Top programmers hope to release on Wednesday a major update to Linux, version 2.6.0, a change that’s expected to help carry the open-source operating system into new markets. Linux 2.6 might get released tonight, C|Net says. UPDATE: The kernel 2.6.0 is out. Get it while it’s hot. Changelog here.
Linux 2.6.0 Released
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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Way to wait till the last minute to tell us.
I’ve been waiting for this for the past 3 months or soo..finally alsa support for my ppc.. hehehe..lets hope cnet is correct..
Merry X-Mas all . This is your gift
Does anyone know a (mini-)distro that supports it as the installation kernel ? It could be alfa or beta, but I need it as binary (bootable cd ?) or as an iso.
Thanks
cause tonight i’ll be wake up all night… working for the faculty, so think i may see the fireworks :-S
Its not very often that a glance at somthing on OSNews gets a genuine gasp from me. I mean the kind of gasp that you might produce if you were suprised with a brand new Ferrari for christmas. This story was deffinatly the exception!
But yes, a nice X-mas gift it is. Although I personally am waiting for my easter gift – a 10.0 mandrake with a 2.6 kernel and KDE 3.2 . I hope it is not wishfull thinking.
Cheerio, Simon
It will be a while before the new glibc comes out which can use the newer features of the 2.6 kernel.
<p>When it does, us source-based users will be busy for days
Get your Gentoo engines ready toooo roooarrr…
And for those of us that bought our copy of Xandros today, we’re already out of date
You just need to recompile glibc with nptl support, and you are good to go. However, only source based distro, like Gentoo where you can recompile the whole system again, will immediately benefit from it though.
Excepted Debian. Just use the libc6-i686 and you’re good to go – it has the new NPTL code built in.
*drools over the perspective of 2.6 + NPTL*
You dont need to wait for ker-2.6.0. 2.4.23 kernel of Slackware provides alsa modules readily. Either, you can compile alsa by yourself on 2.4 kernel (OS distros isn’t a matter), it is easy, not a hard job.
Hopefully, pub/bars and churches would be having not much penguins in this Xmas and New Year Days, all is trying to open Xmas gift from Mr. Tovald. I at that time, will enjoy beer lonely hehe in a pub in which penguinists are not permitted, hehe
Slackware drives me to pub 🙂
“At the top of Morton’s list of changes coming with 2.6.0 is the ability to run on multiprocessor servers–the machines that run around the clock, handling tasks such as bank account management, stock trades, supermarket sales transactions and e-mail delivery.”
Technically, it can already run on multiprocessor servers, as it later explains, but I had to double take on this part 🙂
I hope Morphix releases with this real soon.
Then I could apt-get whatever I want.
🙂
Actually, I’m pretty sure there are other cool features in the kernel that the new glibc will have.
Also, any distribution can recompile glibc with ntpl and rebuild the software against it.
It’s available now. I’m downloading it.
Yup, it’s out. Downloading it now from kernel.org!
Does anyone have a tutorial to migrate from 2.4.22 -> 2.6. Im using Slackware 9.1
33,255,278 bytes
[root@linbox k260]# wget http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.6/linux-2.6.0.t
ar.bz2
–20:01:06– http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.6/linux-2.6.0.tar.bz2
=> `linux-2.6.0.tar.bz2′
Resolving http://www.kernel.org... done.
Connecting to http://www.kernel.org[204.152.189.116]:80... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response… 200 OK
Length: 33,255,278 [application/x-bzip2]
100%[====================================>] 33,255,278 144.81K/s ETA 00:00
20:04:50 (144.81 KB/s) – `linux-2.6.0.tar.bz2′ saved [33255278/33255278]
Tis nice to have gentoo under the hood at times like these.
Yay! And I just finished downloading it too before the masses get their hands on it.
Yay! And I just finished downloading it too before the masses get their hands on it.
Yeah … once Slashdot catches word, it’s all over for the next 2 or 3 days. So get it now while you can.
now is an upgrade guide on how to upgrade our 2.4.x kernel to it… : )
Although I am mostly a Windows/IE user 😎
Try this http://kerneltrap.org/node/view/1788
2.6 released! but 2.4 removed from http://www.kernel.org/
i’m reading this post “2.6 might release tonight”,when i read the 2nd page,the title changed to “2.6 released”
NVM I found one
http://linux.about.com/library/bl/open/newbie/blnewbiea7.htm
> Does anyone have a tutorial to migrate from 2.4.22 -> 2.6. Im using Slackware 9.1
Wait for Slackware to put out their kernel. It shouldn’t take more than 1 or 2 days for Slackware guys to offer you a 2.6 kernel on slackware-current.
As for a tutorial, use ours: http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=443
From the C|Net article:
“Some steps back
Not everything is better, though. Garloff said the part of 2.6 that communicates with memory is less efficient, imposing a practical limit of 24GB of memory to the 32GB that 2.4 could handle. However, he believes that programmers will address the problem.
The new kernel also monitors for new events more frequently–1,000 times per second instead of 100–a fact that slows down the system about 1 percent, Morton said in an October presentation about the kernel.
In addition, 2.6 requires somewhat more memory to run and shows worse performance when it has to use hard drives as extra memory under heavy loads, Morton said.”
I’ll pass
Here’s a torrent for those who read it later and find the bandwidth soaked up: http://alge.nlc.no/linux-2.6.0.tar.bz2.torrent
Finals over, new kernel…time to play
The new kernel also monitors for new events more frequently–1,000 times per second instead of 100–a fact that slows down the system about 1 percent, Morton said in an October presentation about the kernel.
How does MacOSX (Darwin) or even Windows XP compare to this.
Its on ./ now. Goodbye bandwidth
http://slashdot.org/articles/03/12/18/0418205.shtml?tid=106&tid=185…
whoops that should be /.
“How does MacOSX (Darwin) or even Windows XP compare to this.”
I have no idea. Actually that second one of the three little tidbits I grabbed from the C|Net article was the only one that I could justify. The first and the second point though would irritate me to no end if I were still mainly a Linux user. There’s no doubt in my mind that it’ll get fixed, but still, ick.
The question is what is so diffrent for a person like me who runs a uniprocessor computer with less then 2gig of ram and so on
if anyone know the list of improvements please let me know
anyway Happy X-Mas and New Year
Finally a new empire is about to emerge from the horizon. 😉
The new kernel also monitors for new events more frequently–1,000 times per second instead of 100–a fact that slows down the system about 1 percent, Morton said in an October presentation about the kernel.
How does MacOSX (Darwin) or even Windows XP compare to this.
No big deal for windows since win95/win31 ???
I just installed test-11 not more than 10 minutes ago.
You’ll notice integration of ALSA and much better desktop responsiveness.
Its the new kernel, that is the only reason it needs 🙂
Just about to reboot with it now. Bring on 2.7!!!
i’ve been running 2.6 since test5, all i can say is its fast, alot faster then 2.4 on my laptop. i’m uncompressing the new kernel now btw
Its a SCSI and I belive that the “ide-scsi” module isnt included in the 2.6 kernel. Will my CD-RW still work?
Yes, your CD-RW will work. You no longer need any SCSI features or modules compiled into the kernel. So instead of ide-scsi, you only need ide-cd.
Optionally, you can also add “hdx=ide-cd” instead of “hdx=ide-scsi” to your kernel line in your boot loader (either grub or lilo). But I don’t think this step is necessary.
Good Luck.
Right now I am miles aways from my Fedora. Fedora should be 2.6 ready. NPTL has been part of Redhat’s offereings for a while now.
There are a few caveats to upgrading to 2.6 I would suggest reading the following tutorial. It is about 2.6, so its better than the one Eugenia suggested. Quite a few things have changed.
http://kerneltrap.org/node/view/799
This kernel is a peice of junk. The driver for one of the most popular network cards ever is BROKEN. The 3c59x driver does not load on boot. It’s a known issue, but why release the kernel with such a major problem?
A new world!
Sweet, thanx
Thanks to all the kernelhackers (and damn you for releasing this just 6 hours after I compiled -test11 :p)
use the -mm tree, it has the fix you need. btw it’ll be in 2.4.1, probably.
2.4.1 >> 2.6.1 guess that i’m not used yet lolol
I saw a light in my dreams last night, A bright light that will never go out..
A) This represents Linux’s continuous power
B) I had the bedside light on
Works fine for me. Ensure
alias eth0 3c59x
in modprobe.conf.
The new kernel also monitors for new events more frequently–1,000 times per second instead of 100–a fact that slows down the system about 1 percent, Morton said in an October presentation about the kernel.
You can tweak this in make menuconfig (I assume, atleast you can with a patched 2.4). It makes for better interactive use, which is why I use with my 2.4 kernel.
i wonder how end up the ide-scsi issue..
cant wait to give it a try, but propably, like many, im going only to take the big step after 2.6.2 cames out
gg linux
You can tweak this in make menuconfig (I assume, atleast you can with a patched 2.4). It makes for better interactive use, which is why I use with my 2.4 kernel.
The vanilla 2.6 kernel doesn’t allow you do that. I’m not sure if the same is true of non-vanilla 2.6 kernel though.
I think the I can confidently assert the Linux 2.6 kernel in conjunction with Gentoo is the most responsive OS I’ve ever used in a while. Of course, several other factors play a role, but 2.6 is a huge improvement and a significant factor.
Will the Nvidia driver package build a module for 2.6? How long do we have to wait if it does not?
They seem to imply that it will scale better on large systems. That’s great but, even most large companies don’t have systems that large (yet).
Cnet said 2.6 uses more memory and, runs (slightly) slower, and handles swap poorly. Cnet seemd to dock it on some of the only things I would actually need it to do.
Looking at the tar.gz files 2.4.8 is 26 meg, 2.6 is 40.
Will the Nvidia driver package build a module for 2.6? How long do we have to wait if it does not?
they will, meanwhile you can try this http://minion.de/nvidia.html
they worked well under 2.6test releases
I wanna see some benchmarking between 2.6 and WinXP/2003 under heavy loads to see which performs better.
Running 2.6.0-test10-mm1 here, and I won’t be upgrading until -mm is out for 2.6.0.
Will the Nvidia driver package build a module for 2.6? How long do we have to wait if it does not?
Although, I don’t use a Nvidia video cards, I understand nvidia drivers work well with 2.6. Gentoo folks says after installing the kernel, all you need to do is recompile the nvidia drivers and it should work fine. I’m not sure how it works for other distros, though.
Wiki for installing kernel 2.6 on Fedora core 1:
http://www.freax.eu.org/wiki/index.php/Fedora%20core%201~*~…
“Fedora should be 2.6 ready.”
It should, but isn’t. I am still not able to use my LVM volumes with kernel 2.6 on Fedora.
Read Dave Jones summary in the link provided below.
http://www.linux.org.uk/~davej/docs/post-halloween-2.6.txt
Try it . I have a feeling you’ll be plesently suprised. Lots of the new features (pre-emption, 0(1) scheduling etc) have made it seem a lot more responsive to the user. Ok, these have been backported to 2.4, but 2.6 seems more responsive overall than gentoo-sources , which contains most of the back-ports I believe. It also has a simpler build sequence. It may be bigger, slightly slower in some areas, but thats the price of staying ahead of the game. The monitoring for new events is actually a good thing I feel, wrt to the overall responsiveness.
Also, 2.6 performs really well for scaleable server stuff. Better than any *bsd, linux 2.4 according to http://bulk.fefe.de/scalability
> Also, 2.6 performs really well for scaleable server stuff.
> Better than any *bsd, linux 2.4 according to
> http://bulk.fefe.de/scalability
You’ve never used FreeBSD 5.x have you? If not, your argument is groundless. Also, bear in mind that operating systems are very complex pieces of software and a few benchmarks cannot conclusively prove one’s scalability or (insert other feature here) superiority over the other. If you can find a mirror of the review, post it. Otherwise, compare only Linux 2.6 with Linux 2.4.
Finally, your link is down or doesn’t exist as it returns “No such file or directory”.
Are the problems with preemptive solved??
This kernel is a peice of junk. The driver for one of the most popular network cards ever is BROKEN. The 3c59x driver does not load on boot. It’s a known issue, but why release the kernel with such a major problem?
Is it? I’m using such a NIC… this means I can’t install 2.6.0 without losing networking ability?
This kernel is a peice of junk. The driver for one of the most popular network cards ever is BROKEN. The 3c59x driver does not load on boot. It’s a known issue, but why release the kernel with such a major problem?
Is it? I’m using such a NIC… this means I can’t install 2.6.0 without losing networking ability?
I believe there’s something screwed with his setup. I have that card “3Com Corporation 3c905B 100BaseTX [Cyclone] (rev 64)” as reported by lspci, and it ‘just worked’. Compilied in the driver, and DHCP did it’s magic on boot, just like under 2.4.22. (FTR, running Debian/Unstable, on a VIA266A chipset)
3c59x: Donald Becker and others. http://www.scyld.com/network/vortex.html
0000:00:08.0: 3Com PCI 3c905B Cyclone 100baseTx at 0xe000. Vers LK1.1.19
Funny how i do have that card working and loaded. For years, with several kernel versions. Currently compiled in the kernel. Never had any problem with it.
I highly doubt the fact that you can’t get your module compiled is due to the Linux kernel being a “peice of junk”. I find it rather likely the problem lies at yours. Try to compile it in the kernel instead of a module?
Well actually i know what bench he’s talking about, and linux 2.6 was a bit better than freebsd 5.x (which should correct the problems more or less shortly)
once freebsd is fixed however, benches would tend to show it would perform slightly better overal (that’s on 0(1) scheduling btw. openbsd etc are piece of crap in the test ;D=
2.4not too good
“Although, I don’t use a Nvidia video cards, I understand nvidia drivers work well with 2.6. Gentoo folks says after installing the kernel, all you need to do is recompile the nvidia drivers and it should work fine. I’m not sure how it works for other distros, though.”
Patch the source manually and you’re all set. Pretty easy. I did this on Debian GNU/Linux Sid.
250 M/bit link on there server can handle the
strain.
I’m get 60 KB/sec and that’s after it was /.’d. I want that link in my bedroom.
Which do you think will be the first distro to come out with 2.6? I’d like to try a desktop distro with it, one that has multimedia apps already included and configured, so I can easily start using it. Maybe Mandrake or Suse.
Red Hat’s Fedora is set to release Core 2 pretty quickly and it will include 2.6
Note: I’d recommend getting Robert Love’s book, “Linux Kernel Development”, (ISBN: 0672325128) it is a great book and helps you understand the improvements and design decisions that went into the 2.6 kernel.
your link is down or doesn’t exist as it returns “No such file or directory.
Try again with http://bulk.fefe.de/scalability/
Really, browsers are not that difficult 😉
You’ve never used FreeBSD 5.x have you? If not, your argument is groundless. Also, bear in mind that operating systems are very complex pieces of software and a few benchmarks cannot conclusively prove one’s scalability or (insert other feature here) superiority over the other. If you can find a mirror of the review, post it. Otherwise, compare only Linux 2.6 with Linux 2.4.
Since you couldn’t be bothered to find the link, much less read the information, you would have seen that FreeBSD 5.1 was part of a comprehensive test. And, yes Linux 2.4 was compared to Linux 2.6. And yes, according to these tests, Linux 2.6 reigned supreme over both Linux 2.4 and FreeBSD 5.1.
If you actually want to have an intelligent discussion on the matter, try reading (and understanding) the actual study. Then explain to us why the study was deficient in an area that could have exposed a strength in another system, rather than building a strawman and attacking it.
A few forum discussions ago, there were conspiracy theories about Lindows.com waiting for Xandros to release 2.0 before they release LindowsOS 4.5.
I propose that Linus waited them both out in order to release kernel 2.6. He has been working in cohoots with Red Hat in order to have Fedora Core 2 have the jump on the market with the latest kernel.
Now if you’ll excuse me, it’s time for my medication…
Running 2.6.0 on my Slack9.1 box, and it runs like a charm.
Thanks Linus, great work.
Ow and btw: gconfig is great!
Well, Fedora will be out arond march/april with the 2.6 kernel. Other already have it in their development tree..(RedHat Rawhide,Mandrake Cooker,Gentoo, etc.)
The only thing for sure is that it won’t be Debian.(if you count releases,not devel branches)
Yesterday I found a link at Slashdot where the problem with preemtive was due to a user error. A Linus response closed the conversation.
Running 2.6.0-test10-mm1 here, and I won’t be upgrading until -mm is out for 2.6.0.
There is no such thing as -mm anymore, he maintains the kernel proper now.
get over it. they published the OS before 2.6 came out. if you must have 2.6, then install it!!!.
Ok, when someone bashes FreeBSD I just have to say something.
I have tried FreeBSD 5.1 and i loved it. It’s really great. I’ll compare it to Slackware, which I’m very fond of, except faster, extremely well documented and it’s got a great ports and packages system. On the other hand it doesn’t support nearly as much hardware.
The study you refer to compares 2.6test and 2.4 to FreeBSD 5.1. Now FreeBSD 5.1 isn’t exactly the fastest performer of the FreeBSD branches. I’m sure you’re aware of 5.1 hasn’t reached STABLE yet. The developers are currently working on getting 5.x to reach and surpass 4.x performance. Last week I tried the new 4.9 and I was in awe when I first booted into GNOME. I have to admit it’s much faster than 5.1 and Slackware 9.1 (using 2.4.22). I honestly don’t understand why this guy is didn’t use 4.8 (4.9 wasn’t available at the time) for his study, It just doesnt make any sense. Any way I would like to urge anybody who likes Slackware to try out FreeBSD. 5.2 is out soon and it’ll probably go STABLE with 5.3. I don’t know but 5.x may have reached 4.x performance by that time.
BTW the Bitstream Vera fonts render bad in Slackware compared to FreeBSD. Does anybody have a solution to this?
Me thinks we will wait until 2.6.1 comes out and fixes all the ‘features’ in 2.6.0
Go ahead, mod me down…
I have tried FreeBSD 5.1 and i loved it. It’s really great. I’ll compare it to Slackware, which I’m very fond of, except faster, extremely well documented and it’s got a great ports and packages system.
I have a feeling that if I placed you in front of two computers with identical hardware and the same os (doesn’t matter which) running either gnome or KDE and I told you that the computer on the left ran FreeBSD while the computer on the right ran Linux, and asked you to try them out and tell me what system felt the best in use, I’m extremely confident that you would tell me that somehow FreeBSD just felt much better.
In fact, such a semi-blindtest would be fun.
The study you refer to compares 2.6test and 2.4 to FreeBSD 5.1. Now FreeBSD 5.1 isn’t exactly the fastest performer of the FreeBSD branches. I’m sure you’re aware of 5.1 hasn’t reached STABLE yet.
Take a closer look further down on the page, buster. He did these tests with 4.9 as well. And yes, 5.1 scales better.
However, what a lot of you fail to understand is that these particular benchmarks only measure ALGORITHMIC scalability, and most of those measured don’t matter much for the average desktop user.
“I honestly don’t understand why this guy is didn’t use 4.8 (4.9 wasn’t available at the time) for his study”
Don’t take this the wrong way (big FreeBSD guy here) but it is explained why 5.1 was chosen on the site. Also, since that time, the tests were run on 4.x and it proved to be a significantly worse performer than 5.x. NetBSD had also been re-tested and considderably cleaned up it’s act, taking second place.
Once they’re all out and stable, I want to see a comparison between FreeBSD 5.x, DragonFly, NetBSD and (for lack of significantly different options) Fedora with the 2.6 kernel. (I can’t wait to see if DragonFly has as much potential as I think it does or not
Forgive the spelling, I’ve had the flu for five days and am still a little out of it.
>> Me thinks we will wait until 2.6.1 comes out and fixes all the ‘features’ in 2.6.0
>> Go ahead, mod me down…
Sounds reasonable to me, I don’t see any reason why you should be modded down. A few people have already mentioned waiting for 2.6.2. I am sure there are some people who are this news and contemplating moving to 2.4.
I would love to see this comparison as well… I really can’t wait for the releases of DragonFly!! 2.6 is a great release for Linux, I am sure the benchmarks that follow will prove that!
Hi, I followed the Eugenia’s kernel compilation instructions on OSNews, but keep getting an error upon booting with the 2.6.0 kernel:
Kernel Panic
VFS: Unable to mount root filesystem on /dev/hda8
The only parameter in the lilo.conf entry is the one for root as root=/dev/hda8, which works fine for the 2.4.21-244 kernel (SuSE 9.0), but 2.6.0 enters into panic mode.
Did anyone else encounter this problem … and more importantly can anyone please suggest a solution? I have googled my way (hey, I’m not THAT lazy!), but havent found a solution that worked. Thanks in advance!
I’m not pretending to understand the article, I’m no programmer. Just wanted to point out how great FreeBSD is for me.
I didn’t feel the same difference in KDE BTW. KDE is fast on both OSes.
I have compared the OSes on the same computer with multi boot. Still you may be right though I doubt it.
The preemptive kernel does make a difference on the desktop. Isn’t it one of the main desktop features in 2.6.0? I’ve heard many 2.6test users say how much it improved the GUI responsiveness.
I’m looking forward to try out 2.6.0 on my Slackware anyway. It should be nice with that preemptive stuff.
“Kernel Panic
VFS: Unable to mount root filesystem on /dev/hda8”
something to do with the initrd image perhaps?
sounds like your kernel doesn’t ‘know’ the filesystem,
have you compiled it in (not just as module) ??
andy
I got the same error with 2.6.0-test11… but it was just my plain stupidity, as I didn’t choose reiserfs kernel’s driver to compile
And all my partitions’ are using reiserfs filesystem 
So IF you don’t use ext2 or ext3 (default choices in make menuconfig) check if you commanded your menuconfig to support it 
I’m running it right now and everything works perfectly. The problem that I had with test11 is solved, apparently.
> There is no such thing as -mm anymore, he maintains the kernel proper now.
Not true. Andrew Morton will still be using the -mm tree as a sort of testing grounds for proposed changes in the stable tree.
From Linus’ announcement:
“NOTE! I’ll continue to keep track of the 2.6 BK tree until we’re closer to the time when we literally split it for 2.7.x, because both Andrew and I are pretty comfortable with our respective toolchains. But Andrew is the stable tree maintainer, so everything should be approved by him at this
point. Think of the -mm tree as the staging area, and mine as a release tree. We’ll work together, but Andrew is boss.”
Kernel Panic
VFS: Unable to mount root filesystem on /dev/hda8
You should paste the lines immediately above this. All this tells us is that something went wrong trying to mount the root filesystem, which could be anything from a missing driver for the controller for the block device your root filesystem resides on, or lack of proper filesystem support for this device. The lines above will give us this information.
And just to add my $0.02 to the Linux vs. FreeBSD flamewar which was inevitably started here, this is why the FreeBSD kernel configuration and bootloader are so nice… problems like this almost never arise in FreeBSD, but when they do, because the bootloader understands the filesystem and can link modules into the kernel before booting, fixing them is as simple as adding a line to /boot/loader.conf, rather than recompiling your kernel. What is it with Linux people and constantly recompiling their kernels and hand tuning their kernel configs? With FreeBSD I rarely need to deviate from the GENERIC kernel config, especially with the advent of the GENERIC SMP config.
“Which do you think will be the first distro to come out with 2.6? I’d like to try a desktop distro with it, one that has multimedia apps already included and configured, so I can easily start using it. Maybe Mandrake or Suse.”
I’m 100% it is going to be Debian.
oh… you asked which distribution will be first on 2.6 not which distribution is still on 2.2.
I think I didnt check to see if ReiserFS was added as a module when my root filesystem is in fact ReiserFS, which is the default for SuSE (me stupid!). Will try to do that and post here again. BTW, I’m not running this in VMware or something similar, so is there a way of getting to those error message lines & pasting them here?