SELinux

Installing SELinux

SELinux can be installed in three fundamental ways:

• As an integral component of a Linux distribution, installed at the same time as the distribution

• By using binary or source packages, such as the .deb packages used by Debian GNU/Linux; the ebuilds used by Gentoo Linux; or the RPM packages used by Fedora Core, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and SUSE Linux

• By downloading, compiling, and installing the sources provided by the NSA

At the time of writing, only Fedora Core and Gentoo contain SELinux as a fully supported, native facility. So unless you choose one of those distributions, you must install SELinux yourself. If you install SELinux yourself, it’s generally much more convenient to do so using packages. However, prebuilt packages are not available for every Linux distribution. Those who are unable or unwilling to use a distribution for which packages are available must compile the sources provided by the NSA. In many cases, the sources must be modified in order to work properly with the distinctive characteristics of a specific Linux distribution.

The following sections explain how to install and initially configure SELinux for several popular Linux distributions. The final section of this chapter explains how to install SELinux using the source code provided by the NSA.

Using X with SELinux

Coaxing SELinux into working with X has proven to be somewhat difficult. Recent releases of SELinux perform much better in this regard than older releases. But they still fall short ...