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Ubuntu 15.10 Kernel Regression That Broke Graphics Displays In VMWare Patched
prisoninmate writes: On Monday, February 22, 2016, Softpedia reported on the availability of new kernel updates for several of Canonical's supported Ubuntu Linux operating systems, including Ubuntu 15.10, for which five kernel vulnerabilities have been patched at that point in time. And from the looks of it, the respective kernel updates introduced a regression, which Canonical patched four days later, on February 26, 2016, saying that the issue was introduced along with the fixed vulnerabilities for Ubuntu 15.10 (Wily Werewolf) and it broke graphics displays for those running the OS in VMWare VMs.
News like this is important because it highlights the sorry state of Linux today.
Linux used to be all about quality, stability, reliability, and robustness. Linux is what we used to use when we wanted our computers to just work, and continue working.
Yet over the last 5 to 10 years, we've seen a massive decrease in quality across the board. It isn't just Ubuntu. This affects pretty much all distros.
Many of us switched to Linux in the first place because we were fed up with Windows repeatedly crashing, or Mac OS being too limited.
For a long time Linux was better than both of them. We could use Linux for months on end without it crashing, and it gave us the full power of a UNIX-like environment, too.
But that has been eroded away.
Like we see in this incident, Linux has become less-stable than Windows. First there are these kernel fixes, indicating a low quality to begin with. Then there was the regression introduced by the fixes, which further shows a lack of quality!
A kernel change should never break user space. Ever. As Linus Torvalds himself said, "If a change results in user programs breaking, it's a bug in the kernel. We never EVER blame the user programs. ... WE DO NOT BREAK USERSPACE!"
So not only is Linux now approaching the low level of stability we saw with Windows 95 and 98, but it's also stripping away the UNIX-like environment that made it so powerful. We're seeing more and more anti-UNIX software being included in most distributions, including systemd and GNOME 3.
So this makes many of us ask, Why the heck do we still use Linux?!
We need stability. We need a UNIX-like environment. We don't want to use Windows. Linux used to offer all of that, but no longer does. So many of us have moved to FreeBSD, with the rest going to OS X.
You might say, "Well, fuck off then! We don't need you!", but it turns out that we are the kind of people the Linux community desperately needs. We are the ones who contributed code, fixes, bug reports, and documentation. We are the people who helped make Linux what it is. As we've been slowly driven away from Linux we've seen the quality continue to fall and fall. We surely won't be coming back as long as that's the case!
So it could very well be a chicken-and-egg problem. Linux initially drew us in because it was better than the competitors. But now that it has become worse, thanks to efforts like systemd and GNOME 3, we are being driven away. And as we are driven away, Linux gets even worse and worse. But since it's getting worse, it doesn't draw us back in! The FreeBSD and OS X communities now benefit from our contributions, while Linux withers away.
If you run any NON LTS version of Ubuntu in Production then frankly, you deserve anything you get.
NON LTS versions are by their very nature unstable.
This is even truer because of the way Canonical use their own kernels which are forked from the mainstream one AND that they don't seem to contribute any patches back into the mainstream line.