“By the time the 2.6.0 production kernel was released last
December, the kernels in the 2.5.x development tree had been stable
for more than a year. There was little drama associated with the
release of the new code (compared to previous stable kernel
introductions) as the Open Source Development Labs (OSDL), IBM, and
others had been performing consistent, rigorous testing and the
kernel team remain determined to keep the development kernel stable
and usable at all times. In the end, going to 2.6.0 was mainly a
re-labeling exercise…”