Sean Bruno <sean.bruno <at> dsl-only.net> writes:
> What is the relationship between 'Execshield hardware NX/XD bit support'
> and a x86_64 version of linux? I'm not sure I followed your statement,
> but I would like to know more.
The NX/XD bit is only supported if you have both:
* an x86_64 or i686 PAE kernel (not a regular i686 one),
* a CPU which supports that bit, most of which are 64-bit.
As to why only Fedora, Fedora has kernel patches (ExecShield), which might
change how the bit is used, though I'm not sure about that. (Apparently, some
hardware NX/XD support is in the upstream kernel, just not approximation by the
code segment limit on non-NX/XD-enabled x86.) Another reason may be that other
distributions ship older kernels than Fedora does (which might also explain why
it works on FC5).
But it might not be an NX/XD issue at all, as I said, it's just a wild guess.
Kevin Kofler
