Q: How do I get rid of errors about modules net-pf-4 and net-pf-5 not being found after compiling a new kernel?

We are trying to compile a new kernel on our server, using SuSE 5.3. After building the configuration with menuconfig, we run:

make dep
make clean
make bzImage
make modules
make modules_install

This gives us a zImage file in the arch/i386/boot directory. We then run 'make zlilo', to install the new kernel image. All seems to go fine so far, but, when we reboot with the new kernel, there are boot messages relating to IPX and AppleTalk which are not installed nor modularized in our kernel.

The error seems to revolve around '/lib/modules/2.0.35/misc/ipx.o' and appletalk.o. I can't find where the actual messages are logged. They don't show up in any log in /var/log.

A: Ok, looks like you still have the old modules installed on your machine. Before you do the 'make modules_install' you must move the old modules to another directory, such as 'modules_old.' Then, you may make modules_install, and everything should work correctly for you.

I believe the symptoms observed are what naturally happens when you omit the IPX and AppleTalk (net-pf-4 and net-pf-5) driver modules from a kernel.

Your original kernel presumably included those modules, so you didn't see messages from depmod complaining that they couldn't be found.

To suppress the messages, include the following lines in your /etc/conf.modules:

alias net-pf-4 off # Forget IPX
alias net-pf-5 off # Forget DDP / appletalk