6.7. Linux Kernel

This section covers changes and important information regarding the 2.6.33-based kernel in Fedora 13.

Fedora may include additional patches to the kernel for improvements, bug fixes, or additional features. For this reason, the Fedora kernel may not be line-for-line equivalent to the so-called vanilla kernel from the kernel.org web site at http://www.kernel.org.

To obtain a list of these patches, download the source RPM package and run the following command:

rpm -qpl kernel-<version>.src.rpm

6.7.1. Changelog

To retrieve a log of changes to the package, run the following command:

rpm -q --changelog kernel-<version>

Note that this list has entries about upstream kernel changes applied to the package as well as Fedora-specific enhancements such as bug fixes and enhancements not yet available in the upstream kernel. A detailed summary of changes in each upstream version is at http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.6/ChangeLog-<version>, e.g. the changelog for kernel 2.6.33 is at http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.6/ChangeLog-2.6.33.

If you need a user friendly version of the changelog, refer to http://wiki.kernelnewbies.org/LinuxChanges. A short and full diff of the kernel is available from http://kernel.org/git. The Fedora version kernel is based on the Linus tree.

If you need user friendly documentation about new features in a major upstream kernel release, refer to http://wiki.kernelnewbies.org/LinuxChanges.

A complete history of changes to the kernel is available from http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux-2.6.git;a=summary.

Customizations made for the Fedora version are available from http://cvs.fedoraproject.org.

6.7.2. Preparing for Kernel Development

Fedora 13 does not include the kernel-source package provided by older versions, since only the kernel-devel package is required now to build external modules.

6.7.3. Reporting Bugs

Refer to http://kernel.org/pub/linux/docs/lkml/reporting-bugs.html for information on reporting bugs in the Linux kernel. You may also use http://bugzilla.redhat.com for reporting bugs that are specific to Fedora.