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What to Expect from Linux 2.6.12
apt-get writes "Saw this Linuxworld report from the annual Australian Linux conference, Linux.conf.au, in Canberra last week. The article outlines some of the new features we can expect for the 2.6.12 kernel release, including: support for trusted computing, and security enhanced Linux. The kernel developers are also working on improving the 'feel' of the Linux desktop with inotify for file managers and events notification so hardware 'just works'. Unfortunately no release date other than 'sometime soon' is given."
Just for those not in the know..
/home recursively. I don't remember why or which. :)
Inotify is a replacement for dnotify. With both you can watch for a file for changes. You can even watch a directory for changes. However with dnotify you couldn't recursively watch a directory for changes. To do so required basically 'opening' each folder and quickly you use up the maximum number of files you can open.
With inotify it still doesn't directly support recursively watching a directory but example code for doing so is given and doesn't have the same problems. One distro uses this for watching
As for the notification thing - that's part of HAL, and means usb pens, cameras, etc should be 'auto detected' and the user can be notified and asked what to do automatically.
It's a different thing. The 'trusted computing' in Windows is all about DRM, preventing you from getting access to data on your machine.
The 'trusted computing' in Linux 2.6.12 is about being able to run a process that is restricted in what it can do (read and write to a pipe, essentially), so that you can run an arbitary downloaded binary without worrying that it will do bad things. (think: distributed.net, SETI, etc).
If you're a *nix user, think really cool chroot jail.