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2.6 Linux Kernel in Need of an Overhaul?
toadlife writes "ZDNet UK reports that Andrew Morton, the head maintainer of the Linux production kernel, is concerned about the amount of bugs in the 2.6 kernel. He is considering the possibility of dedicating an entire release cycle to fixing long standing bugs." From the article: "One problem is that few developers are motivated to work on bugs, according to Morton. This is particularly a problem for bugs that affect old computers or peripherals, as kernel developers working for corporations don't tend to care about out-of-date hardware, he said. Nowadays, many kernel developers are employed by IT companies, such as hardware manufacturers, which can cause problems as they can mainly be motivated by self-interest."
About a month ago this blue screen appeared on a Windows 2003 Server Appliance Edition NAS BOX. Attempt to mount an NFS share served by the windows NAS, and boom blue screen. This is a commercial NAS box running a supposidly ultra stable version of windows for such devices. I would have picked the linux powered box but it wasn't my choice.
As I replied to your post's parent, dodgy drivers are often the culprit. Firewalls and virus checkers in particular often install really weird kernel drivers which are often just buggy. The same thing is probably possible with things like spyware and so on, especially if they use rootkits and the like. It's not so much a problem with Windows as it is a problem with unreliable third-party stuff, in my experience.
Of course, if it's spyware, Windows should have at least prompted the user before they installed something so fundamental to the system. On the other hand, even if it did, many users will just click past.