2.6.13 Linux Kernel Released 464
LynuxFre@k writes "Linux Torvalds announced the release of the 2.6.13 Linux kernel. He noted that there was a major change to the x86 PCI code, and that while all bugs from the change were believed to be found during the release candidate phase, it's possible that some devices may have problems. From this release on, it is intended that major changes only be merged into the kernel within two weeks after a major release. The rest of the time will be spent fixing bugs, with the goal of both increasing overall stability and decreasing the amount of time between major releases. Download the latest Linux kernel from a kernel.org mirror."
kernel bug fixes (Score:3, Insightful)
I wish Linus would arrive at a policy and just stick with it instead of all these gyrations of "we'll use this method from now on...no wait...we'll use this one from now on...and by the way I want everyone to switch revision control systems now...oh wait...sigh.
Re:kernel bug fixes (Score:3, Insightful)
I wish Linus would just stick with fixing bugs in stable releases and leave major changes to development versions, but I guess that'd take finding him a new toy to play with.
Re:kernel bug fixes (Score:4, Insightful)
Then again, if it happens too often, more time is spent switching back and forth between the new "great" ideas than doing actual work.
Re:kernel bug fixes (Score:5, Insightful)
What exactly is wrong with refining the development process?
Re:kernel bug fixes (Score:5, Insightful)
Or how would you like them to do it? "We will do things this way, and by god, we will do it like this untill the end of time! Even if better ways of doing this comes along, we will not change our ways!"
Re:kernel bug fixes (Score:2, Insightful)
But... gee, if it bothers you that much you can point Andrew Morton to your kernel tree, or send him your patches. He does a pretty good job of ensuring things don't clash, and queues it up and merges with Linus, getting initial bug testing and review along the way.
Sorry (Score:4, Insightful)
Industry standard 3d, compositing and editing tools all run under linux which is the natural progression because of their IRIX legacy.
I've also done some DTP under linux but that probably wasn't professional, since I didn't just bang a series of poorly masked raster images together like most 'professional' agencies we dealt with.
Does this make me a linux fanatic?
Re:How about a stable ABI? (Score:2, Insightful)
Compiling and installing a new kernel isn't for everyone, that's why there are these collections of tested software known as "Linux Distros" where geeks get the software packaged nicely so you can use a GUI to do all your upgrading. If the CLI scares you so much and you want to use Linux, I'd recomend using Fedora or Ubuntu and sticking to standard packages.
Re:How about a stable ABI? (Score:4, Insightful)
You don't have to. years ago when I used SuSE, I never ever compiled anything, and I had no problems
Linux does have something similar. How about Yast or Synaptic or up2date? True, it's not identical to way things are done in Windows or OS X. But Linux is not Windows or OS X.
I don't think the kernel-developers are to blame if some GUI-tool doesn't do the job. They work on the kernel, not on the GUI.
Failed at what? To satisfy the whims of some random user who propably hasn't paid one dime for the software he's using? Here's a hint to you: they (the developers) don't owe you anything.
Re:How about a stable ABI? (Score:5, Insightful)
B) Fine. You come up with a GUI that can allow me to find files modified on the second Tuesday of every month between May 1, 1946 and June 27, 1978, which contain the words 'secret' and 'report' within 26 characters of each other, sort them by date, and replace any occurence of the word 'anchovie' by 'dead bug'. Some things GUI's just cannot do, some things GUI's do that are just command line interfaces in a fancy coloured textbox, some things GUI's can do once in the time that someone who knows the command can do twenty times.
Secondly, how do you expect a GUI to be able to do stuff like modify computer internals safely? Windows answer to this is usually that settings won't take effect until the next reboot, which makes your computer *stop all it's work* until it's done. X can be restarted with a single keystroke to have the same effect. Maybe a couple of command line edits in between but meanwhile none of your users have been disconnected, no programs have stopped doing what they were supposed to be doing.
Command-lines are not for the faint-of-heart. Then again, last time I touched the command line on my own Linux desktop (not counting other machines that are cmd-line only via SSH) was to run LILO - not something that a "desktop doughnut" should be doing. You obviously have either different ideas of what you should be doing on a normal desktop machine or have not found out how to do them GUI-wise. By the same token, Windows should never expect me to recover in safe mode, or via recovery console, or by running any batch commands ever. Fine for the ordinary desktop user because it very rarely does. Not fine for a power user. An ordinary desktop user wouldn't even notice if you ran a Windows GUI on a Linux machine.
C) Man pages can be a pain in the arse (make it compulsory to include enough examples to demonstrate every option!). HOWTO's are not always up-to-date. Forums are, pretty much, for people who want to know how to install this Linux thing they downloaded. Then again... how much documentation do you get with Windows?
A small booklet showing you how to use a mouse to point at the various icons. An online help system that, even with it's wizard-style help for some items, is next to useless if you don't know the terms to look for (I work support for six schools... that's about 60-100 staff and a few thousand pupils. I have NEVER seen or heard of anyone even bother to try using Windows Help or Help inside ANY program because it's never been useful to them). Annoying dogs, wizards, paperclips that people want me to TURN OFF for them because they can't figure out how.
That's surely Linux 0-0 Windows in terms of help.
If you're an advanced user, you've got to be comfortable with the command-line. I carry a USB key full of cmd-line utils and use them almost every day on Windows and Linux. It's amazing how much quicker "Start, Run, Cmd, ipconfig" is than navigating that poxy GUI network settings. And while I'm there, doing "route print" is the ONLY way to discover Windows network routes.
Anyone who's not going to set up networks or advanced stuff (i.e. users), or home users shouldn't ever NEED to worry about the command line on either OS. And they don't. They pick a distro like Lindows and once the installation is complete, they never see it again. Or they have a decent desktop set up and then never see the command-line again. You, however, are on the border. You are trying to do stuff that NEEDS a command line, stuff that's beyond a GUI point-and-click.
Re:How about a stable ABI? (Score:3, Insightful)
> I don't think the kernel-developers are to blame if some GUI-tool doesn't do the job. They work on the kernel, not on the GUI.
In fact, if some functionality requires a GUI, people like me are mightily upset. The moment I'm forced to drop to a goddamn GUI, you (the grandparent poster) as a whiny user have failed.
[Disclaimer: not a single byte of my code can be found in the official kernel tree, so take my words with a grain of salt. Still, I don't really imagine Linus using mouse for anything but cut&paste]
Re:More kernel crashes as of late? (Score:5, Insightful)
I've recently had networking go south when packets were being written to localhost. Some adaptec scsi stuff was recently messed up, apparently now fixed in 2.6.13 - but no way I'm going to try it until it's been out for a while. I've seen problems with quotas in combination with ext3. I recently started experiencing connection tracking weirdnesses with an iptables setup I've used at home for probably a couple of years. I've seen versions where network latencies would grow ever so slowly until they reached a critical threshold that sent my server(s) spiraling into oblivion. Yes, I file bug reports. Yes, problems get fixed. But at the same time, new ones show up. Sometimes bad ones.
I've become accustomed to rebooting Windows to fix problems, but that's exactly why I use Linux - because it was rock solid. I won't say that anymore, and it bums me out big time. I like new shiny objects too, but not at the expense of stability. Especially not on servers, which is where Linux has made the most headway.
The problem with the current versioning system is that even if there is a bug-fix only decimal release, and even if there is only a two week window to introduce new features, the bug fixing won't get done. Why? Because new features are more fun than fixing bugs. Even if I can't submit a new feature until several months from now, that doesn't mean I won't work on it in leiu of fixing bugs.
Linus should freeze the 2.6 kernel series against *any* new features at all, for a period of about a year. All work should be on increasing stability, ironing out bugs, improving device drivers, and other such menial housekeeping. The kernel contributers who really buck up, get to work, and help with this effort should get big karma bonuses from Linus. Those who hang back and work on their own thing should be pushed down a level in future kernel submission evaluations.
Sorry to be so negative, but I really hope this gets better. I'm a huge fan, but I have been wasting way too much time lately dealing with problems that end up being way beyond my control. When there is a problem with my systems, I want it to be my fault, because then I can do something about it.
Re:2.6 a year and a half old but... (Score:2, Insightful)
Debian Stable = things that have been 'thoroughly' tested for like 2 years or more. Hell, even using Debian Unstable, most of your software is still incredibly out of date.
Red Hat isn't quite as slow. But pretty darned slow.
Re:How about a stable ABI? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:kernel bug fixes (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:How about a stable ABI? (Score:4, Insightful)
Any time I'm forced to drop to a command line, you as a developer have failed.
Without getting into the whole "you have failed" thing and whether or not your particular requirements are some sort of mandatory minimum, it's my opinion that the same thing applies to GUIs. I think every piece of functionality should be available in three different ways:
The common Unix and OSS methodology is to build the command-line tools first, then factor out libraries and add GUI interfaces that use either the libraries or even the command-line tools underneath. So, it's common that features are accessible for a while from the command line, but not from the GUI. In the Windows world, the methodology is to construct the GUI first, then expose functional components via OLE and then, maybe, to create command-line tools. Of course, it's very common in the Windows world to stop after the GUI.
IMO, the Unix and OSS approach is superior because it improves the odds that all three interfaces will be implemented, leading to maximum functionality not only for novices, but also for power users and developers. But I won't clam that Microsoft has "failed" because I understand the difference between my opinion and global Truth.
Re:How about a stable ABI? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:kernel bug fixes (Score:3, Insightful)
This case is typical of most such "policy changes" in that he's really just voicing something that's been a defacto policy for a while. All of 2.6 has followed the pattern that the biggest changes went in at the beginning of the -rc, with later -rc's being for stabilization, it's just that this hasn't been an explicit policy and hasn't been consistently enforced, so there have been some weird exceptions.
Linus has switched revision control systems twice in the history of the kernel. The first time, from nothing to Bitkeeper, took a long time to happen. The second, from Bitkeeper to Git, was obviously much more sudden. But Linus didn't really have much choice (except that many would argue it was partly his fault for choosing Bitkeeper in the first place).
Those of us that aren't among the few big subsystem maintainers mostly haven't been affected since most of us just rely on emailing patches and ignore bitkeeper and git anyway.
From the point of someone just reading slashdot or kerneltrap it may look like things are changing very often. But really these changes have been pretty gradual.
--Bruce Fields
Re:2.6 a year and a half old but... (Score:1, Insightful)
Nonsense? Ah, so you've never seen an update screw the pooch or a supposed migration that was supposed to be easy as pie go totally awry on a mission critical system.
Yeah, it's called "if it works, don't fuck with it unless you have a damned good reason." Just because a newer version comes out is not a valid reason unless it supports a feature that your shop cannot live without.
Re:More kernel crashes as of late? (Score:5, Insightful)
Not me.
But it's very hard to generalize from one person's experience to any general "recent trend of unstability." Most of the bugs are in drivers, so people's experiences tend to be highly dependent on exactly which hardware they have.
--Bruce Fields
Re:Why is Linux so great? Please share your reason (Score:3, Insightful)
What's sad is that you see them coming from far far away, but the worst is that their arguments are always flawed.
So they play with emotional things, and don't even get that right (Linux is *not* user friendly, and until it is linux will stay with > 1% marketshare, I suppose they meant < 1 %
And then, say stupid things like :
Take installation. Linux zealots are now saying "oh installing is so easy, just do apt-get install package or emerge package": Yes, because typing in "apt-get" or "emerge" makes so much more sense to new users than double-clicking an icon that says "setup".
Eliminating the context, and deliberately forgetting the part about the GUI, like Synaptic or Mandrake Update (which are available in the menu, with names like "Update your system" or "Add new applications").
But wait, they are even more stupid than that !!!! They have no shame. They even talk about the difficultly of Linux configuration issues and then, to illustrate that, ask How do I get Quake 3 to run in Linux?. Which of course, has nothing to do with Linux configuration issues, and everything to do with the Quake 3 editor not providing a convenient installation method. I don't know Quake 3 per se, so I can't verify what these unreliable sources say, but if these guy http://wcuniverse.sourceforge.net/ [sourceforge.net] can provide an installation file for their Open Source game that works on any Linux thanks to the very old Loki installer, I think any proprietary company can do it too.
Oh but wait, I checked and Quake 3 actually comes with the same installer at least for the french version !!!!
But of course, this old troll had to detail all the installation instructions of the NVidia driver and whatnot for XFree, to sound complicated. Trolls these days
Heck, today I just saw "X does not support PNP displays", "X is slow", "Linux has bad font support"
Fortunately, anti-Linux trolls do not include "Linux has no games" when they talk about difficulty of installing Quake 3 on it, thank god !
Re:Devfs removed (Score:5, Insightful)
udev pushes all the device naming policy to userspace. Moving policy stuff to userspace is something that linux developers (and hackers of other OSes too) love because it's a much better design. That was the main reason for udev.
Re:kernel bug fixes (Score:3, Insightful)
We've been using SuSE Enterprise server on H/P DL hardware here and it is absolutely rock solid. We've been replacing HPUX with SuSE, and no matter how these boxes are pounded they handle the load very gracefully and without any hint of trouble. We're pleased to find that the 2.6 kernel scales much better than the old 2.4, so the difference has been all good - oh and we don't bother compiling our own kernels, we leave that to Novell/SuSE since we've got other things to do, and they've been doing a great job.
Just some real world data as a counterpoint to the FUD.
Re:Tannenbaum's Revenge? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:How about a stable ABI? (Score:3, Insightful)
"Why do all these lusers keep using crappy Windows? They should use a product that they don't understand and that we refuse to improve for them because it's free and we don't owe them anything!"
Because THAT'S a good sales pitch...
Re:kernel bug fixes (Score:3, Insightful)
Even if he has reported bugs, with the new features breaking stuff, he would probably find new bugs next release. But the fact of the matter is that 2.6 is less stable and it is the new development method that is to blame. Most people don't have time to track down bugs of this nature, especially in a bussiness environment where the OS is just supposed to work. If Linus and gang are looking for Linux to just be some developers toy where the fun is in creating and fixing things then they are doing the right stuff but if they want to make a reputation for solid systems that bussinesses can use, they are making a mistake. When someone relies on an OS to do multimillion dollar transactions and it goes down, they don't want to hear "I am sending in a bug report to the kernel mailing list right now".
Re:2.6 a year and a half old but... (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm using 2.4 under Debian (Woody, or Old-Stable) for the past 2-3 years.
It works with my hardware, and I consider it a proven kernel.
Why should I upgrade a working kernel?
A new kernel model? (Score:2, Insightful)
If you add this to the complexity of an OS anyone can easily understand why a "partitioned" schema would greatly help the development.
Of course I'm also thinking about an oldish querelle [fluidsignal.com] between Linus and Andy Tanenbaum about monolythic kernel and microkernel approaches. I'm not talking just about this, but at least about partitioning of the code into (almost) independed units.
And maybe a microkernel approach could help to move in this direction: none can deny that both of them have a lot to teach about OSes.
Please, send flames to