On Mon, Sep 13, 2004 at 12:55:31PM +0100, PFJ wrote: > > > I notice that many people upgrade the kernel as new releases come out. > > Just wondering what the reasons are? Is it just security? > > Security, speed, bug fixes, additional goodies - the list goes on. > > Me, I do it so that I can send bug reports back. And to annoy the wife! In the announcement there will be a list of the changes made. Some of these are general bug fixes, some are specific bug fixes and some are security related. It can be hard to research all the listed bugs compare the code and form a personal opinion. Thus most folks do upgrade and place a bit of faith on the work done by others. Me I do both... I download the update and give the changes a look. At times the differences are clearly an improvement, other times the change is subtle, and often I do not understand what the change changes but I try. To be sure I have faith in the collective set of eyes inspecting code changes. If you watch bug fixes (read bugzilla logs) many times you will see discussions and reviews of the changes and choices. These discussions are an education. If you are unwilling to just update then do some homework on the change and if a specific change as presented in the code and bugzilla logs needs some elaboration this is a good place to ask. Google and source code are your friend. -- T o m M i t c h e l l In the USA, be informed, Vote Nov 2004.
