Linux Kernel 2.6.32 LTS Has Reached End of Life 76
prisoninmate writes: At the end of January we reported the fact that the oldest long-term supported kernel branch, Linux 2.6.32, is about to reached its end of life in February 2016, as announced by Willy Tarreau, who said that there might be another point release in a few weeks if important things need to be fixed. Well, it took a little bit longer than two weeks, and on March 12, he published details about the last maintenance release in the series, Linux kernel 2.6.32.71 LTS, along with the official end of life announcement, recommending users to move to the Linux 3.2 branch.
Age? (Score:2)
Re:Age? (Score:4, Informative)
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The 2.6 branch of Linux was released in late 2003, so I am not really sure what point you are trying to make...
Longer than BSD, Windows of the same time period (Score:4, Informative)
In 2009, three kernels were released, Linux 2.32, FreeBSD 7, and Windows 7. FreeBSD 7 went eol four years later, in 2013. Windows 7 service packs also ended in 2013, Windows 7 mainstream support ended in 2015, Linux 2.32 will support will (somewhat) end in 2016.
So other operating systems have support for 4-6 years, Linux for 7 years.
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Bingo, RHEL 5+ matches the 10 year support lifecycle for Windows with the same ongoing support past that mark at $Millions per year. That hasn't always been true but as their customer base has grown into the same enterprise markets that Windows has existed in for some time they have had to match the same customer needs/wants/demands. The two support lifecycles even look largely the same with 5-6 years of feature changes followed by 4-5 years of security only patching. Again this matches the general desires
Kernels? (Score:1)
That seems to be a fairly misleading statement
Windows 7 isn't just a "Kernel", it's an Operating System. Ditto for FreeBSD 7. While the kernel may be the core of an OS, userland certainly plays a significant part as well, particular for a desktop OS. For example, on a Win7 64-bit machine, the actual kernel would probably be something like "6.1.7601.17592"
So comparing those three, it would be more fair to use something like a Linux distribution/version from that era, such as
* "Ubuntu Jaunty Jackelope" ( EOL O [ubuntu.com]
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Yes, but you can upgrade to the next/current version free of charge.
but enough about Windows...
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Only the desktop versions. If you're a company, you have to deal with Windows Server licences, Exchange, MS SQL server, MS Office, etc. The last major refresh we did cost over $700,000 to Microsoft in licenses, with the cost of hardware ($2.4 million) and labor ($??,???) counted separately. A linux update would have saved us over a million dollars between licences and hardware costs as the linux software equivalents had much lower hardware requirements to get the same performance. Exchange was the real
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huh, the 13 years of Linux 2.6 compares well with 12 years of solaris 9 (released Mar 2002 - EOL Oct 2014) or AIX 5.3 (Aug 2004-April 2012). Even the IBM mainframe OS don't go that long for major/minor point release (includes kernel)
yes the kernel version of each included with support compared to linux which is just the kernel
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You got 7 years of backported fixes for free. What are you bitching about? Commercial vendors demand payment for those services.
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Well, one advantage with Linux is if you really wanted to keep using 2.6 for some reason, you have the source code and you could keep patching in for as long as you want to. With your commercial vendors selling closed source software, when it goes out of support you're left hanging.
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Oh you crazy evolutionists.
Re:Well, that's it. (Score:4, Interesting)
That's the last kernel that I as an individual was vaguely able to keep up with. Now it's such a bloated mess that unless you've been part of the development team for decades, you're really not going to be able to maintain an understanding. It seems nearly every project in computing goes this way. Oh well, sic transit and stuff.
According to this chart [linuxcounter.net] 2.6.32 had ~9.8 MLoC so I'd say you weren't doing too shabby. In fact if you can keep up with over half the current kernel at ~16.8 MLoC, Linus might be hiring...
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2.6.32 had ~9.8 MLoC
Most of which are device drivers.
current kernel at ~16.8 MLoC
Most of which are device drivers, and some more device drivers.
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You are confusing the kernel and the system initialization process when the system boots ;-)
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Damn, been a while since I worked on the kernel (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm just a user now using Linux to write software for embedded systems.
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Well I played around with the kernel on the slackware 123 CD back in 1993 or something. Kernel must have been version 0.99.11 Alpha or something like that...
Back then, it was considered new ;-)
Finally! (Score:5, Informative)
As someone having to develop complex drivers for 3 years for this particular version of kernel because Cavium would not port their SDK to anything newer until couple years ago, I can honestly say, it was time... for a long time...
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But why is it when XP goes EOL and MS is starting it ignore 7 we all SCREAM ANTI CHRIST
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Because the vast majority can go from 2.6.32 to a newer kernel without noticing any negative side effects?
Version 4 didn't have in it's changelog "Now with spyware!"
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And those who want to stay on 2.6 are welcome to, and if there's a big enough community they could even conceivably manage to make changes/apply fixes on their own.
Try applying a Windows 7 security fix to Windows XP. Good luck with that.
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Proper analogy would be a windows 10 security fix to windows xp.
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Because windows 8+ comes with tons of caveats users don't want to deal with?
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Well we paid for XP and 7, and we don't have source code to fix it. But Microsoft is taking our toys away from us.
When Linux does an EOL, it means fewer people work on it. But there source code is there, and there is still some informal activity in the community when it comes to back porting security patches.
CHange for the sake of change (Score:5, Funny)
Oh here we go again! Linus wants more money and obsolete perfectly good computers so they can sell more apps on the Gnu appstore. THis is OUTRAGEOUS! We just upgraded from kernel 2.2 from 2001 last year and Linus ends support already?? Kernel 2.6.32 works just fine and is modern and well supported.
I can't believe users put up with this vandalism and forced obsolence. All the icons are in the wrong spot and my users can't handle change so quickly
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Re:CHange for the sake of change (Score:5, Funny)
Okay, everyone, say it with me now:
WhooooOOOooooosh
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*woosh*
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The icons have nothing to do with the Kernel. They're a product of the GUI.
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It's unlikely the craploads of malware currently in play would be able to target such an old kernel.
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Didn't they backport systemD to that Kernel?
Re:Implications for Centos & Scientific Linux (Score:3)
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Don't be fooled by the 2.6.32 in RedHat EL6 kernels. That was only the base level. RedHat constantly backports important updates from newer kernels. The latest version is 2.6.32-573.18.1 and still counting (N.B. 573 is somewhat higher than the 71 on the LTS). Mind you I do find the EL7 kernels to be more responsive, so there is always a good argument to upgrade, but no rush 2020 is still a few years away.