't installed in Chapter 5 because it needed root privilege to do so. We're going to need it in a few moments for the test suite. Therefore we work around the problem by installing it now:

make install-root

This package has a test suite available which can perform a number of checks to ensure it built correctly. However, this particular test suite makes some assumptions with regards to the presence of non-root users and groups that don't apply this early into the LFS build. We therefore create a dummy system user and two dummy groups to allow the tests to run properly. Should you choose not to run the test suite, skip down to "Install the package". The following commands will prepare us for the test suite. Create two dummy groups and a dummy user name:

echo "dummy1:x:1000" >> /etc/group
echo "dummy2:x:1001:dummy" >> /etc/group
echo "dummy:x:1000:1000:::/bin/bash" >> /etc/passwd

Some tests are meant to run as root:

make check-root

The remainder of the tests are run as the dummy user:

su dummy -c "make RUN_EXPENSIVE_TESTS=yes check"

Remove the dummy groups and user name:

sed -i.bak '/dummy/d' /etc/passwd /etc/group

Install the package:

make install

And move some programs to their proper locations:

mv /usr/bin/{basename,cat,chgrp,chmod,chown,cp,dd,df} /bin
mv /usr/bin/{date,echo,false,head,install,ln,ls} /bin
mv /usr/bin/{mkdir,mknod,mv,pwd,rm,rmdir,sync} /bin
mv /usr/bin/{sleep,stty,su,test,touch,true,uname} /bin
mv /usr/bin/chroot /usr/sbin

We'll be using the kill program from the Procps package (installed as /bin/kill later in the chapter). Remove the one installed by Coreutils:

rm /usr/bin/kill

Finally, create a few necessary symlinks:

ln -s test /bin/[
ln -s ../../bin/install /usr/bin

Contents of Coreutils

Installed programs: basename, cat, chgrp, chmod, chown, chroot, cksum, comm, cp, csplit, cut, date, dd, df, dir, dircolors, dirname, du, echo, env, expand, expr, factor, false, fmt, fold, groups, head, hostid, hostname, id, install, join, link, ln, logname, ls, md5sum, mkdir, mkfifo, mknod, mv, nice, nl, nohup, od, paste, pathchk, pinky, pr, printenv, printf, ptx, pwd, readlink, rm, rmdir, seq, sha1sum, shred, sleep, sort, split, stat, stty, su, sum, sync, tac, tail, tee, test, touch, tr, true, tsort, tty, uname, unexpand, uniq, unlink, uptime, users, vdir, wc, who, whoami and yes

Short descriptions

basename strips any path and a given suffix from the given file name.

cat concatenates files to standard output.

chgrp changes the group ownership of each given file to the given group. The group can be either given a a name or a numeric ID.

chmod changes the permissions of each given file to the given mode. The mode can be either a symbolic representation of the changes to make, or an octal number representing the new permissions.

chown changes the user and/or group ownership of each given file to the given user:group pair.

chroot runs a given command with the specified directory as the / directory. The given command can be an interactive shell. On most systems only root can do this.

cksum prints the CRC checksum and the byte counts of each specified file.

comm compares two sorted files, outputting in three columns the lines that are unique, and the lines that are common.

cp copies files.

csplit splits a given file into several new files, separating them according to given patterns or line numbers, and outputting the byte count of each new file.

cut prints parts of lines, selecting the parts according to given fields or positions.

date displays the current time in the given format, or sets the system date.

dd copies a file using the given blocksize and count, while optionally performing conversions on it.

df reports the amount of disk space available (and used) on all mounted file systems, or only on the file systems holding the given files.

dir is the same as ls.

dircolors outputs commands to set the LS_COLOR environment variable, to change the color scheme used by ls.

dirname strips the non-directory suffix from a given file name.

du reports the amount of disk space used by the current directory, or by each of the given directories including all their subdirectories, or by each of the given files.

echo displays the given strings.

env runs a command in a modified environment.

expand converts tabs to spaces.

expr evaluates expressions.

factor prints the prime factors of all specified integer numbers.

false does nothing, unsuccessfully. It always exits with a status code indicating failure.

fmt reformats the paragraphs in the given files.

fold wraps the lines in the given files.

groups reports a user's group memberships.

head prints the first ten lines (or the given number of lines) of each given file.

hostid reports the numeric identifier (in hexadecimal) of the host.

hostname reports or sets the name of the host.

id reports the effective user ID, group ID, and group memberships of the current user, or of a given user.

install copies files while setting their permission modes and, if possible, their owner and group.

join joins from two files the lines that have identical join fields.

link creates a hard link with the given name to the given file.

ln makes hard links or soft links between files.

logname reports the current user's login name.

ls lists the contents of each given directory. By default it orders the files and subdirectories alphabetically.

md5sum reports or checks MD5 checksums.

mkdir creates directories with the given names.

mkfifo creates FIFOs with the given names.

mknod creates device nodes with the given names. A device node is a character special file, or a block special file, or a FIFO.

mv moves or renames files or directories.

nice runs a program with modified scheduling priority.

nl numbers the lines from the given files.

nohup runs a command immune to hangups, with output redirected to a log file.

od dumps files in octal and other formats.

paste merges the given files, joining sequentially corresponding lines side by side, separated by TABs.

pathchk checks whether file names are valid or portable.

pinky is a lightweight finger. It reports some information about the given users.

pr paginates and columnates files for printing.

printenv prints the environment.

printf prints the given arguments according to the given format -- much like the C printf function.

ptx produces from the contents of the given files a permuted index, with each keyword in its context.

pwd reports the name of the current directory.

readlink reports the value of the given symbolic link.

rm removes files or directories.

rmdir removes directories, if they are empty.

seq prints a sequence of numbers, within a given range and with a given increment.

sha1sum prints or checks 160-bit SHA1 checksums.

shred overwrites the given files repeatedly with strange patterns, to make it real hard to recover the data.

sleep pauses for the given amount of time.

sort sorts the lines from the given files.

split splits the given file into pieces, by size or by number of lines.

stty sets or reports terminal line settings.

su runs a shell with substitute user and group IDs.

sum prints checksum and block counts for each given file.

sync flushes file system buffers. It forces changed blocks to disk and updates the super block.

tac concatenates the given files in reverse.

tail prints the last ten lines (or the given number of lines) of each given file.

tee reads from standard input while writing both to standard output and to the given files.

test compares values and checks file types.

touch changes file timestamps, setting the access and modification times of the given files to the current time. Files that do not exist are created with zero length.

tr translates, squeezes, and deletes the given characters from standard input.

true does nothing, successfully. It always exits with a status code indicating success.

tsort performs a topological sort. It writes a totally ordered list according to the partial ordering in a given file.

tty reports the file name of the terminal connected to standard input.

uname reports system information.

unexpand converts spaces to tabs.

uniq discards all but one of successive identical lines.

unlink removes the given file.

uptime reports how long the system has been running, how many users are logged on, and the system load averages.

users reports the names of the users currently logged on.

vdir is the same as ls -l.

wc reports the number of lines, words, and bytes for each given file, and a total line when more than one file is given.

who reports who is logged on.

whoami reports the user name associated with the current effective user ID.

yes outputs 'y' or a given string repeatedly, until killed.

Installing Zlib-1.2.1

The Zlib package contains compression and uncompression routines used by some programs.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     1.5 MB

Official download location for Zlib (1.2.1):
http://www.gzip.org/zlib/

For its installation Zlib depends on: Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Glibc, Make, Sed.

Installation of Zlib

Prepare Zlib for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --shared

Note: Zlib is known to build its shared library incorrectly if CFLAGS is specified in the environment. If you are using your own CFLAGS variable, be sure to add the -fPIC directive to your CFLAGS for the duration of the above command, then remove it afterwards.

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which can perform a number of checks to ensure it built correctly. The test suite for Zlib is quick and painless so we recommend it be run. The following command will test the shared library:

make check

Install the shared library:

make install

Now also build the non-shared (static) library:

make clean
./configure --prefix=/usr
make

The following command will test the static library:

make check

Install the static library:

make install

And fix the permissions on the static library:

chmod 644 /usr/lib/libz.a

It is good policy and common practice to place important libraries into the /lib directory. This matters most in scenarios where /usr is on a separate partition. Essentially, the run-time components of any libraries depended upon by programs in /bin or /sbin should reside in /lib so that they are on the root partition and available in the event of /usr being inaccessible.

Therefore we move the run-time components of the shared Zlib into /lib by issuing the following command:

mv /usr/lib/libz.so.* /lib

Now we need to fix up the /usr/lib/libz.so symlink because we just moved the location of the file it points to:

ln -sf ../../lib/libz.so.1 /usr/lib/libz.so

Contents of Zlib

Installed libraries: libz[a,so]

Short description

libz* contains compression and uncompression functions used by some programs.

Installing Lfs-Utils-0.4.2

The Lfs-Utils package contains a few helper files.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     1.1 MB

Official download location for Lfs-Utils (0.4.2):
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/~winkie/downloads/lfs-utils/

The installation dependencies for Lfs-Utils haven't been checked yet.

Installation of Lfs-Utils

Prepare Lfs-Utils for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --with-libc

The meaning of the configure option:

--with-libc: This causes the mktemp program to use the mkstemp and mkdtemp functions from the system C library.

Compile the package:

make

And install it:

make install

Now copy two supporting files included in the Lfs-Utils tarball to their destination:

cp etc/{services,protocols} /etc

The /etc/services file is used to resolve service numbers to human-readable names, and the /etc/protocols does the same for protocol numbers.

Contents of Lfs-Utils

Installed programs: mktemp, tempfile, http-get and iana-net

Installed files: protocols, services

Short descriptions

mktemp creates temporary files in a secure manner. It is used in scripts.

tempfile creates temporary files in a less secure manner than mktemp. It is installed for backwards-compatibility.

The http-get script takes advantage of a little known feature of bash called "net redirection". It is used to download from websites without using any other programs.

iana-net uses the http-get script to simplify the process of procuring IANA's services and protocols configuration files.

Installing Findutils-4.1.20

The Findutils package contains programs to find files. The finding is done either by doing a live recursive search through a directory tree, or by consulting a previously set up database.

Approximate build time:  0.2 SBU
Required disk space:     7.5 MB

Official download location for Findutils (4.1.20):
ftp://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/findutils/

For its installation Findutils depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Findutils

Prepare Findutils for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --libexecdir=/usr/lib/locate

The default location for the locate database is /usr/var. To make the location of this database FHS-compliant, add --localstatedir=/var/lib/misc to the above configure options.

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which can perform a number of checks to ensure it built correctly. Should you choose to run it, the following command will do so:

make check

And install the package:

make install

Contents of Findutils

Installed programs: bigram, code, find, frcode, locate, updatedb and xargs

Short descriptions

bigram was formerly used to produce locate databases.

code was formerly used to produce locate databases. It is the ancestor of frcode.

find searches given directory trees for files matching the specified criteria.

frcode is called by updatedb to compress the list of file names. It uses front-compression, reducing the database size by a factor of 4 to 5.

locate searches through a database of file names, and reports the names that contain a given string or match a given pattern.

updatedb updates the locate database. It scans the entire file system (including other file systems that are currently mounted, unless told not to) and puts every file name it finds in the database.

xargs can be used to apply a given command to a list of files.

Installing Gawk-3.1.3

The Gawk package contains programs for manipulating text files.

Approximate build time:  0.2 SBU
Required disk space:     17 MB

Official download location for Gawk (3.1.3):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gawk/

For its installation Gawk depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Gawk

Prepare Gawk for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --libexecdir=/usr/lib

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which can perform a number of checks to ensure it built correctly. Should you choose to run it, the following command will do so:

make check

And install the package:

make install

Contents of Gawk

Installed programs: awk (link to gawk), gawk, gawk-3.1.3, grcat, igawk, pgawk, pgawk-3.1.3 and pwcat

Short descriptions

gawk is a program for manipulating text files. It is the GNU implementation of awk.

grcat dumps the group database /etc/group.

igawk gives gawk the ability to include files.

pgawk is the profiling version of gawk.

pwcat dumps the password database /etc/passwd.

Installing Ncurses-5.3

The Ncurses package contains libraries for the terminal-independent handling of character screens.

Approximate build time:  0.6 SBU
Required disk space:     27 MB

Official download location for Ncurses (5.3):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/ncurses/
And for the Ncurses Etip Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/ncurses-5.3-etip-2.patch

For its installation Ncurses depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Ncurses

Fix a minor problem related to the etip.h header file:

patch -Np1 -i ../ncurses-5.3-etip-2.patch

Now prepare Ncurses for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --with-shared --without-debug

Compile the package:

make

Install the package:

make install

Give the Ncurses libraries execute permissions:

chmod 755 /usr/lib/*.5.3

And fix a library that shouldn't be executable:

chmod 644 /usr/lib/libncurses++.a

Move the libraries to the /lib directory, where they're expected to reside:

mv /usr/lib/libncurses.so.5* /lib

Since the libraries have been moved to /lib, a few symlinks are currently pointing towards non-existing files. Recreate those symlinks:

ln -sf ../../lib/libncurses.so.5 /usr/lib/libncurses.so
ln -sf libncurses.so /usr/lib/libcurses.so

Contents of Ncurses

Installed programs: captoinfo (link to tic), clear, infocmp, infotocap (link to tic), reset (link to tset), tack, tic, toe, tput and tset

Installed libraries: libcurses.[a,so] (link to libncurses.[a,so]), libform.[a,so], libmenu.[a,so], libncurses++.a, libncurses.[a,so], libpanel.[a,so]

Short descriptions

captoinfo converts a termcap description into a terminfo description.

clear clears the screen, if this is possible.

infocmp compares or prints out terminfo descriptions.

infotocap converts a terminfo description into a termcap description.

reset reinitializes a terminal to its default values.

tack is the terminfo action checker. It is mainly used to test the correctness of an entry in the terminfo database.

tic is the terminfo entry-description compiler. It translates a terminfo file from source format into the binary format needed for the ncurses library routines. A terminfo file contains information on the capabilities of a certain terminal.

toe lists all available terminal types, for each giving its primary name and its description.

tput makes the values of terminal-dependent capabilities available to the shell. It can also be used to reset or initialize a terminal, or report its long name.

tset can be used to initialize terminals.

libncurses* contain functions to display text in many complicated ways on a terminal screen. A good example of the use of these functions is the menu displayed during the kernel's make menuconfig.

libform* contain functions to implement forms.

libmenu* contain functions to implement menus.

libpanel* contain functions to implement panels.

Installing Vim-6.2

The Vim package contains a powerful text editor.

Approximate build time:  0.4 SBU
Required disk space:     34 MB

Official download location for Vim (6.2):
ftp://ftp.vim.org/pub/editors/vim/unix/

For its installation Vim depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, Sed.

Alternatives to Vim

If you prefer another editor -- like Emacs, Joe, or Nano -- to Vim, have a look at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/stable/postlfs/editors.html for suggested installation instructions.

Installation of Vim

First change the default locations of the vimrc and gvimrc files to /etc.

echo '#define SYS_VIMRC_FILE "/etc/vimrc"' >> src/feature.h
echo '#define SYS_GVIMRC_FILE "/etc/gvimrc"' >> src/feature.h

Now prepare Vim for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which performs a number of checks to ensure it will function correctly. However, the Vim test suite will output a whole lot of seemingly garbage characters to screen which can occasionally wreak havoc with the running terminal. Accordingly, the running of the test suite here is optional. Should you choose to run the Vim test suite, the following command will do so:

make test

And install the package:

make install

When called as vi, vim will run in old-fashioned vi-mode. To allow this, create a symlink:

ln -s vim /usr/bin/vi

If you are going to install the X Window system on your LFS system, you may want to re-compile Vim after having installed X. Vim comes with a nice GUI version of the editor that requires X and a few other libraries to be installed. For more information read the Vim documentation.

Configuring Vim

By default, vim runs in vi-compatible mode. Some people might like this, but we prefer to run vim in its own mode (else we wouldn't have included it in this book, but the original vi). Create a default vim configuration file by running the following:

cat > /etc/vimrc << "EOF"
" Begin /etc/vimrc

set nocompatible
set backspace=2
syntax on

" End /etc/vimrc
EOF

The set nocompatible will make vim behave in a more useful way than the default vi-compatible manner. The set backspace=2 allows backspacing over line breaks, autoindent and the start of insert. And the syntax on switches on vim's semantic colouring.

Contents of Vim

Installed programs: efm_filter.pl, efm_perl.pl, ex (link to vim), less.sh, mve.awk, pltags.pl, ref, rview (link to vim), rvim (link to vim), shtags.pl, tcltags, vi (link to vim), view (link to vim), vim, vim132, vim2html.pl, vimdiff (link to vim), vimm, vimspell.sh, vimtutor and xxd

Short descriptions

efm_filter.pl is a filter for creating an error file that can be read by vim.

efm_perl.pl reformats the error messages of the Perl interpreter for use with the quickfix mode of vim.

ex starts vim in ex mode.

less.sh is a script that starts vim with less.vim.

mve.awk processes vim errors.

pltags.pl creates a tags file for perl code, for use by vim.

ref checks the spelling of arguments.

rview is a restricted version of view: no shell commands can be started and view can't be suspended.

rvim is a restricted version of vim: no shell commands can be started and vim can't be suspended.

shtags.pl generates a tag file for perl scripts.

tcltags generates a tag file for TCL code.

vi starts vim in vi-compatible mode.

view starts vim in read-only mode.

vim is the editor.

vim132 starts vim with the terminal in 132-column mode.

vim2html.pl converts vim documentation to HTML.

vimdiff edits two or three versions of a file with vim and show differences.

vimm enables the DEC locator input model on a remote terminal.

vimspell.sh is a script which spells a file and generates the syntax statements necessary to highlight in vim.

vimtutor teaches you the basic keys and commands of vim.

xxd makes a hexdump of the given file. It can also do the reverse, so it can be used for binary patching.

Installing M4-1.4

The M4 package contains a macro processor.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     3.0 MB

Official download location for M4 (1.4):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/m4/

For its installation M4 depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Perl, Sed.

Installation of M4

Prepare M4 for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which can perform a number of checks to ensure it built correctly. Should you choose to run it, the following command will do so:

make check

And install the package:

make install

Contents of M4

Installed program: m4

Short description

m4 copies the given files while expanding the macros that they contain. These macros are either built-in or user-defined and can take any number of arguments. Besides just doing macro expansion, m4 has built-in functions for including named files, running Unix commands, doing integer arithmetic, manipulating text in various ways, recursion, and so on. The m4 program can be used either as a front-end to a compiler or as a macro processor in its own right.

Installing Bison-1.875

The Bison package contains a parser generator.

Approximate build time:  0.6 SBU
Required disk space:     10.6 MB

Official download location for Bison (1.875):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/bison/
And for the Bison Attribute Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/bison-1.875-attribute.patch

For its installation Bison depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, M4, Make, Sed.

Installation of Bison

First fix a minor compilation problem that Bison has with some packages, the patch is backported from CVS:

patch -Np1 -i ../bison-1.875-attribute.patch

Now prepare Bison for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which can perform a number of checks to ensure it built correctly. Should you choose to run it, the following command will do so (and takes a long time):

make check

And install the package:

make install

Contents of Bison

Installed programs: bison and yacc

Installed library: liby.a

Short descriptions

bison generates, from a series of rules, a program for analyzing the structure of text files. Bison is a replacement for yacc (Yet Another Compiler Compiler).

yacc is a wrapper for bison, meant for programs that still call yacc instead of bison. It calls bison with the -y option.

liby.a is the Yacc library containing implementations of Yacc-compatible yyerror and main functions. This library is normally not very useful, but POSIX requires it.

Installing Less-381

The Less package contains a text file viewer.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     3.4 MB

Official download location for Less (381):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/less/

For its installation Less depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, Sed.

Installation of Less

Prepare Less for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --bindir=/bin --sysconfdir=/etc

The meaning of the configure option:

--sysconfdir=/etc: This option tells the programs created by the package to look in /etc for their configuration files.

Compile the package:

make

And install it:

make install

Contents of Less

Installed programs: less, lessecho and lesskey

Short descriptions

less is a file viewer or pager. It displays the contents of the given file, letting you scroll around, find strings, and jump to marks.

lessecho is needed to expand metacharacters, such as * and ?, in filenames on Unix systems.

lesskey is used to specify the key bindings for less.

Installing Groff-1.19

The Groff package contains programs for processing and formatting text.

Approximate build time:  0.5 SBU
Required disk space:     43 MB

Official download location for Groff (1.19):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/groff/

For its installation Groff depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Groff

Groff expects the environment variable PAGE to contain the default paper size. For those in the United States, the command below is appropriate. If you live elsewhere, you may want to change PAGE=letter to PAGE=A4.

Prepare Groff for compilation:

PAGE=letter ./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

And install it:

make install

Some documentation programs, such as xman, will not work properly without the following symlinks:

ln -s soelim /usr/bin/zsoelim
ln -s eqn /usr/bin/geqn
ln -s tbl /usr/bin/gtbl

Contents of Groff

Installed programs: addftinfo, afmtodit, eqn, eqn2graph, geqn (link to eqn), grn, grodvi, groff, groffer, grog, grolbp, grolj4, grops, grotty, gtbl (link to tbl), hpftodit, indxbib, lkbib, lookbib, mmroff, neqn, nroff, pfbtops, pic, pic2graph, post-grohtml, pre-grohtml, refer, soelim, tbl, tfmtodit, troff and zsoelim (link to soelim)

Short descriptions

addftinfo reads a troff font file and adds some additional font-metric information that is used by the groff system.

afmtodit creates a font file for use with groff and grops.

eqn compiles descriptions of equations embedded within troff input files into commands that are understood by troff.

eqn2graph converts an EQN equation into a cropped image.

grn is a groff preprocessor for gremlin files.

grodvi is a driver for groff that produces TeX dvi format.

groff is a front-end to the groff document formatting system. Normally it runs the troff program and a post-processor appropriate for the selected device.

groffer displays groff files and man pages on X and tty.

grog reads files and guesses which of the groff options -e, -man, -me, -mm, -ms, -p, -s, and -t are required for printing files, and reports the groff command including those options.

grolbp is a groff driver for Canon CAPSL printers (LBP-4 and LBP-8 series laser printers).

grolj4 is a driver for groff that produces output in PCL5 format suitable for an HP Laserjet 4 printer.

grops translates the output of GNU troff to Postscript.

grotty translates the output of GNU troff into a form suitable for typewriter-like devices.

gtbl is the GNU implementation of tbl.

hpftodit creates a font file for use with groff -Tlj4 from an HP-tagged font metric file.

indxbib makes an inverted index for the bibliographic databases a specified file for use with refer, lookbib, and lkbib.

lkbib searches bibliographic databases for references that contain specified keys and reports any references found.

lookbib prints a prompt on the standard error (unless the standard input is not a terminal), reads from the standard input a line containing a set of keywords, searches the bibliographic databases in a specified file for references containing those keywords, prints any references found on the standard output and repeats this process until the end of input.

mmroff is a simple preprocessor for groff.

neqn formats equations for ascii output.

nroff is a script that emulates the nroff command using groff.

pfbtops translates a Postscript font in .pfb format to ASCII.

pic compiles descriptions of pictures embedded within troff or TeX input files into commands understood by TeX or troff.

pic2graph converts a PIC diagram into a cropped image.

pre-grohtml translates the output of GNU troff to html.

post-grohtml translates the output of GNU troff to html.

refer copies the contents of a file to the standard output, except that lines between .[ and .] are interpreted as citations, and lines between .R1 and .R2 are interpreted as commands about how citations are to be processed.

soelim reads files and replaces lines of the form .so file by the contents of the mentioned file.

tbl compiles descriptions of tables embedded within troff input files into commands that are understood by troff.

tfmtodit creates a font file for use with groff -Tdvi.

troff is highly compatible with Unix troff. Usually it should be invoked using the groff command, which will also run preprocessors and post-processors in the appropriate order and with the appropriate options.

zsoelim is the GNU implementation of soelim.

Installing Sed-4.0.9

The Sed package contains a stream editor.

Approximate build time:  0.2 SBU
Required disk space:     5.2 MB

Official download location for Sed (4.0.9):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/sed/

For its installation Sed depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Texinfo.

Installation of Sed

Prepare Sed for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --bindir=/bin

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which can perform a number of checks to ensure it built correctly. Should you choose to run it, the following command will do so:

make check

And install the package:

make install

Contents of Sed

Installed program: sed

Short description

sed is used to filter and transform text files in a single pass.

Installing Flex-2.5.4a

The Flex package contains a utility for generating programs that recognize patterns in text.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     3.4 MB

Official download location for Flex (2.5.4a):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/non-gnu/flex/

For its installation Flex depends on: Bash, Binutils, Bison, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, M4, Make, Sed.

Installation of Flex

Prepare Flex for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which can perform a number of checks to ensure it built correctly. Should you choose to run it, the following command will do so:

make bigcheck

And install the package:

make install

There are some packages that expect to find the Lex library in /usr/lib. Create a symlink to account for this:

ln -s libfl.a /usr/lib/libl.a

A few programs don't know about flex yet and try to run its predecessor lex. To support those programs, create a shell script named lex that calls flex in Lex emulation mode:

cat > /usr/bin/lex << "EOF"
#!/bin/sh
# Begin /usr/bin/lex

exec /usr/bin/flex -l "$@"

# End /usr/bin/lex
EOF
chmod 755 /usr/bin/lex

Contents of Flex

Installed programs: flex, flex++ (link to flex) and lex

Installed library: libfl.a

Short descriptions

flex is a tool for generating programs that recognize patterns in text. Pattern recognition is useful in many applications. From a set of rules on what to look for flex makes a program that looks for those patterns. The reason to use flex is that it is much easier to specify the rules for than to write the actual pattern-finding program.

flex++ invokes a version of flex that is used exclusively for C++ scanners.

libfl.a is the flex library.

Installing Gettext-0.14.1

The Gettext package contains utilities for internationalization and localization. These allow programs to be compiled with Native Language Support (NLS), enabling them to output messages in the user's native language.

Approximate build time:  6.9 SBU
Required disk space:     55 MB

Official download location for Gettext (0.14.1):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gettext/

For its installation Gettext depends on: Bash, Binutils, Bison, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Gettext

Prepare Gettext for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which performs a number of checks to ensure it will function correctly. It's worth noting that Gettext does not play a critical role in the overall operation of an LFS system. In addition, the Gettext test suite runs for quite a long period of time. Accordingly, the running of the test suite here is not crucial. Should you choose to run the Gettext test suite, the following command will do so:

make check

And install the package:

make install

Contents of Gettext

Installed programs: autopoint, config.charset, config.rpath, envsubst, gettext, gettextize, hostname, msgattrib, msgcat, msgcmp, msgcomm, msgconv, msgen, msgexec, msgfilter, msgfmt, msggrep, msginit, msgmerge, msgunfmt, msguniq, ngettext, project-id, team-address, trigger, urlget, user-email and xgettext

Installed libraries: libasprintf[a,so], libgettextlib[a,so], libgettextpo[a,so] and libgettextsrc[a,so]

Short descriptions

autopoint copies standard gettext infrastructure files into a source package.

config.charset outputs a system-dependent table of character encoding aliases.

config.rpath outputs a system-dependent set of variables, describing how to set the runtime search path of shared libraries in an executable.

envsubst substitutes environment variables in shell format strings.

gettext translates a natural language message into the user's language, by looking up the translation in a message catalog.

gettextize copies all standard Gettext files into the given top-level directory of a package, to begin internationalizing it.

hostname displays a network hostname in various forms.

msgattrib filters the messages of a translation catalog according to their attributes and manipulates the attributes.

msgcat concatenates and merges the given .po files.

msgcmp compares two .po files to check that both contain the same set of msgid strings.

msgcomm finds the messages that are common to to the given .po files.

msgconv converts a translation catalog to a different character encoding.

msgen creates an English translation catalog.

msgexec applies a command to all translations of a translation catalog.

msgfilter applies a filter to all translations of a translation catalog.

msgfmt generates a binary message catalog from from a translation catalog.

msggrep extracts all messages of a translation catalog that match a given pattern or belong to some given source files.

msginit creates a new .po file, initializing the meta information with values from the user's environment.

msgmerge combines two raw translations into a single file.

msgunfmt decompiles a binary message catalog into raw translation text.

msguniq unifies duplicate translations in a translation catalog.

ngettext displays native language translations of a textual message whose grammatical form depends on a number.

xgettext extracts the translatable message lines from the given source files, to make the first translation template.

libasprintf defines the autosprintf class which makes C formatted output routines usable in C++ programs, for use with the <string> strings and the <iostream> streams.

libgettextlib is a private library containing common routines used by the various gettext programs. They're not meant for general use.

libgettextpo is used to write specialized programs that process PO files. This library is used when the standard applications shipped with gettext won't suffice (such as msgcomm, msgcmp, msgattrib and msgen).

libgettextsrc is a private library containing common routines used by the various gettext programs. They're not meant for general use.

Installing Net-tools-1.60

The Net-tools package contains programs for basic networking.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     9.4 MB

Official download location for Net-tools (1.60):
http://www.tazenda.demon.co.uk/phil/net-tools/
And for the Net-tools Mii-Tool-Gcc33 Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/net-tools-1.60-miitool-gcc33-1.patch

For its installation Net-tools depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Glibc, Make.

Installation of Net-tools

If you don't know what to answer to all the questions asked during the make config phase below, then just accept the defaults. This will be just fine in the majority of cases. What you're asked here is a bunch of questions about which network protocols you've enabled in your kernel. The default answers will enable the tools from this package to work with the most common protocols: TCP, PPP, and several others. You still need to actually enable these protocols in the kernel -- what you do here is merely telling the package to include support for those protocols in its programs, but it's up to the kernel to make the protocols available.

First fix a small syntax problem in the sources of the mii-tool program:

patch -Np1 -i ../net-tools-1.60-miitool-gcc33-1.patch

Now prepare Net-tools for compilation with:

make config

If you intend to accept the default settings, you may skip the questions generated by make config by running yes "" | make config instead.

Compile the package:

make

And install it:

make update

Contents of Net-tools

Installed programs: arp, dnsdomainname (link to hostname), domainname (link to hostname), hostname, ifconfig, nameif, netstat, nisdomainname (link to hostname), plipconfig, rarp, route, slattach and ypdomainname (link to hostname)

Short descriptions

arp is used to manipulate the kernel's ARP cache, usually to add or delete an entry, or to dump the entire cache.

dnsdomainname reports the system's DNS domain name.

domainname reports or sets the system's NIS/YP domain name.

hostname reports or sets the name of the current host system.

ifconfig is the main utility for configuring network interfaces.

nameif names network interfaces based on MAC addresses.

netstat is used to report network connections, routing tables, and interface statistics..

nisdomainname does the same as domainname.

plipconfig is used to fine tune the PLIP device parameters, to improve its performance.

rarp is used to manipulate the kernel's RARP table.

route is used to manipulate the IP routing table.

slattach attaches a network interface to a serial line. This allows you to use normal terminal lines for point-to-point links to other computers.

ypdomainname does the same as domainname.

Installing Inetutils-1.4.2

The Inetutils package contains programs for basic networking.

Approximate build time:  0.2 SBU
Required disk space:     11 MB

Official download location for Inetutils (1.4.2):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/inetutils/
And for the Inetutils No-Server-Man-Pages Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/inetutils-1.4.2-no_server_man_pages-1.patch

For its installation Inetutils depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, Sed.

Installation of Inetutils

We are not going to install all the programs that come with Inetutils. However, the Inetutils build system will insist on installing all the man pages anyway. The following patch will correct this situation:

patch -Np1 -i ../inetutils-1.4.2-no_server_man_pages-1.patch

Now prepare Inetutils for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --libexecdir=/usr/sbin \
    --sysconfdir=/etc --localstatedir=/var \
    --disable-logger --disable-syslogd \
    --disable-whois --disable-servers

The meaning of the configure options:

--disable-logger: This option prevents Inetutils from installing the logger program, which is used by scripts to pass messages to the System Log Daemon. We do not install it because Util-linux installs a better version later.
--disable-syslogd: This option prevents Inetutils from installing the System Log Daemon, which is installed with the Sysklogd package.
--disable-whois: This option disables the building of the Inetutils whois client, which is woefully out of date. Instructions for a better whois client are in the BLFS book.
--disable-servers: This disables the installation of the various network servers included as part of the Inetutils package. These servers are deemed not appropriate in a basic LFS system. Some are insecure by nature and are only considered safe on trusted networks. More information can be found at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/stable/basicnet/inetutils.html. Note that better replacements are available for many of these servers.

Compile the package:

make

Install it:

make install

And move the ping program to its proper place:

mv /usr/bin/ping /bin

Contents of Inetutils

Installed programs: ftp, ping, rcp, rlogin, rsh, talk, telnet and tftp

Short descriptions

ftp is the ARPANET file transfer program.

ping sends echo-request packets and reports how long the replies take.

rcp does remote file copy.

rlogin does remote login.

rsh runs a remote shell.

talk is used to chat up another user.

telnet is an interface to the TELNET protocol.

tftp is a trivial file transfer program.

Installing Perl-5.8.3

The Perl package contains the Practical Extraction and Report Language.

Approximate build time:  2.9 SBU
Required disk space:     143 MB

Official download location for Perl (5.8.3):
http://www.perl.com/

For its installation Perl depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Perl

Prepare Perl for compilation:

./configure.gnu --prefix=/usr -Dpager="/bin/less -isR"

If you want more control over the way Perl sets itself up to be built, you can run the interactive Configure script instead and modify the way Perl is built. If you think you can live with the (sensible) defaults Perl auto-detects, then just use the command listed above.

The meaning of the configure option:

-Dpager="/bin/less -isR": This corrects an error in the perldoc code with the invocation of the less program.

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which can perform a number of checks to ensure it built correctly. Should you choose to run it, you first have to create a basic /etc/hosts file, needed by a couple of tests to resolve the name localhost:

echo "127.0.0.1 localhost $(hostname)" > /etc/hosts

Now run the tests, if you wish:

make test

And install the package:

make install

Contents of Perl

Installed programs: a2p, c2ph, dprofpp, enc2xs, find2perl, h2ph, h2xs, libnetcfg, perl, perl5.8.3 (link to perl), perlbug, perlcc, perldoc, perlivp, piconv, pl2pm, pod2html, pod2latex, pod2man, pod2text, pod2usage, podchecker, podselect, psed (link to s2p), pstruct (link to c2ph), s2p, splain and xsubpp

Installed libraries: (too many to name)

Short descriptions

a2p translates awk to perl.

c2ph dumps C structures as generated from "cc -g -S" stabs.

dprofpp displays perl profile data.

en2cxs builds a Perl extension for the Encode module, from either Unicode Character Mappings or Tcl Encoding Files.

find2perl translates find commands to perl.

h2ph converts .h C header files to .ph Perl header files.

h2xs converts .h C header files to Perl extensions.

libnetcfg can be used to configure the libnet.

perl combines some of the best features of C, sed, awk and sh into a single swiss-army language.

perlbug is used to generate bug reports about Perl or the modules that come with it, and mail them.

perlcc generates executables from Perl programs.

perldoc displays a piece of documentation in pod format that is embedded in the perl installation tree or in a perl script.

perlivp is the Perl Installation Verification Procedure. It can be used to verify that Perl and its libraries have been installed correctly.

piconv is a Perl version of the character encoding converter iconv.

pl2pm is a rough tool for converting Perl4 .pl files to Perl5 .pm modules.

pod2html converts files from pod format to HTML format.

pod2latex converts files from pod format to LaTeX format.

pod2man converts pod data to formatted *roff input.

pod2text converts pod data to formatted ASCII text.

pod2usage prints usage messages from embedded pod docs in files.

podchecker checks the syntax of pod format documentation files.

podselect displays selected sections of pod documentation.

psed is a Perl version of the stream editor sed.

pstruct dumps C structures as generated from "cc -g -S" stabs.

s2p translates sed to perl.

splain is used to force verbose warning diagnostics in perl.

xsubpp converts Perl XS code into C code.

Installing Texinfo-4.6

The Texinfo package contains programs for reading, writing, and converting Info documents.

Approximate build time:  0.2 SBU
Required disk space:     17 MB

Official download location for Texinfo (4.6):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/texinfo/

For its installation Texinfo depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, Sed.

Installation of Texinfo

Prepare Texinfo for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which can perform a number of checks to ensure it built correctly. Should you choose to run it, the following command will do so:

make check

Install the package:

make install

And optionally install the components belonging in a TeX installation:

make TEXMF=/usr/share/texmf install-tex

The meaning of the make parameter:

TEXMF=/usr/share/texmf: The TEXMF makefile variable holds the location of the root of your TeX tree if, for example, you plan to install a TeX package later on.

The Info documentation system uses a plain text file to hold its list of menu entries. The file is located at /usr/share/info/dir. Unfortunately, due to occasional problems in the Makefiles of various packages, it can sometimes get out of step with the Info manuals actually installed on the system. If ever you need to recreate the /usr/share/info/dir file, the following optional commands will accomplish the task:

cd /usr/share/info
rm dir
for f in *
do install-info $f dir 2>/dev/null
done

Contents of Texinfo

Installed programs: info, infokey, install-info, makeinfo, texi2dvi and texindex

Short descriptions

info is used to read Info documents. Info documents are a bit like man pages, but often go much deeper than just explaining all the flags. Compare for example man tar and info tar.

infokey compiles a source file containing Info customizations into a binary format.

install-info is used to install Info files. It updates entries in the Info index file.

makeinfo translates the given Texinfo source documents into various other formats: Info files, plain text, or HTML.

texi2dvi is used to format the given Texinfo document into a device-independent file that can be printed.

texindex is used to sort Texinfo index files.

Installing Autoconf-2.59

The Autoconf package contains programs for producing shell scripts that can automatically configure source code.

Approximate build time:  2.9 SBU
Required disk space:     7.7 MB

Official download location for Autoconf (2.59):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/autoconf/

For its installation Autoconf depends on: Bash, Coreutils, Diffutils, Grep, M4, Make, Perl, Sed.

Installation of Autoconf

Prepare Autoconf for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which performs a number of checks to ensure it will function correctly. It's worth noting that Autoconf does not play a critical role in the overall operation of an LFS system. In addition, the Autoconf test suite runs for quite a long period of time. Accordingly, the running of the test suite here is not crucial. Should you choose to run the Autoconf test suite, the following command will do so:

make check

And install the package:

make install

Contents of Autoconf

Installed programs: autoconf, autoheader, autom4te, autoreconf, autoscan, autoupdate and ifnames

Short descriptions

autoconf is a tool for producing shell scripts that automatically configure software source code packages to adapt to many kinds of Unix-like systems. The configuration scripts it produces are independent -- running them does not require the autoconf program.

autoheader is a tool for creating template files of C #define statements for configure to use.

autom4te is a wrapper for the M4 macro processor.

autoreconf comes in handy when there are a lot of autoconf-generated configure scripts around. The program runs autoconf and autoheader repeatedly (where appropriate) to remake the autoconf configure scripts and configuration header templates in a given directory tree.

autoscan can help to create a configure.in file for a software package. It examines the source files in a directory tree, searching them for common portability problems and creates a configure.scan file that serves as as a preliminary configure.in for the package.

autoupdate modifies a configure.in file that still calls autoconf macros by their old names to use the current macro names.

ifnames can be helpful when writing a configure.in for a software package. It prints the identifiers that the package uses in C preprocessor conditionals. If a package has already been set up to have some portability, this program can help to determine what configure needs to check. It can fill in some gaps in a configure.in file generated by autoscan.

Installing Automake-1.8.2

The Automake package contains programs for generating Makefiles for use with Autoconf.

Approximate build time:  5.3 SBU
Required disk space:     6.8 MB

Official download location for Automake (1.8.2):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/automake/

For its installation Automake depends on: Autoconf, Bash, Coreutils, Diffutils, Grep, M4, Make, Perl, Sed.

Installation of Automake

Prepare Automake for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which performs a number of checks to ensure it will function correctly. It's worth noting that Automake does not play a critical role in the overall operation of an LFS system. In addition, the Automake test suite runs for quite a long period of time. Accordingly, the running of the test suite here is not crucial. Should you choose to run the Automake test suite, the following command will do so:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Contents of Automake

Installed programs: acinstall, aclocal, aclocal-1.8, automake, automake-1.8, compile, config.guess, config.sub, depcomp, elisp-comp, install-sh, mdate-sh, missing, mkinstalldirs, py-compile, symlink-tree, ylwrap

Short descriptions

acinstall is a script that installs aclocal-style M4 files.

aclocal generates aclocal.m4 files based on the contents of configure.in files.

automake is a tool for automatically generating Makefile.in's from files called Makefile.am. To create all the Makefile.in files for a package, run this program in the top level directory. By scanning the configure.ins it automatically finds each appropriate Makefile.am and generate the corresponding Makefile.in.

compile is a wrapper for compilers.

config.guess is a script that attempts to guess the canonical triplet for the given build, host, or target architecture.

config.sub is a configuration validation subroutine script.

depcomp is a script for compiling a program so that not only the desired output is generated but also dependency information.

elisp-comp byte-compiles Emacs Lisp code.

install-sh is a script that installs a program, a script, or a datafile.

mdate-sh is a script that prints the modification time of a file or directory.

missing is a script acting as a common stub for missing GNU programs during an installation.

mkinstalldirs is a script that creates a directory tree.

py-compile compiles a Python program.

symlink-tree is a script to create a symlink tree of a directory tree.

ylwrap is a wrapper for lex and yacc.

Installing Bash-2.05b

The Bash package contains the Bourne-Again SHell.

Approximate build time:  1.2 SBU
Required disk space:     27 MB

Official download location for Bash (2.05b):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/bash/
And for the Bash Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/bash-2.05b-2.patch

For its installation Bash depends on: Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, Sed.

Installation of Bash

Bash has a number of bugs in it that cause it to not behave the way it is expected at times. Fix this behaviour with the following patch:

patch -Np1 -i ../bash-2.05b-2.patch

Now prepare Bash for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --bindir=/bin

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which can perform a number of checks to ensure it built correctly. Should you choose to run it, the following command will do so:

make tests

Install the package:

make install

And reload the newly compiled bash program:

exec /bin/bash --login +h

Contents of Bash

Installed programs: bash, sh (link to bash) and bashbug

Short descriptions

bash is a widely-used command interpreter. It performs all kinds of expansions and substitutions on a given command line before executing it, thus making this interpreter a powerful tool.

bashbug is a shell script to help the user compose and mail bug reports concerning bash in a standard format.

sh is a symlink to the bash program. When invoked as sh, bash tries to mimic the startup behavior of historical versions of sh as closely as possible, while conforming to the POSIX standard as well.

Installing File-4.07

The File package contains a utility for determining the type of files.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     6.3 MB

Official download location for File (4.07):
ftp://ftp.astron.com/pub/file/

Alternate Download Location:
ftp://gaosu.rave.org/pub/linux/lfs/

For its installation File depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed, Zlib.

Installation of File

Prepare File for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

And install it:

make install

Contents of File

Installed program: file

Installed library: libmagic.[a,so]

Short descriptions

file tries to classify each given file. It does this by performing several tests: file system tests, magic number tests, and language tests. The first test that succeeds determines the result.

libmagic contains routines for magic number recognition, used by the file program.

Installing Libtool-1.5.2

The Libtool package contains the GNU generic library support script. It wraps the complexity of using shared libraries in a consistent, portable interface.

Approximate build time:  1.5 SBU
Required disk space:     20 MB

Official download location for Libtool (1.5.2):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/libtool/

For its installation Libtool depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Libtool

Prepare Libtool for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which can perform a number of checks to ensure it built correctly. Should you choose to run it, the following command will do so:

make check

And install the package:

make install

Contents of Libtool

Installed programs: libtool and libtoolize

Installed libraries: libltdl.[a,so].

Short descriptions

libtool provides generalized library-building support services.

libtoolize provides a standard way to add libtool support to a package.

libltdl hides the various difficulties of dlopening libraries.

Installing Bzip2-1.0.2

The Bzip2 package contains programs for compressing and decompressing files. On text files they achieve a much better compression than the traditional gzip.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     3.0 MB

Official download location for Bzip2 (1.0.2):
ftp://sources.redhat.com/pub/bzip2/

For its installation Bzip2 depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Make.

Installation of Bzip2

Prepare Bzip2 for compilation with:

make -f Makefile-libbz2_so
make clean

The -f flag will cause Bzip2 to be built using a different Makefile file, in this case the Makefile-libbz2_so file, which creates a dynamic libbz2.so library and links the Bzip2 utilities against it.

Compile the package:

make

If you are reinstalling Bzip2, you will now first have to do rm -f /usr/bin/bz*, otherwise the following make install will fail.

Install the programs:

make install

And install the shared bzip2 binary into the /bin directory, then make some necessary symbolic links, and clean up:

cp bzip2-shared /bin/bzip2
cp -a libbz2.so* /lib
ln -s ../../lib/libbz2.so.1.0 /usr/lib/libbz2.so
rm /usr/bin/{bunzip2,bzcat,bzip2}
mv /usr/bin/{bzip2recover,bzless,bzmore} /bin
ln -s bzip2 /bin/bunzip2
ln -s bzip2 /bin/bzcat

Contents of Bzip2

Installed programs: bunzip2 (link to bzip2), bzcat (link to bzip2), bzcmp, bzdiff, bzegrep, bzfgrep, bzgrep, bzip2, bzip2recover, bzless and bzmore

Installed libraries: libbz2.a, libbz2.so (link to libbz2.so.1.0), libbz2.so.1.0 (link to libbz2.so.1.0.2) and libbz2.so.1.0.2

Short descriptions

bunzip2 decompresses bzipped files.

bzcat decompresses to standard output.

bzcmp runs cmp on bzipped files.

bzdiff runs diff on bzipped files.

bzgrep and friends run grep on bzipped files.

bzip2 compresses files using the Burrows-Wheeler block sorting text compression algorithm with Huffman coding. The compression rate is generally considerably better than that achieved by more conventional compressors using LZ77/LZ78, like gzip.

bzip2recover tries to recover data from damaged bzip2 files.

bzless runs less on bzipped files.

bzmore runs more on bzipped files.

libbz2* is the library implementing lossless, block-sorting data compression, using the Burrows-Wheeler algorithm.

Installing Diffutils-2.8.1

The Diffutils package contains programs that show the differences between files or directories.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     7.5 MB

Official download location for Diffutils (2.8.1):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/diffutils/

For its installation Diffutils depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Diffutils

Prepare Diffutils for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

And install it:

make install

Contents of Diffutils

Installed programs: cmp, diff, diff3 and sdiff

Short descriptions

cmp compares two files and reports whether or in which bytes they differ.

diff compares two files or directories and reports which lines in the files differ.

diff3 compares three files line by line.

sdiff merges two files and interactively outputs the results.

Installing Ed-0.2

The Ed package contains a spartan line editor.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     3.1 MB

Official download location for Ed (0.2):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/ed/
And for the Ed Mkstemp Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/ed-0.2-mkstemp.patch

For its installation Ed depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Ed

Note: Ed isn't something which many people use. It's installed here because it can be used by the patch program if you encounter an ed-based patch file. This happens rarely because diff-based patches are preferred these days.

Ed normally uses the mktemp function to create temporary files in /tmp, but this function contains a vulnerability (see the section on Temporary Files in http://en.tldp.org/HOWTO/Secure-Programs-HOWTO/avoid-race.html). The following patch makes Ed use mkstemp instead, which is the recommended way to create temporary files.

Apply the patch:

patch -Np1 -i ../ed-0.2-mkstemp.patch

Now prepare Ed for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --exec-prefix=""

The meaning of the configure option:

--exec-prefix="": This forces the programs to be installed into the /bin directory. Having the programs available there is useful in the event of the /usr partition being unavailable.

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which can perform a number of checks to ensure it built correctly. Should you choose to run it, the following command will do so:

make check

Install the package:

make install

Contents of Ed

Installed programs: ed and red (link to ed)

Short descriptions

ed is a line-oriented text editor. It can be used to create, display, modify and otherwise manipulate text files.

red is a restricted ed -- it can only edit files in the current directory and cannot execute shell commands.

Installing Kbd-1.12

The Kbd package contains keytable files and keyboard utilities.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     12 MB

Official download location for Kbd (1.12):
ftp://ftp.win.tue.nl/pub/linux-local/utils/kbd/
And for the Kbd More-Programs Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/kbd-1.12-more-programs-1.patch

For its installation Kbd depends on: Bash, Binutils, Bison, Coreutils, Diffutils, Flex, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Gzip, M4, Make, Sed.

Installation of Kbd

By default some of Kbd's utilities (setlogcons, setvesablank and getunimap) are not installed. First enable the compilation of these utilities:

patch -Np1 -i ../kbd-1.12-more-programs-1.patch

Now prepare Kbd for compilation:

./configure

Compile the package:

make

And install it:

make install

Configuring your keyboard

Few things are more annoying than using Linux while a wrong keymap for your keyboard is loaded. If you have a standard US keyboard, however, you can skip this section, as the US keymap is the default as long as you don't change it.

To change the default keymap, create the /usr/share/kbd/keymaps/defkeymap.map.gz symlink by running the following command:

ln -s path/to/keymap /usr/share/kbd/keymaps/defkeymap.map.gz

Of course, replace path/to/keymap with the path and name of your keyboard's map file. For example, if you have a Dutch keyboard, you would use i386/qwerty/nl.map.gz.

Another way to set your keyboard's layout is to compile the keymap into the kernel. This ensures that your keyboard will always work as expected, even when you boot into maintenance mode (by passing `init=/bin/sh' to the kernel), as then the bootscript that normally sets up your keymap isn't run.

Run the following command to patch the current default keymap into the kernel source. You will have to repeat this command whenever you unpack a new kernel:

loadkeys -m /usr/share/kbd/keymaps/defkeymap.map.gz > \
    /usr/src/linux-2.4.24/drivers/char/defkeymap.c

Contents of Kbd

Installed programs: chvt, deallocvt, dumpkeys, fgconsole, getkeycodes, getunimap, kbd_mode, kbdrate, loadkeys, loadunimap, mapscrn, openvt, psfaddtable (link to psfxtable), psfgettable (link to psfxtable), psfstriptable (link to psfxtable), psfxtable, resizecons, setfont, setkeycodes, setleds, setlogcons, setmetamode, setvesablank, showconsolefont, showkey, unicode_start and unicode_stop

Short descriptions

chvt changes the foreground virtual terminal.

deallocvt deallocates unused virtual terminals.

dumpkeys dumps the keyboard translation tables.

fgconsole prints the number of the active virtual terminal.

getkeycodes prints the kernel scancode-to-keycode mapping table.

getunimap prints the currently used unimap.

kbd_mode reports or sets the keyboard mode.

kbdrate sets the keyboard repeat and delay rates.

loadkeys loads the keyboard translation tables.

loadunimap loads the kernel unicode-to-font mapping table.

mapscrn is an obsolete program that used to load a user-defined output character mapping table into the console driver. This is now done by setfont.

openvt starts a program on a new virtual terminal (VT).

psf* are a set of tools for handling Unicode character tables for console fonts.

resizecons changes the kernel idea of the console size.

setfont lets you change the EGA/VGA fonts on the console.

setkeycodes loads kernel scancode-to-keycode mapping table entries, useful if you have some unusual keys on your keyboard.

setleds sets the keyboard flags and LEDs. Many people find it useful to have NumLock on by default, setleds +num achieves this.

setlogcons sends kernel messages to the console.

setmetamode defines the keyboard meta key handling.

setvesablank lets you fiddle with the built-in hardware screensaver (no toasters, just a blank screen).

showconsolefont shows the current EGA/VGA console screen font.

showkey reports the scancodes and keycodes and ASCII codes of the keys pressed on the keyboard.

unicode_start puts the keyboard and console in unicode mode.

unicode_stop reverts keyboard and console from unicode mode.

Installing E2fsprogs-1.34

The E2fsprogs package contains the utilities for handling the ext2 file system. It also supports the ext3 journaling file system.

Approximate build time:  0.6 SBU
Required disk space:     48.4 MB

Official download location for E2fsprogs (1.34):
http://download.sourceforge.net/e2fsprogs/

For its installation E2fsprogs depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, Gawk, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed, Texinfo.

Installation of E2fsprogs

It is recommended to build E2fsprogs outside of the source tree:

mkdir ../e2fsprogs-build
cd ../e2fsprogs-build

Prepare E2fsprogs for compilation:

../e2fsprogs-1.34/configure --prefix=/usr --with-root-prefix="" \
    --enable-elf-shlibs

The meaning of the configure options:

--with-root-prefix="": Certain programs (such as the e2fsck program) are considered essential programs. When, for example, /usr isn't mounted, these essential programs have to be available. They belong in directories like /lib and /sbin. If this option isn't passed to E2fsprogs's configure, the programs are placed in the /usr directory, which is not what we want.
--enable-elf-shlibs: This creates the shared libraries which some programs in this package make use of.

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which can perform a number of checks to ensure it built correctly. Should you choose to run it, the following command will do so:

make check

Install most of the package:

make install

And install also the shared libraries:

make install-libs

Contents of E2fsprogs

Installed programs: badblocks, blkid, chattr, compile_et, debugfs, dumpe2fs, e2fsck, e2image, e2label, findfs, fsck, fsck.ext2, fsck.ext3, logsave, lsattr, mk_cmds, mke2fs, mkfs.ext2, mkfs.ext3, mklost+found, resize2fs, tune2fs and uuidgen.

Installed libraries: libblkid.[a,so], libcom_err.[a,so], libe2p.[a,so], libext2fs.[a,so], libss.[a,so] and libuuid.[a,so]

Short descriptions

badblocks searches a device (usually a disk partition) for bad blocks.

blkid is a command line utility to locate and print block device attributes.

chattr changes the attributes of files on a second extended (ext2) file system.

compile_et is an error table compiler. It converts a table of error-code names and messages into a C source file suitable for use with the com_err library.

debugfs is a file system debugger. It can be used to examine and change the state of an ext2 file system.

dumpe2fs prints the super block and blocks group information for the file system present on a given device.

e2fsck is used to check, and optionally repair, second extended (ext2) file systems, and also ext3 file systems.

e2image is used to save critical ext2 file system data to a file.

e2label will display or change the file system label on the ext2 file system present on a given device.

findfs finds a file system by label or UUID.

fsck is used to check, and optionally repair, file systems. By default it checks the file systems listed in /etc/fstab

logsave saves the output of a command in a logfile.

lsattr lists the attributes of files on a second extended file system.

mk_cmds converts a table of command names and help messages into a C source file suitable for use with the libss subsystem library.

mke2fs is used to create a second extended file system on the given device.

mklost+found is used to create a lost+found directory on a second extended file system. It pre-allocates disk blocks to this directory to lighten the task of e2fsck.

resize2fs can be used to enlarge or shrink an ext2 file system.

tune2fs is used adjust tunable file system parameters on a second extended file system.

uuidgen creates new universally unique identifiers (UUID). Each new UUID can reasonably be considered unique among all UUIDs created, on the local system and on other systems, in the past and in the future.

libblkid contains routines for device identification and token extraction.

libcom_err is the common error display routine.

libe2p is used by dumpe2fs, chattr, and lsattr.

libext2fs contains routines to enable user-level programs to manipulate an ext2 file system.

libss is used by debugfs.

libuuid contains routines for generating unique identifiers for objects that may be accessible beyond the local system.

Installing Grep-2.5.1

The Grep package contains programs for searching through files.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     5.8 MB

Official download location for Grep (2.5.1):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/grep/

For its installation Grep depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Make, Sed, Texinfo.

Installation of Grep

Prepare Grep for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --bindir=/bin --with-included-regex

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which can perform a number of checks to ensure it built correctly. Should you choose to run it, the following command will do so:

make check

And install the package:

make install

Contents of Grep

Installed programs: egrep (link to grep), fgrep (link to grep) and grep

Short descriptions

egrep prints lines matching an extended regular expression.

fgrep prints lines matching a list of fixed strings.

grep prints lines matching a basic regular expression.

Installing Grub-0.94

The Grub package contains the GRand Unified Bootloader.

Approximate build time:  0.2 SBU
Required disk space:     10 MB

Official download location for Grub (0.94):
ftp://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/grub/

For its installation Grub depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, Sed.

Installation of Grub

First fix a compilation problem with GCC-3.3.2:

sed -i 's/2 long/2/' stage2/fsys_reiserfs.c

Now prepare Grub for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

And install it:

make install
mkdir /boot/grub
cp /usr/share/grub/i386-pc/stage{1,2} /boot/grub

Replace i386-pc with whatever directory is appropriate for your hardware.

The i386-pc directory also contains a number of *stage1_5 files, different ones for different file systems. Have a look at the ones available and copy the appropriate ones to the /boot/grub directory. Most people will copy the e2fs_stage1_5 and/or reiserfs_stage1_5 files.

Contents of Grub

Installed programs: grub, grub-install, grub-md5-crypt, grub-terminfo and mbchk

Short descriptions

grub is the GRand Unified Bootloader's command shell.

grub-install installs GRUB on the given device.

grub-md5-crypt encrypts a password in MD5 format.

grub-terminfo generates a terminfo command from a terminfo name. It can be used if you have an uncommon terminal.

mbchk checks the format of a multiboot kernel.

Installing Gzip-1.3.5

The Gzip package contains programs for compressing and decompressing files.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     2.6 MB

Official download location for Gzip (1.3.5):
ftp://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/gzip/

For its installation Gzip depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Gzip

Prepare Gzip for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

The gzexe script has the location of the gzip binary hard-wired into it. Because we later change the location of the binary, the following command assures that the new location gets placed into the script:

cp gzexe.in{,.backup}
sed 's%"BINDIR"%/bin%' gzexe.in.backup > gzexe.in

Compile the package:

make

Install the package:

make install

And move the programs to the /bin directory:

mv /usr/bin/gzip /bin
rm /usr/bin/{gunzip,zcat}
ln -s gzip /bin/gunzip
ln -s gzip /bin/zcat
ln -s gunzip /bin/uncompress

Contents of Gzip

Installed programs: gunzip (link to gzip), gzexe, gzip, uncompress (link to gunzip), zcat (link to gzip), zcmp, zdiff, zegrep, zfgrep, zforce, zgrep, zless, zmore and znew

Short descriptions

gunzip decompresses gzipped files.

gzexe is used to create self-uncompressing executable files.

gzip compresses the given files, using Lempel-Ziv (LZ77) coding.

zcat uncompresses the given gzipped files to standard output.

zcmp runs cmp on gzipped files.

zdiff runs diff on gzipped files.

zegrep runs egrep on gzipped files.

zfgrep runs fgrep on gzipped files.

zforce forces a .gz extension on all given files that are gzipped files, so that gzip will not compress them again. This can be useful when file names were truncated during a file transfer.

zgrep runs grep on gzipped files.

zless runs less on gzipped files.

zmore runs more on gzipped files.

znew recompresses files from compress format to gzip format -- .Z to .gz.

Installing Man-1.5m2

The Man package contains programs for finding and viewing manual pages.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     1.9MB

Official download location for Man (1.5m2):
ftp://ftp.win.tue.nl/pub/linux-local/utils/man/
And for the Man 80-Columns Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/man-1.5m2-80cols.patch

For its installation Man depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Gawk, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Man

We'll make three adjustments to the sources of Man.

The first is a patch which allows Man to work better with recent releases of Groff. In particular, man pages will now display using the full terminal width instead of being limited to 80 characters:

patch -Np1 -i ../man-1.5m2-80cols.patch

The second is a sed substitution to add the -R switch to the PAGER variable so that escape sequences are properly handled by Less:

sed -i 's/-is/&R/' configure

The third is also a sed substitution to comment out the "MANPATH /usr/man" line in the man.conf file to prevent redundant results when using programs such as whatis:

sed -i 's%MANPATH./usr/man%#&%' src/man.conf.in

Now prepare Man for compilation:

./configure -default -confdir=/etc

The meaning of the configure options:

-default: This tells the configure script to select a sensible set of default options. For example: only English man pages, no message catalogs, man not suid, handle compressed man pages, compress cat pages, create cat pages whenever the appropriate directory exists, follow FHS by putting cat pages under /var/cache/man provided that that directory exists.
-confdir=/etc: This tells the man program to look for the man.conf configuration file in the /etc directory.

Compile the package:

make

And install it:

make install

Note: If you wish to disable SGR escape sequences, you should edit the man.conf file and add the -c switch to NROFF.

You may want to also take a look at the BLFS page at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/cvs/postlfs/compressdoc.html which deals with formatting and compression issues for man pages.

Contents of Man

Installed programs: apropos, makewhatis, man, man2dvi, man2html and whatis

Short descriptions

apropos searches the whatis database and displays the short descriptions of system commands that contain a given string.

makewhatis builds the whatis database. It reads all the manual pages in the manpath and for each page writes the name and a short description in the whatis database.

man formats and displays the requested on-line manual page.

man2dvi converts a manual page into dvi format.

man2html converts a manual page into html.

whatis searches the whatis database and displays the short descriptions of system commands that contain the given keyword as a separate word.

Installing Make-3.80

The Make package contains a program for compiling large packages.

Approximate build time:  0.2 SBU
Required disk space:     8.8 MB

Official download location for Make (3.80):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/make/

For its installation Make depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Sed.

Installation of Make

Prepare Make for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which can perform a number of checks to ensure it built correctly. Should you choose to run it, the following command will do so:

make check

And install the package:

make install

Contents of Make

Installed program: make

Short description

make automatically determines which pieces of a large package need to be recompiled, and then issues the relevant commands.

Installing Modutils-2.4.26

The Modutils package contains programs for handling kernel modules.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     2.9 MB

Official download location for Modutils (2.4.26):
ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/modutils/

For its installation Modutils depends on: Bash, Binutils, Bison, Coreutils, Diffutils, Flex, GCC, Glibc, Grep, M4, Make, Sed.

Installation of Modutils

Prepare Modutils for compilation:

./configure

Compile the package:

make

And install it:

make install

Contents of Modutils

Installed programs: depmod, genksyms, insmod, insmod_ksymoops_clean, kallsyms (link to insmod), kernelversion, ksyms (link to insmod), lsmod (link to insmod), modinfo, modprobe (link to insmod) and rmmod (link to insmod)

Short descriptions

depmod creates a dependency file, based on the symbols it finds in the existing set of modules. This dependency file is used by modprobe to automatically load the required modules.

genksyms generates symbol version information.

insmod installs a loadable module in the running kernel.

insmod_ksymoops_clean deletes saved ksyms and modules not accessed for two days.

kallsyms extracts all kernel symbols for debugging.

kernelversion reports the major version of the running kernel.

ksyms displays exported kernel symbols.

lsmod shows which modules are loaded.

modinfo examines an object file associated with a kernel module and displays any information that it can glean.

modprobe uses a dependency file, created by depmod, to automatically load the relevant modules.

rmmod unloads modules from the running kernel.

Installing Patch-2.5.4

The Patch package contains a program for modifying files.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     1.9 MB

Official download location for Patch (2.5.4):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/patch/

For its installation Patch depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Patch

Prepare Patch for compilation:

CPPFLAGS=-D_GNU_SOURCE ./configure --prefix=/usr

Again, the preprocessor flag -D_GNU_SOURCE is only needed on the PowerPC platform. On other architectures you can leave it out.

Compile the package:

make

And install it:

make install

Contents of Patch

Installed program: patch

Short description

patch modifies files according to a patch file. A patch file normally is a difference listing created with the diff program. By applying these differences to the original files, patch creates the patched versions. Using patches instead a entire new tarballs to keep your sources up-to-date can save you a lot of download time.

Installing Procinfo-18

The Procinfo package contains programs for displaying system information.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     0.2 MB

Official download location for Procinfo (18):
ftp://ftp.cistron.nl/pub/people/svm/

For its installation Procinfo depends on: Binutils, GCC, Glibc, Make, Ncurses.

Installation of Procinfo

Compile Procinfo:

make LDLIBS=-lncurses

The meaning of the make parameter:

LDLIBS=-lncurses: This tells Procinfo to use the libncurses library instead of the long-obsolete libtermcap.

And install the package:

make install

Contents of Procinfo

Installed programs: lsdev, procinfo and socklist

Short descriptions

lsdev lists the devices present in your system, and which IRQs and IO ports they use.

procinfo displays an overview of some of the info present in the virtual proc file system.

socklist lists the open sockets, reporting their type, portnumber, and other specifics.

Installing Procps-3.1.15

The Procps package contains programs for monitoring processes.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     6.2 MB

Official download location for Procps (3.1.15):
http://procps.sourceforge.net/

For its installation Procps depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Glibc, Make, Ncurses.

Installation of Procps

Compile Procps:

make

Install it:

make install

And remove a spurious library link:

rm /lib/libproc.so

Contents of Procps

Installed programs: free, kill, pgrep, pkill, pmap, ps, skill, snice, sysctl, tload, top, uptime, vmstat, w and watch

Installed library: libproc.so

Short descriptions

free reports the amount of free and used memory in the system, both physical and swap memory.

kill is used to send signals to processes.

pgrep looks up processes based on their name and other attributes.

pkill signals processes based on their name and other attributes.

pmap reports the memory map of the given process.

ps gives a snapshot of the current processes.

skill sends signals to processes matching the given criteria.

snice changes the scheduling priority of processes matching the given criteria.

sysctl modifies kernel parameters at run time.

tload prints a graph of the current system load average.

top displays the top CPU processes. It provides an ongoing look at processor activity in real time.

uptime reports how long the system has been running, how many users are logged on, and the system load averages.

vmstat reports virtual memory statistics, giving information about processes, memory, paging, block IO, traps, and CPU activity.

w shows which users are currently logged on, where and since when.

watch runs a given command repeatedly, displaying the first screenful of its output. This allows you to watch the output change over time.

libproc contains the functions used by most programs in this package.

Installing Psmisc-21.4

The Psmisc package contains programs for displaying information on processes.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     2.2 MB

Official download location for Psmisc (21.4):
http://download.sourceforge.net/psmisc/

For its installation Psmisc depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, Sed.

Installation of Psmisc

Prepare Psmisc for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --exec-prefix=/

The meaning of the configure option:

--exec-prefix=/: This causes the binaries to be installed in /bin and not in /usr/bin. As the Psmisc programs are often used in bootscripts, they should be available also when the /usr file system isn't mounted.

Compile the package:

make

And install it:

make install

There is no reason for the pstree and pstree.x11 programs to reside in /bin. We therefore move them to /usr/bin. Also, there is no need for pstree.x11 to exist as a separate program. We therefore make it a symbolic link to pstree:

mv /bin/pstree* /usr/bin
ln -sf pstree /usr/bin/pstree.x11

By default Psmisc's pidof program isn't installed. Generally, this isn't a problem because we later install the Sysvinit package, which provides a better pidof program. But if you're not going to use Sysvinit, you should complete the installation of Psmisc by creating the following symlink:

ln -s killall /bin/pidof

Contents of Psmisc

Installed programs: fuser, killall, pstree and pstree.x11 (link to pstree)

Short descriptions

fuser reports the PIDs of processes that use the given files or file systems.

killall kills processes by name. It sends a signal to all processes running any of the given commands.

pstree displays running processes as a tree.

pstree.x11 same as pstree except that it waits for confirmation before exiting.

Installing Shadow-4.0.4.1

The Shadow package contains programs for handling passwords in a secure way.

Approximate build time:  0.4 SBU
Required disk space:     11 MB

Official download location for Shadow (4.0.4.1):
ftp://ftp.pld.org.pl/software/shadow/

For its installation Shadow depends on: Bash, Binutils, Bison, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Shadow

Shadow hard-wires the path to the passwd binary within the binary itself, but does this the wrong way. If a passwd binary is not present before installing Shadow, the package incorrectly assumes it is going to be located at /bin/passwd, but then installs it in /usr/bin/passwd. This will lead to errors about not finding /bin/passwd. To work around this bug, create a dummy passwd file, so that it gets hard-wired properly:

touch /usr/bin/passwd

Now prepare Shadow for compilation:

./configure --libdir=/usr/lib --enable-shared

Work around a problem that prevents Shadow's internationalization from working:

echo '#define HAVE_SETLOCALE 1' >> config.h

Compile the package:

make

And install it:

make install

Shadow uses two files to configure authentication settings for the system. Install these two config files:

cp etc/{limits,login.access} /etc

We want to change the password method to enable MD5 passwords which are theoretically more secure than the default "crypt" method and also allow password lengths greater than 8 characters. We also need to change the old /var/spool/mail location for user mailboxes to the current location at /var/mail. We do this by changing the relevant configuration file while copying it to its destination:

sed -e 's%/var/spool/mail%/var/mail%' \
    -e 's%#MD5_CRYPT_ENAB.no%MD5_CRYPT_ENAB yes%' \
    etc/login.defs.linux > /etc/login.defs

Note: Be extra careful when typing all of the above. It is probably safer to cut-and-paste it rather than try and type it all in.

Move some misplaced symlinks to their proper locations:

mv /bin/sg /usr/bin
mv /bin/vigr /usr/sbin

And move Shadow's dynamic libraries to a more appropriate location:

mv /usr/lib/lib{shadow,misc}.so.0* /lib

As some packages expect to find the just-moved libraries in /usr/lib, create the following symlinks:

ln -sf ../../lib/libshadow.so.0 /usr/lib/libshadow.so
ln -sf ../../lib/libmisc.so.0 /usr/lib/libmisc.so

The -D option of the useradd program requires this directory for it to work properly:

mkdir /etc/default

Coreutils has already installed a better groups program in /usr/bin. Remove the one installed by Shadow:

rm /bin/groups

Configuring Shadow

This package contains utilities to modify users' passwords, add or delete users and groups, and the like. We're not going to explain what 'password shadowing' means. A full explanation can be found in the doc/HOWTO file within the unpacked Shadow source tree. There's one thing to keep in mind if you decide to use Shadow support: programs that need to verify passwords (for example xdm, ftp daemons, pop3 daemons) need to be 'shadow-compliant', that is they need to be able to work with shadowed passwords.

To enable shadowed passwords, run the following command:

/usr/sbin/pwconv

And to enable shadowed group passwords, run the following command:

/usr/sbin/grpconv

Under normal circumstances, you won't have created any passwords yet. However, if returning to this section to enable shadowing, you should reset any current user passwords with the passwd command or any group passwords with the gpasswd command.

Setting the root password

Choose a password for user root and set it by running the following command:

passwd root

Contents of Shadow

Installed programs: chage, chfn, chpasswd, chsh, dpasswd, expiry, faillog, gpasswd, groupadd, groupdel, groupmod, groups, grpck, grpconv, grpunconv, lastlog, login, logoutd, mkpasswd, newgrp, newusers, passwd, pwck, pwconv, pwunconv, sg (link to newgrp), useradd, userdel, usermod, vigr (link to vipw) and vipw

Short descriptions

chage is used to change the maximum number of days between obligatory password changes.

chfn is used to change a user's full name and some other info.

chpasswd is used to update the passwords of a whole series of user accounts in one go.

chsh is used to change a user's default login shell.

dpasswd is used to change dial-up passwords for user login shells.

expiry checks and enforces the current password expiration policy.

faillog is used to examine the log of login failures, to set a maximum number of failures before an account is blocked, or to reset the failure count.

gpasswd is used to add and delete members and administrators to groups.

groupadd creates a group with the given name.

groupdel deletes the group with the given name.

groupmod is used to modify the given group's name or GID.

groups reports the groups of which the given users are members.

grpck verifies the integrity of the group files, /etc/group and /etc/gshadow.

grpconv creates or updates the shadow group file from the normal group file.

grpunconv updates /etc/group from /etc/gshadow and then deletes the latter.

lastlog reports the most recent login of all users, or of a given user.

login is used by the system let users sign on.

logoutd is a daemon used to enforce restrictions on log-on time and ports.

mkpasswd encrypts the given password using the also given perturbation.

newgrp is used to change the current GID during a login session.

newusers is used to create or update a whole series of user accounts in one go.

passwd is used to change the password for a user or group account.

pwck verifies the integrity of the password files, /etc/passwd and /etc/shadow.

pwconv creates or updates the shadow password file from the normal password file.

pwunconv updates /etc/passwd from /etc/shadow and then deletes the latter.

sg executes a given command while the user's GID is set to that of the given group.

useradd creates a new user with the given name, or updates the default new-user information.

userdel deletes the given user account.

usermod is used to modify the given user's login name, UID, shell, initial group, home directory, and the like.

vigr can be used to edit the /etc/group or /etc/gshadow files.

vipw can be used to edit the /etc/passwd or /etc/shadow files.

libmisc...

libshadow contains functions used by most programs in this package.

Installing Sysklogd-1.4.1

The Sysklogd package contains programs for logging system messages, such as those given by the kernel when unusual things happen.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     0.5 MB

Official download location for Sysklogd (1.4.1):
http://www.infodrom.org/projects/sysklogd/download/

For its installation Sysklogd depends on: Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Glibc, Make.

Installation of Sysklogd

Compile Sysklogd:

make

And install it:

make install

Configuring Sysklogd

Create a new file /etc/syslog.conf by running the following:

cat > /etc/syslog.conf << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/syslog.conf

auth,authpriv.* -/var/log/auth.log
*.*;auth,authpriv.none -/var/log/sys.log
daemon.* -/var/log/daemon.log
kern.* -/var/log/kern.log
mail.* -/var/log/mail.log
user.* -/var/log/user.log
*.emerg *

# End /etc/syslog.conf
EOF

Contents of Sysklogd

Installed programs: klogd and syslogd

Short descriptions

klogd is a system daemon for intercepting and logging kernel messages.

syslogd logs the messages that system programs offer for logging. Every logged message contains at least a date stamp and a hostname, and normally the program's name too, but that depends on how trusting the logging daemon is told to be.

Installing Sysvinit-2.85

The Sysvinit package contains programs for controlling the startup, running, and shutdown of your system.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     0.9 MB

Official download location for Sysvinit (2.85):
ftp://ftp.cistron.nl/pub/people/miquels/sysvinit/

For its installation Sysvinit depends on: Binutils, Coreutils, GCC, Glibc, Make.

Installation of Sysvinit

When run levels are changed (for example, when halting the system), init sends the TERM and KILL signals to the processes which it started. Init prints "Sending processes the TERM signal" to the screen. This seems to imply that init is sending these signals to all the currently running processes. To avoid this confusion, the init.c file can be modified, so that the sentence reads "Sending processes started by init the TERM signal".

Edit the halt message:

cp src/init.c{,.backup}
sed 's/Sending processes/& started by init/g' \
    src/init.c.backup > src/init.c

Compile Sysvinit:

make -C src

And install it:

make -C src install

Configuring Sysvinit

Create a new file /etc/inittab by running the following:

cat > /etc/inittab << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/inittab

id:3:initdefault:

si::sysinit:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc sysinit

l0:0:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 0
l1:S1:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 1
l2:2:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 2
l3:3:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 3
l4:4:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 4
l5:5:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 5
l6:6:wait:/etc/rc.d/init.d/rc 6

ca:12345:ctrlaltdel:/sbin/shutdown -t1 -a -r now

su:S016:once:/sbin/sulogin

1:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty1 9600
2:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty2 9600
3:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty3 9600
4:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty4 9600
5:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty5 9600
6:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty tty6 9600

# End /etc/inittab
EOF

Contents of Sysvinit

Installed programs: halt, init, killall5, last, lastb (link to last), mesg, pidof (link to killall5), poweroff (link to halt), reboot (link to halt), runlevel, shutdown, sulogin, telinit (link to init), utmpdump and wall

Short descriptions

halt normally invokes shutdown with the -h flag, except when already in runlevel 0, then it tells the kernel to halt the system. But first it notes in the file /var/log/wtmp that the system is being brought down.

init is the mother of all processes. It reads its commands from /etc/inittab, which normally tell it which scripts to run for which runlevel, and how many gettys to spawn.

killall5 sends a signal to all processes, except the processes in its own session -- so it won't kill the shell running the script that called it.

last shows which users last logged in (and out), searching back through the file /var/log/wtmp. It can also show system boots and shutdowns, and runlevel changes.

lastb shows the failed login attempts, as logged in /var/log/btmp.

mesg controls whether other users can send messages to the current user's terminal.

pidof reports the PIDs of the given programs.

poweroff tells the kernel to halt the system and switch off the computer. But see halt.

reboot tells the kernel to reboot the system. But see halt.

runlevel reports the previous and the current runlevel, as noted in the last runlevel record in /var/run/utmp.

shutdown brings the system down in a secure way, signaling all processes and notifying all logged-in users.

sulogin allows the superuser to log in. It is normally invoked by init when the system goes into single user mode.

telinit tells init which runlevel to enter.

utmpdump displays the content of the given login file in a friendlier format.

wall writes a message to all logged-in users.

Installing Tar-1.13.25

The Tar package contains an archiving program.

Approximate build time:  0.2 SBU
Required disk space:     10 MB

Official download location for Tar (1.13.25):
ftp://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/tar/

For its installation Tar depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed.

Installation of Tar

Prepare Tar for compilation:

./configure --prefix=/usr --bindir=/bin \
    --libexecdir=/usr/sbin

Compile the package:

make

This package has a test suite available which can perform a number of checks to ensure it built correctly. Should you choose to run it, the following command will do so:

make check

And install the package:

make install

Contents of Tar

Installed programs: rmt and tar

Short descriptions

rmt is used to remotely manipulate a magnetic tape drive, through an interprocess communication connection.

tar is used to create and extract files from archives, also known as tarballs.

Installing Util-linux-2.12

The Util-linux package contains miscellaneous utility programs. Among them are utilities for handling file systems, consoles, partitions, and messages.

Approximate build time:  0.2 SBU
Required disk space:     16 MB

Official download location for Util-linux (2.12):
http://ftp.cwi.nl/aeb/util-linux/

For its installation Util-linux depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Ncurses, Sed, Zlib.

FHS compliance notes

The FHS recommends that we use /var/lib/hwclock, instead of the usual /etc, as the location for the adjtime file. To make the hwclock program FHS-compliant, run the following:

cp hwclock/hwclock.c{,.backup}
sed 's%etc/adjtime%var/lib/hwclock/adjtime%' \
    hwclock/hwclock.c.backup > hwclock/hwclock.c
mkdir -p /var/lib/hwclock

Installation of Util-linux

Prepare Util-linux for compilation:

./configure

Compile the package:

make HAVE_KILL=yes HAVE_SLN=yes

The meaning of the make parameters:

HAVE_KILL=yes: This prevents the kill program (already installed by Procps) from being built and installed again.
HAVE_SLN=yes: This prevents the sln program (a statically linked ln, already installed by Glibc) from being built and installed again.

And install the package:

make HAVE_KILL=yes HAVE_SLN=yes install

Contents of Util-linux

Installed programs: agetty, arch, blockdev, cal, cfdisk, chkdupexe, col, colcrt, colrm, column, ctrlaltdel, cytune, ddate, dmesg, elvtune, fdformat, fdisk, fsck.cramfs, fsck.minix, getopt, hexdump, hwclock, ipcrm, ipcs, isosize, line, logger, look, losetup, mcookie, mkfs, mkfs.bfs, mkfs.cramfs, mkfs.minix, mkswap, more, mount, namei, pg, pivot_root, ramsize (link to rdev), raw, rdev, readprofile, rename, renice, rev, rootflags (link to rdev), script, setfdprm, setsid, setterm, sfdisk, swapoff (link to swapon), swapon, tunelp, ul, umount, vidmode (link to rdev), whereis and write

Short descriptions

agetty opens a tty port, prompts for a login name, and then invokes the login program.

arch reports the machine's architecture.

blockdev allows you to call block device ioctls from the command line.

cal displays a simple calender.

cfdisk is used to manipulate the partition table of the given device.

chkdupexe finds duplicate executables.

col filters out reverse line feeds.

colcrt is used to filter nroff output for terminals that lack some capabilities such as overstriking and half-lines.

colrm filters out the given columns.

column formats a given file into multiple columns.

ctrlaltdel sets the function of the Ctrl+Alt+Del key combination, to a hard or a soft reset.

cytune was used to tune the parameters of the serial line drivers for Cyclades cards.

ddate gives the Discordian date, or converts the given Gregorian date to a Discordian one.

dmesg dumps the kernel boot messages.

elvtune can be used to tune the performance and interactiveness of a block device.

fdformat low-level formats a floppy disk.

fdisk could be used to manipulate the partition table of the given device.

fsck.cramfs performs a consistency check on the Cramfs file system on the given device.

fsck.minix performs a consistency check on the Minix file system on the given device.

getopt parses options in the given command line.

hexdump dumps the given file in hexadecimal, or in another given format.

hwclock is used to read or set the system's hardware clock (also called the RTC or BIOS clock).

ipcrm removes the given IPC resource.

ipcs provides IPC status information.

isosize reports the size of an iso9660 file system.

line copies a single line.

logger enters the given message into the system log.

look displays lines that begin with the given string.

losetup is used to set up and control loop devices.

mcookie generates magic cookies, 128-bit random hexadecimal numbers, for xauth.

mkfs is used to build a file system on a device (usually a harddisk partition).

mkfs.bfs creates an SCO bfs file system.

mkfs.cramfs creates a cramfs file system.

mkfs.minix creates a Minix file system.

mkswap initializes the given device or file to be used as a swap area.

more is a filter for paging through text one screenful at a time. But less is much better.

mount attaches the file system on the given device to the given directory in the system's file tree.

namei shows the symbolic links in the given pathnames.

pg displays a text file one screenful at a time.

pivot_root makes the given file system the new root file system of the current process.

ramsize could be used to set the size of the RAM disk in a bootable image.

rdev could be used to query and set the root device and other things in a bootable image.

readprofile reads kernel profiling information.

rename renames the given files, replacing a given string with another.

renice is used to alter the priority of running processes.

rev reverses the lines of a given file.

rootflags could be used to set the rootflags in a bootable image.

script makes a typescript of a terminal session, of everything printed to the terminal.

setfdprm sets user-provided floppy disk parameters.

setsid runs the given program in a new session.

setterm is used to set terminal attributes.

sfdisk is a disk partition table manipulator.

swapdev could be used to set the swap device in a bootable image.

swapoff disables devices and files for paging and swapping.

swapon enables devices and files for paging and swapping.

tunelp is used to tune the parameters of the line printer.

ul is a filter for translating underscores into escape sequences indicating underlining for the terminal in use.

umount disconnects a file system from the system's file tree.

vidmode could be used to set the video mode in a bootable image.

whereis reports the location of binary, the source, and the manual page for the given command.

write sends a message to the given user. That is, if that user has not disabled such messages.

Installing GCC-2.95.3

Approximate build time:  1.5 SBU
Required disk space:     130 MB

Official download location for GCC-2 (2.95.3):
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/gcc/
And for the GCC-2 Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/gcc-2.95.3-2.patch
And for the GCC-2 No-Fixincludes Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/gcc-2.95.3-no-fixinc.patch
And for the GCC-2 Return-Type Patch:
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/patches/lfs/cvs/gcc-2.95.3-returntype-fix.patch

Installation of GCC

This is an older release of GCC which we are going to install for the purpose of compiling the Linux kernel in Chapter 8. This version is recommended by the kernel developers when you need absolute stability. Later versions of GCC have not received as much testing for Linux kernel compilation. Using a later version is likely to work, however, we recommend adhering to the kernel developer's advice and using the version here to compile your kernel.

Note: We don't install the C++ compiler or libraries here. However, there may be reasons why you would want to install them. More information can be found at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/stable/general/gcc2.html.

We'll install this older release of GCC into the non-standard prefix of /opt so as to avoid interfering with the system GCC already installed in /usr .

Apply the patches and make a small adjustment:

patch -Np1 -i ../gcc-2.95.3-2.patch
patch -Np1 -i ../gcc-2.95.3-no-fixinc.patch
patch -Np1 -i ../gcc-2.95.3-returntype-fix.patch
echo timestamp > gcc/cstamp-h.in

The GCC documentation recommends building GCC outside of the source directory in a dedicated build directory:

mkdir ../gcc-2-build
cd ../gcc-2-build

Compile and install the compiler:

../gcc-2.95.3/configure --prefix=/opt/gcc-2.95.3 \
    --enable-shared --enable-languages=c \
    --enable-threads=posix
make bootstrap
make install

Revised chroot command

From now on when you exit the chroot environment and wish to re-enter it, you should run the following modified chroot command:

chroot $LFS /usr/bin/env -i \
    HOME=/root TERM=$TERM PS1='\u:\w\$ ' \
    PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin \
    /bin/bash --login

The reason being there is no longer any need to use programs from the /tools directory. However, we don't want to remove the /tools directory just yet. There is still some use for it towards the end of the book.

Installing LFS-Bootscripts-1.12

The LFS-Bootscripts package contains a set of bootscripts.

Approximate build time:  0.1 SBU
Required disk space:     0.3 MB

Official download location for LFS-Bootscripts (1.12):
http://downloads.linuxfromscratch.org/

For its installation LFS-Bootscripts depends on: Bash, Coreutils.

Installation of LFS-Bootscripts

We will be using SysV style init scripts. We have chosen this style because it is widely used and we feel comfortable with it. If you would prefer to try something else, Marc Heerdink has written a hint about BSD style init scripts, to be found at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/bsd-init.txt. And if you'd like something more radical, search the LFS mailing lists for depinit.

If you decide to use BSD style, or some other style scripts, you can skip the next chapter when you arrive at it and move on to Chapter 8.

Install the boot scripts:

cp -a rc.d sysconfig /etc

Give root ownership of the scripts:

chown -R root:root /etc/rc.d /etc/sysconfig

Contents of LFS-bootscripts

Installed scripts: checkfs, cleanfs, functions, halt, ifdown, ifup, loadkeys, localnet, mountfs, mountproc, network, rc, reboot, sendsignals, setclock, swap, sysklogd and template

Short descriptions

The checkfs script checks the file systems just before they are mounted (with the exception of journal and network based file systems).

The cleanfs script removes files that shouldn't be preserved between reboots, such as those in /var/run/ and /var/lock/. It re-creates /var/run/utmp and removes the possibly present /etc/nologin, /fastboot and /forcefsck files.

The functions script contains functions shared among different scripts, such as error and status checking.

The halt script halts the system.

The ifdown and ifup scripts assist the network script with network devices.

The loadkeys script loads the keymap table you specified as proper for your keyboard layout.

The localnet script sets up the system's hostname and local loopback device.

The mountfs script mounts all file systems that aren't marked noauto or aren't network based.

The mountproc script is used to mount the proc file system.

The network script sets up network interfaces, such as network cards, and sets up the default gateway where applicable.

The rc script is the master runlevel control script. It is responsible for running all the other scripts one-by-one in a specific sequence.

The reboot script reboots the system.

The sendsignals script makes sure every process is terminated before the system reboots or halts.

The setclock script resets the kernel clock to localtime in case the hardware clock isn't set to GMT time.

The swap script enables and disables swap files and partitions.

The sysklogd script starts and stops the system and kernel log daemons.

The template script is a template you can use to create your own bootscripts for your other daemons.

About debugging symbols

Most programs and libraries are, by default, compiled with debugging symbols included (with gcc option -g).

When debugging a program or library that was compiled with debugging information included, the debugger can give you not only memory addresses but also the names of the routines and variables.

But the inclusion of these debugging symbols enlarges a program or library significantly. To get an idea of the amount of space these symbols occupy, have a look at the following:

a bash binary with debugging symbols: 1200 KB
a bash binary without debugging symbols: 480 KB
Glibc and GCC files (/lib and /usr/lib) with debugging symbols: 87 MB
Glibc and GCC files without debugging symbols: 16 MB

Sizes may vary a little, depending on which compiler was used and which C library. But when comparing programs with and without debugging symbols, the difference will generally be a factor between 2 and 5.

As most people will probably never use a debugger on their system software, a lot of disk space can be regained by removing these symbols .

To remove debugging symbols from a binary (which must be an a.out or ELF binary), run strip --strip-debug filename. Wildcards can be used to treat multiple files (use something like strip --strip-debug $LFS/tools/bin/*).

For your convenience, Chapter 9 includes one simple command to strip all debugging symbols from all programs and libraries on your system. Additional information on optimization can be found in the hint at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/optimization.txt.

Chapter 7. Setting up system boot scripts

Introduction

This chapter will set up the bootscripts you installed in the previous chapter. Most of these scripts will work without needing to modify them, but a few do require additional configuration files, as they deal with hardware dependent information.

How does the booting process with these scripts work?

Linux uses a special booting facility named SysVinit. It's based on a concept of runlevels. It can be widely different from one system to another, so it can't be assumed that because things worked in <insert distro name> they should work like that in LFS too. LFS has its own way of doing things, but it respects generally accepted standards.

SysVinit (which we'll call init from now on) works using a runlevels scheme. There are 7 (from 0 to 6) runlevels (actually, there are more runlevels but they are for special cases and generally not used. The init man page describes those details), and each one of those corresponds to the things the computer is supposed to do when it starts up. The default runlevel is 3. Here are the descriptions of the different runlevels as they are often implemented:

0: halt the computer
1: single-user mode
2: multi-user mode without networking
3: multi-user mode with networking
4: reserved for customization, otherwise does the same as 3
5: same as 4, it is usually used for GUI login (like X's xdm or KDE's kdm)
6: reboot the computer

The command used to change runlevels is init <runlevel> where <runlevel> is the target runlevel. For example, to reboot the computer, a user would issue the init 6 command. The reboot command is just an alias for it, as is the halt command an alias for init 0.

There are a number of directories under /etc/rc.d that look like like rc?.d where ? is the number of the runlevel and rcsysinit.d which contain a number of symbolic links. Some begin with a K, the others begin with an S, and all of them have two numbers following the initial letter. The K means to stop (kill) a service, and the S means to start a service. The numbers determine the order in which the scripts are run, from 00 to 99; the lower the number the sooner it gets executed. When init switches to another runlevel, the appropriate services get killed and others get started.

The real scripts are in /etc/rc.d/init.d. They do all the work, and the symlinks all point to them. Killing links and starting links point to the same script in /etc/rc.d/init.d. That's because the scripts can be called with different parameters like start, stop, restart, reload, status. When a K link is encountered, the appropriate script is run with the stop argument. When a S link is encountered, the appropriate script is run with the start argument.

There is one exception. Links that start with an S in the rc0.d and rc6.d directories will not cause anything to be started. They will be called with the parameter stop to stop something. The logic behind it is that when you are going to reboot or halt the system, you don't want to start anything, only stop the system.

These are descriptions of what the arguments make the scripts do:

start: The service is started.
stop: The service is stopped.
restart: The service is stopped and then started again.
reload: The configuration of the service is updated. This is used after the configuration file of a service was modified, when the service doesn't need to be restarted.
status: Tells if the service is running and with which PIDs.

Feel free to modify the way the boot process works (after all, it's your own LFS system). The files given here are just an example of how it can be done in a nice way (well, what we consider nice -- you may hate it).

Configuring the setclock script

This setclock script reads the time from your hardware clock (also known as BIOS or CMOS clock) and either converts that time to localtime using the /etc/localtime file (if the hardware clock is set to GMT) or not (if the hardware clock is already set to localtime). There is no way to auto-detect whether the hardware clock is set to GMT or not, so we need to configure that here ourselves.

Change the value of the UTC variable below to a 0 (zero) if your hardware clock is not set to GMT time.

Create a new file /etc/sysconfig/clock by running the following:

cat > /etc/sysconfig/clock << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/sysconfig/clock

UTC=1

# End /etc/sysconfig/clock
EOF

Now, you may want to take a look at a very good hint explaining how we deal with time on LFS at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/downloads/files/time.txt. It explains issues such as time zones, UTC, and the TZ environment variable.

Do I need the loadkeys script?

If you decided to compile your keymap file directly into the kernel back at the end of Chapter 6, then you strictly speaking don't need to run this loadkeys script, since the kernel has already set up the keymap for you. You can still run it if you want, it isn't going to hurt you. It could even be beneficial to keep it in case you run a lot of different kernels and don't remember or want to compile the keymap into every kernel you lay your hands on.

If you decided you don't need to, or don't want to use the loadkeys script, remove the /etc/rc.d/rcsysinit.d/S70loadkeys symlink.

Configuring the sysklogd script

The sysklogd script invokes the syslogd program with the -m 0 option. This option turns off the periodic timestamp mark that syslogd writes to the log files every 20 minutes by default. If you want to turn on this periodic timestamp mark, edit the sysklogd script and make the changes accordingly. See man syslogd for more information.

Configuring the localnet script

Part of the localnet script is setting up the system's hostname. This needs to be configured in the /etc/sysconfig/network.

Create the /etc/sysconfig/network file and enter a hostname by running:

echo "HOSTNAME=lfs" > /etc/sysconfig/network

"lfs" needs to be replaced with the name the computer is to be called. You should not enter the FQDN (Fully Qualified Domain Name) here. That information will be put in the /etc/hosts file later on.

Creating the /etc/hosts file

If a network card is to be configured, you have to decide on the IP-address, FQDN and possible aliases for use in the /etc/hosts file. The syntax is:

<IP address> myhost.example.org aliases

You should make sure that the IP-address is in the private network IP-address range. Valid ranges are:

       Class Networks
        A     10.0.0.0
        B     172.16.0.0 through 172.31.0.0
        C     192.168.0.0 through 192.168.255.0

A valid IP address could be 192.168.1.1. A valid FQDN for this IP could be www.linuxfromscratch.org.

If you aren't going to use a network card, you still need to come up with a FQDN. This is necessary for certain programs to operate correctly.

If a network card is not going to be configured, create the /etc/hosts file by running:

cat > /etc/hosts << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/hosts (no network card version)

127.0.0.1 <value of HOSTNAME>.example.org <value of HOSTNAME> localhost

# End /etc/hosts (no network card version)
EOF

If a network card is to be configured, create the /etc/hosts file by running:

cat > /etc/hosts << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/hosts (network card version)

127.0.0.1 localhost
192.168.1.1 <value of HOSTNAME>.example.org <value of HOSTNAME>

# End /etc/hosts (network card version)
EOF

Of course, the 192.168.1.1 and <value of HOSTNAME>.example.org have to be changed to your liking (or requirements if assigned an IP-address by a network/system administrator and this machine is planned to be connected to an existing network).

Configuring the network script

This section only applies if you're going to configure a network card.

If you don't have any network cards, you are most likely not going to create any configuration files relating to network cards. If that is the case, you must remove the network symlinks from all the runlevel directories (/etc/rc.d/rc*.d)

Configuring default gateway

If you're on a network you may need to set up the default gateway for this machine. This is done by adding the proper values to the /etc/sysconfig/network file by running the following:

cat >> /etc/sysconfig/network << "EOF"
GATEWAY=192.168.1.2
GATEWAY_IF=eth0
EOF

The values for GATEWAY and GATEWAY_IF need to be changed to match your network setup. GATEWAY contains the IP address of the default gateway, and GATEWAY_IF contains the network interface through which the default gateway can be reached.

Creating network interface configuration files

Which interfaces are brought up and down by the network script depends on the files in the /etc/sysconfig/network-devices directory. This directory should contain files in the form of ifconfig.xyz, where xyz is a network interface name (such as eth0 or eth0:1)

If you decide to rename or move this /etc/sysconfig/network-devices directory, make sure you update the /etc/sysconfig/rc file as well and update the network_devices by providing it with the new path.

Now, new files are created in that directory containing the following. The following command creates a sample ifconfig.eth0 file:

cat > /etc/sysconfig/network-devices/ifconfig.eth0 << "EOF"
ONBOOT=yes
IP=192.168.1.1
NETMASK=255.255.255.0
BROADCAST=192.168.1.255
EOF

Of course, the values of those variables have to be changed in every file to match the proper setup. If the ONBOOT variable is set to yes, the network script will bring it up during the booting of the system. If set to anything else but yes, it will be ignored by the network script and thus not brought up.

Creating the /etc/resolv.conf file

If you're going to be connected to the internet then most likely you'll need some means of DNS name resolution to resolve internet domain names to IP addresses. This is best achieved by placing the IP address of a DNS server into /etc/resolv.conf. Create the file by running the following:

cat > /etc/resolv.conf << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/resolv.conf

nameserver <IP address of your nameserver>

# End /etc/resolv.conf
EOF

Of course, replace <IP address of your nameserver> with the IP address of the DNS server most appropriate for your setup. This will often be provided by your ISP or it may even be a router on your local network.

Chapter 8. Making the LFS system bootable

Introduction

This chapter will make LFS bootable. This chapter deals with creating a new fstab file, building a new kernel for the new LFS system and installing the Grub bootloader so that the LFS system can be selected for booting at startup.

Creating the /etc/fstab file

The /etc/fstab file is used by some programs to determine where partitions are to be mounted by default, which file systems must be checked and in which order. Create a new file systems table like this:

cat > /etc/fstab << "EOF"
# Begin /etc/fstab

# file system  mount-point  fs-type  options         dump  fsck-order

/dev/xxx      /            fff      defaults        1     1
/dev/yyy      swap         swap     pri=1           0     0
proc          /proc        proc     defaults        0     0
devpts        /dev/pts     devpts   gid=4,mode=620  0     0
shm           /dev/shm     tmpfs    defaults        0     0

# End /etc/fstab
EOF

Of course, replace xxx, yyy and fff with the values appropriate for your system -- for example hda2, hda5 and reiserfs. For all the details on the six fields in this table, see man 5 fstab.

When using a reiserfs partition, the 1 1 at the end of the line should be replaced with 0 0, as such a partition does not need to be dumped or checked

The /dev/shm mount point for tmpfs is included to allow enabling POSIX shared memory. Your kernel must have the required support built into it for this to work -- more about this in the next section. Please note that currently very little software actually uses POSIX shared memory. Therefore you can consider the /dev/shm mount point optional. For more information, see Documentation/filesystems/tmpfs.txt in the kernel source tree.

There are other lines which you may consider adding to your fstab file. One example is a line to use if you intend to use USB devices:

usbfs       /proc/bus/usb  usbfs    defaults    0     0

This option will of course only work if you have the relevant support compiled into your kernel.

Installing Linux-2.4.24

The Linux package contains the kernel and the header files.

Estimated build time:           All default options: 4.20 SBU
Estimated required disk space:  All default options: 181 MB

Official download location for Linux (2.4.24):
ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/

For its installation Linux depends on: Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Findutils, GCC, Glibc, Grep, Gzip, Make, Modutils, Perl, Sed.

Installation of the kernel

Building the kernel involves a few steps: configuration, compilation, and installation. If you don't like the way this book configures the kernel, view the README file in the kernel source tree for alternative methods.

Prepare for compilation by running the following command:

make mrproper

Configure the kernel via a menu-driven interface:

make menuconfig

make oldconfig may be more appropriate in some situations. See the README file for more information.

If you wish, you may skip kernel configuration by simply copying the kernel config file, .config, from your host system (assuming it is available) to the unpacked linux-2.4.24 directory. However, we don't recommend this option. You're much better off exploring all the configuration menus and creating your own kernel configuration from scratch.

For POSIX shared memory support, ensure that the kernel config option "Virtual memory file system support" is enabled. It resides within the "File systems" menu and is normally enabled by default.

Verify dependencies and create dependency information files:

make CC=/opt/gcc-2.95.3/bin/gcc dep

Compile the kernel image:

make CC=/opt/gcc-2.95.3/bin/gcc bzImage

Compile the drivers which have been configured as modules:

make CC=/opt/gcc-2.95.3/bin/gcc modules

If you intend to use kernel modules, you will need an /etc/modules.conf file. Information pertaining to modules and to kernel configuration in general may be found in the kernel documentation, which is found in the linux-2.4.24/Documentation directory. The modules.conf man page and the kernel HOWTO at http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Kernel-HOWTO.html may also be of interest to you.

Install the modules:

make CC=/opt/gcc-2.95.3/bin/gcc modules_install

As nothing is complete without documentation, build the manual pages that come with the kernel:

make mandocs

And install these pages:

cp -a Documentation/man /usr/share/man/man9

Kernel compilation has finished but more steps are required to complete the installation. Some files need to be copied to the /boot directory.

The path to the kernel image may vary depending on the platform you're using. Issue the following command to install the kernel:

cp arch/i386/boot/bzImage /boot/lfskernel

System.map is a symbol file for the kernel. It maps the function entrypoints of every function in the kernel API, as well as the addresses of the kernel data structures for the running kernel. Issue the following command to install the map file:

cp System.map /boot

.config is the kernel configuration file that was produced by the make menuconfig step above. It contains all the config selections for the kernel that was just compiled. It's a good idea to keep this file for future reference:

cp .config /boot/config-lfskernel

Contents of Linux

Installed files: the kernel, the kernel headers, and the System.map

Short descriptions

The kernel is the engine of your GNU/Linux system. When switching on your box, the kernel is the first part of your operating system that gets loaded. It detects and initializes all the components of your computer's hardware, then makes these components available as a tree of files to the software, and turns a single CPU into a multi-tasking machine capable of running scores of programs seemingly at the same time.

The kernel headers define the interface to the services that the kernel provides. The headers in your system's include directory should always be the ones against which Glibc was compiled and should therefore not be replaced when upgrading the kernel.

The System.map file is a list of addresses and symbols. It maps the entry points and addresses of all the functions and data structures in the kernel.

Making the LFS system bootable

Your shiny new LFS system is almost complete. One of the last things to do is ensure you can boot it. The instructions below apply only to computers of IA-32 architecture, i.e. mainstream PC's. Information on "boot loading" for other architectures should be available in the usual resource specific locations for those architectures.

Boot loading can be a complex area. First, a few cautionary words. You really should be familiar with your current boot loader and any other operating systems present on your hard drive(s) that you might wish to keep bootable. Please make sure that you have an emergency boot disk ready, so that you can rescue your computer if, by any chance, your computer becomes unusable (unbootable).

Earlier, we compiled and installed the Grub boot loader software in preparation for this step. The procedure involves writing some special Grub files to specific locations on the hard drive. Before we get to that, we highly recommend that you create a Grub boot floppy diskette just in case. Insert a blank floppy diskette and run the following commands:

dd if=/boot/grub/stage1 of=/dev/fd0 bs=512 count=1
dd if=/boot/grub/stage2 of=/dev/fd0 bs=512 seek=1

Remove the diskette and store it somewhere safe. Now we'll run the grub shell:

grub

Grub uses its own naming structure for drives and partitions, in the form of (hdn,m), where n is the hard drive number, and m the partition number, both starting from zero. This means, for instance, that partition hda1 is (hd0,0) to Grub, and hdb2 is (hd1,1). In contrast to Linux, Grub doesn't consider CD-ROM drives to be hard drives, so if you have a CD on hdb, for example, and a second hard drive on hdc, that second hard drive would still be (hd1).

Using the above information, determine the appropriate designator for your root partition. For the following example, we'll assume your root partition is hda4.

First, tell Grub where to search for its stage{1,2} files -- you can use Tab everywhere to make Grub show the alternatives:

root (hd0,3)

Warning

The following command will overwrite your current boot loader. Don't run the command if this is not what you want. For example, you may be using a third party boot manager to manage your MBR (Master Boot Record). In this scenario, it would probably make more sense to install Grub into the "boot sector" of the LFS partition, in which case the command would become: setup (hd0,3).

Then tell it to install itself into the MBR (Master Boot Record) of hda:

setup (hd0)

If all is well, Grub will have reported finding its files in /boot/grub. That's all there is to it:

quit

Now we need to create a "menu list" file, defining Grub's boot menu:

cat > /boot/grub/menu.lst << "EOF"
# Begin /boot/grub/menu.lst

# By default boot the first menu entry.
default 0

# Allow 30 seconds before booting the default.
timeout 30

# Use prettier colors.
color green/black light-green/black

# The first entry is for LFS.
title LFS 5.1
root (hd0,3)
kernel --no-mem-option /boot/lfskernel root=/dev/hda4
EOF

Note: By default, Grub will automatically pass a "mem=xxx" command line argument to the kernel. However, Grub occasionally gets the amount of memory wrong which can lead to problems in some circumstances. It's best to disable this functionality and let the kernel determine the amount of memory itself, hence the use of the --no-mem-option above.

You may want to add an entry for your host distribution. It might look like this:

cat >> /boot/grub/menu.lst << "EOF"
title Red Hat
root (hd0,2)
kernel /boot/kernel-2.4.20 root=/dev/hda3
initrd /boot/initrd-2.4.20
EOF

Also, if you happen to dual-boot Windows, the following entry should allow booting it:

cat >> /boot/grub/menu.lst << "EOF"
title Windows
rootnoverify (hd0,0)
chainloader +1
EOF

If info grub doesn't tell you all you want to know, you can find more information regarding Grub on its website, located at: http://www.gnu.org/software/grub.

Chapter 9. The End

The End

Well done! You have finished installing your LFS system. It may have been a long process, but we hope it was worth it. We wish you a lot of fun with your new shiny custom built Linux system.

Now would be a good time to strip all debug symbols from the binaries on your LFS system. If you are not a programmer and don't plan on debugging your software, then you will be happy to know that you can reclaim a few tens of megs by removing debug symbols. This process causes no inconvenience other than not being able to debug the software fully anymore, which is not an issue if you don't know how to debug.

Disclaimer: 98% of the people who use the command mentioned below don't experience any problems. But do make a backup of your LFS system before you run this command. There's a slight chance it may backfire on you and render your system unusable (mostly by destroying your kernel modules and dynamic & shared libraries). This is caused more often by typos than by a problem with the command used.

Having said that, the --strip-debug option we use to strip is quite harmless under normal circumstances. It doesn't strip anything vital from the files. It also is quite safe to use --strip-all on regular programs (don't use that on libraries - they will be destroyed), but it's not as safe, and the space you gain is not all that much. But if you're tight on disk space every little bit helps, so decide for yourself. Please refer to the strip man page for other strip options you can use. The general idea is to not run strip on libraries (other than --strip-debug), just to be on the safe side.

If you are planning to go ahead and perform the strip, special care is needed to ensure you're not running any binaries that are about to be stripped -- including the active bash shell. Therefore you'll need to exit the chroot environment and reenter it using a modified chroot command:

logout
chroot $LFS /tools/bin/env -i \
    HOME=/root TERM=$TERM PS1='\u:\w\$ ' \
    PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin \
    /tools/bin/bash --login

Now run the following command:

/tools/bin/find /{,usr/,usr/local/}{bin,sbin,lib} -type f \
   -exec /tools/bin/strip --strip-debug '{}' ';'

Quite a number of files will be reported as having their file format not recognized. Most of these are scripts instead of binaries. These warnings can be safely ignored.

It may be a good idea to create an /etc/lfs-release file. By having this file it is very easy for you (and for us if you are going to ask for help with something at some point) to find out which LFS version you have installed on your system. Create this file by running:

echo 5.1-pre1 > /etc/lfs-release

Get Counted

Want to be counted as an LFS user now that you have finished the book? Head over to http://linuxfromscratch.org/cgi-bin/lfscounter.cgi and register as an LFS user by entering your name and the first LFS version you have used.

Let's reboot into LFS now...

Rebooting the system

Now that all of the software has been installed, it's time to exit the chroot environment and reboot the computer. Before we exit the chroot environment, let's unmount any mounted virtual file systems by running:

umount /proc
umount /dev/pts

Exit the chroot environment:

logout

Additionally, now that all software has been installed, there is no longer a need for the /tools directory. You may delete it. As this will also remove the temporary copies of Tcl, Expect and DejaGnu, which were used for running the toolchain tests, you will need to recompile and re-install them on your LFS system if you want to use these programs later.

Also you may now want to move the contents of /sources to /usr/src/packages or something similar (or simply delete them if you've burned them on a CD) and delete the directory.

Before we reboot, let's unmount the LFS partition itself:

umount $LFS

If you earlier decided to create multiple partitions, you'll need to unmount the other partitions before you unmount $LFS, like this:

umount $LFS/usr
umount $LFS/home
umount $LFS

And now you can reboot your system by running something like:

/sbin/shutdown -r now

Assuming the Grub boot loader was set up as outlined earlier, the default menu should be set to boot LFS 5.1 automatically.

After you have rebooted, your LFS system is ready for use and you can start adding your own software.

What now?

We thank you for reading the LFS Book and hope that you've found this book useful and worth your time.

Now that you have finished installing your LFS system, you may be wondering "What now?". In order to answer that question, we have composed a list of resources for you.

Beyond Linux From Scratch

The Beyond Linux From Scratch book covers installation procedures for a wide range of software beyond the scope of the LFS Book. The BLFS project can be found at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/.
LFS Hints

The LFS Hints are a collection of small, educational documents submitted by volunteers in the LFS community. The Hints are available at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/hints/list.html.
Mailing lists

There are several LFS mailing lists you may subscribe to if you are in need of help. See Chapter 1 - Mailing lists for more information.
The Linux Documentation Project

The goal of the Linux Documentation Project is to collaborate in all of the issues of Linux documentation. The LDP features a large collection of HOWTOs, Guides and man pages; it may be found at http://www.tldp.org/.

IV. Part IV - Appendices

Table of Contents
A. Index of packages
B. Index of programs and library files

Appendix A. Index of packages

Autoconf
Automake
Bash
Binutils
Bison
Bootscripts
Bzip2
Coreutils
DejaGnu
Diffutils
E2fsprogs
Ed
Expect
File
Findutils
Flex
Gawk
GCC
Gettext
Glibc
Grep
Groff
Grub
Gzip
Inetutils
Kbd
Less
Lfs-Utils
Libtool
Linux
M4
Make
Makedev
Man
Man-pages
Modutils
Ncurses
Net-tools
Patch
Perl
Procinfo
Procps
Psmisc
Sed
Shadow
Sysklogd
Sysvinit
Tar
Tcl
Texinfo
Util-linux
Vim
Zlib

Appendix B. Index of programs and library files

This is a list of all the programs and library files that are installed in this book, each with a link to the package in Appendix A to which it belongs.

a2p : Perl
acinstall : Automake
aclocal : Automake
addftinfo : Groff
addr2line : Binutils
afmtodit : Groff
agetty : Util-linux
apropos : Man
ar : Binutils
arch : Util-linux
arp : Net-tools
as : Binutils
attrs : Perl
autoconf : Autoconf
autoheader : Autoconf
autom4te : Autoconf
automake : Automake
autopoint : Gettext
autoreconf : Autoconf
autoscan : Autoconf
autoupdate : Autoconf
awk : Gawk
badblocks : E2fsprogs
basename : Coreutils
bash : Bash
bashbug : Bash
bigram : Findutils
bison : Bison
blkid : E2fsprogs
blockdev : Util-linux
bunzip2 : Bzip2
bzcat : Bzip2
bzcmp : Bzip2
bzdiff : Bzip2
bzegrep : Bzip2
bzfgrep : Bzip2
bzgrep : Bzip2
bzip2 : Bzip2
bzip2recover : Bzip2
bzless : Bzip2
bzmore : Bzip2
c++ : GCC
c++filt : Binutils
c2ph : Perl
cal : Util-linux
captoinfo : Ncurses
cat : Coreutils
catchsegv : Glibc
cc : GCC
cc1 : GCC
cc1plus : GCC
cfdisk : Util-linux
chage : Shadow
chattr : E2fsprogs
checkfs : Bootscripts
chfn : Shadow
chgrp : Coreutils
chkdupexe : Util-linux
chmod : Coreutils
chown : Coreutils
chpasswd : Shadow
chroot : Coreutils
chsh : Shadow
chvt : Kbd
cksum : Coreutils
cleanfs : Bootscripts
clear : Ncurses
cmp : Diffutils
code : Findutils
col : Util-linux
colcrt : Util-linux
collect2 : GCC
colrm : Util-linux
column : Util-linux
comm : Coreutils
compile : Automake
compile_et : E2fsprogs
config.charset : Gettext
config.guess : Automake
config.rpath : Gettext
config.sub : Automake
cp : Coreutils
cpp : GCC
csplit : Coreutils
ctrlaltdel : Util-linux
cut : Coreutils
cytune : Util-linux
date : Coreutils
dd : Coreutils
ddate : Util-linux
deallocvt : Kbd
debugfs : E2fsprogs
depcomp : Automake
depmod : Modutils
df : Coreutils
diff : Diffutils
diff3 : Diffutils
dir : Coreutils
dircolors : Coreutils
dirname : Coreutils
dmesg : Util-linux
dnsdomainname : Net-tools
domainname : Net-tools
dpasswd : Shadow
dprofpp : Perl
du : Coreutils
dumpe2fs : E2fsprogs
dumpkeys : Kbd
e2fsck : E2fsprogs
e2image : E2fsprogs
e2label : E2fsprogs
echo : Coreutils
ed : Ed
efm_filter.pl : Vim
efm_perl.pl : Vim
egrep : Grep
elisp-comp : Automake
elvtune : Util-linux
env : Coreutils
envsubst : Gettext
enc2xs : Perl
eqn : Groff
e2n2graph : Groff
ex : Vim
expand : Coreutils
expiry : Shadow
expr : Coreutils
factor : Coreutils
faillog : Shadow
false : Coreutils
fdformat : Util-linux
fdisk : Util-linux
fgconsole : Kbd
fgrep : Grep
file : File
find : Findutils
find2perl : Perl
findfs : E2fsprogs
flex : Flex
flex++ : Flex
fmt : Coreutils
fold : Coreutils
frcode : Findutils
free : Procps
fsck : E2fsprogs
fsck.cramfs : Util-linux
fsck.ext2 : E2fsprogs
fsck.ext3 : E2fsprogs
fsck.minix : Util-linux
ftp : Inetutils
functions : Bootscripts
fuser : Psmisc
g++ : GCC
gawk : Gawk
gcc : GCC
gccbug : GCC
gcov : GCC
gencat : Glibc
genksyms : Modutils
geqn : Groff
getconf : Glibc
getent : Glibc
getkeycodes : Kbd
getopt : Util-linux
gettext : Gettext
gettextize : Gettext
getunimap : Kbd
glibcbug : Glibc
gpasswd : Shadow
gprof : Binutils
grcat : Gawk
grep : Grep
grn : Groff
grodvi : Groff
groff : Groff
groffer : Groff
grog : Groff
grolbp : Groff
grolj4 : Groff
grops : Groff
grotty : Groff
groupadd : Shadow
groupdel : Shadow
groupmod : Shadow
groups : Shadow
groups : Coreutils
grpck : Shadow
grpconv : Shadow
grpunconv : Shadow
gtbl : Groff
gunzip : Gzip
gzexe : Gzip
gzip : Gzip
h2ph : Perl
h2xs : Perl
halt : Bootscripts
halt : Sysvinit
head : Coreutils
hexdump : Util-linux
hostid : Coreutils
hostname : Gettext
hostname : Net-tools
hostname : Coreutils
hpftodit : Groff
http-get : Lfs-Utils
hwclock : Util-linux
iana-net : Lfs-Utils
iconv : Glibc
iconvconfig : Glibc
id : Coreutils
ifconfig : Net-tools
ifdown : Bootscripts
ifnames : Autoconf
ifup : Bootscripts
igawk : Gawk
indxbib : Groff
info : Texinfo
infocmp : Ncurses
infokey : Texinfo
infotocap : Ncurses
init : Sysvinit
insmod : Modutils
insmod_ksymoops_clean : Modutils
install : Coreutils
install-info : Texinfo
install-sh : Automake
ipcrm : Util-linux
ipcs : Util-linux
isosize : Util-linux
join : Coreutils
kallsyms : Modutils
kbdrate : Kbd
kbd_mode : Kbd
kernelversion : Modutils
kill : Procps
killall : Psmisc
killall5 : Sysvinit
klogd : Sysklogd
ksyms : Modutils
last : Sysvinit
lastb : Sysvinit
lastlog : Shadow
ld : Binutils
ld.so : Glibc
ldconfig : Glibc
ldd : Glibc
lddlibc4 : Glibc
less : Less
less.sh : Vim
lessecho : Less
lesskey : Less
lex : Flex
libanl : Glibc
libasprintf : Gettext
libbfd : Binutils
libblkid : E2fsprogs
libBrokenLocale : Glibc
libbsd-compat : Glibc
libbz2 : Bzip2
libc : Glibc
libcom_err : E2fsprogs
libcrypt : Glibc
libcurses : Ncurses
libc_nonshared : Glibc
libdl : Glibc
libe2p : E2fsprogs
libext2fs : E2fsprogs
libfl : Flex
libform : Ncurses
libg : Glibc
libgcc* : GCC
libgettextlib : Gettext
libgettextpo : Gettext
libgettextsrc : Gettext
libiberty : GCC
libieee : Glibc
libltdl* : Libtool
libm : Glibc
libmagic : File
libmcheck : Glibc
libmemusage : Glibc
libmenu : Ncurses
libmisc : Shadow
libncurses* : Ncurses
libnetcfg : Perl
libnsl : Glibc
libnss* : Glibc
libopcodes : Binutils
libpanel : Ncurses
libpcprofile : Glibc
libperl : Perl
libproc : Procps
libpthread : Glibc
libresolv : Glibc
librpcsvc : Glibc
librt : Glibc
libSegFault : Glibc
libshadow : Shadow
libss : E2fsprogs
libstdc++ : GCC
libsupc++ : GCC
libthread_db : Glibc
libtool : Libtool
libtoolize : Libtool
libutil : Glibc
libuuid : E2fsprogs
liby : Bison
libz : Zlib
line : Util-linux
link : Coreutils
lkbib : Groff
ln : Coreutils
loadkeys : Bootscripts
loadkeys : Kbd
loadunimap : Kbd
locale : Glibc
localedef : Glibc
localnet : Bootscripts
locate : Findutils
logger : Util-linux
login : Shadow
logname : Coreutils
logoutd : Shadow
logsave : E2fsprogs
look : Util-linux
lookbib : Groff
losetup : Util-linux
ls : Coreutils
lsattr : E2fsprogs
lsdev : Procinfo
lsmod : Modutils
m4 : M4
make : Make
MAKEDEV : Makedev
makeinfo : Texinfo
makewhatis : Man
man : Man
man2dvi : Man
man2html : Man
mapscrn : Kbd
mcookie : Util-linux
md5sum : Coreutils
mdate-sh : Automake
mesg : Sysvinit
missing : Automake
mkdir : Coreutils
mke2fs : E2fsprogs
mkfifo : Coreutils
mkfs : Util-linux
mkfs.bfs : Util-linux
mkfs.cramfs : Util-linux
mkfs.ext2 : E2fsprogs
mkfs.ext3 : E2fsprogs
mkfs.minix : Util-linux
mkinstalldirs : Automake
mklost+found : E2fsprogs
mknod : Coreutils
mkpasswd : Shadow
mkswap : Util-linux
mktemp : Lfs-Utils
mk_cmds : E2fsprogs
mmroff : Groff
modinfo : Modutils
modprobe : Modutils
more : Util-linux
mount : Util-linux
mountfs : Bootscripts
mountproc : Bootscripts
msgattrib : Gettext
msgcat : Gettext
msgcmp : Gettext
msgcomm : Gettext
msgconv : Gettext
msgen : Gettext
msgexec : Gettext
msgfilter : Gettext
msgfmt : Gettext
msggrep : Gettext
msginit : Gettext
msgmerge : Gettext
msgunfmt : Gettext
msguniq : Gettext
mtrace : Glibc
mv : Coreutils
mve.awk : Vim
namei : Util-linux
nameif : Net-tools
neqn : Groff
netstat : Net-tools
network : Bootscripts
newgrp : Shadow
newusers : Shadow
ngettext : Gettext
nice : Coreutils
nisdomainname : Net-tools
nl : Coreutils
nm : Binutils
nohup : Coreutils
nroff : Groff
nscd : Glibc
nscd_nischeck : Glibc
objcopy : Binutils
objdump : Binutils
od : Coreutils
oldps : Procps
openvt : Kbd
parse.bash : Util-linux
parse.tcsh : Util-linux
passwd : Shadow
paste : Coreutils
patch : Patch
pathchk : Coreutils
pcprofiledump : Glibc
perl : Perl
perlbug : Perl
perlcc : Perl
perldoc : Perl
perlivp : Perl
pfbtops : Groff
pg : Util-linux
pgawk : Gawk
pgrep : Procps
pic : Groff
pic2graph : Groff
piconv : Perl
pidof : Sysvinit
ping : Inetutils
pinky : Coreutils
pivot_root : Util-linux
pkill : Procps
pl2pm : Perl
plipconfig : Net-tools
pltags.pl : Vim
pmap : Procps
pod2html : Perl
pod2latex : Perl
pod2man : Perl
pod2text : Perl
pod2usage : Perl
podchecker : Perl
podselect : Perl
post-grohtml : Groff
poweroff : Sysvinit
pr : Coreutils
pre-grohtml : Groff
printenv : Coreutils
printf : Coreutils
procinfo : Procinfo
project-id : Gettext
ps : Procps
psed : Perl
psfaddtable : Kbd
psfgettable : Kbd
psfstriptable : Kbd
psfxtable : Kbd
pstree : Psmisc
pstree.x11 : Psmisc
pstruct : Perl
ptx : Coreutils
pt_chown : Glibc
pwcat : Gawk
pwck : Shadow
pwconv : Shadow
pwd : Coreutils
pwunconv : Shadow
py-compile : Automake
ramsize : Util-linux
ranlib : Binutils
rarp : Net-tools
raw : Util-linux
rc : Bootscripts
rcp : Inetutils
rdev : Util-linux
re : Perl
readelf : Binutils
readlink : Coreutils
readprofile : Util-linux
reboot : Bootscripts
reboot : Sysvinit
red : Ed
ref : Vim
refer : Groff
rename : Util-linux
renice : Util-linux
reset : Ncurses
resize2fs : E2fsprogs
resizecons : Kbd
rev : Util-linux
rlogin : Inetutils
rm : Coreutils
rmdir : Coreutils
rmmod : Modutils
rmt : Tar
rootflags : Util-linux
route : Net-tools
rpcgen : Glibc
rpcinfo : Glibc
rsh : Inetutils
runlevel : Sysvinit
rview : Vim
rvim : Vim
s2p : Perl
script : Util-linux
sdiff : Diffutils
sed : Sed
sendsignals : Bootscripts
seq : Coreutils
setclock : Bootscripts
setfdprm : Util-linux
setfont : Kbd
setkeycodes : Kbd
setleds : Kbd
setlogcons : Kbd
setmetamode : Kbd
setsid : Util-linux
setterm : Util-linux
setvesablank : Kbd
sfdisk : Util-linux
sg : Shadow
sh : Bash
sha1sum : Coreutils
showconsolefont : Kbd
showkey : Kbd
shred : Coreutils
shtags.pl : Vim
shutdown : Sysvinit
size : Binutils
skill : Procps
slattach : Net-tools
sleep : Coreutils
sln : Glibc
snice : Procps
socklist : Procinfo
soelim : Groff
sort : Coreutils
splain : Perl
split : Coreutils
sprof : Glibc
stat : Coreutils
strings : Binutils
strip : Binutils
stty : Coreutils
su : Coreutils
sulogin : Sysvinit
sum : Coreutils
swap : Bootscripts
swapoff : Util-linux
swapon : Util-linux
symlink-tree : Automake
sync : Coreutils
sysctl : Procps
sysklogd : Bootscripts
syslogd : Sysklogd
tac : Coreutils
tack : Ncurses
tail : Coreutils
talk : Inetutils
tar : Tar
tbl : Groff
tcltags : Vim
team-address : Gettext
tee : Coreutils
telinit : Sysvinit
telnet : Inetutils
tempfile : Lfs-Utils
template : Bootscripts
test : Coreutils
test.bash : Util-linux
test.tcsh : Util-linux
texi2dvi : Texinfo
texindex : Texinfo
tfmtodit : Groff
tftp : Inetutils
tic : Ncurses
tload : Procps
toe : Ncurses
top : Procps
touch : Coreutils
tput : Ncurses
tr : Coreutils
trigger : Gettext
troff : Groff
true : Coreutils
tset : Ncurses
tsort : Coreutils
tty : Coreutils
tune2fs : E2fsprogs
tunelp : Util-linux
tzselect : Glibc
ul : Util-linux
umount : Util-linux
uname : Coreutils
uncompress : Gzip
unexpand : Coreutils
unicode_start : Kbd
unicode_stop : Kbd
uniq : Coreutils
unlink : Coreutils
updatedb : Findutils
uptime : Coreutils
uptime : Procps
urlget : Gettext
user-email : Gettext
useradd : Shadow
userdel : Shadow
usermod : Shadow
users : Coreutils
utmpdump : Sysvinit
uuidgen : E2fsprogs
vdir : Coreutils
vi : Vim
vidmode : Util-linux
view : Vim
vigr : Shadow
vim : Vim
vim132 : Vim
vim2html.pl : Vim
vimdiff : Vim
vimm : Vim
vimspell.sh : Vim
vimtutor : Vim
vipw : Shadow
vmstat : Procps
w : Procps
wall : Sysvinit
watch : Procps
wc : Coreutils
whatis : Man
whereis : Util-linux
who : Coreutils
whoami : Coreutils
write : Util-linux
xargs : Findutils
xgettext : Gettext
xsubpp : Perl
xtrace : Glibc
xxd : Vim
yacc : Bison
yes : Coreutils
ylwrap : Automake
ypdomainname : Net-tools
zcat : Gzip
zcmp : Gzip
zdiff : Gzip
zdump : Glibc
zegrep : Gzip
zfgrep : Gzip
zforce : Gzip
zgrep : Gzip
zic : Glibc
zless : Gzip
zmore : Gzip
znew : Gzip
zsoelim : Groff