Linux Foundation's 'Super-Long-Term Stable Kernel Program' Announces 10 Years of Support for Its 6.1 Kernel (linuxfoundation.org) 17
Last week the Linux Foundation announced its Civil Infrastructure Platform project "has expanded its super-long-term stable kernel program with a 6.1-based series.
"Just like for the previously started kernel series (4.4-cip, 4.19-cip and 5.10-cip), the project is committed to maintaining the 6.1-cip kernel for a minimum of 10 years after its initial release." The Civil Infrastructure Platform project is establishing an open source base layer of industrial grade Linux to enable the use and implementation of software building blocks for civil infrastructure. The project's kernels are maintained like regular long-term-stable kernels, and developers of the CIP kernel are also involved in long-term-stable kernel review and testing.
While regular long-term-stable kernels are moving back to 2 years maintenance, CIP kernels are set up for 10 years. In order to enable this extended lifetime, CIP kernels are scoped-down in actively supported kernel features and target architecture. At the same time, CIP kernels accept non-invasive backports from newer mainline kernels that enable new hardware...
"The CIP kernels are developed and reviewed with the same meticulous attention as regular Long-Term-Stable kernels," said Yoshi Kobayashi, Technical Steering Committee Chair at the CIP project. "Our developers actively participate in reviewing and testing long-term-stable kernels, contributing to the overall quality and security of the platform. A key highlight is our work on the IEC 62443 security standard, aimed at fortifying the resilience of critical infrastructure systems."
"As 2023 comes to a close, the CIP project has stood as a beacon of stability and innovation, with a commitment to driving collaboration to strengthen this essential initiative," said Urs Gleim, Governing Board Chair at the CIP project...
The Civil Infrastructure Platform is driving open source collaboration and innovation around industrial grade software for prodúcts used in industrial automation and for civil infrastructure, such as trains and power grids. To learn more about the CIP project, including how to get involved and contribute, please visit our booth at the Linux Foundation Open Source Summit Japan, December 5 — 6, or visit our website.
"Just like for the previously started kernel series (4.4-cip, 4.19-cip and 5.10-cip), the project is committed to maintaining the 6.1-cip kernel for a minimum of 10 years after its initial release." The Civil Infrastructure Platform project is establishing an open source base layer of industrial grade Linux to enable the use and implementation of software building blocks for civil infrastructure. The project's kernels are maintained like regular long-term-stable kernels, and developers of the CIP kernel are also involved in long-term-stable kernel review and testing.
While regular long-term-stable kernels are moving back to 2 years maintenance, CIP kernels are set up for 10 years. In order to enable this extended lifetime, CIP kernels are scoped-down in actively supported kernel features and target architecture. At the same time, CIP kernels accept non-invasive backports from newer mainline kernels that enable new hardware...
"The CIP kernels are developed and reviewed with the same meticulous attention as regular Long-Term-Stable kernels," said Yoshi Kobayashi, Technical Steering Committee Chair at the CIP project. "Our developers actively participate in reviewing and testing long-term-stable kernels, contributing to the overall quality and security of the platform. A key highlight is our work on the IEC 62443 security standard, aimed at fortifying the resilience of critical infrastructure systems."
"As 2023 comes to a close, the CIP project has stood as a beacon of stability and innovation, with a commitment to driving collaboration to strengthen this essential initiative," said Urs Gleim, Governing Board Chair at the CIP project...
The Civil Infrastructure Platform is driving open source collaboration and innovation around industrial grade software for prodúcts used in industrial automation and for civil infrastructure, such as trains and power grids. To learn more about the CIP project, including how to get involved and contribute, please visit our booth at the Linux Foundation Open Source Summit Japan, December 5 — 6, or visit our website.
Re:Meticulous attention? (Score:5, Insightful)
This is mostly a lot like windows LTSC (former LTSB). It's intended for embedded systems that have minimal interest in patching and updates. Many of them will be "deploy once and forget" and never even touch internet. Some will have internet connectivity and receive some critical patches, but the focus is on maintaining the core functionality and compatibility with original setup, not "keeping it up to date".
Just like you don't tear up bridges because you decided that new type of piping going through it is slightly better than old one. You just leave it in until it's time to do a rehaul on the whole thing, and then you tear the old pipes out and put new ones in for another couple of decades, or whatever the expected age of that bridge until the next rehaul is.
Doesn't have $X feeture /s (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Doesn't have $X feeture /s
What are you? A gamer? Maybe a bleeding edge hardware sycophant? /s
Raises hand (Score:5, Insightful)
While regular long-term-stable kernels are moving back to 2 years maintenance, ...
How is 2 years seriously considered "long-term"?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
How is 2 years seriously considered "long-term"?
Simple, society has trained most younger generations to think:
1) Anything longer than 5 seconds is an eternity.
2) A device must be replaced at least once every 6 months to 2 years at most.
3) Anything not running the released-2-seconds-ago bleeding edge Alpha patch is "insecure" and "threatens" their security as well.
So you have them complain loudly when anyone talks about long term support for older versions of software / hardware. As it's unfathomable to them for devices / software to survive longer
Re: (Score:1)
Well many can no longer afford to buy cars and houses, and live from day to day...
The USA/Russia might start a nuclear war too. So what long term? ;)
But yeah it'd be stupid to have to keep migrating a zillion dollar chip fab from one foundation to a new slightly incompatible one every 18 months because the foundation is no longer supported by the vendor...
By the time you finish fixing and retesting zillions of potentially affected stuff, it's time to move again...
Great for "jobs", but not really an efficien
Re: (Score:2)
3) wouldn't be such an issue if the ecosystem was open (I actually mean collaborative though), instead of a bunch of fractured silos.
Re:Raises hand (Score:5, Interesting)
I makes sense if you consider the nomenclature is exclusively from the perspective of kernel developers.
* "Mainline" is the one developers are currently working on. Users never use "mainline".
* "stable" is the one developers already released (it's stable in the sense that features won't change, only bugfixes). Most end users don't use "stable" (it's too recent for distro release to include it).
* "longterm" are the 6 different versions for which the developers compromise themselves in maintaining for 2 years.
They could change the nomenclature to match what users expect: mainline -> beta; stable -> current; longterm -> stable. But the kernel.org nomenclature is not for end users, nobody other than kernel developers and distro maintainers are supposed to read the pages where these words appear.
Re: (Score:2)
How is 2 years seriously considered "long-term"?
How is it not? With the pace of development and of the discovery of new security holes, 2 years is a long time. I used to be one of those people who bragged about their long uptimes, but now I'm one of those people who reboots every day and is therefore running the updated kernel (or libc, or whatever) ASAP after a vulnerability is discovered.
It's not reasonable to expect old kernel versions to be updated for long periods without paying for the privilege. There's no good reason to stay on the old version fo
FAQ: Who are the founding members? (Score:3, Informative)
Who are the founding members?
Early supporters of CIP include Codethink, Hitachi, Plat’Home, Siemens and Toshiba.
Can my organization join?
Any organization can join this project. If your organization is NOT a member of The Linux Foundation, you need to join The Linux Foundation first.
How can I write code for the CIP code base?
Anyone can submit contributions to the project. We anticipate that the Technical Steering Committee will publish information on technical contributions shortly.
Who is expected to be an end-user of the CIP code?
Any technical systems responsible for supervision, control, and management of infrastructure supporting human activities, including, for example, electric power generation and energy distribution, oil and gas, water and wastewater, healthcare, communications, transportation, and community management. These systems deliver essential services, provide shelter, and support social interactions and economic development. They are society’s lifelines.
https://www.cip-project.org/faq [cip-project.org]
Table: CIP Reference Hardware (Score:2, Informative)
List of reference hardware and platforms, including x86-64, ARM v7/v8, and RISCV64, by supported kernel:
https://wiki.linuxfoundation.org/civilinfrastructureplatform/ciptesting/cipreferencehardware [linuxfoundation.org]
from https://www.cip-project.org/announcement/2022/08/11/cip-core-supports-debian-11-based-reference-images [cip-project.org])