Linux Kernel 6.1 releases
The Linux kernel is an open source monolithic Unix-like computer operating system kernel. The Linux family of operating systems is based on this kernel and deployed on both traditional computer systems such as personal computers and servers, usually in the form of Linux distributions, and on various embedded devices such as routers, wireless access points, PBXes, set-top boxes, FTA receivers, smart TVs, PVRs, and NAS appliances. The Android operating system for tablet computers, smartphones, and smartwatches uses services provided by the Linux kernel to implement its functionality. While the adoption on desktop computers is low, Linux-based operating systems dominate nearly every other segment of computing, from mobile devices to mainframes. As of November 2017, all of the world’s 500 most powerful supercomputers run Linux.
The Linux kernel was conceived and created in 1991 by Linus Torvalds for his personal computer and with no cross-platform intentions, but has since expanded to support a huge array of computer architectures, many more than other operating systems or kernels. Linux rapidly attracted developers and users who adopted it as the kernel for other free software projects, notably the GNU Operating System. The Linux kernel has received contributions from nearly 12,000 programmers from more than 1,200 companies, including some of the largest software and hardware vendors.
Larry Ewing, Simon Budig and Anja Gerwinski [Public domain or Attribution], via Wikimedia Commons
Linux Kernel 6.1 RC8 released.
So here we are, a week late, but last week was nice and slow, and I'm
much happier about the state of 6.1 than I was a couple of weeks ago
when things didn't seem to be slowing down.
Of course, that means that now we have the merge window from hell,
just before the holidays, with me having some pre-holiday travel
coming up too. So while delaying things for a week was the right thing
to do, it does make the timing for the 6.2 merge window awkward.
That said, I'm happy to report that people seem to have taken that to
heart, and I already have two dozen pull requests pending for tomorrow
in my inbox. And hopefully I'll get another batch overnight, so that I
can try to really get as much of the merge window done with early. We
all want to have a calm holiday season.
And because of that "we all want to have a calm holiday season", I
want to re-iterate that I'm going to be pretty strict about the merge
window rules. The rules are that the pull requests sent to me during
the merge window should have been ready _before_ the merge window, and
have seen some time in linux-next. No last-minute batch of
experimental new development that hasn't been seen by our test
automation.
So to make my life easier, I will just drop any pull requests that
come in late, or that look like they haven't been in linux-next. This
time of year, we're all going to be much happier to deal with the
stress of the season _without_ having to deal with the stress of any
late development. So if you already realize that work hasn't been in
linux-next, let's just all agree to not even send me the pull request
at all, and we'll all be happy with the calm end-of-the-year season.
Ok?
Anyway, I think I've harped on that enough, let's just enjoy this
release and the upcoming festivities. As can be seen from the shortlog
below, last week really was very quiet, and it's mainly a few
last-minute fixes mostly dominated by drivers (networking in
particular, but there's some media, HID and GPU noise in there too).
Linus
