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Linux kernels

LinuxKit kernel images are distributed as hub images which contain the kernel, kernel modules, kernel config file, and optionally, kernel headers to compile kernel modules against. The repository containing the official LinuxKit kernels is at linuxkit/kernels.

The LinuxKit kernels are based on the latest stable releases and are updated frequently to include bug and security fixes. For some kernels we do carry additional patches, which are mostly back-ported fixes from newer kernels. The full kernel source with patches can be found on github. Each kernel image is tagged with the full kernel version (e.g., linuxkit/kernel:4.9.33) and with the full kernel version plus the hash of the files it was created from (git tree hash of the ./kernel directory). For selected kernels (mostly the LTS kernels and latest stable kernels) we also compile/push kernels with additional debugging enabled. The hub images for these kernels have the -dbg suffix in the tag. For some kernels, we also provide matching packages containing the perf utility for debugging and performance tracing. The perf package is called kernel-perf and is tagged the same way as the kernel packages.

In addition to the official images, there are also some scripts which repackage kernels packages from some Linux distributions into LinuxKit kernel packages. These are mostly provided for testing purposes.

Note now linuxkit also embraces Preempt-RT Linux kernel to support more use cases for the promising IoT scenarios. All -rt patches are grabbed from https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/projects/rt/. But so far we just enable it over 4.14.x.

Loading kernel modules

Most kernel modules are autoloaded with mdev but if you need to modprobe a module manually you can use the modprobe package in the onboot section like this:

  - name: modprobe
    image: linuxkit/modprobe:<hash>
    command: ["modprobe", "-a", "iscsi_tcp", "dm_multipath"]

Compiling external kernel modules

This section describes how to build external (out-of-tree) kernel modules. It is assumed you have the source available to those modules, and require the correct kernel version headers and compile tools.

The LinuxKit kernel packages include kernel-dev.tar which contains the headers and other files required to compile kernel modules against the specific version of the kernel. Currently, the headers are not included in the initial RAM disk, but it is possible to compile custom modules offline and then include the modules in the initial RAM disk.

There is a example, but basically one can use a multi-stage build to compile the kernel modules:

FROM linuxkit/kernel:4.9.33 AS ksrc
FROM linuxkit/alpine:<hash> AS build
RUN apk add build-base

COPY --from=ksrc /kernel-dev.tar /
RUN tar xf kernel-dev.tar

# copy module source code and compile

To use the kernel module, we recommend adding a final stage to the Dockerfile above, which copies the kernel module from the build stage and performs a insmod as the entry point. You can add this package to the onboot section in your YAML file. kmod.yml contains an example for the configuration.

Modifying the kernel config

Each series of kernels has a config file dedicated to it in ../kernel/, e.g. config-4.9.x-x86_64, which is applied during the kernel build process.

If you need to modify the kernel config, make kconfig in the kernel directory will create a local linuxkit/kconfig Docker image, which contains the patched sources for all support kernels and architectures in /linux-4.<minor>.<rev>. The kernel source also has the kernel config copied to the default kernel config.

Running the image like:

docker run --rm -ti -v $(pwd):/src linuxkit/kconfig

will give you a interactive shell where you can modify the kernel configuration you want, either by editing the config file, or via make menuconfig etc. Once you are done, save the file as .config and copy it back to the source tree, e.g. /src/kernel-config-4.9.x-x86_64.

You can also configure other architectures other than the native one. For example to configure the arm64 kernel on x86_64, use:

make ARCH=arm64 defconfig
make ARCH=arm64 oldconfig # or menuconfig

Note: We try to keep the differences between kernel versions and architectures to a minimum, so if you make changes to one configuration also try to apply it to the others. The script kconfig-split.py can be used to compare kernel config files. For example:

../scripts/kconfig-split.py config-4.9.x-aarch64 config-4.9.x-x86_64

creates a file with the common and the x86_64 and arm64 specific config options for the 4.9.x kernel series.

Building and using custom kernels

To build and test locally modified kernels, e.g., to try a different kernel config or new patches, the existing kernel build system in the kernel directory can be re-used. For example, assuming the current 4.9 kernel is 4.9.33, you can build a local kernel with:

make build_4.9.x

This will create a local kernel image called linuxkit/kernel:4.9.33-<hash>-dirty assuming you haven't committed you local changes. You can then use this in your YAML file as:

kernel:
  image: linuxkit/kernel:4.9.33-<hash>-dirty

If you have committed your local changes, the -dirty will not be appended. Then you can also override the Hub organisation to use the image elsewhere with (and also disable image signing):

make ORG=<your hub org>

The image will be uploaded to Hub and can be use in a YAML file as <your hub org>/kernel:4.9.33 or as <your hub org>/kernel:4.9.33-<hash>.

The kernel build system has some provision to allow local customisation to the build.

If you want to override/add some kernel config options, you can add a file called config-4.9.x-x86_64-foo and then invoke the build with make EXTRA=-foo build_4.9.x-foo and this will build an image with the additional kernel config options enabled.

If you want additional patches being applied, just copy them to the patches-4.X.x and the build process will pick them up.

Working with Linux kernel patches for LinuxKit

We may apply patches to the Linux kernel used in LinuxKit, primarily to cherry-pick some upstream patches or to add some additional functionality, not yet accepted upstream.

Patches are located in kernel/patches-<kernel version> and should follow these rules:

  • Patches must be in git am format, i.e. they should contain a complete and sensible commit message.
  • Patches must contain a Developer's Certificate of Origin.
  • Patch files must have a numeric prefix to ensure the ordering in which they are applied.
  • If patches are cherry-picked, they must be cherry-picked with -x to contain the original commit ID.
  • If patches are from a different git tree (other than the stable tree), or from a mailing list posting they should contain an Origin: line with a link to the source.

This document outlines the recommended procedure to handle patches. The general process is to apply them to a branch of the Linux stable tree and then export them with git format-patch.

If you want to add or remove patches currently used, please also ping @rneugeba on the PR so that we can update our internal Linux tree to ensure that patches are carried forward if we update the kernel in the future.

Preparation

Patches are applied to point releases of the linux stable tree. You need an up-to-date copy of that tree:

git clone git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux-stable.git

Add it as a remote to a clone of the LinuxKit clone.

We use the following variables:

  • KITSRC: Base directory of LinuxKit repository
  • LINUXSRC: Base directory of Linux stable kernel repository e.g.:
KITSRC=~/src/linuxkit/linuxkit
LINUXSRC=~/src/linuxkit/linux

to refer to the location of the LinuxKit and Linux kernel trees.

Updating the patches to a new kernel version

There are different ways to do this, but we recommend applying the patches to the current version and then rebase to the new version. We define the following variables to refer to the current base tag and the new tag you want to rebase the patches to:

CURTAG=v4.9.14
NEWTAG=v4.9.15

If you don't already have a branch, it's best to import the current patch set and then rebase:

cd $LINUXSRC
git checkout -b ${NEWTAG}-linuxkit ${CURTAG}
git am ${KITSRC}/kernel/patches/*.patch
git rebase ${NEWTAG}-linuxkit ${NEWTAG}

The git am should not have any conflicts and if the rebase has conflicts resolve them, then git add <files> and git rebase --continue.

If you already have linux tree with a ${CURTAG}-linuxkit branch, you can rebase by creating a new branch from the current branch and then rebase:

cd $LINUXSRC
git checkout ${CURTAG}-linuxkit
git branch ${NEWTAG}-linuxkit ${CURTAG}-linuxkit
git rebase --onto ${NEWTAG} ${NEWTAG} ${NEWTAG}-linuxkit

Again, resolve any conflicts as described above.

Adding/Removing patches

If you want to add or remove patches make sure you have an up-to-date branch with the currently applied patches (see above). Then either any normal means (git cherry-pick -x, git am, or git commit, etc) to add new patches. For cherry-picked patches also please add a Origin: line after the DCO lines with a reference the git tree the patch was cherry-picked from.

If the patch is not cherry-picked try to include as much information in the commit message as possible as to where the patch originated from. The canonical form would be to add a Origin: line after the DCO lines, e.g.:

Origin: https://patchwork.ozlabs.org/patch/622404/

Export patches to LinuxKit

To export patches to LinuxKit, you should use git format-patch from the Linux tree, e.g., something along these lines:

cd $LINUXSRC
rm $KITSRC/kernel/patches-4.9.x/*
git format-patch -o $KITSRC/kernel/patches-4.9.x v4.9.15..HEAD

Then, create a PR for LinuxKit.

Using perf

The kernel-perf package contains a statically linked perf binary under /usr/bin which is matched with the kernel of the same tag. The simplest way to use the perf utility is to add the package to the init section in the YAML file. This adds the binary to the root filesystem.

To use the binary, you can either bind mount it into the getty or ssh service container or you can access the root filesystem from the getty container via nsenter:

nsenter -m/proc/1/ns/mnt ash

Alternatively, you can add the kernel-perf package as stage in a multi-stage build to add it to a custom package.

ZFS

The kernel build Makefile has support for building the ZFS kernel modules. Note, the modules are currently not distributed as standard LinuxKit packages and if you wish to use them you have to compile them yourself:

cd kernel
make ORG=<foo> push_zfs_4.9.x # or different kernel version

will build and push a zfs-kmod-4.9.<version> image to Docker Hub under the ORG specified. This package contains the all the standard kernel modules from the kernel specified plus the spl and zfs kernel modules, with depmod run over them, so they can be modprobeed. To use the modules do something like this in your YAML file:

kernel:
  image: linuxkit/kernel:4.9.<version>
  cmdline: "console=tty0 console=ttyS0 console=ttyAMA0"
init:
  - <foo>/zfs-kmod:4.9.<version>
  ...

Then, you also need to make sure the Alpine zfs utilities are available in the container where your want to run zfs commands. The Alpine zfs utilities are available in linuxkit/alpine and the version of the kernel module should match the version of the tools. The container where you run the zfs tools might also need CAP_SYS_MODULE to be able to load the kernel modules.