Linux Kernel's thread

14 Staging Drivers Get Nuked From Linux 3.17

Over 200,000 lines of code is being removed from the Linux 3.17 kernel in the staging subsystem due to the removal of a bunch of old, unmaintained drivers.

Greg Kroah-Hartman shared that with the staging driver patches for Linux 3.17, there's over 39,000 new lines of code while over 254,000 lines have been removed. The big code delta comes from 14 different drivers being removed that were "obsolete and no one was willing to work on cleaning them up."

The drivers removed with Linux 3.17 include Crystalhd, Winbond, wlags49_h2, serqt_usb2, dgrp, cxt1e1, tidspbridge, ced1401, frontier, keucr, phison,silicom, and sep. Of that list, the crystalhd driver may be noticeable for Broadcom's Crystal HD audio/video hardware coder.

Besides removing the old cruft, the staging pull has continued work on the staging Lustre driver, Unisys, gdm72xx, rtl8192u, rtl8188eu, BCM, Comedi, vt6655, and the other usual staging churn.

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AMD Radeon Graphics Get Many Changes For Linux 3.17

The Radeon DRM driver changes have been published for queuing into drm-next before hitting the mainline Linux 3.17 kernel tree.

Among the exciting work to be found for the AMD Radeon graphics kernel driver in Linux 3.17 include:

- Good Hawaii support for the AMD Radeon R9 290 series. The R9 290/290X should now work with the open-source driver at long last, but besides Linux 3.17 you'll need newer microcode files and also the latest Gallium3D code. Once 3.17-rc1 has been tagged, I'll move ahead with my open-source Radeon Hawaii benchmarks on the R9 290.

- Support for a new firmware format to make updates easier to manage.

- Dynamic Power Management (DPM) is now enabled by default on more GPUs. DPM is being re-enabled by default for Cayman and BTC hardware.

- GPU VM improvements.

- Support for uncached and write combined GTT buffers.

- Userptr support. The user pointer support allows turning a memory pointer supplied by user-space into a buffer object for the DRM kernel graphics driver. Userptr can be used for GPGPU/compute scenarions and other situation for feeding memory objects from user-space to the kernel driver.

- Various other fixes and improvements.

The full listing of Radeon DRM changes lined up for the Linux 3.17 merge window can be found via the DRI development list.

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Boas noticias para o pessoal com gráficas AMD.
 
É impressão minha ou o 3.16.0 voltou a trazer o bug do "event bug" para o dmesg???

É que o meu dmesg já está outra vez atulhado com mensagens de "event bug" e ainda agora acabei de instalar o kernel!
 
Nouveau's Big Batch Of Changes Land In Linux 3.17

Being merged into the mainline kernel code-base for Linux 3.17 was the big DRM feature pull that included enhancements to the Intel and AMD Radeon graphics drivers (among the other smaller DRM/KMS drivers), but missing from action was the open-source NVIDIA driver. The Nouveau driver changes were delayed by some last-minute bug-hunting but now a separate pull request was issued to land the Nouveau driver updates for Linux 3.17.

Among the highlights for the Linux 3.17 additions relating to Nouveau for open-source NVIDIA graphics:

- Furthering of the NVIDIA GK20A Kepler GPU that's found within the Tegra K1 SoC. Code contributed by NVIDIA for this high-performance mobile ARM GPU include probing and re-clocking support. The GK20A re-clocking doesn't bring any new magic to the Nouveau driver but is using a statically defined performance state table.

- Outside of the Tegra space, NVIDIA also helped out in fixing up Kepler GPUs on Nouveau that have their graphics engine powered off on startup.

- Removing lots of hard-coding of graphics engine setup details for Fermi/Kepler/Maxwell GPUs. This improvement should particularly help out higher-end NVIDIA graphics cards, according to Nouveau maintainer Ben Skeggs.

- Support for Zero Bandwidth Clear on Fermi/Kepler/Maxwell graphics cards. The Zero Bandwidth Clears is actually a patented NVIDIA feature, "A system and method for performing zero-bandwidth-clears reduces external memory accesses by a graphics processor when performing clears and subsequent read operations. A set of clear values is stored in the graphics processor. Each region of a color or z buffer may be configured using a zero-bandwidth-clear command to reference a clear value without writing the external memory. The clear value is provided to a requestor without accessing the external memory when a read access is performed." Ben explained that this feature also needs user-space support but some applications can benefit already from the support.

- Reviewed and exposed the full object APIs to user-space, for exposing information like performance counters, the aforementioned Zero Bandwidth Clear controls, and other events. Other interface additions are expected in future kernel revisions.

- Other fixes, including a fix for using Nouveau in a headless mode.

Overall it's a fairly nice set of changes for this kernel cycle for this largely reverse-engineered, open-source NVIDIA driver while it's great to see NVIDIA Corp providing a bit more help to the team. With the Linux 3.16 kernel came Nouveau re-clocking support for Kepler GPUs but it doesn't work for all Kepler GPUs and not for all pstates, but at least when it works, it can boost the performance a lot. With Linux 3.17 there doesn't appear to be any breakthroughs for re-clocking like adding Fermi support, dynamic re-clocking based upon load, or other long sought after features, but we can always look forward to Linux 3.18 and beyond. With Linux 3.17 they did decide to hid again the pstate sysfs file that's used for re-clocking. There's now a pstate module parameter for exposing the file on the basis the file is going to be moved in the future.

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Depois das melhorias apresentadas para as drivers das gráficas AMD e Intel para o kernel 3.17, finalmente são anunciadas as melhorias para a Nouveau, as drivers open source da NVIDIA.
O mais interessante é o maior apoio da própria NVIDIA no desenvolvimento da Nouveau. O aumento do mercado gaming em Linux também contribui para um maior interesse pelos fabricantes de hardware :P

No geral têm sido já apresentadas muitas melhorias e muita limpeza de código legacy neste Kernel 3.17, empolgando mais que o 3.16. A RC1 está quase aí.. :)
 
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The New Features Of The Linux 3.17 Kernel

Now that the merge window has passed and Linux 3.17-rc1 released, here's a rundown of the new features for the Linux 3.17 kernel.

Highlights of Linux 3.17 include:

Graphics:

- Many Radeon GPU improvements -- including working Radeon R9 290 series support.

- Numerous graphics improvements for Intel's driver.

- Continued Nouveau driver improvements for this open-source NVIDIA driver.

- A new DRM driver.

Hardware:

- DMA-BUF cross-device synchronization support.

- Many old/unmaintained drivers were removed.

- Intel Braswell audio driver.

- Improved Sony SIXAXIS device support.

- Better Wacom tablet support.

- ACPI 5.1 / ACPI on ARM work.

- Lots of new ARM hardware enablement.

- Support for detecting free-falls of Toshiba laptops.

- Intel Idle Broadwell support.

Other:

- Support for using EFI to boot Xen Dom0.

- KVM improvements for x86.

- Enhancements to F2FS.

- A sysfs interface for XFS.

- Linux APIC code is working towards a big overhaul.

Stay tuned for our benchmarking of the Linux 3.17 kernel and other kernel tests that will be coming on Phoronix in the days and weeks ahead.

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A RC1 do Kernel 3.17 já está disponível para download para quem quiser testar.
 
Graphics Driver Changes Coming In The Linux 3.18 Kernel

While the Linux 3.17 kernel isn't being released for a few weeks, we already have a good idea for the DRM graphics driver improvements coming for the Linux 3.18 cycle.

Linux 3.17 has many new features, including many DRM graphics improvements, with Linux 3.18 there's of course more changes to get excited about; it's a never-ending cycle in improving Linux graphics drivers and the kernel stack as a whole. With Linux 3.18 though, it's going to be the first release where the drm-next merge window is closing early. Usually David Airlie, the DRM subsystem maintainer, allows new DRM graphics driver code to be introduced up until the start of the next kernel merge window, with that drm-next code-base then being sent in for mainline inclusion. Beginning with Linux 3.18, Airlie is planning to close the merge window of drm-next around the -rc5 state of the previous release. As a result, this week is likely the last that major new DRM graphics driver code has a chance to land for making the 3.18 window.

David's been landing a bunch of code this week into his drm-next tree for Linux 3.18 and among the highlights are:

- Nouveau driver improvements that include support for DisplayPort audio, re-clocking improvements for select GPUs, and fan control improvements.

- Numerous Intel driver improvements that include many Cherryview improvements for the forthcoming Atom SoC. There's also still Broadwell tuning taking place, some basic prep work for Skylake (though the Intel Skylake Linux enablement doesn't look like it will come until at least Linux 3.19), and other code clean-ups.

- The AMD Radeon DRM driver supports concurrent buffer reads, Userptr support, and RV6xx UVD video decoding support as its major features for Linux 3.18.

There's also been core DRM improvements and other enhancements to the smaller DRM drivers.

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O kernel 3.17 ainda em RC5 mas já se fala nas melhorias do kernel 3.18, que continuam a focar-se essencialmente em melhorias nas drivers gráficas dos vários sistemas.
 
Linux 3.17 Kernel Released With Many Great Features

After a calm week when Linux 3.17 was extended by one week, Linus Torvalds happily released the Linux 3.17 kernel a few minutes ago. Linux 3.17 is out in all of its glory and due to Torvalds' travel schedule the Linux 3.18 merge window will be open for about three weeks.

Linux 3.17 is a big improvement and brings a ton of great features like working AMD Radeon R9 290 support, Xbox One controller support, DMA-BUF cross-device synchronization, a lot of ARM hardware improvements, free-fall support for Toshiba laptops, Intel Braswell and Cherry Trail enablement work, EFI Xen Dom0 boot support, file-system improvements, and much more. Linux 3.17 is a very exciting update!

While Linus doesn't go into detail about all the new features like the aforelinked Phoronix articles, you can read his brief statement via the kernel mailing list. For some random bar trivia, Torvalds has kept the "Shuffling Zombie Juror" code-name for Linux 3.17, which has been the same since Linux 3.14 albeit changed in the Linux 3.16.x stable series.

Due to Linus travelling next week and the LinuxCon EU event the following week, Linus won't immediately start merging changes for the Linux 3.18 kernel but rather will be a few days out... Thus the merge window for Linux 3.18 will technically be open for about three weeks from now (roughly until 26 October). For Linux 3.18 we already have to look forward to many open-source graphics driver improvements, maybe OverlayFS, and a variety of other changes we'll be covering live over the 3.18 merge window followed by four Linux 3.18 benchmarks in the weeks ahead. We've already delivered a ton of Linux 3.17 benchmarks while more articles are still forthcoming.

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTgwNDk
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Linux 3.18-rc1 Released One Week Early With Many Changes

While Linus Torvalds initially anticipated the Linux 3.18 merge window being three weeks in length due to his Linux Foundation conference travels, he ended up managing to release Linux 3.18-rc1 after just two weeks... The release is out there now with its many changes.

Linus explained in the release announcement, "What happened is that not only did I merge actively despite travels - I was out of communication just for a couple of days (almost, but not entirely, due to flights - the hotel in DÃsseldorf lost all internet for a day too). But perhaps more importantly, people seem to have aggressively sent in their pull requests, because rc1 contains more than linux-next did a couple of days after 3.17.. So holding it up another week just seems pointless."

The Linux 3.18 kernel contains many exciting changes and new features as outlined in the numerous Phoronix articles... In the next day or so I'll have my complete recap of interesting changes merged for Linux 3.18.

Linus said due to closing the merge window one week early, he might make some exceptions for maintainers still needing to push new code this coming week. In particular, he's still hoping to merge OverlayFS.

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Changes So Far For The Linux 3.18 Kernel

While we're just one week in for what's expected to be a longer than usual merge window, here's a look at the top work so far for the Linux 3.18 kernel.

Highlights from our coverage so far of Linux 3.18 development includes the following features set to be part of this next version of the Linux kernel:

File-Systems:

- Btrfs RAID improvements concerning recovery and repair.

- New F2FS features.

New Hardware Support:

- New media drivers.

- New ARM hardware support.

- AMD Carrizo temperature monitoring.

- Proper handling of Razer's Sabertooth.

Other:

- Xen PVSCSI support.

- Firmware core dump to user-space support.

- Various USB changes.

- 64-bit ARM's kernel is closer to building under Clang.

- Wacom tablet improvements.

- Many ACPI and power management enhancements.

Other Pending Changes (Not Yet Officially Sent In, Etc):

- Many Intel GPU driver improvements.

- Potentially OverlayFS.

- Radeon GPU re-clocking improvements.

- Radeon R600 UVD support.

- Radeon Userptr support.

- Various DRM graphics driver improvements.

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Linux 3.18-rc3 Released, Codenamed The "Diseased Newt"

The third weekly release candidate is now available for the Linux 3.18 kernel.

Like with 3.18-rc2, Linus Torvalds isn't happy that the development pace isn't calming down for nearing midway through the kernel's development. There's still been many changes all over the place in the past week, while feature development has been over for some time.

For what it's worth, with Linux 3.18-rc3, Torvalds finally renamed the "Shuffling Zombie Juror" codename that the kernel has been for several releases now and is referring to the kernel now as Diseased Newt.

If you're not familiar with the Linux 3.18 features, check out the usual Phoronix feature overview of Linux 3.18.

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTgyODc
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É a primeira versão que funciona no meu portátil, uma vez que a RC1 e RC2 não davam :)
 
Linux 3.18 Kernel Released, But It Doesn't Fix That Odd Regression

As anticipated, Linus Torvalds officially released the Linux 3.18 kernel this Sunday evening.

The Linux 3.18 kernel is now out there though that nasty lockup issue has still yet to be resolved. Dave Jones is nearing the end of bisecting the issue, but since it also affects Linux 3.17 and not too many people seem to get hit by the lockups, Linus Torvalds decided to go ahead and do the 3.18 release on schedule. Linus was also concerned that dragging out the 3.18 release would then complicate the Linux 3.19 merge window due to the holidays later this month.

The Linux 3.18 kernel presents a lot of new features worth writing home about, but then again we're already excited about the Linux 3.19 activity.

Linux 3.18 is codenamed the Diseased Newt and Torvalds' official release announcement can be read on the Indiana kernel mailing list.

Now the Linux 3.19 kernel merge window is open for two weeks of exciting changes.

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTg1NjY
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Crow- disse:
Linux 3.18 Kernel Released, But It Doesn't Fix That Odd Regression
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Instalado no meu pc do trabalho e no meu pc de casa. Até agora, tudo bem.

O lockup de que se fala deve acontecer só (digo eu) em condições de grande stress para o sistema. Estou a usar a versão 3.17 desde que apareceram as primeiras rc nos repositórios debian e até agora não tive nenhum bloqueio marado no kernel
 
O procedimento vai depender da distro, mas suponho que será como actualizar outro pacote qualquer sem internet, só precisas de transferir os ficheiros necessários para a máquinas com uma pen USB ou algo assim.
 
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