This chapter includes a list of packages that need to be downloaded for building a basic Linux system. The listed version numbers correspond to versions of the software that are known to work, and this book is based on their use. We highly recommend not using newer versions because the build commands for one version may not work with a newer version. The newest package versions may also have problems that work-arounds have not been developed for yet.
All the URLs, when possible, refer to the package's information page at http://www.freshmeat.net/. The Freshmeat pages provide easy access to official download sites, as well as project websites, mailing lists, FAQ, changelogs, and more.
Download locations may not always be accessible. If a download location has changed since this book was published, Google (http://www.google.com) provides a useful search engine for most packages. If this search is unsuccessful, try one of the alternate means of downloading discussed at http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/packages.html.
Downloaded packages and patches will need to be stored somewhere that is conveniently available throughout the entire build. A working directory is also required to unpack the sources and build them. $LFS/sources can be used both as the place to store the tarballs and patches and as a working directory. By using this directory, the required elements will be located on the LFS partition and will be available during all stages of the building process.
To create this directory, execute, as user root, the following command before starting the download session:
mkdir $LFS/sources
Make this directory writable and sticky. “Sticky” means that even if multiple users have write permission on a directory, only the owner of a file can delete the file within a sticky directory. The following command will enable the write and sticky modes:
chmod a+wt $LFS/sources