is it worth it?

[stinkoman]

ok, so considering i havent even thought of compiling my own kernel before, is it really worth compiling one? like balancing the work involved, the frustration for someone who has no idea what their doing, then whatever comes out of it?

[Thrillhouse]

I guess I would say it depends on the purpose.

If you're doing it to enhance performance on a modern machine, I would say no. The amount of time you would end up putting into it wouldn't be worth what you get out of it. You wouldn't save a significant amount of disk space and performance wouldn't be measurably better.

However, if you're doing it as a learning exercise, I would say go for it. You'll probably never have to do it again but at least you would know how to do it and you might pick up a few other tidbits of knowledge along the way.

[stinkoman]

ok well then i guess ill give it try, any good sites i should check for instructions a baby could follow?

[Thrillhouse]

Well, a good distro-independent source is this one:

Linux Kernel in a Nutshell (although I'm not sure of the legality of putting a published book on a website)

O'Reilly publishes very good Linux books.

If you're looking for something distro-specific, just google the words "compile kernel guide" (or something along those lines) along with the name of the distro you use and see what you come up with.

I believe Gentoo has a HOW-TO for it on their Wiki but I can't seem to reach it right now.

[ryokimball]

Hey! That might be exactly what I'm looking for!!

...quick off-topic question --are all O'Rielly books free, or what? I see a lot of them distributed freely on the internet...

[anomie]

OT:

Linux Kernel in a Nutshell (although I'm not sure of the legality of putting a published book on a website)

That's the author's (Greg Kroah-Hartman's) website.