- various alpha updates (David M-T)
- SMP update to make it work with PPro's.
- floppy and ide-cd changes (to make them work with >8 minor bits and
the alpha, respectively).
- console driver race condition fix (draft #1 - I'll have to edit it a
bit more). I haven't actually tested this, as I've been doing
development over the network. Tell me if it breaks.
- socket locking bug-fix.
The socket locking bugfix is the large one, and hopefully fixes some of
the network problems people have been seeing. If you see messages like
"double lock on socket at xxxxxx"
"trying to unlock unlocked socket at xxxxx"
_please_ look up the xxxx in your System.map (the closest few entries),
and send me a mail with the information.
Also, one final "administrative" thing. I've been seeing postings to
the newsgroups and mailing lists that say that 1.3.x kernels are
development kernels and that people shouldn't use them. Now, this isn't
actually true..
1.3.x kernels _are_ development kernels, but the more people that use
them, the merrier. People should be _aware_ of the fact that it's a
development kernel, but they shouldn't be discouraged from using them as
long as they know what it means:
- if you see a bug, report it. To me, to the mailing lists, and
possibly even to the newsgroups. If you're running an old kernel,
people will usually tell you to upgrade to the latest kernel and then
try it again, so you might want to do that before being told.
- if you get bitten by a bug, tough luck. I'll do my very best to get
the bug fixed, but the one thing I won't do is feel sorry for you.
In fact, I might ask you to do it all over again, just to get more
information. I'm a heartless bastard.
So do not try to discourage people from trying development kernels: just
tell them what that implies. Lots of people will then be happier to use
the stable kernels, but if everybody is chicken, we won't get any
bugreports or fixes.
This is especially true as the next stable kernel is getting closer..
Linus