Any reason to continually upgrade kernel?

[Praetor]

I'm running a 2.6.23.2 kernel now on my server/primary workhorse. I started with the .20 series and kept upgrading until I found all of my devices were properly recognized and working.

My other machines are running variations of .20 - .22 releases. I generally keep the packages up to date, is there any reason to update the kernel if the older release just works?

 

[silverpig]

Maybe. Read the release notes. Sometimes vulnerabilities are patched and depending on how much you care about that, it might be important.

Generally I just update when it says there's something to update, and fix anything that breaks, although nothing really does.

Short answer: Whatever floats your boat.

 

[Nothinman]

The kernel isn't special, it should be updated like any other application on your system.

 

[DarkThinker]

TBH for the first time in so many years of using Linux, I have for the first time last month added the Kernel to my YUM updates exclusion list!
My hardware is fully recognized, my system runs properly. The only reason I did this, is because I got sick of having to recompile all my software / driver modules for the new kernel. Now there is obviously a possible security / performance / glitch fix enhancement in updates. But I upgrade every 2 or 3 cycles. That way I keep the effort on my side to a minimum.

But perhaps I am ignorant, perhaps there is a solution that takes care of my worries and allows me to stay up to date w.r.t to the Kernel version, but I seriously doubt it.

 

[Nothinman]

But perhaps I am ignorant, perhaps there is a solution that takes care of my worries and allows me to stay up to date w.r.t to the Kernel version, but I seriously doubt it.

Stop using out of tree drivers. Or use one's that are packaged by your distro, for example the nvidia-kernel-* packages in Debian non-free that contain the binary nVidia module instead of installing it manually from nVidia.com.

 

[DarkThinker]

Originally posted by: Nothinman

But perhaps I am ignorant, perhaps there is a solution that takes care of my worries and allows me to stay up to date w.r.t to the Kernel version, but I seriously doubt it.

Stop using out of tree drivers. Or use one's that are packaged by your distro, for example the nvidia-kernel-* packages in Debian non-free that contain the binary nVidia module instead of installing it manually from nVidia.com.

well I wouldn't go with out of tree stuff if I didn't have to, why would I want out of tree if the in tree works right out? Plus it's not only drivers, but applications also. Are VMware modules in tree for instance?

 

[kamper]

I find vmware a real pain with kernel updates. Plus (and here comes a pretty pathetic excuse), rebooting is a pain when your desktops are covered with 10 shells, 15+ browser tabs and all sorts of assorted other junk that you have to find back afterwards. I just went well over 2 months without rebooting just recently for those two reasons alone, most of that time with pending kernel updates 😱

 

[Nothinman]

well I wouldn't go with out of tree stuff if I didn't have to, why would I want out of tree if the in tree works right out? Plus it's not only drivers, but applications also. Are VMware modules in tree for instance?

I know that but there are instances where you have a choice, for instance choosing to use Intel video instead of nVidia. Applications that have direct dependencies on the kernel are extremely rare but yes, there is a set of kernel modules being developed separately from the VMWare provided modules so hopefully they will get incorporated upstream eventually.

 

[Red Squirrel]

I rarely upgrade, since I find it causes more headaches then it's worth. I usually go the lazy way and use the packages that come with the distro and just upgrade the distro once and a while, maybe every 2-3 years or what not, if I find I'm running into issues.

One thing about Linux is once it works, as long as you don't fool around with it, it keeps working, unlike windows, which will randomly stop after a while.

 

[Nothinman]

I usually go the lazy way and use the packages that come with the distro

That's the best route because in the stable release of a distro they'll keep the same version of the kernel so you won't have to recompile anything after an update.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Oh, good to know then lol. figured getting the latest and doing the ./configure way was the best way, but that is also the hardest. Things like apache have like 30 lines just for the ./configure string if you want it done right.

 

[Nothinman]

figured getting the latest and doing the ./configure way was the best way, but that is also the hardest.

That would be exceptionally difficult considering that the kernel doesn't use autotools so there's no configure script...

 

[silverpig]

Originally posted by: Nothinman

figured getting the latest and doing the ./configure way was the best way, but that is also the hardest.

That would be exceptionally difficult considering that the kernel doesn't use autotools so there's no configure script...

Heh, it's been a while since I ran gentoo but it's something like

make menuconfig
make && make modules && make modules_install

then

cp arch/<whatever your arch is>/boot/bzImage /boot

I think that's it?

 

[Nothinman]

I can't say I've ever run Gentoo in anything besides VMWare but I would have assumed that they had something akin to make-kpkg to handle most of the compilation and package building of a kernel for you.