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Linux 4.18 Releases With Steam Controller Kernel Driver, Spectre Updates (phoronix.com)
fstack writes: Linus Torvalds has released Linux 4.18 as the newest kernel bringing a Steam Controller kernel driver, Spectre updates for ARM64, power management updates, a "Restartable Services" system call, AMD Radeon graphics driver improvements, V3D DRM as Broadcom's new graphics driver, DM writecache support, USB 3.2 support, and many other updates. Linus Torvalds wrote of the 4.18 final release: "It was a very calm week, and arguably I could just have released on schedule last week, but we did have some minor updates. Mostly networking, but some vfs race fixes (mentioned in the rc8 announcement as 'pending') and a couple of driver fixes (scsi, networking, i2c). Some other minor random things (arm crypto fix, parisc memory ordering fix)." In a separate article, Phoronix details all the changes and new features available in this release.
What a guy. Should win a Nobel prize. Best buy in tech ever.
Get used to it: we are going to get Spectre updates for years. That one will never be completely patched in software.
Great! Now we're just waiting on a decent text editor...
#DeleteChrome
The brash braniac that he is, wonder whats his take on the ToRs...
It might make the updates before 18.10 is ready. The rate of uptake with new kernels seems to have increased with Ubuntu and derivative distros. Not sure why you would want Steam gaming inside the kernel, but then these are deep technical matters. As long as it works and doesn't break my day, whatever.
Emacs is now part of systemd. It can now be used to edit binary blobs. Ascii file support has been deprecated in the new systemd.emacs.
why we need a kernel driver for a gaming device ? surely there is some userland service or something that can talk usb hid ?
The Steam Controller, is a hand controller for playing Steam games.
It is not, disappointingly, a gadget for controlling steam engines.
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
Man, I knwe Linux was all about supporting old devices, but this is Steampunk-grade.
Singularity: a belief in the "God" idea with the "demiurge" relation inverted.
The annoying part about SystemD is that like PulseAudio, a previous Pottering project known to be a buggy mess (at least until some more competent management came in and fixed it), it's a genuinely needed replacement for something aging and badly outdated.
Unfortunately people are too aware of the pitfalls of NIH syndrome so you're not going to be able to get enough members of the open source community to create a competently done init replacement to replace an incompetently done one that still (somewhat) works.
"Why should I want to make anything up? Life's bad enough as it is without wanting to invent any more of it."
Why not trying by yourself?
If the procedure to update kernel looks complex, you may just use the Ukuu very simple updater (actually just a wrapper, with nice explanations, and even available within U. app store itself IIRC).
I for one am using the latest 4.17 kernel (from two days ago), installed via Ukuu, on all my Ubuntu 16 LTS machines*.
(Ukuu even explains you how to proceed if you loaded a failed kernel, with a simple action to switch back to your previous one. Which happened to me once in the last 20 updates (an obviously too small download that I would now detect), and I did switch back in something like 5 mn, reboots included.)
(*) OK, two machines ;-)
Herve S.
They retire that pile of shit yet or is Poettering still sucking everyone's dicks to keep it?
Given Linus's own comments on the matter why would you think anyone who matters cares?
The dongle still works better then bluetooth, if you can deal with a thingy sticking out of your PC
Sure, there are other init systems, but none of them are as well supported as init or SystemD. As for distros without SystemD, they're more of a developer demonstration rather than anything maintained as a proper distro meant for production use.
"Why should I want to make anything up? Life's bad enough as it is without wanting to invent any more of it."
What's wrong with vim? ;)
*grabs popcorn*