Compiling a kernel

To compile your own kernel using Ubuntu (or any distro that uses Ubuntu kernels, for example Mint, elementary OS, but not Pop!_OS) the first step is to get hold of the kernel sources.

The official channel for vanilla kernel sources is https://kernel.org, but this isn’t necessarily the best place to start. Instead, we’ll use an Ubuntu kernel, which includes numerous patches and backported features. It also has the advantage of coming with a configuration very close to what you’re currently running (in fact it’s identical if you have the same version). So if we make only small changes there, then we’d hope the resulting kernel still has all the functionality of the old.

Besides the kernel source files, we also need the required build tools. If you’ve ever compiled anything before