[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Paul J. Keenan) wrote: >> On Thu, 3 Feb 2000, Colin Watson wrote: >> > [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Shaul Karl) wrote: >> > >It is my understanding that each kernel-source package provides >> > >kernel-headers. Yet kernel-source-2.2.14 does not mention it. >> > > >> > >What am I missing? >> > >> > No, kernel-source doesn't provide kernel headers. However, if you >> > install kernel-package you'll be able to use something like 'fakeroot >> > make-kpkg kernel_headers' to build yourself a kernel-headers package. >> > (Obviously you'll need fakeroot, dpkg-dev, possibly devscripts, etc.) > >If kernel-source does not provide kernel-headers, then what files are in >kernel-headers that are not provided by kernel-source ? What is their >function ? > >I understood (only from inspection, mind you) that kernel-headers was a >subset of kernel-source provide for compiling other program which needed >to reference the kernel declarations, but preferred not to compile a >whole kernel. Thus it saved them some disk space. Is this wrong ?
Subtly, yes; well, your understanding of the function of kernel-headers is pretty accurate, but you're misunderstanding the Provides: line somewhat. kernel-source does indeed "provide" a superset of the same files as kernel-headers, but the term "provide" is misleading here, as it's only in the loose sense of "contain" rather than the stricter sense of the Debian package Provides: line. In particular, the files aren't in quite the same places (the kernel-headers postinst script sets up various symlinks which I'm not sure are in kernel-source). The easiest way to think about it is that kernel-headers is a binary package compiled in a slightly unusual way from the kernel-source source package. Libraries that give you a -dev package are along these lines too, it's just that their source package isn't normally among the binary archives. You might find it less confusing to use something like 'apt-get source kernel-source-2.2.14' to get the kernel-source package, rather than treating it as a binary package. HTH, -- Colin Watson [EMAIL PROTECTED]
