Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Linux 2.6 Kernel Stability Freeze

Posted by simoniker on from the os-musical-chairs dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Linux Creator Linus Torvalds released the 2.6.0-test7 Linux development kernel today and declared a "stability freeze". It has been made quite clear that from this point only "strictly necessary stuff" will be accepted, clearing the way for an official 2.6.0 release sooner than later... possibly at the end of this month."

11 of 378 comments (clear)

  1. That's good by ixt · · Score: 5, Interesting

    2.5 has been largely successful, and a lot of end users were able to compile it. 2.3? That's another story. I remember not being able to compile 2.3 once.

    Good job to all the kernel hackers.

  2. Reiser 4 by agrippa_cash · · Score: 4, Interesting

    So it looks like we'll have to wait a while longer for Reiser4, or were some of the Reiser4 implimentation problems due to the shifting kernel patches? Anyone? Anyone?

    1. Re:Reiser 4 by caluml · · Score: 4, Interesting

      More importantly, is XFS in there by default? I haven't tried it since about 2.5.59. It's annoying when patches made for vanilla 2.4 don't apply on 2.4 + XFS. If the vanilla kernel came with XFS, those patches would be made against that, and would apply.

      --
      Get your own free personal location tracker
  3. Stability? by Wooky_linuxer · · Score: 5, Interesting

    When the 2.4 series came out, it was much criticisd for not having anything near the stability of the old 2.2 series (I'd say it haven't catch up yet,but since I use it in a desktop machine 2.2 is not an option)... What can we wait from the brave new world the 2.6 kernel will bring?

    --
    Where is that guy who'd die defending what I had to say when I need him?
    1. Re:Stability? by Overly+Critical+Guy · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I installed several distributions in the 2.4 series, and at least a dozen different kernel releases, and never saw, experienced or heard about any file system corruption due to the kernel. Then again, most intellegent people don't load the freshest kernel on a production machine.

      Then you weren't paying attention. 2.4.x was a complete wreck, and everyone complained. I still remember the infamous Thanksgiving "turkey" kernel that randomly corrupted ext3 partitions.

      The base definition of an operating system is the kernel running it, dummy. Linux is the system operating my devices and letting me operate my computer.

      Windows also has permissions. Every single Windows network I've ever run or worked with operated the same way.

      Another "GNU/Linux" weenie. Here's the part where someone mods me down instead of posting in disagreement.

      --
      "Sufferin' succotash."
    2. Re:Stability? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

      Then you weren't paying attention. 2.4.x was a complete wreck, and everyone complained. I still remember the infamous Thanksgiving "turkey" kernel that randomly corrupted ext3 partitions.



      There was nothing 'random' about it, it only corrupted the filesystem if you did not sync your disks before you unmounted them. Which distributions like Debian have done in their shutdown/reboot scripts. Still it was quite a nasty bug. But you also have to remember not every machine, probably not even a majority of machines out there are running ext3. Diversity and choice in a kernel and in cases like this can be pretty neat at limiting the damage done by a borked kernel.
  4. Modular source code? by pjack76 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    How difficult is it to only download those kernel modules I actually want to compile? As time goes on and new stuff keeps getting added to the kernel the source just gets out of hand. Someone should set up a little webby clicky thing that's like "make menuconfig" but then assembles a tarball only containing your precise configuration and those modules you've selected. Just a thought.

    --

    Wow, a lucrative publishing contract! I don't have to be evil anymore. --Meteor

  5. Re:Is it faster? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting
    Can it copy it in less than 2 minutes now like Windows Server 2003 on the othyer partition of my computer?
    That's really not saying much. Usually when a person says, "in under x minutes" they really mean, nearly. So from this we can deduce that this computer that you allegedly own transfers at about 0.14 MB/sec. Wow, I think my IDE ZIP can do better than that! Not to mention my P233MMX w/64MB and an ancient 1.0 GB Quantum Fireball running in MDMA2 on Linux 2.4.18 outperforms your computer running Windows 2003 with exceedingly more powerful hardware.

    Damn, I'm staying away from that Microsoft bloat, holy hell!! ;-)
  6. Radeon FB fixed? by fishbowl · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Is the Radeon FrameBuffer Console fixed?

    It's been horribly broken in the 2.6 test kernels I've tried.

    --
    -fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
  7. Injunction? by Roofus · · Score: 1, Interesting

    So where's the injunction from SCO to stop distribution of this? I mean, they are trying to mitigate their damages aren't they?

  8. ataraid by thrift24 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Does anyone know if ataraid is in the kernel yet, or what exactly they plan on doing with that? In 2.6-test6 there wasn't a trace of ataraid around. This is bad news for anyone wanting to upgrade to 2.6 who use highpoint or promise raids. Wanted to install gentoo w/ 2.6 on the girlfriends computer a couple days ago when i found this out, now she's running a heavily patched 2.4 kernel and ataraid is buggy...It would really suck to not see a working ataraid driver in the 2.6 kernel