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Linux Kernel 6.0
- linsomniac 4y agoMajor versions of Linux used to be awaited with bated breath. For many years I ran a "Linux kernel major release pool", which probably nobody here remembers, but it was fairly popular. Npw, it's fairly boring when a new release comes out. Don't get me wrong, I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing...
- WastingMyTime89 4y agoIt’s mostly because Linux stopped having major release. Linus changes the first number when he finds that the second one is growing too big which apparently means twenty-ish.
- yjftsjthsd-h 4y agoI personally wish it had gone semver and the version expressed how "boring" and stable it was; "Linux 6.0" sounds like a big deal (but in spite of all the features and changes really isn't*), where "Linux 2.1028.0" would better reflect the reality IMO - smooth, stable progression. * EDIT: In the sense of being non disruptive and safe; the features are very non-boring:)
- capableweb 4y agoSemver makes sense when you want to have a way of breaking the API interface and signal that to people. If there is one thing I've learned from reading various messages from Linus on the mailing lists, is that WE DO NOT BREAK USERSPACE! So Linux would be perpetually on the same major version, which means there is little reason to use Semver in this case. Also, the first number gets updated whenever Linus feels like the second number gets too large, not sure how "2.1028.0" would solve that :)
- yjftsjthsd-h 4y ago> So Linux would be perpetually on the same major version, Yes:) > which means there is little reason to use Semver in this case. Okay, that's fair. If semver is there to signal breaking changes and there will never be breaking changes maybe it's not super useful. > Also, the first number gets updated whenever Linus feels like the second number gets too large, not sure how "2.1028.0" would solve that :) That's not "also"; I'm specifically saying that Torvald's versioning system is bad. Honestly I'd be happier with losing the leading number completely and doing an increment per feature release; right now the "major" version field just doesn't mean anything.
- creshal 4y agoSemver makes really no sense. The userspace ABI tries to never have breaking changes; yet the internal APIs for use by drivers, and indeed the drivers themselves, can have breaking changes every single release. Not that most users care, as most of the tens of thousands of devices supported are fairly obscure and the changes don't affect the other users… yet kernel API changes that break, say, Nvidia's drivers or ZFS or other high-profile out of tree drivers, have an outsized effect. You either have to increase the semver major version with every single release, or somehow version internal APIs separately, which isn't really practical either.
- bombcar 4y agoI still have scars from 2.4->2.6.
- kstrauser 4y agoThat was an exciting year, in the “our house is on fire” sense.
- Gibbon1 4y agoMy companies first embedded linux project was right smack in the middle of that. I think there were some big changes in gcc. NAND flash was relatively new. So much out of date docs, broken/incompatible code, and false starts.
- stusmall 4y agoI was working on an embedded system long after that transition happened. The BSP we got from the chip vendor was still targeting 2.4. We had to port all the drivers over ourselves. The long tail of old software in embedded world is ridiculous and painful
- mschuster91 4y agoAt least Android did a good job in forcing chipset vendors to keep up their BSPs with recent kernel versions... basically every chipset in use by anything with Android will have a decently modern kernel version. Now, if Google would also enforce open-source compliance... the amount of hoops one has to jump through to get OSS dumps is absurd, and most of these lack critical parts (e.g. build toolchain, kernel config, partition layouts, DTBs) so it's OSS in theory but unusable to develop alternative OSes in practice.
- midislack 4y ago2.4.15 was still the very best Linux kernel, everything bloated like crazy afterwards.
- ajsnigrutin 4y agoBut we did get alsa in our kernels :D
- saagarjha 4y agoThat’s because major releases are done when Linus feels like it, not because there’s something major in the new release.
- ajsnigrutin 4y agoI blame browsers for this... They were the ones who started the "version inflation", where a new major version meant almost nothing... and everything else followed slowly. The problem i see is, what's next? Google chrome is at 106... a few more years, and 200.. 300? What happens if linus runs out of fingers for the major number too? I miss the "good old times", where 2.4.17->2.4.17.1 meant a minor patch, ->2.4.18 meant a new version with some new features, -> 2.6.x meant some large changes, and 3.x meant something huge, with possible backwards incompatibilities and making you choose, between a mature 2.x version vs a newish 3.x version.
- eesmith 4y agoThe "good old times" include Solaris 2.6 -> Solaris 7 ;)
- gruturo 4y agoWhile true, that was also SunOS 5.6 to SunOS 5.7. One name for the marketing brochures, one for techies (and their scripts). Works for me.
- ChrisRR 4y agoLinux version 2 was release in June 1996, and v3 in July 2011 15 years later. Everything in-between was incremental. This massively predates web browsers with 100 versions
- ajsnigrutin 4y agoLinux v3 should be 2.6.40 Also in 2011 firefox went from "slow versioning" (up to version 4) to a new major version number every few months... the unofficial reason was, that chrome was "overtaking" firefox in version numbers, and "higher number == better browser" (chrome went from 9 to 16 that year).
- osigurdson 4y ago>> Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds I hadn't realized that before. The link below discusses the reasons why this was done. https://www.linux.com/news/linux-mark-institute-protecting-linux-trademark/ https://www.linux.com/news/linux-mark-institute-protecting-l...
- Waterluvian 4y agoFascinating. So he’s basically the BDFL of the name by making sure one person (him) can police its use.
- 0x6c6f6c 4y agoLeaving it some entity like the Linux Foundation likely would have been much much worse.
- hoseja 4y ago"As a CEO of Linux Foundation, I too deserve a competitive compensation package, like the CEO of Mozilla Foundation."
- bamboozled 4y agoIs this a real quote ?
- hoseja 4y agoNo, just an extrapolation.
- bamboozled 4y agoWhy would that be worse ?
- capableweb 4y ago"Design by committee" is a great way to create something that works for a lot of people, but is average at best. If you want to create something that really excels, you need someone to drive home the vision and that's really hard to do when you're more than one, because it's really hard to be 100% on the same page. Not to say it's impossible, it's just a lot harder.
- keepquestioning 4y agoSo what are the headline grabbing features?
- shmerl 4y agoamdgpu has finally fixed the flickering bug for high refresh rate displays.
- remexre 4y agoublk -- performant user-space block drivers; though maybe it's not of the most utility unless the network-raid things companies have been building on it get open-sourced (might've already happened, I haven't been following closely)
- stevefan1999 4y agothis could benefit ZFS and FUSE as a whole
- zamalek 4y agoA very Intel ACPI hack was ruining AMD Zen performance in some scenarios (up to 1000%). Real-world (non-benchmark) perf has yet to be determined. [1]: https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/tip/tip.git/commit/?h=x86/urgent&id=e400ad8b7e6a1b9102123c6240289a811501f7d9 https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/tip/tip.git/...
- butterisgood 4y agoIt’s adopted a new, modern, microkernel design. … kidding
- LAC-Tech 4y agoIt's very easy to armchair criticise the linux kernel, but it's surely one of the marvels of modern software engineering in terms of size, scope, usage and longevity. Well done to the team.
- travisgriggs 4y agoAgreed. What amazes me is that they (and a number of other projects) do it without any traditional “management.” Sure, there might be a release manager, but it’s more like a coordinator/comptroller function. It’s just a bunch of (mostly)”let’s act like adults” sort of people, and without all of the bureaucracy that usually accompanies some of even the smallest software efforts, it just keeps going.
- imiric 4y agoIt's inspirational, to say the least. Linux is a testament that a truly distributed team can not only work efficiently, but deliver a successful product. I'm inclined to think that it's partly because they're not chasing growth metrics, have to report to stakeholders, etc. Most companies drown in the overhead related to such processes.
- ianlevesque 4y agoI don’t disagree but there are many corporate contributors who are getting paid based on the success of the optimizations and features they upstream to the kernel. At FAANG it’s the same metrics-based success you refer to.
- cpach 4y agoGood point. But there’s not one such paradigm ruling the whole process of developing Linux. I guess we actually could say there are competing paradigms.
- pmontra 4y agoThose corporations work together to contribute to the same open source code base and at the same time they are trying to (commercially) kill each other. Quite a wonder.
- nirui 4y agokernel.org still showing 5.19.12 at this moment. Guess it will be updated soon :D
- fabianhjr 4y agoAlready tagged on git: https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/tag/?h=v6.0 https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/lin...
- Iwan-Zotow 4y agoWaiting for kernel 6.6.6
- chungy 4y agoGiven the release cadence of Linux, I'll predict 6.6.6 to come out in August 2023.
- collegeburner 4y agoi hope Linus skips that version or goes 6.6.5 to 6.7.0.
- chungy 4y ago6.6.6 would be a patch release to 6.6 and Linus almost never bothers with those. It'll be more the territory of Greg Kroah-Hartman. 6.5, 6.6, 6.7 will be major versions of the kernel. All of them will receive patch releases (6.5.1, 6.6.6, 6.7.2, etc); one of them may become LTS, they may not. Whether gkh decides to skip 6.6.6 and go to 6.6.7 instead, that's up to him, but it'd probably cause more issues with scripts than it'd be worth it. I get that people can be superstitious, but imo it's not worth it.
- PieUser 4y agoCan someone explain what Linus meant by "running out of fingers and toes"? EDIT: Ah I got the joke - he meant DIGITS!
- chomp 4y agoLinus used to post to Google+, so a lot of the original posts are gone to the wind, however, he originally said that he'd bump major versions when the numbers get too big, i.e. he runs out of fingers and toes to count the minor version. Here's an article for reference (2015): https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2015/02/linux-version-dilemma-linus-torvalds-is-running-out-of-fingers-and-toes/ https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2015/02/linux...
- smashed 4y agoThe last release number was 5.19. Linux 6.0 could have been versioned as 5.20 but Linus chose 6.0 out of thin air. Nothing more nothing less.
- usr1106 4y ago4.20 exists, but 3.20 and 5.20 don't. I don't think there is any meaning to the numbers. It has been "the next release" since the 2.15 branch has been abandoned.
- awill 4y agoyou have 10 fingers and 10 toes. 10+10=20. So instead of 5.20, he named it 6.0
- GoblinSlayer 4y agoBut 20 is countable with fingers and toes.
- berkut 4y agoNot if you start from 0 :)
- szastamasta 4y agoIt maybe off-topic, but don’t you think that semver is somewhat dead if even kernel (software everyone depends on) does not use it any more? According to semver there should be some heavy incompatible changes in this release, while it’s only a regular update. Maybe we should all just agree that semver is simply a pipe dream and we are never sure that lib update won’t break our app. Or that lib maintainers take compatibility really serious and they don’t break it, like kernel hackers do.
- CorrectHorseBat 4y agoThe kernel has never used semver, and it doesn't have to because it never breaks userspace.
- szastamasta 4y agoWasn’t it that version 2.xx was introduced due to incompatible changes? At least it’s what i remember.
- broodbucket 4y agoDunno, but 2.x was ~20 years ago, things are different now
- szastamasta 4y agoSorry, it looks I’m a bit old :P
- jlokier 4y ago20 years was a friendly underestimate. 2.x was introduced 26 years ago ;-) If it helps, I remember the transition from Linux 0.99 to 1.0, the switch to ELF and Glibc, the first non-x86 architecture support, the introduction of kernel modules, threads being a new feature, and the dropping of 386 support - all but the last happened while I was using Linux as my desktop OS at my day job :-)
- indeyets 4y agoI wonder if various proxy software (haproxy?) would be able to benefit from these new uring features.
- guerrilla 4y agoBeautiful. And a sign that I'm very old. I started in the transition from 2.2 to 2.4 which I remember being a big deal but I don't recall why. Anyway, Linux has been my daily driver ever since. No regrets on that front.
- capableweb 4y agoThe architecture of the kernel changed a lot between those two versions. There was a lot of changes, more than what I could reasonable fit in a quick comment. Here is a quick overview: https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Kernel/Migrate_2.4_to_2.6 https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Kernel/Migrate_2.4_to_2.6