Zack's Kernel News
Zack's Kernel News

Chronicler Zack Brown reports on the latest news, views, dilemmas, and developments within the Linux kernel community.
Submitting Fixes to Various Trees
Greg Kroah-Hartman revealed a schism in the development process when he complained that he had more than 170 patches marked for the stable series that he couldn't apply because they hadn't gotten into Linus's tree yet.
One of the rules for the stable tree is that it only accepts patches after they are already in the main tree. This process may seem odd, but it's intended to prevent too much divergence between the trees. The thinking is also that anything good enough for the stable tree is good enough for the main tree, and the way to ensure that it actually goes into the main tree is to make that an explicit requirement.
Linus's development process has evolved quite a bit over the years, but at the moment it seems to start with a brief "merge window," during which time developers submit their patches. Then, it goes through a series of stabilizing release candidates – from -rc1
to -rc7
or -rc8
or thereabouts. After that, Linus releases a new official kernel version, and the process begins again.
[...]
Buy this article as PDF
(incl. VAT)
Buy Linux Magazine
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.

News
-
Red Hat Releases RHEL 10 Early
Red Hat quietly rolled out the official release of RHEL 10.0 a bit early.
-
openSUSE Joins End of 10
openSUSE has decided to not only join the End of 10 movement but it also will no longer support the Deepin Desktop Environment.
-
New Version of Flatpak Released
Flatpak 1.16.1 is now available as the latest, stable version with various improvements.
-
IBM Announces Powerhouse Linux Server
IBM has unleashed a seriously powerful Linux server with the LinuxONE Emperor 5.
-
Plasma Ends LTS Releases
The KDE Plasma development team is doing away with the LTS releases for a good reason.
-
Arch Linux Available for Windows Subsystem for Linux
If you've ever wanted to use a rolling release distribution with WSL, now's your chance.
-
System76 Releases COSMIC Alpha 7
With scores of bug fixes and a really cool workspaces feature, COSMIC is looking to soon migrate from alpha to beta.
-
OpenMandriva Lx 6.0 Available for Installation
The latest release of OpenMandriva has arrived with a new kernel, an updated Plasma desktop, and a server edition.
-
TrueNAS 25.04 Arrives with Thousands of Changes
One of the most popular Linux-based NAS solutions has rolled out the latest edition, based on Ubuntu 25.04.
-
Fedora 42 Available with Two New Spins
The latest release from the Fedora Project includes the usual updates, a new kernel, an official KDE Plasma spin, and a new System76 spin.