Automate custom gentoo kernel update tasks.

The update process can be divided into the following steps:

1. configure - copy and update the previous .config
2. build - compile the new kernel and install modules
3. install - copy the new EFI stub kernel image to the EFI system partition
4. commit - commit the new config with a detailed commit message
5. clean - remove unused kernel source directories, modules and boot images

This tool aims to minimize the effort by automating the previous steps, while ensuring maximum flexibility w.r.t. configuration changes.

The following variables will be used throughout this description:

old - previous kernel's source directory

new - new kernel's source directory

esp - directory containing the live kernel image on the EFI system partition (/boot/EFI/Gentoo/bootx64.efi)

jobs - number of parallel make jobs given by -j (default: 64)

version - new kernel's version string

Runs make menuconfig if the current config file is missing, or no other kernel is installed

Otherwise, copy the current config file to the new source directory if it doesn't exist (prevent accidental overwrite).

cp -n ${old}/.config ${new}

Get newly added config options and store the result in ${new}/.newoptions.

cd ${new}
make listnewconfig > ${new}/.newoptions

If -l was selected: print newly added config options and exit.

cat ${new}/.newoptions
exit

Interactively update the previous config and exit if aborted.

cd ${new}
make oldconfig || exit

Build and install modules, using the given number of jobs.

make -j ${jobs} && make modules_install

Update symlink /usr/src/linux to the new source directory.

eselect kernel set $(basename ${new})

Install the EFI stub kernel image (and a backup copy to revert to in case something breaks after a subsequent kernel update).

mount /boot
cp ${new}/arch/x86_64/boot/bzImage ${esp}/bootx64.efi
cp ${new}/arch/x86_64/boot/bzImage ${esp}/gentoo-${version}.efi

Rebuild external modules.

emerge @module-rebuild

Remove unused kernel source directories, modules and boot images.

emerge --depclean sys-kernel/gentoo-sources
rm -rf $(find /usr/src/ -maxdepth 1 -name "linux-*" | sed -e '/${old}/d' -e '/${new}/d')
rm -rf $(ls -1 /lib/modules/ | sed -e '/${old}/d' -e '/${new}/d')
rm -rf $(ls -1 ${esp} | sed -e '/${old}/d' -e '/${new}/d' -e '/bootx64/d')

The default is to keep the previous kernel version in case something goes horribly wrong.

Commit the new kernel config with a detailed commit message.

git add -f /usr/src/linux/.config
git commit -S -m "${msg}"

The message will not only contain the version change, but also details about the newly added or removed options.

You may use the ebuild app-admin/ekernel from my personal repository.

• >=dev-lang/python-3.10
• dev-python/packaging
• sys-apps/portage