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Kernel development

The 2.2 prerelease series has begun; as of this writing, the current version is 2.2pre5. Your editor, typing on a 2.2pre4 system, is quite content with the results. This kernel is clearly getting closer to release quality. A snapshot of the things remaining to be fixed can be seen on Alan Cox's 2.2 jobs list, but it tends to run behind at times (Alan is busy, fortunately, doing real work!).

Testing of 2.2 has brought out a few surprises thus far, including:

The ISDN code is old. This, apparently, is the result of a miscommunication between Linus and the ISDN developers, who thought last summer's code freeze was a code freeze. The ISDN patch is large, and Linus has expressed an unwillingness to integrate it at this point. So this one may have to wait for a later 2.2 release.
The kernel NFS daemon patches are missing; these patches were done by H. J. Lu and others, and have moved knfsd a long way toward actually working. According to Linus, this is a result of there being nobody who has really taken responsibility for the kernel NFS code. After this note, a few volunteers stepped forward, with G. Allen Morris III being the most attractive candidate. Allen has already contributed a number of NFS patches and is well respected in this area. Thanks are due to Allen for offering to help in this area.
The fact remains that 2.2 will go out with a sub-standard NFS server implementation. Unless something changes quickly, NFS over TCP will not be supported, and NVSv3 is beyond hope. With luck some of that will be remedied not too far into the 2.2 series.
There have also been some complaints about NFS file corruption, usually dealing with Solaris servers. It appears that at least some of those difficulties are due to a bug on the Solaris side.
People are having trouble building NTFS. Expect this one to be fixed shortly. There are also reports of problems with VFAT which seem to be being fixed quickly.
There are incompatibilities between the frame buffer console and some of the accelerated X servers. This one could prove harder; some video hardware is unpleasant stuff to deal with. It may be that the frame buffer console is a bad idea for people with at least some video cards.
On a related note, people interested in frame buffer device development may want to join this new mailing list for frame buffer developers.
The driver for Tulip-based ethernet cards is old and fails to work properly on a number of current cards. It also seemingly has problems on SMP systems. The current driver, instead, has some interoperability problems with the current kernel code, such that Linus does not want to use it. It's not clear what the solution to this one will be.
The "processor type" configuration option has a stronger effect now, meaning that if you try to run a kernel built for a Pentium Pro on a plain Pentium unpleasant things will happen at boot time. Some confusion resulted from the configuration options (Do you know if your processor has proper TSC support?), leading to a couple of rounds of changes. When configuring a kernel, be sure to get this option right (or go with the 'i386' option, which works on everything Intelish).

As was already said on the front page, now is the time to be finding any other problems that remain, before the 2.2.0 release goes out.

One other area of pre-2.2 activity is in tuning the virtual memory system for better performance, especially in tight memory situations. Andrea Arcangeli has been rapidly putting out patches, one of which, hopefully, will get folded in before 2.2 comes out. (Your editor is running arca-vm-8, the latest patch as of press time, with no ill effect, though the performance gains are hard to quantify).

The Linux Kernel Archive Mirror System is now active; see the announcement for more. The system seems to be working quite well, providing generally faster access for kernel downloads than going straight to ftp.kernel.org. The one complaint that has been raised is that not all of the mirrors have both the '.gz' and '.bz' kernel images. If that is truly a big problem for you, pick a server name like:

ftp.gz.us.kernel.org, or
www.bz2.uk.kernel.org

The first case connects to an FTP server in the U.S. which is known to carry '.gz' files. The second goes to a WWW server in the U.K. that has '.bz' files.

Kudos are due to H. Peter Anvin and all of the maintainers of the mirror sites for having set up a highly effective mirror system. Please make a point of using it when you grab your kernels.

The fourth 2.0.37 prepatch is available with lots of new updates; see the announcement for details.

The Linux-MM (memory management) page has moved. Update your bookmarks to the new site when you get a chance.

A new version of the international kernel patch is out, so that you can now add cryptographic capabilities to your 2.2pre kernel. See the announcement for details.

January 7, 1999

Since we're a weekly publication, chances are we'll be behind a rev or two on the kernel release by the time you read this page. Up-to-the-second information can always be found at LinuxHQ.

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