Now that the development cycle of the Linux 4.14 kernel gets closer to an end with the RC5 snapshot already out the door on October 15, we can say that the final release of the next long-term supported kernel series should arrive on November 5, 2017. Only two RCs are left for this cycle, RC6 on October 22 and RC7 on October 29. The Linux 4.14 LTS kernel packs numerous new features and support for newer hardware through updated drivers. However, the fifth Release Candidate contains updates for the x86, PowerPC and MIPS architectures, as well as for GPU, USB, networking and sound drivers, and various core kernel changes for networking, lockdep, and mm.