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2.6.13 Linux Kernel Released
LynuxFre@k writes "Linux Torvalds announced the release of the 2.6.13 Linux kernel. He noted that there was a major change to the x86 PCI code, and that while all bugs from the change were believed to be found during the release candidate phase, it's possible that some devices may have problems. From this release on, it is intended that major changes only be merged into the kernel within two weeks after a major release. The rest of the time will be spent fixing bugs, with the goal of both increasing overall stability and decreasing the amount of time between major releases. Download the latest Linux kernel from a kernel.org mirror."
"From this release on, it is intended that major changes only be merged into the kernel within two weeks after a major release. The rest of the time will be spent fixing bugs, with the goal of both increasing overall stability and decreasing the amount of time between major releases."
I wish Linus would arrive at a policy and just stick with it instead of all these gyrations of "we'll use this method from now on...no wait...we'll use this one from now on...and by the way I want everyone to switch revision control systems now...oh wait...sigh.
Industry standard 3d, compositing and editing tools all run under linux which is the natural progression because of their IRIX legacy.
I've also done some DTP under linux but that probably wasn't professional, since I didn't just bang a series of poorly masked raster images together like most 'professional' agencies we dealt with.
Does this make me a linux fanatic?
As you may have noticed, this article is about the KERNEL. Changing your kernel is a very much geek thing to do. If there is any place you should expect to need the CLI to install something it is the kernel!
Compiling and installing a new kernel isn't for everyone, that's why there are these collections of tested software known as "Linux Distros" where geeks get the software packaged nicely so you can use a GUI to do all your upgrading. If the CLI scares you so much and you want to use Linux, I'd recomend using Fedora or Ubuntu and sticking to standard packages.
You don't have to. years ago when I used SuSE, I never ever compiled anything, and I had no problems
Linux does have something similar. How about Yast or Synaptic or up2date? True, it's not identical to way things are done in Windows or OS X. But Linux is not Windows or OS X.
I don't think the kernel-developers are to blame if some GUI-tool doesn't do the job. They work on the kernel, not on the GUI.
Failed at what? To satisfy the whims of some random user who propably hasn't paid one dime for the software he's using? Here's a hint to you: they (the developers) don't owe you anything.
Lesbian Nazi Hookers Abducted by UFOs and Forced Into Weight Loss Programs - -all next week on Town Talk.
A) Fine. So we'll distribute one binary version of the kernel. It won't work as fast. It'll be hundreds of megs in size. It will take ages to load as it checks for every single known piece of hardware. You've just lost all the speed/memory advantage of having a tailored kernel. Alternatively, it'll come with a hundred modules. It'll also never be x64 optimised or, for that matter, able to work on every machine (some options crash some machines, while the opposite options may crash others) and APM/ACPI will NEVER work on some machines.
B) Fine. You come up with a GUI that can allow me to find files modified on the second Tuesday of every month between May 1, 1946 and June 27, 1978, which contain the words 'secret' and 'report' within 26 characters of each other, sort them by date, and replace any occurence of the word 'anchovie' by 'dead bug'. Some things GUI's just cannot do, some things GUI's do that are just command line interfaces in a fancy coloured textbox, some things GUI's can do once in the time that someone who knows the command can do twenty times.
Secondly, how do you expect a GUI to be able to do stuff like modify computer internals safely? Windows answer to this is usually that settings won't take effect until the next reboot, which makes your computer *stop all it's work* until it's done. X can be restarted with a single keystroke to have the same effect. Maybe a couple of command line edits in between but meanwhile none of your users have been disconnected, no programs have stopped doing what they were supposed to be doing.
Command-lines are not for the faint-of-heart. Then again, last time I touched the command line on my own Linux desktop (not counting other machines that are cmd-line only via SSH) was to run LILO - not something that a "desktop doughnut" should be doing. You obviously have either different ideas of what you should be doing on a normal desktop machine or have not found out how to do them GUI-wise. By the same token, Windows should never expect me to recover in safe mode, or via recovery console, or by running any batch commands ever. Fine for the ordinary desktop user because it very rarely does. Not fine for a power user. An ordinary desktop user wouldn't even notice if you ran a Windows GUI on a Linux machine.
C) Man pages can be a pain in the arse (make it compulsory to include enough examples to demonstrate every option!). HOWTO's are not always up-to-date. Forums are, pretty much, for people who want to know how to install this Linux thing they downloaded. Then again... how much documentation do you get with Windows?
A small booklet showing you how to use a mouse to point at the various icons. An online help system that, even with it's wizard-style help for some items, is next to useless if you don't know the terms to look for (I work support for six schools... that's about 60-100 staff and a few thousand pupils. I have NEVER seen or heard of anyone even bother to try using Windows Help or Help inside ANY program because it's never been useful to them). Annoying dogs, wizards, paperclips that people want me to TURN OFF for them because they can't figure out how.
That's surely Linux 0-0 Windows in terms of help.
If you're an advanced user, you've got to be comfortable with the command-line. I carry a USB key full of cmd-line utils and use them almost every day on Windows and Linux. It's amazing how much quicker "Start, Run, Cmd, ipconfig" is than navigating that poxy GUI network settings. And while I'm there, doing "route print" is the ONLY way to discover Windows network routes.
Anyone who's not going to set up networks or advanced stuff (i.e. users), or home users shouldn't ever NEED to worry about the command line on either OS. And they don't. They pick a distro like Lindows and once the installation is complete, they never see it again. Or they have a decent desktop set up and then never see the command-line again. You, however, are on the border. You are trying to do stuff that NEEDS a command line, stuff that's beyond a GUI point-and-click.
>> Any time I'm forced to drop to a command line, you as a developer have failed.
> I don't think the kernel-developers are to blame if some GUI-tool doesn't do the job. They work on the kernel, not on the GUI.
In fact, if some functionality requires a GUI, people like me are mightily upset. The moment I'm forced to drop to a goddamn GUI, you (the grandparent poster) as a whiny user have failed.
[Disclaimer: not a single byte of my code can be found in the official kernel tree, so take my words with a grain of salt. Still, I don't really imagine Linus using mouse for anything but cut&paste]
The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
Yes, unfortunately I have the same experience. I used to rely on the vanilla Linux kernel tree being rock solid. Now I feel I must stay many months behind in order to avoid potentially catastrophic problems. Considering the number of bug fixes, particularly w/ regard to security, that can show up in new kernel releases, it's not an ideal situation: you're damned if you do, and you're damned if you don't.
I've recently had networking go south when packets were being written to localhost. Some adaptec scsi stuff was recently messed up, apparently now fixed in 2.6.13 - but no way I'm going to try it until it's been out for a while. I've seen problems with quotas in combination with ext3. I recently started experiencing connection tracking weirdnesses with an iptables setup I've used at home for probably a couple of years. I've seen versions where network latencies would grow ever so slowly until they reached a critical threshold that sent my server(s) spiraling into oblivion. Yes, I file bug reports. Yes, problems get fixed. But at the same time, new ones show up. Sometimes bad ones.
I've become accustomed to rebooting Windows to fix problems, but that's exactly why I use Linux - because it was rock solid. I won't say that anymore, and it bums me out big time. I like new shiny objects too, but not at the expense of stability. Especially not on servers, which is where Linux has made the most headway.
The problem with the current versioning system is that even if there is a bug-fix only decimal release, and even if there is only a two week window to introduce new features, the bug fixing won't get done. Why? Because new features are more fun than fixing bugs. Even if I can't submit a new feature until several months from now, that doesn't mean I won't work on it in leiu of fixing bugs.
Linus should freeze the 2.6 kernel series against *any* new features at all, for a period of about a year. All work should be on increasing stability, ironing out bugs, improving device drivers, and other such menial housekeeping. The kernel contributers who really buck up, get to work, and help with this effort should get big karma bonuses from Linus. Those who hang back and work on their own thing should be pushed down a level in future kernel submission evaluations.
Sorry to be so negative, but I really hope this gets better. I'm a huge fan, but I have been wasting way too much time lately dealing with problems that end up being way beyond my control. When there is a problem with my systems, I want it to be my fault, because then I can do something about it.
Why would the developers care one bit about what's going into use in old ass distributions, by default?
Debian Stable = things that have been 'thoroughly' tested for like 2 years or more. Hell, even using Debian Unstable, most of your software is still incredibly out of date.
Red Hat isn't quite as slow. But pretty darned slow.
"Champagne for my real friends - and real pain for my sham friends!" http://ericblade.postalboard.com/
OK, first off, this guy is obviously a desktop user. So, yeah, it's understandable he wants everything driven via a GUI. Fair and reasonable request really. But he should understand that not everyone is a desktop user and many people who use Linux as more than just for servers are power users who LIKE having the power and flexibility of low level configuration files. Man pages do suck when not written properly. Would a few examples kill people to write?? But, the argument that Linux is free and that "the developers don't owe you anything" is getting old. Ok, it's free. BUT it's being put out there as a superior OS to Windows. So if you're going to develop and tout it as such, stand behind it and stop running for cover behind statements like: "Failed at what? To satisfy the whims of some random user who propably hasn't paid one dime for the software he's using? Here's a hint to you: they (the developers) don't owe you anything" This isn't helping anyone's cause. Learn to take and use criticism to make a better OS. Linux isn't better becuase it's free, linux is btter becuase it's a superior system is so many ways. Hardly any REGULAR desktop users would say it's as easy to use/configure as Windows and until they do, there's work ahead for developers....
Any time I'm forced to drop to a command line, you as a developer have failed.
Without getting into the whole "you have failed" thing and whether or not your particular requirements are some sort of mandatory minimum, it's my opinion that the same thing applies to GUIs. I think every piece of functionality should be available in three different ways:
The common Unix and OSS methodology is to build the command-line tools first, then factor out libraries and add GUI interfaces that use either the libraries or even the command-line tools underneath. So, it's common that features are accessible for a while from the command line, but not from the GUI. In the Windows world, the methodology is to construct the GUI first, then expose functional components via OLE and then, maybe, to create command-line tools. Of course, it's very common in the Windows world to stop after the GUI.
IMO, the Unix and OSS approach is superior because it improves the odds that all three interfaces will be implemented, leading to maximum functionality not only for novices, but also for power users and developers. But I won't clam that Microsoft has "failed" because I understand the difference between my opinion and global Truth.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
Snobbery like this is partly why Linux fails. GUIs are easier to use, especially for the non-technical user - i.e. 90% of computer users -or- who you should be catering to if you ever want Linux to be anything other than a niche operating system.
Nonsense? Ah, so you've never seen an update screw the pooch or a supposed migration that was supposed to be easy as pie go totally awry on a mission critical system.
Yeah, it's called "if it works, don't fuck with it unless you have a damned good reason." Just because a newer version comes out is not a valid reason unless it supports a feature that your shop cannot live without.
Not me.
But it's very hard to generalize from one person's experience to any general "recent trend of unstability." Most of the bugs are in drivers, so people's experiences tend to be highly dependent on exactly which hardware they have.
--Bruce Fields
anti-Linux (MS ?) Shills are at it again, with their support to mod them up. The oldest occurrence of this post I can find is this one : http://ask.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=135647&cid =11333134 .
...).
... I suppose this one will be resurrected often though. Reminds me of the good old days, when old trolls were reappearing even though the problems were fixed a long time ago. ...
What's sad is that you see them coming from far far away, but the worst is that their arguments are always flawed.
So they play with emotional things, and don't even get that right (Linux is *not* user friendly, and until it is linux will stay with > 1% marketshare, I suppose they meant < 1 %
And then, say stupid things like :
Take installation. Linux zealots are now saying "oh installing is so easy, just do apt-get install package or emerge package": Yes, because typing in "apt-get" or "emerge" makes so much more sense to new users than double-clicking an icon that says "setup".
Eliminating the context, and deliberately forgetting the part about the GUI, like Synaptic or Mandrake Update (which are available in the menu, with names like "Update your system" or "Add new applications").
But wait, they are even more stupid than that !!!! They have no shame. They even talk about the difficultly of Linux configuration issues and then, to illustrate that, ask How do I get Quake 3 to run in Linux?. Which of course, has nothing to do with Linux configuration issues, and everything to do with the Quake 3 editor not providing a convenient installation method. I don't know Quake 3 per se, so I can't verify what these unreliable sources say, but if these guy http://wcuniverse.sourceforge.net/ can provide an installation file for their Open Source game that works on any Linux thanks to the very old Loki installer, I think any proprietary company can do it too.
Oh but wait, I checked and Quake 3 actually comes with the same installer at least for the french version !!!!
But of course, this old troll had to detail all the installation instructions of the NVidia driver and whatnot for XFree, to sound complicated. Trolls these days
Heck, today I just saw "X does not support PNP displays", "X is slow", "Linux has bad font support"
Fortunately, anti-Linux trolls do not include "Linux has no games" when they talk about difficulty of installing Quake 3 on it, thank god !
These discussions along with final reason for pushing udev were concentrated on devfs weaknesses rather than udev superiority.
udev pushes all the device naming policy to userspace. Moving policy stuff to userspace is something that linux developers (and hackers of other OSes too) love because it's a much better design. That was the main reason for udev.
I'd prove you wrong, but I stopped reading after you said that there's no major improvements "under the hood" (is there any part to the kernel that is not considered "under the hood") anymore. That claim alone shows that no matter how insightful you might otherwise be, you're completely out of touch with reality. :)
quidquid latine dictum sit altum videtur.
That works both ways - the users do not owe you anything either, which means that you can't complain if they then decide to go and use XYZ other OS.
"Why do all these lusers keep using crappy Windows? They should use a product that they don't understand and that we refuse to improve for them because it's free and we don't owe them anything!"
Because THAT'S a good sales pitch...
"If he were a plant, people would roll him up and smoke him."
I'm using 2.4 under Debian (Woody, or Old-Stable) for the past 2-3 years.
It works with my hardware, and I consider it a proven kernel.
Why should I upgrade a working kernel?
Maybe that the time has come for Linus to take in some consideration the need for a change in the kernel code model. As of today it is released as a monolythic piece of software wheighing 27+ MB of compressed code (almost 240 MB when uncompressed). /dev/null.
If you add this to the complexity of an OS anyone can easily understand why a "partitioned" schema would greatly help the development.
Of course I'm also thinking about an oldish querelle between Linus and Andy Tanenbaum about monolythic kernel and microkernel approaches. I'm not talking just about this, but at least about partitioning of the code into (almost) independed units.
And maybe a microkernel approach could help to move in this direction: none can deny that both of them have a lot to teach about OSes.
Please, send flames to
Maybe Computers will never be as intelligent as Humans.
For sure they won't ever become so stupid. [VR-1988]