On Wed, Apr 1, 2020 at 5:25 PM David <dlocklea...@gmail.com> wrote:

> As of today, my install still uses the version below
> for the kernel
>
>      5.6.0-0.rc7.git1.1.fc33.x86_64
>
> ( and is running great, in my opinion )
>
> But in today's Rawhide compose announcement of upgraded
> packages, the kernel was listed as
> upgrading to the newer
>
>      kernel-5.7.0-0.rc0.git2.1.fc33
>
> So I have several questions
>
> 1 )   Yesterday, I think I only got the kernel-header package.     Is that
> the way this normally works.
>

The kernel upgrades pretty much daily, though sometimes it can take a day
or 2 to get out to mirrors. Between what you are running and what has been
built, we did 5.6.0-1,  kernel-5.7.0-0.rc0.git1.1,
and kernel-5.7.0-0.rc0.git2.1  Kernel-headers is typically built only once
a week, or once per rc.


> 2 )    Does Rawhide never run on the stable version of the kernel ?
>

Generally not for more than 24 hours. As 5.6.0 was released on a Sunday, it
gets built on Monday morning. We will either start doing builds of the
merge window Monday afternoon, or Tuesday morning at the latest.  This
week, it was Monday afternoon.  Kernels are built with a snapshot of
Linus tree most weekdays.  The first rc build each week and the final
stable build of a kernel are built as release kernels with debug options
turned off, and git snapshots in between have additional debugging options
turned on. These do have some impact on performance, but not too drastic.
Of course we also offer regular snapshot builds in a rawhide nodebug
repository for people who really want them.  A side effect of this is they
are not secureboot signed while the official rawhide builds are.


>
>
3 )    What all goes into repackaging the kernel by the people tasked with
> doing that ?
>

Taking a snapshot of the current upstream tree, setting all of the new
config options appropriately, building/testing/pushing.  Stable updates
tend to require much less work, config doesn't change.  Even with rc
kernels after rc1 the config is fairly set until the next merge window
opens up.


>
>
4 )   How much different are the two kernels listed above ?
>

 The diff between rc7-git1 and 5.7 git snapshot 2 is roughly 300k lines.
The merge window is when the majority of new features for a given version
come in, so the diff from day to day can be huge. For instance snapshot 2
is almost 280k lines smaller than snapshot 3, and that covers a roughly 24
hour period.  After rc1 comes out, this slows down drastically.

5 )   Does Rawhide use every tiny update on the git for the kernel, or does
> it
> sometimes skip one or two ?
>
> We tend to take a snapshot every weekday, provided upstream has pulled in
commits.


> 6 ) Are there any other interesting insights related to this procedure ?
>
>
It is fairly straightforward, build and test the upstream tree as often as
possible.  This lets us hopefully catch bugs before they make it to a
stable release, and gives us a much smaller window for tracking down bugs
that are found... If you have a problem with 5.6-rc5-git2, but rc5.git1
works for you, it has been narrowed down to just a few dozen possible
issues.  From there it is easier to fix, or report the issue to upstream
for a fix, and hopefully get that fix in before 5.6.0 final releases. Once
a Fedora version hits beta (as F32 has, it only gets a snapshot once per
week with the rcX releases until the stable it out, so FC32 is on 5.6.0
right now, with 5.6.1 building. It will remain on stable kernels. The week
after next is a 5.6.0 test week where we will get users testing the 5.6
series on stable Fedora versions (F31 and F30), and based on the feedback
from that, we will get 5.6.x onto those branches as the supported kernel
shortly after.

I am just curious, and I am certain that the answers may be above my IQ, so
> please try to explain it all as simple as possible.
>
> I have used other developmental versions of distros, but this process does
> not
> take place in some of those.    For example, even in the most unstable of
> the
> KDE Neon "Unstable Developer's Edition," the kernel never changes ( except
> maybe some kind of security update ?? ).      I do not recall the kernel
> getting so
> many updates in Tumbleweed either.    ( Tumbleweed, is my second favorite
> way
> to use Linux, by the way. )
>
>
I can understand from a KDE development platform, they are more concerned
with KDE changes than kernel changes.  Somewhat surprised that Tumbleweed
isn't updating the kernel at least weekly.  We tend to be more aggressive
than most in updating the kernel across the board, but particularly in
rawhide, we have found the feedback loop that we get from this to be
valuable.

Thank you.
>
> David Locklear
> Novice Rawhide user
>
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