“In certain situations, a small patch for 2.6.38 perceivably
improves the response time of desktop environments. Transparent
Huge Pages, on the other hand, simplify memory management, which is
particularly relevant in terms of virtualisation and server
software.“On Tuesday last week, Linus Torvalds issued the seventh release
candidate of Linux 2.6.38. Among other things, Torvalds mentioned a
fix for a flaw in Btrfs that can potentially cause data loss in
certain situations – again, there was no indication of a
final release date for 2.6.38.“Nevertheless, the next version in the main development branch
is approaching completion, and the Kernel Log will, therefore,
gradually conclude its “Coming in 2.6.38″ mini series; the
penultimate part will discuss the advancements in terms of the
kernel’s architecture code, infrastructure and virtualisation. Part
1 and part 3 discussed the changes to the graphics hardware and
network communication code; part 2 and part 4 revolved around file
systems and storage. This week, the series will be concluded with
an article on the kernel’s audio, USB and video hardware
drivers.”