Current kernel release status

The current development kernel is 2.5.30, which was released by Linus on August 1. It includes the usual IDE patches (through IDE 111), changes to the "generic disk" data structure, the "strict overcommit" VM patch, the removal of the "khttpd" in-kernel web server, a number of devfs changes (by Greg Kroah-Hartman, and not entirely to devfs author Richard Gooch's liking), a long list of driverfs changes, and many other fixes and updates. See the long-format changelog for all the details.

Linus's BitKeeper tree (which will become 2.5.31) includes an ISDN update, more driverfs work, a JFS update, a lot of ethernet driver updates, and more. Interestingly, this tree also includes the "User-mode Linux preparation" patches, which make various changes to core code needed by UML. UML itself is not there yet, but the presence of these patches suggest that it is coming soon.

The current prepatch from Dave Jones is 2.5.30-dj1, which contains a small set of fixes and some rubble from his switch over to BitKeeper. "Chances are this won't even boot for many people (if any at all)."

The latest 2.5 kernel status summary from Guillaume Boissiere came out on August 7.

The current stable kernel is 2.4.19. The much-awaited final release was announced by Marcelo on August 2; it contained no changes after the -rc5 release candidate. The full list of changes in 2.4.19 is available - be warned that it is long.

Marcelo has already released 2.4.20-pre1, the first prepatch for the 2.4.20 kernel. The list of changes is long, but it consists mostly of fixes and driver updates. Marcelo did initially include a backport of NAPI (high performance networking; see the October 4, 2001 LWN Kernel Page), but backed parts of it out at the last minute; he is waiting for justification to include it for real. Says Marcelo: "2.4.20 will be a much faster release cycle than 2.4.19 was."

The current prepatch from Alan Cox is 2.4.20-pre1-ac1.

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