Kernel release status [LWN.net]

The current development kernel is 2.6.0-test9, released by Linus on October 25. It consists almost entirely of important fixes, of course, but Linus also threw in Jeff Garzik's "libata" driver. As always, the long-format changlog has the details.

It seems a real 2.6.0 release could be getting close:

If this works out, then I'll submit -test10 to Andrew Morton, and if he takes it we'll probably have a real 2.6.0 after a final shakedown.

Linus's approach of restricting patches to the most important fixes should help to stabilize the kernel. It also is likely to mean, however, that there will be a substantial pile of patches waiting to go in after the 2.6.0 release.

2.6.0-test9 is, perhaps, unique in having its own press release, something that is not normally done for development kernels. OSDL, it seems, wants to be sure that the world knows where Linus and Andrew work these days.

Linus's BitKeeper tree, as of this writing, contains a relatively small number of fixes.

The current stable kernel is 2.4.22; Marcelo released 2.4.23-pre8 on October 22. Along with the usual fixes, this patch also includes an ACPI update, some driver updates, and a set of tmpfs fixes.