[sclug] Not upgrading kernel to 2.6

[Matt]

On Sat, 2004-07-24 at 14:48, Derek M Jones wrote:
> 
> >> However,
> >> I did take a copy of /boot and was about to give it ago when
> >> I read the following:
> >> 
> >> http://developers.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/07/22/0138244&tid=106&tid=8
> >> 
> >> Since I prefer to get my excitement outside of kernel hacking
> >> I have decided to stay away from 2.6
> >
> >This is why you should take heed of the advice in the article and rely
> >on $DISTRO to Do The Right Thing. The Fedora Core 2 2.6.x kernel for
> >example, will have extra patches either to add more functionality, or
> >more commonly to add improvements to stability *without* adding extra
> >functionality that can change the expected behaviour.
> 
> As various commenters pointed out, how many distributions have the
> resources or interest in performing a thorough check?

The big ones tend to do, for values of big that I probably don't have to
spell out. The fact their kernel packages pack extra patches along with
the vanilla kernel source is not a coincidence.

Maybe this is a reason why having five squillion different Linux
distributions is a bad thing. Joe Bloggs sat in his bedroom with his own
"Bloggix" Linux Distro simply doesn't have the resources to maintain his
own kernel and associated patches, nor does he probably have the
resources to track and keep up-to-date WRT other package security
updates.

But I notice you've gone back to Red Hat 9, is that using the vendor
kernel with its extra patches? Or a vanilla kernel? How do you deal with
the NPTL threading issues?

Matt