Users Guide

Installing Managed System Software on Supported Linux Operating Systems 101
Forcing Dynamic Kernel Support on Red Hat Enterprise Linux Update Releases When Kernel is Tainted
Server Administrator provides precompiled device drivers for the "Gold" releases of supported Red Hat
Enterprise Linux operating systems. Red Hat Enterprise Linux supports loading device drivers built for
the "Gold" release, on the Update releases. This means Server Administrator does not have to ship
precompiled device drivers for every Red Hat Enterprise Linux Update release and users are not forced to
use DKS in order to run Server Administrator on every system that is running a Red Hat Enterprise
Linux Update release. However, loading a device driver built for the "Gold" release of Red Hat
Enterprise Linux (version 3) on an Update release may taint the kernel. If the kernel on a system running
a Red Hat Enterprise Linux (version 3) Update release has been tainted by this device driver load
process, Server Administrator’s init script command restart-forcekernelmatch can be used to force DKS
to be used in this situation. DKS will build device drivers that do not taint the running kernel.
Determining if the Running Kernel is Tainted
After Server Administrator services have been started, perform the following steps on Red Hat
Enterprise Linux Update releases to determine if the kernel has been tainted:
1
Log in as root .
2 Execute the following command:
lsmod
If you see Tainted: GF in the first line of the output as in the following message, the running kernel
is tainted:
Module Size Used by Tainted: GF
The "tainted" status may be caused by the Server Administrator device driver load process.
Forcing Dynamic Kernel Support on Red Hat Enterprise Linux Update Releases
After the installation of Server Administrator, perform the following steps to force DKS to be used on
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Update releases to build device drivers for the running kernel, if needed,
so that they do not taint the kernel:
1
Ensure that the prerequisites of DKS are met.
2 Execute the following command:
/etc/init.d/instsvcdrv restart-forcekernelmatch
This command will first stop the Server Administrator device drivers. It will then search for precompiled
device drivers to load, by checking for precompiled device drivers built for a kernel whose name is an
exact match as the name of the running kernel. If it fails to find an exact match, it will use DKS to build
device drivers for the running kernel. Finally, the command will restart the Server Administrator
device drivers.
NOTE: The system must be rebooted to clear the kernel "tainted" status.