Linux 6.9 will be the first kernel version with ten million Git objects

Linus Torvalds has released version 6.8 of the Linux kernel and noted “random Git numerology” – when work on this version of the kernel was finished, the Git repository used to track it contained 9.996 million objects, The Register reports.

“So it took a bit longer for the commit counts to come down this release than I tend to prefer,” Torvalds writes in the release announcement for version 6.8. “but a lot of that seemed to be about various selftest updates (networking in particular) rather than any actual real sign of problems.”

The developer said that this will be the last major kernel to have less than 10 million Git objects.

“Of course, there is absolutely nothing special about it apart from a nice round number. Git doesn’t care,” he added.

In fact, the magic is lost a bit when you realize that linux-next, another Linux kernel update tree not maintained by Torvalds, has long since grown to over 10 million Git objects.

Torvalds rated the addition of the new Xe drm driver as the most significant addition to this version of the kernel. The driver ensures the operation of Intel graphics processors, regardless of whether they are integrated into the processor or are separate devices. The update is considered experimental.

Another addition to the kernel adds support for Amazon Web Services’ Nitro, the cloud giant’s isolation technology that offloads security and networking functions to the SmartNIC. The new driver exposes Nitro hardware to the kernel, allowing Linux guests to access the services it offers.

The bcachefs file system, one of the big additions to Linux 6.7, has received some fixes to help improve performance. Another improvement allowed the Rust kernel to be used on processors that use the Chinese LoongArch architecture.

Raspberry Pi 5 graphics hardware has received more support, and Nintendo’s Switch Online controllers are now supported by Linux.

Torvalds’ post ended with an appeal to kernel developers to test version 6.8 of the kernel, as well as a thank you to those who had already submitted pulls for version 6.9 of the kernel before the merge window opened.

Context:

What are Git objects? These are different types of data in the repository. There are four types of objects: blobs for file contents, trees for directories, commits for repository versions, and tags for marking important points.