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SubjectRe: The stability crisis
For whats its worth, I agree 2.2.x it way too unstable. I wouldn't
recommend anybody switch to it as it stands now.

I've not had huge problems, mostly sound problems (which I am hoping to
look into as part of my first dip into kernel 'hacking') and a single
complete hang in X, but from reading the list and seeing the file
corruption 'reading beyond end of device' errors people have had in
2.2.10, I fell that something has gone wrong in the development process.

The scary thing is that the 2.3 codebase is branched off the relatively
unstable 2.2 codebase, so 2.4 will have the bugs introduced in 2.3, AND
ones from 2.2 that didn't/may not get fixed.

I really don't care about NT and FUD, but I would like to see things going
more in the direction of the 2.0.x kernels in terms of stability.

I don't think its proper to draw attention away from the 2.2.10 problems
with a comment as to how it is still maturing - Sure 2.0.x took 37
iterations to become 'fully' stable, but its troubling that there is so
much concern about the 2.3.x file corruption, and nothing about the 2.2.x
corruption (even though I personally don't experience it).

Fall isn't that far away, and I would really like to feel more confident
in the 2.2 kernel I'm running now before switching to the bigger and
better 2.4 :P

:( My two cents, anyway. I've been concerned for a bit, but don't consider
myself talented enough programmer to actively do anything about it (I'm
still learning...)

Sincerely,
Rene

On Tue, 29 Jun 1999, Aaron Lehmann wrote:

> Linux 2.2.36 was a very stable kernel. I have never experianced a crash
> with it. However, this does not at all hold true for the 2.2.x series.
>
> During the initial stage of the 2.2 series, it was pretty darn stable. I
> got about 60 days of uptime out of 2.2.1 until a power failure or a need
> to mess with hardware or something. (Actually, now I think it was a hard
> lockup). Back then we knew that 2.2 was not at all as stable as 2.0.36,
> but we knew it would mature.
>
> WRONG!
>
> Linus waited a few months to open the 2.3 branch. A lot of untested
> patches were making it into the 2.2 series! People like me breathed a sigh
> of relief when Linus opened up the 2.3 branch. Now we knew that all of the
> patches would go into 2.3 and 2.2 would become mature and stable like
> 2.0.36
>
> But that was only half right. Linus decided to hasten the release of 2.4
> to "in the fall", and all of the developers jumped onto the 2.3 kernel,
> leaving us with a stable kernel which is totally inadequate.
>
> 2.2.10 is by far less stable than any operating system I have used
> excuding MacOS. During the past _week_ I have had three oopsen using
> kernel 2.2.9 and 2.2.10. I have never had an oops before this week with
> the exception of Linux on platforms where the ports are excusabe immature
> and on unstable hardware. Once I found a small bug with a friend in 2.0.x
> that caused an oops but it wasn't anything major. It was fixed
> immediately.
>
> All the attention has shifted to 2.3. Most people as well as benchmarkers
> are using 2.2.10. Helloo??? This is a perfect time for Microsoft to spread
> FUD since the "stable" branch of Linux is far less stable than even
> Windows NT. THIS IS NOT GOOD FOR LINUX OR THE PEOPLE WHO USE IT! Something
> needs to be done about this fast. I reccomend that 2.2.10 be made rock
> solid. Most features and new device drivers can wait until fall with 2.4.
> Of course, 2.4 should be made and kept very stable as a 2.5 or 2.9 is
> opened up immediately.
>
> I hate to bitch about stuff like this but if I were to try to write kernel
> code I would probably just add more fatal bugs :).
>
> Maybe Alan Cox should voulenteer to maintain 2.2 :). He did a great job
> with 2.0.
>
> And all kernel hackers out there, PLEASE help make 2.2 more stable.
>
> Speed is a problem that has been dealt with a lot lately, due to the
> numerous benchmarks. I believe that this is also a priority, but
> secondary to stability, at least at this level of instability.
>
>
> Thanks.
>
>
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