kernel headers

Dear Seawolf Users:

I have a question regarding the kernel-headers package.

When RHN issues kernel updates, they no longer include any updates for the
kernel-headers rpm.  The last one issued was something like version
2.4.9-blah-blah.

The files provided by that kernel-headers package are the *.h files in the
/usr/include/asm and /usr/include/linux directories.  OK.  I can see that most
of them are the same as in /usr/src/linux-2.4/include/asm and ../linux; but
clearly, some of those files have since been updated/added/deleted (compared
to the /usr/include files) by newer versions of kernel-source rpm.

It would seem reasonable to uninstall the kernel-headers package, and put
symlinks in place of /usr/include/asm and ../linux to point directly to the
latest and greatest kernel header files.  BUT, I cannot uninstall
kernel-headers, because it is required by glibc-devel, which is required by
gcc.  ARRRGH.

So, now that I have upgraded to a newer kernel version 2.4.18-blah-blah, and
the source contains different header files, am I totally screwed if I try to
compile things with gcc and run them under this new kernel?  (Only if the code
uses an obsolete header file, I suppose, but trying to determine that reliably
could be a nightmare.)

Can anyone explain the correct procedure at this point?

Thanks.

Jim