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Linus Torvalds 78dc53c422 Merge branch 'for-linus2' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/jmorris/linux-security
Pull security subsystem updates from James Morris:
 "In this patchset, we finally get an SELinux update, with Paul Moore
  taking over as maintainer of that code.

  Also a significant update for the Keys subsystem, as well as
  maintenance updates to Smack, IMA, TPM, and Apparmor"

and since I wanted to know more about the updates to key handling,
here's the explanation from David Howells on that:

 "Okay.  There are a number of separate bits.  I'll go over the big bits
  and the odd important other bit, most of the smaller bits are just
  fixes and cleanups.  If you want the small bits accounting for, I can
  do that too.

   (1) Keyring capacity expansion.

        KEYS: Consolidate the concept of an 'index key' for key access
        KEYS: Introduce a search context structure
        KEYS: Search for auth-key by name rather than target key ID
        Add a generic associative array implementation.
        KEYS: Expand the capacity of a keyring

     Several of the patches are providing an expansion of the capacity of a
     keyring.  Currently, the maximum size of a keyring payload is one page.
     Subtract a small header and then divide up into pointers, that only gives
     you ~500 pointers on an x86_64 box.  However, since the NFS idmapper uses
     a keyring to store ID mapping data, that has proven to be insufficient to
     the cause.

     Whatever data structure I use to handle the keyring payload, it can only
     store pointers to keys, not the keys themselves because several keyrings
     may point to a single key.  This precludes inserting, say, and rb_node
     struct into the key struct for this purpose.

     I could make an rbtree of records such that each record has an rb_node
     and a key pointer, but that would use four words of space per key stored
     in the keyring.  It would, however, be able to use much existing code.

     I selected instead a non-rebalancing radix-tree type approach as that
     could have a better space-used/key-pointer ratio.  I could have used the
     radix tree implementation that we already have and insert keys into it by
     their serial numbers, but that means any sort of search must iterate over
     the whole radix tree.  Further, its nodes are a bit on the capacious side
     for what I want - especially given that key serial numbers are randomly
     allocated, thus leaving a lot of empty space in the tree.

     So what I have is an associative array that internally is a radix-tree
     with 16 pointers per node where the index key is constructed from the key
     type pointer and the key description.  This means that an exact lookup by
     type+description is very fast as this tells us how to navigate directly to
     the target key.

     I made the data structure general in lib/assoc_array.c as far as it is
     concerned, its index key is just a sequence of bits that leads to a
     pointer.  It's possible that someone else will be able to make use of it
     also.  FS-Cache might, for example.

   (2) Mark keys as 'trusted' and keyrings as 'trusted only'.

        KEYS: verify a certificate is signed by a 'trusted' key
        KEYS: Make the system 'trusted' keyring viewable by userspace
        KEYS: Add a 'trusted' flag and a 'trusted only' flag
        KEYS: Separate the kernel signature checking keyring from module signing

     These patches allow keys carrying asymmetric public keys to be marked as
     being 'trusted' and allow keyrings to be marked as only permitting the
     addition or linkage of trusted keys.

     Keys loaded from hardware during kernel boot or compiled into the kernel
     during build are marked as being trusted automatically.  New keys can be
     loaded at runtime with add_key().  They are checked against the system
     keyring contents and if their signatures can be validated with keys that
     are already marked trusted, then they are marked trusted also and can
     thus be added into the master keyring.

     Patches from Mimi Zohar make this usable with the IMA keyrings also.

   (3) Remove the date checks on the key used to validate a module signature.

        X.509: Remove certificate date checks

     It's not reasonable to reject a signature just because the key that it was
     generated with is no longer valid datewise - especially if the kernel
     hasn't yet managed to set the system clock when the first module is
     loaded - so just remove those checks.

   (4) Make it simpler to deal with additional X.509 being loaded into the kernel.

        KEYS: Load *.x509 files into kernel keyring
        KEYS: Have make canonicalise the paths of the X.509 certs better to deduplicate

     The builder of the kernel now just places files with the extension ".x509"
     into the kernel source or build trees and they're concatenated by the
     kernel build and stuffed into the appropriate section.

   (5) Add support for userspace kerberos to use keyrings.

        KEYS: Add per-user_namespace registers for persistent per-UID kerberos caches
        KEYS: Implement a big key type that can save to tmpfs

     Fedora went to, by default, storing kerberos tickets and tokens in tmpfs.
     We looked at storing it in keyrings instead as that confers certain
     advantages such as tickets being automatically deleted after a certain
     amount of time and the ability for the kernel to get at these tokens more
     easily.

     To make this work, two things were needed:

     (a) A way for the tickets to persist beyond the lifetime of all a user's
         sessions so that cron-driven processes can still use them.

         The problem is that a user's session keyrings are deleted when the
         session that spawned them logs out and the user's user keyring is
         deleted when the UID is deleted (typically when the last log out
         happens), so neither of these places is suitable.

         I've added a system keyring into which a 'persistent' keyring is
         created for each UID on request.  Each time a user requests their
         persistent keyring, the expiry time on it is set anew.  If the user
         doesn't ask for it for, say, three days, the keyring is automatically
         expired and garbage collected using the existing gc.  All the kerberos
         tokens it held are then also gc'd.

     (b) A key type that can hold really big tickets (up to 1MB in size).

         The problem is that Active Directory can return huge tickets with lots
         of auxiliary data attached.  We don't, however, want to eat up huge
         tracts of unswappable kernel space for this, so if the ticket is
         greater than a certain size, we create a swappable shmem file and dump
         the contents in there and just live with the fact we then have an
         inode and a dentry overhead.  If the ticket is smaller than that, we
         slap it in a kmalloc()'d buffer"

* 'for-linus2' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/jmorris/linux-security: (121 commits)
  KEYS: Fix keyring content gc scanner
  KEYS: Fix error handling in big_key instantiation
  KEYS: Fix UID check in keyctl_get_persistent()
  KEYS: The RSA public key algorithm needs to select MPILIB
  ima: define '_ima' as a builtin 'trusted' keyring
  ima: extend the measurement list to include the file signature
  kernel/system_certificate.S: use real contents instead of macro GLOBAL()
  KEYS: fix error return code in big_key_instantiate()
  KEYS: Fix keyring quota misaccounting on key replacement and unlink
  KEYS: Fix a race between negating a key and reading the error set
  KEYS: Make BIG_KEYS boolean
  apparmor: remove the "task" arg from may_change_ptraced_domain()
  apparmor: remove parent task info from audit logging
  apparmor: remove tsk field from the apparmor_audit_struct
  apparmor: fix capability to not use the current task, during reporting
  Smack: Ptrace access check mode
  ima: provide hash algo info in the xattr
  ima: enable support for larger default filedata hash algorithms
  ima: define kernel parameter 'ima_template=' to change configured default
  ima: add Kconfig default measurement list template
  ...
2013-11-21 19:46:00 -08:00
arch Merge branch 'next' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/benh/powerpc 2013-11-20 15:13:47 -08:00
block blk-mq: add blktrace insert event trace 2013-11-19 19:00:45 -07:00
crypto Merge branch 'for-linus2' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/jmorris/linux-security 2013-11-21 19:46:00 -08:00
Documentation Merge branch 'for-linus2' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/jmorris/linux-security 2013-11-21 19:46:00 -08:00
drivers Merge branch 'for-linus2' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/jmorris/linux-security 2013-11-21 19:46:00 -08:00
firmware firmware,IB/qib: revert firmware file move 2013-04-05 12:19:39 -07:00
fs Merge git://git.infradead.org/users/eparis/audit 2013-11-21 19:18:14 -08:00
include Merge branch 'for-linus2' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/jmorris/linux-security 2013-11-21 19:46:00 -08:00
init Merge branch 'for-linus2' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/jmorris/linux-security 2013-11-21 19:46:00 -08:00
ipc Merge branch 'akpm' (patches from Andrew Morton) 2013-11-13 15:45:43 +09:00
kernel Merge branch 'for-linus2' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/jmorris/linux-security 2013-11-21 19:46:00 -08:00
lib Merge branch 'for-linus2' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/jmorris/linux-security 2013-11-21 19:46:00 -08:00
mm Revert "mm: create a separate slab for page->ptl allocation" 2013-11-20 14:41:47 -08:00
net Merge branch 'for-linus' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/viro/vfs 2013-11-20 14:25:39 -08:00
samples kfifo API type safety 2013-11-15 09:32:23 +09:00
scripts Merge branch 'for-linus2' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/jmorris/linux-security 2013-11-21 19:46:00 -08:00
security Merge branch 'for-linus2' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/jmorris/linux-security 2013-11-21 19:46:00 -08:00
sound Merge branch 'next' of git://git.infradead.org/users/vkoul/slave-dma 2013-11-20 13:20:24 -08:00
tools More ACPI and power management updates for 3.13-rc1 2013-11-20 13:25:04 -08:00
usr initramfs: read CONFIG_RD_ variables for initramfs compression 2013-11-13 12:09:26 +09:00
virt/kvm Here are the 3.13 KVM changes. There was a lot of work on the PPC 2013-11-15 13:51:36 +09:00
.gitignore .gitignore: ignore *.lz4 files 2013-07-31 14:41:02 -07:00
.mailmap Viresh has moved 2012-06-20 14:39:36 -07:00
COPYING
CREDITS MAINTAINERS: update Zwane Mwaikambo's e-mail address 2013-11-13 12:09:14 +09:00
Kbuild kbuild: Fix missing system calls check on mips. 2011-11-09 14:37:44 +01:00
Kconfig kbuild: migrate all arch to the kconfig mainmenu upgrade 2010-09-19 22:54:11 -04:00
MAINTAINERS Merge branch 'for-linus2' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/jmorris/linux-security 2013-11-21 19:46:00 -08:00
Makefile Merge branch 'kbuild' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/mmarek/kbuild 2013-11-15 14:06:38 -08:00
README Merge branch 'master' into for-next 2012-10-28 19:29:19 +01:00
REPORTING-BUGS Docs: Move ref to Frohwalt Egerer to end of REPORTING-BUGS 2013-04-18 16:55:09 -07:00

        Linux kernel release 3.x <http://kernel.org/>

These are the release notes for Linux version 3.  Read them carefully,
as they tell you what this is all about, explain how to install the
kernel, and what to do if something goes wrong. 

WHAT IS LINUX?

  Linux is a clone of the operating system Unix, written from scratch by
  Linus Torvalds with assistance from a loosely-knit team of hackers across
  the Net. It aims towards POSIX and Single UNIX Specification compliance.

  It has all the features you would expect in a modern fully-fledged Unix,
  including true multitasking, virtual memory, shared libraries, demand
  loading, shared copy-on-write executables, proper memory management,
  and multistack networking including IPv4 and IPv6.

  It is distributed under the GNU General Public License - see the
  accompanying COPYING file for more details. 

ON WHAT HARDWARE DOES IT RUN?

  Although originally developed first for 32-bit x86-based PCs (386 or higher),
  today Linux also runs on (at least) the Compaq Alpha AXP, Sun SPARC and
  UltraSPARC, Motorola 68000, PowerPC, PowerPC64, ARM, Hitachi SuperH, Cell,
  IBM S/390, MIPS, HP PA-RISC, Intel IA-64, DEC VAX, AMD x86-64, AXIS CRIS,
  Xtensa, Tilera TILE, AVR32 and Renesas M32R architectures.

  Linux is easily portable to most general-purpose 32- or 64-bit architectures
  as long as they have a paged memory management unit (PMMU) and a port of the
  GNU C compiler (gcc) (part of The GNU Compiler Collection, GCC). Linux has
  also been ported to a number of architectures without a PMMU, although
  functionality is then obviously somewhat limited.
  Linux has also been ported to itself. You can now run the kernel as a
  userspace application - this is called UserMode Linux (UML).

DOCUMENTATION:

 - There is a lot of documentation available both in electronic form on
   the Internet and in books, both Linux-specific and pertaining to
   general UNIX questions.  I'd recommend looking into the documentation
   subdirectories on any Linux FTP site for the LDP (Linux Documentation
   Project) books.  This README is not meant to be documentation on the
   system: there are much better sources available.

 - There are various README files in the Documentation/ subdirectory:
   these typically contain kernel-specific installation notes for some 
   drivers for example. See Documentation/00-INDEX for a list of what
   is contained in each file.  Please read the Changes file, as it
   contains information about the problems, which may result by upgrading
   your kernel.

 - The Documentation/DocBook/ subdirectory contains several guides for
   kernel developers and users.  These guides can be rendered in a
   number of formats:  PostScript (.ps), PDF, HTML, & man-pages, among others.
   After installation, "make psdocs", "make pdfdocs", "make htmldocs",
   or "make mandocs" will render the documentation in the requested format.

INSTALLING the kernel source:

 - If you install the full sources, put the kernel tarball in a
   directory where you have permissions (eg. your home directory) and
   unpack it:

     gzip -cd linux-3.X.tar.gz | tar xvf -

   or

     bzip2 -dc linux-3.X.tar.bz2 | tar xvf -

   Replace "X" with the version number of the latest kernel.

   Do NOT use the /usr/src/linux area! This area has a (usually
   incomplete) set of kernel headers that are used by the library header
   files.  They should match the library, and not get messed up by
   whatever the kernel-du-jour happens to be.

 - You can also upgrade between 3.x releases by patching.  Patches are
   distributed in the traditional gzip and the newer bzip2 format.  To
   install by patching, get all the newer patch files, enter the
   top level directory of the kernel source (linux-3.X) and execute:

     gzip -cd ../patch-3.x.gz | patch -p1

   or

     bzip2 -dc ../patch-3.x.bz2 | patch -p1

   Replace "x" for all versions bigger than the version "X" of your current
   source tree, _in_order_, and you should be ok.  You may want to remove
   the backup files (some-file-name~ or some-file-name.orig), and make sure
   that there are no failed patches (some-file-name# or some-file-name.rej).
   If there are, either you or I have made a mistake.

   Unlike patches for the 3.x kernels, patches for the 3.x.y kernels
   (also known as the -stable kernels) are not incremental but instead apply
   directly to the base 3.x kernel.  For example, if your base kernel is 3.0
   and you want to apply the 3.0.3 patch, you must not first apply the 3.0.1
   and 3.0.2 patches. Similarly, if you are running kernel version 3.0.2 and
   want to jump to 3.0.3, you must first reverse the 3.0.2 patch (that is,
   patch -R) _before_ applying the 3.0.3 patch. You can read more on this in
   Documentation/applying-patches.txt

   Alternatively, the script patch-kernel can be used to automate this
   process.  It determines the current kernel version and applies any
   patches found.

     linux/scripts/patch-kernel linux

   The first argument in the command above is the location of the
   kernel source.  Patches are applied from the current directory, but
   an alternative directory can be specified as the second argument.

 - Make sure you have no stale .o files and dependencies lying around:

     cd linux
     make mrproper

   You should now have the sources correctly installed.

SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS

   Compiling and running the 3.x kernels requires up-to-date
   versions of various software packages.  Consult
   Documentation/Changes for the minimum version numbers required
   and how to get updates for these packages.  Beware that using
   excessively old versions of these packages can cause indirect
   errors that are very difficult to track down, so don't assume that
   you can just update packages when obvious problems arise during
   build or operation.

BUILD directory for the kernel:

   When compiling the kernel, all output files will per default be
   stored together with the kernel source code.
   Using the option "make O=output/dir" allow you to specify an alternate
   place for the output files (including .config).
   Example:

     kernel source code: /usr/src/linux-3.X
     build directory:    /home/name/build/kernel

   To configure and build the kernel, use:

     cd /usr/src/linux-3.X
     make O=/home/name/build/kernel menuconfig
     make O=/home/name/build/kernel
     sudo make O=/home/name/build/kernel modules_install install

   Please note: If the 'O=output/dir' option is used, then it must be
   used for all invocations of make.

CONFIGURING the kernel:

   Do not skip this step even if you are only upgrading one minor
   version.  New configuration options are added in each release, and
   odd problems will turn up if the configuration files are not set up
   as expected.  If you want to carry your existing configuration to a
   new version with minimal work, use "make oldconfig", which will
   only ask you for the answers to new questions.

 - Alternative configuration commands are:

     "make config"      Plain text interface.

     "make menuconfig"  Text based color menus, radiolists & dialogs.

     "make nconfig"     Enhanced text based color menus.

     "make xconfig"     X windows (Qt) based configuration tool.

     "make gconfig"     X windows (Gtk) based configuration tool.

     "make oldconfig"   Default all questions based on the contents of
                        your existing ./.config file and asking about
                        new config symbols.

     "make silentoldconfig"
                        Like above, but avoids cluttering the screen
                        with questions already answered.
                        Additionally updates the dependencies.

     "make olddefconfig"
                        Like above, but sets new symbols to their default
                        values without prompting.

     "make defconfig"   Create a ./.config file by using the default
                        symbol values from either arch/$ARCH/defconfig
                        or arch/$ARCH/configs/${PLATFORM}_defconfig,
                        depending on the architecture.

     "make ${PLATFORM}_defconfig"
                        Create a ./.config file by using the default
                        symbol values from
                        arch/$ARCH/configs/${PLATFORM}_defconfig.
                        Use "make help" to get a list of all available
                        platforms of your architecture.

     "make allyesconfig"
                        Create a ./.config file by setting symbol
                        values to 'y' as much as possible.

     "make allmodconfig"
                        Create a ./.config file by setting symbol
                        values to 'm' as much as possible.

     "make allnoconfig" Create a ./.config file by setting symbol
                        values to 'n' as much as possible.

     "make randconfig"  Create a ./.config file by setting symbol
                        values to random values.

     "make localmodconfig" Create a config based on current config and
                           loaded modules (lsmod). Disables any module
                           option that is not needed for the loaded modules.

                           To create a localmodconfig for another machine,
                           store the lsmod of that machine into a file
                           and pass it in as a LSMOD parameter.

                   target$ lsmod > /tmp/mylsmod
                   target$ scp /tmp/mylsmod host:/tmp

                   host$ make LSMOD=/tmp/mylsmod localmodconfig

                           The above also works when cross compiling.

     "make localyesconfig" Similar to localmodconfig, except it will convert
                           all module options to built in (=y) options.

   You can find more information on using the Linux kernel config tools
   in Documentation/kbuild/kconfig.txt.

 - NOTES on "make config":

    - Having unnecessary drivers will make the kernel bigger, and can
      under some circumstances lead to problems: probing for a
      nonexistent controller card may confuse your other controllers

    - Compiling the kernel with "Processor type" set higher than 386
      will result in a kernel that does NOT work on a 386.  The
      kernel will detect this on bootup, and give up.

    - A kernel with math-emulation compiled in will still use the
      coprocessor if one is present: the math emulation will just
      never get used in that case.  The kernel will be slightly larger,
      but will work on different machines regardless of whether they
      have a math coprocessor or not.

    - The "kernel hacking" configuration details usually result in a
      bigger or slower kernel (or both), and can even make the kernel
      less stable by configuring some routines to actively try to
      break bad code to find kernel problems (kmalloc()).  Thus you
      should probably answer 'n' to the questions for "development",
      "experimental", or "debugging" features.

COMPILING the kernel:

 - Make sure you have at least gcc 3.2 available.
   For more information, refer to Documentation/Changes.

   Please note that you can still run a.out user programs with this kernel.

 - Do a "make" to create a compressed kernel image. It is also
   possible to do "make install" if you have lilo installed to suit the
   kernel makefiles, but you may want to check your particular lilo setup first.

   To do the actual install, you have to be root, but none of the normal
   build should require that. Don't take the name of root in vain.

 - If you configured any of the parts of the kernel as `modules', you
   will also have to do "make modules_install".

 - Verbose kernel compile/build output:

   Normally, the kernel build system runs in a fairly quiet mode (but not
   totally silent).  However, sometimes you or other kernel developers need
   to see compile, link, or other commands exactly as they are executed.
   For this, use "verbose" build mode.  This is done by inserting
   "V=1" in the "make" command.  E.g.:

     make V=1 all

   To have the build system also tell the reason for the rebuild of each
   target, use "V=2".  The default is "V=0".

 - Keep a backup kernel handy in case something goes wrong.  This is 
   especially true for the development releases, since each new release
   contains new code which has not been debugged.  Make sure you keep a
   backup of the modules corresponding to that kernel, as well.  If you
   are installing a new kernel with the same version number as your
   working kernel, make a backup of your modules directory before you
   do a "make modules_install".

   Alternatively, before compiling, use the kernel config option
   "LOCALVERSION" to append a unique suffix to the regular kernel version.
   LOCALVERSION can be set in the "General Setup" menu.

 - In order to boot your new kernel, you'll need to copy the kernel
   image (e.g. .../linux/arch/i386/boot/bzImage after compilation)
   to the place where your regular bootable kernel is found. 

 - Booting a kernel directly from a floppy without the assistance of a
   bootloader such as LILO, is no longer supported.

   If you boot Linux from the hard drive, chances are you use LILO, which
   uses the kernel image as specified in the file /etc/lilo.conf.  The
   kernel image file is usually /vmlinuz, /boot/vmlinuz, /bzImage or
   /boot/bzImage.  To use the new kernel, save a copy of the old image
   and copy the new image over the old one.  Then, you MUST RERUN LILO
   to update the loading map!! If you don't, you won't be able to boot
   the new kernel image.

   Reinstalling LILO is usually a matter of running /sbin/lilo. 
   You may wish to edit /etc/lilo.conf to specify an entry for your
   old kernel image (say, /vmlinux.old) in case the new one does not
   work.  See the LILO docs for more information. 

   After reinstalling LILO, you should be all set.  Shutdown the system,
   reboot, and enjoy!

   If you ever need to change the default root device, video mode,
   ramdisk size, etc.  in the kernel image, use the 'rdev' program (or
   alternatively the LILO boot options when appropriate).  No need to
   recompile the kernel to change these parameters. 

 - Reboot with the new kernel and enjoy. 

IF SOMETHING GOES WRONG:

 - If you have problems that seem to be due to kernel bugs, please check
   the file MAINTAINERS to see if there is a particular person associated
   with the part of the kernel that you are having trouble with. If there
   isn't anyone listed there, then the second best thing is to mail
   them to me (torvalds@linux-foundation.org), and possibly to any other
   relevant mailing-list or to the newsgroup.

 - In all bug-reports, *please* tell what kernel you are talking about,
   how to duplicate the problem, and what your setup is (use your common
   sense).  If the problem is new, tell me so, and if the problem is
   old, please try to tell me when you first noticed it.

 - If the bug results in a message like

     unable to handle kernel paging request at address C0000010
     Oops: 0002
     EIP:   0010:XXXXXXXX
     eax: xxxxxxxx   ebx: xxxxxxxx   ecx: xxxxxxxx   edx: xxxxxxxx
     esi: xxxxxxxx   edi: xxxxxxxx   ebp: xxxxxxxx
     ds: xxxx  es: xxxx  fs: xxxx  gs: xxxx
     Pid: xx, process nr: xx
     xx xx xx xx xx xx xx xx xx xx

   or similar kernel debugging information on your screen or in your
   system log, please duplicate it *exactly*.  The dump may look
   incomprehensible to you, but it does contain information that may
   help debugging the problem.  The text above the dump is also
   important: it tells something about why the kernel dumped code (in
   the above example, it's due to a bad kernel pointer). More information
   on making sense of the dump is in Documentation/oops-tracing.txt

 - If you compiled the kernel with CONFIG_KALLSYMS you can send the dump
   as is, otherwise you will have to use the "ksymoops" program to make
   sense of the dump (but compiling with CONFIG_KALLSYMS is usually preferred).
   This utility can be downloaded from
   ftp://ftp.<country>.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/ksymoops/ .
   Alternatively, you can do the dump lookup by hand:

 - In debugging dumps like the above, it helps enormously if you can
   look up what the EIP value means.  The hex value as such doesn't help
   me or anybody else very much: it will depend on your particular
   kernel setup.  What you should do is take the hex value from the EIP
   line (ignore the "0010:"), and look it up in the kernel namelist to
   see which kernel function contains the offending address.

   To find out the kernel function name, you'll need to find the system
   binary associated with the kernel that exhibited the symptom.  This is
   the file 'linux/vmlinux'.  To extract the namelist and match it against
   the EIP from the kernel crash, do:

     nm vmlinux | sort | less

   This will give you a list of kernel addresses sorted in ascending
   order, from which it is simple to find the function that contains the
   offending address.  Note that the address given by the kernel
   debugging messages will not necessarily match exactly with the
   function addresses (in fact, that is very unlikely), so you can't
   just 'grep' the list: the list will, however, give you the starting
   point of each kernel function, so by looking for the function that
   has a starting address lower than the one you are searching for but
   is followed by a function with a higher address you will find the one
   you want.  In fact, it may be a good idea to include a bit of
   "context" in your problem report, giving a few lines around the
   interesting one. 

   If you for some reason cannot do the above (you have a pre-compiled
   kernel image or similar), telling me as much about your setup as
   possible will help.  Please read the REPORTING-BUGS document for details.

 - Alternatively, you can use gdb on a running kernel. (read-only; i.e. you
   cannot change values or set break points.) To do this, first compile the
   kernel with -g; edit arch/i386/Makefile appropriately, then do a "make
   clean". You'll also need to enable CONFIG_PROC_FS (via "make config").

   After you've rebooted with the new kernel, do "gdb vmlinux /proc/kcore".
   You can now use all the usual gdb commands. The command to look up the
   point where your system crashed is "l *0xXXXXXXXX". (Replace the XXXes
   with the EIP value.)

   gdb'ing a non-running kernel currently fails because gdb (wrongly)
   disregards the starting offset for which the kernel is compiled.