Slashdot Mirror


Linus Torvalds Announces Ridiculously Small Second Linux 4.10 Release Candidate (softpedia.com)

The first day of 2017 starts off for Linux users with the release of the second RC (Release Candidate) development version of the upcoming Linux 4.10 kernel, as announced by Linus Torvalds himself. From a report on Softpedia: As expected, Linux kernel 4.10 entered development two weeks after the release of Linux kernel 4.9, on Christmas Day (December 25, 2016), but don't expect to see any major improvements or any other exciting things in RC2, which comes one week after the release of the first RC, because most of the developers were busy partying. With a total of 26 changes, Linux kernel 4.10 Release Candidate 2 is extremely small for an RC build, but Linus Torvalds decided not to skip it and interrupt the development cycle of Linux 4.10 just because of the Christmas and New Year's holidays. "It's been a really slow week between Christmas Day and New Years Day, and I am not complaining at all. It does mean that RC2 is ridiculously and unrealistically small," said Linus Torvalds in the mailing list announcement. "I almost decided to skip RC2 entirely, but a small little meaningless release every once in a while never hurt anybody."

43 comments

  1. There are no small releases. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Only small minds.

    1. Re: There are no small releases. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Small penises*

      - Your wife.

    2. Re: There are no small releases. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Small bank accounts*

      - Your ex wife

  2. Busy Christmas by doconnor · · Score: 2

    Back before development was professionalized, was Christmas a period of rapid change as kernel hackers finally had time off work to really dig into Linux?

    1. Re:Busy Christmas by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      ^ This.

      I finished 4 side projects over the holidays

    2. Re:Busy Christmas by Kjella · · Score: 2

      Back before development was professionalized, was Christmas a period of rapid change as kernel hackers finally had time off work to really dig into Linux?

      I doubt it. Many would be students and for Christmas they are busy with family things. The days it's soggy, windy and overall shitty to be out in late autumn or early spring long before exams would probably be the bulk of it.

      --
      Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
    3. Re:Busy Christmas by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Development over the holidays, including Christmas, is still a huge release/development period, especially for smaller/hobbyist projects. The kernel has sort of moved out of that scope as most kernel devs have turned pro, but if you look at other Linux-related projects, things still pick up over the holiday.

  3. Wait a Trump minute... by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 5, Funny

    The developers were partying during the holidays?! No wonder Linux for the Desktop isn't ready yet.

    1. Re:Wait a Trump minute... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Every day is Christmas for us ;)

    2. Re: Wait a Trump minute... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      GNU has done its part (GNOME).

      It's the Linux drivers and their documentation (ie. old and/or rude forum posts) that can be hellish, amongst other things.

    3. Re: Wait a Trump minute... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You think GNU's part consists of GNOME? A whole lot of GNU/Linux users have never seen GNOME. I've run it on a couple of live distros, but I've never installed it. I'm a KDE partisan. But GNU is still massively important to all of my operating systems (I think. I haven't bothered to check whether or not the FreeBSD-based NAS4Free uses GNU).

  4. Ridiculously Small? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Obviously to match his penis!

  5. The actual content by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Why link to the softpedia article instead of the actual mailing list post Linus made?

    http://lkml.iu.edu/hypermail/l...

    1. Re:The actual content by unixisc · · Score: 1

      What is 'ridiculously small'? Is it anything like 'embarrassingly parallel'?

    2. Re:The actual content by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I would prefer Linus to focus on cleaning up all of the 'unused variable" warnings and similar warnings. As a matter of fact, it would be fantastic if all of the developers of applications would clean-up these issues as well.

    3. Re:The actual content by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Variables is a flawed concept anyway. Everyone knows that the only solution is constants.

    4. Re: The actual content by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Why? The compiler removes them anyways. And btw I have never seen such a warning when compiling the kernel so I suspect that you are lying.

  6. Re:Is systemd separate from Linux? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    What is this systemd people keep speaking about? I have a Linux system, no "d" needed. What would "d" stand for, "dictator"?

  7. Re:Is systemd separate from Linux? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    I'm new to Linux, and I'm confused about how the kernel relates to systemd. Is the kernel a part of systemd? If they are separate, why?

    systemd is the Windowsification of Linux: take a corporate-mandated (I'm looking at YOU, Red Hat!) solution in search of a problem, and use it to break that which is not broken (even if it might need some improvment) in order to produce vendor lock-in as much as possible.

  8. Re:Is systemd separate from Linux? by Phusion · · Score: 1, Informative

    Systemd is kind of like the glue between applications and the kernel. It has replaced the init system that was the standard on many popular linux distros. You don't need to worry about that, this is the core of the linux OS and will do everything it's supposed to do on its own. You don't integrate this with an existing linux system, it's a standalone. Also, since you're a linux noob, you should just stick to Linux Mint or maybe one of the versions of Ubuntu that doesn't ship with Unity, like Kubuntu or Xubuntu. You can find them here --> Kubuntu http://www.kubuntu.org/getkubu... Xubuntu https://xubuntu.org/getxubuntu... If you have a working Windows or Mac computer, you can use virtualization software like VirtualBox to set up a VM of pretty much any distro you want, running in a window (or full screened) on top of Windows or OSX. It's a great way to test out a full install without hosing your primary partition. This project (RSL) is not for beginners, so stick with an established desktop distro instead.

    --
    640k ought to be enough for anyone.
  9. Re:Is systemd separate from Linux? by ls671 · · Score: 0

    you are missing a third component to understand everything clearly: kerneld

    IMHO, I believe systemd is spying on kerneld but I ain't too sure ;-(

    http://tldp.org/HOWTO/Kerneld/...

    --
    Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
  10. Re:Is systemd separate from Linux? by Billly+Gates · · Score: 1

    I'm new to Linux, and I'm confused about how the kernel relates to systemd. Is the kernel a part of systemd? If they are separate, why?

    No it is not!

    Read the headline. The kernel is supposed to be small?! Clearly it runs on top of the SystemD OS

  11. Linux users? Partying? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That must refer to "building world" and watching the compiler output for days straight.

  12. Re:Is systemd separate from Linux? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If this is what an experienced linuxer sounds like, then i really don't want to hear a newbie. Shudder.

  13. Bug free open source by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heartbleed
    Henson failed to notice a bug in Seggelmann's implementation, and introduced the flawed code into OpenSSL's source code repository on December 31, 2011

    Cowards! Clearly developing over the holidays could never lead to a serious defect.

    1. Re:Bug free open source by dgatwood · · Score: 1

      Yup. Murphy's Law tells us that this ridiculously small update probably introduces either a serious security hole or a rare but catastrophic data loss bug. :-)

      --

      Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.

  14. Re: Is systemd separate from Linux? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The Linux kernel is a component of SystemD. When booting the computer, you can choose which version of the kernel to use (the latest versions usually contain major bugs) or even an alternative kernel like BSD. Because of SystemD, you don't need to change all your configuration and settings only because of the choice of kernel.

    At least, this is how it should be.

  15. there is no such thing by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    as only a small release in a Dev cycle.
    Heavy testing on a small release will help vet everything in it. Which will lead to code that matures faster.

    Stability
    Reliability
    Robustness

  16. Define "small". by Ungrounded+Lightning · · Score: 1

    As I read behind the headline, "small" means "small number of changes".

    As I read the headline itself, "small" sounds like "tiny memory footprint".

    Reading the headline I expected it to be notice that Linus had released a stripped down kernel for platforms that need a minimal functionality kernel because they have limited resources or need substantial security auditing and thus a kernel with no unnecessary code to be examined for security issues. That's not what I find the article to be about, at all.

    Dang!

    Can someone retroactively update the article title to clarify this?

    --
    Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
    1. Re:Define "small". by fbobraga · · Score: 1

      As I read behind the headline, "small" means "small number of changes".

      As I read the headline itself, "small" sounds like "tiny memory footprint".

      yeap, exactly same case here

    2. Re:Define "small". by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      or better can someone make Ridiculously Small Second Linux? please?

    3. Re:Define "small". by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Ah yes, there are always those people who expect Slashdot Editors to Edit.

  17. not meaningless by AndyKron · · Score: 1

    "but a small little meaningless release every once in a while never hurt anybody." FUCK anybody who says that. I get enough small meaningless updates all the time, and I'm about ready to chuck this fucking computer crap out the window because of it.

    1. Re:not meaningless by nadass · · Score: 0

      "but a small little meaningless release every once in a while never hurt anybody." FUCK anybody who says that. I get enough small meaningless updates all the time, and I'm about ready to chuck this fucking computer crap out the window because of it.

      I'm fairly certain that the Internet would not care.

    2. Re:not meaningless by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "but a small little meaningless release every once in a while never hurt anybody." FUCK anybody who says that. I get enough small meaningless updates all the time, and I'm about ready to chuck this fucking computer crap out the window because of it.

      Unless you go to heroic lengths, aside from reading this article you will not be impacted by this whatsoever. I'd recommend you chill out (& get some fresh air).

  18. Linus Torvalds Announces Ridiculously Small... by ntrfug · · Score: 1

    This sounds more like a 4/1 announcement than a 4.10.

  19. Re:Is systemd separate from Linux? by ls671 · · Score: 1
    --
    Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
  20. [sigh] You don't understand the context by daboochmeister · · Score: 1

    No "release rage" outburst warranted, and both your computer and window should be left alone. He's talking about one of the incremental internal releases of the Linux kernel, on the way to a final 4.10 Linux kernel release, some weeks from now..

    --
    "Ahh! I see you're in that indeterminate Schrodinger state where - oh, uh ... never mind." Dave Bucci