Genkernel in 2023

:: gentoo, kernel, linux, sysadmin, system, tutorial

By: Maciej Barć

I really wanted to look into the new kernel building solutions for Gentoo and maybe migrate to dracut, but last time I tried, ~1.5 years ago, the initreamfs was now working for me.

And now in 2023 I’m still running genkernel for my personal boxes as well as other servers running Gentoo.

I guess some short term solutions really become defined tools :P

So this is how I rebuild my kernel nowadays:

  1. Copy old config

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    cd /usr/src
cp linux-6.1.38-gentoo/.config linux-6.1.41-gentoo/

  2. Remove old kernel build directories

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    rm -r linux-6.1.31-gentoo

  3. Run initial preparation

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    ( eselect kernel set 1 && cd /usr/src/linux && make olddefconfig )

  4. Call genkernel

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    genkernel                                                       \
    --no-menuconfig                                             \
    --no-clean                                                  \
    --no-clear-cachedir                                         \
    --no-cleanup                                                \
    --no-mrproper                                               \
    --lvm                                                       \
    --luks                                                      \
    --mdadm                                                     \
    --nfs                                                       \
    --kernel-localversion="-$(hostname)-$(date '+%Y.%m.%d')"    \
    all

  5. Rebuild the modules

    If in your /etc/genkernel.conf you have MODULEREBUILD turned off, then also call emerge:

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    emerge -1 @module-rebuild