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Linux 4.7 Released

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Re: Linux 4.7 Released

#61

Post by spoiler »

INTPenis wrote: post #57
voltagex_ wrote: post #26

Honest question: how many years do you think it'll be until embedded device manufacturers (routers, various TV boxes, wifi hard drives [1]) ship recent kernels? A $200 modem/router bought 6 months ago ships with a hacked up version of 2.6.36.4 that's barely buildable - mainly because the wifi chipset vendor refuses to open source their code and refuses to update the BSP [2]. 1: http://www.seagate.com/au/en/support/do…

Curiously timed question because when the 4.7 kernel release announcement was sent out I googled one of the contributs on a whim and found that they worked for a company that builds embedded systems. And this guy is contributing to the 4.7 kernel. ;) But that's just one guy, one company. I believe most companies like the stability of using something old and well proven.

> But that's just one guy, one company. I believe most companies like the stability of using something old and well proven.

Isn't it the opposite with the kernel, though? Doesn't its stability improve over time? That's at least the feeling I get. I make some embedded "devices" as a hobby (none of it is mass-produced), and I feel like things are better now than they used to be ~3 years ago.

Re: Linux 4.7 Released

#62

Post by pricechild »

stephenr wrote: post #60
voltagex_ wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fibre to the home. I think your ONT is my NTD. Box on my wall that I'm not really allowed to touch, then Ethernet straight to my router which handles PPPoE.

Well pretty much any router with a PPPoE client should work then. What is the "free city wifi" thing you referred to that requires the isp provided router?

I suspect he means the schemes where you agree to run an AP other customers can use and in return you get to connect to their AP's while on the move.

Re: Linux 4.7 Released

#63

Post by qwertyuiop924 »

mackal wrote: post #44
dcgudeman wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why is kdbus bad?

Because it's related to systemd.

No, because it's an overcomplicated system that's putting things into the kernel that definitely don't belong there, because the userspace implementation was slow, which, according to Linus, was not an inherent problem with the idea of putting it in userspace, but was because the code was written by a bunch of monkeys at typewriters.

Re: Linux 4.7 Released

#64

Post by qwertyuiop924 »

tangent128 wrote: post #35
qwertyuiop924 wrote: post #13

Just so long as kdbus hasn't been merged yet...

It appears that kdbus is being reworked into BUS1[0]; the new API looks a lot less warty. [0] http://www.bus1.org/bus1.html

That looks... better, but still ugly. I'd rather the whole thing was killed.

Re: Linux 4.7 Released

#65

Post by hhjkjhkjhhlkj »

grawlinson wrote: post #29
voltagex_ wrote: post #26

Honest question: how many years do you think it'll be until embedded device manufacturers (routers, various TV boxes, wifi hard drives [1]) ship recent kernels? A $200 modem/router bought 6 months ago ships with a hacked up version of 2.6.36.4 that's barely buildable - mainly because the wifi chipset vendor refuses to open source their code and refuses to update the BSP [2]. 1: http://www.seagate.com/au/en/support/do…

>mainly because the wifi chipset vendor refuses to open source their code and refuses to update the BSP In that case, never. Trying to get vendors to open source anything is a hilarious exercise in futility.

> Trying to get vendors to open source anything is a hilarious exercise in futility.

Not really take Broadcom fro example, from https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/broadcom_wireless#Histo...

Broadcom has a noted history with its support for Wi-Fi devices regarding GNU/Linux. For a good portion of its initial history, Broadcom devices were either entirely unsupported or required the user to tinker with the firmware. The limited set of wireless devices that were supported were done so by a reverse-engineered driver. The reverse-engineered b43 driver was introduced in the 2.6.24 kernel.

In August 2008, Broadcom released the 802.11 Linux STA driver officially supporting Broadcom wireless devices on GNU/Linux. This is a restrictively licensed driver and it does not work with hidden ESSIDs, but Broadcom promised to work towards a more open approach in the future.

In September 2010, Broadcom released a fully open source driver. The brcm80211 driver was introduced in the 2.6.37 kernel and in the 2.6.39 kernel it was sub-divided into the brcmsmac and brcmfmac drivers.

Re: Linux 4.7 Released

#66

Post by igravious »

zbraniecki wrote: post #24
Zagitta wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sadly this isn't quite the case with skylake IGPU, there's a ton of issues with power management options rendering the system very unstable or down right unusable. Also worth noting is that NVME ssd power management is flat out unsupported resulting in additional 3W power draw on DELL XPS 13 pcs out of the 6W that's currently possible with stable power options enabled.

Just to put those words in context - I use Dell XPS 13 with Linux 4.7 and my power usage drops to 4.1 Watt discharge rate and holds an average of 6 W when I'm on average use. That means that I usually have around 7-8 hours of battery on my average use, and if I'm in a battery-sensitive environment like a long flight, I can reduce screen brightness and turn off wifi and get up to 14 hours of battery. Right at this mom…

Which revision of the Dell XPS 13? Thanks in advance!

Re: Linux 4.7 Released

#67

Post by executesorder66 »

throwaway_exer wrote: post #56
executesorder66 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Trying to get vendors to open source anything is a hilarious exercise in futility. I hate that this is true. Could anyone explain to me why though? Would it not make life easier for them if they just open sourced their firmware and let other people update/maintain it? (Sorry for the noob question, I haven't looked into this in detail)

1) opens them up to more patent infringement lawsuits 2) FCC prefers SDN radios be blackboxes 3) costs more money to document and support

1) Why would they be infringing on a patent if they open source their own code? Could you expand on this point please.

2) Seems like a small subset of devices. And the FCC only has power in the US right?

3) Surely they have to document their stuff internally anyway. And being opensource can mean free documentation. Same for support.

Re: Linux 4.7 Released

#68

Post by Nullabillity »

spoiler wrote: post #61
INTPenis wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Curiously timed question because when the 4.7 kernel release announcement was sent out I googled one of the contributs on a whim and found that they worked for a company that builds embedded systems. And this guy is contributing to the 4.7 kernel. ;) But that's just one guy, one company. I believe most companies like the stability of using something old and well proven.

> But that's just one guy, one company. I believe most companies like the stability of using something old and well proven. Isn't it the opposite with the kernel, though? Doesn't its stability improve over time? That's at least the feeling I get. I make some embedded "devices" as a hobby (none of it is mass-produced), and I feel like things are better now than they used to be ~3 years ago.

> I make some embedded "devices" as a hobby (none of it is mass-produced), and I feel like things are better now than they used to be ~3 years ago.

I guess what they meant was that sticking to old versions gives you a stable target to develop against, not that the resulting product will be stable.

Upgrading to 4.whatever would give you all the improvements, absolutely, but it would also give you all the new bugs, and mean that you have to keep up with all the refactoring that have been done since (and will be done in the future, if you plan to stay up to date).

Re: Linux 4.7 Released

#69

Post by voltagex_ »

pricechild wrote: post #62
stephenr wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well pretty much any router with a PPPoE client should work then. What is the "free city wifi" thing you referred to that requires the isp provided router?

I suspect he means the schemes where you agree to run an AP other customers can use and in return you get to connect to their AP's while on the move.

Yep - Telstra Air. But I'm not on that ISP yet

Re: Linux 4.7 Released

#70

Post by UncleSlacky »

chrisper wrote: post #19
dman wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Depends on the hardware and the amount of effort you put in. If you stick to purely Intel chips (cpu, gpu and wifi) if you spend the 5 minutes it takes to get powertop happy then you end up with equivalent battery life to windows. (Basing this on thinkpad t440 and thinkpad t450). On my AMD APU laptop, I have been unable to get battery life to be similar to windows.

Make sure you also checkout TLP since you have a Thinkpad.

TLP works on pretty much any brand of laptop these days. There are some Thinkpad-specific extras, but the core functionality is brand-agnostic.
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