Page: 1, 2  Next

[RESOLVED] Why is there a "0" in the middle of the kernel version?
Nobodyin
Status: Curious
Joined: 19 Jan 2023
Posts: 7
Reply Quote
This extra zero messes up the order of my most recent kernels during boot. I know it is no big deal to some people but can we get rid of it?
Back to top
damentz
Status: Assistant
Joined: 09 Sep 2008
Posts: 1117
Reply Quote
It's a holdover from the 2.6.NN kernel versioning. When Linus removed the dot notation, it broke Debian's kernel package. I tried removing it myself at some point and ran into issues, but maybe it's worth trying again.

In-fact, I checked how Siduction is doing their kernels and they've been able to remove the dot zero: liquorix.net/siduction/extra/pool/main/l/linux-siduction/. I'll dig into their kernel package this weekend and see how hard it would be to fix.
Back to top
Nobodyin
Status: Curious
Joined: 19 Jan 2023
Posts: 7
Reply Quote
Thank you. XanMod kernels manage to not have the extra zero but I prefer to use Liquorix.
Back to top
damentz
Status: Assistant
Joined: 09 Sep 2008
Posts: 1117
Reply Quote
Next release will include the change below:
github.com/damentz/liquorix-package/commit/0ed0f30d8f1e1d081567d899b77bcf94ba7acc93

Some history, the change was put in over 8 years ago, 3 years after kernel 3.0 came out. A single user using proprietary software reported a bug about their software crashing because the kernel version was 2 digits instead of 3.

As far as I know, it's rare to come across software that misbehaves for the number of digits, but Debian rarely takes risk by reverting changes like these.
Back to top
damentz
Status: Assistant
Joined: 09 Sep 2008
Posts: 1117
Reply Quote
Latest release has the zero stripped off. Let me know if you run into any issues with software compatibility.

I'll leave this thread open for about a week and mark it as RESOLVED if there's no issues.
Back to top
Nobodyin
Status: Curious
Joined: 19 Jan 2023
Posts: 7
Reply Quote
I can verify that the zero is gone but the order is still not quite right.

menuentry 'Linux Mint 21.1 Cinnamon, with Linux 6.1.7-x64v3-xanmod1' --class linuxmint
menuentry 'Linux Mint 21.1 Cinnamon, with Linux 6.1.0-7.2-liquorix-amd64' --class linuxmint
menuentry 'Linux Mint 21.1 Cinnamon, with Linux 6.1-8.1-liquorix-amd64' --class linuxmint
menuentry 'Linux Mint 21.1 Cinnamon, with Linux 5.15.0-58-generic' --class linuxmint

The first "-" instead of a "." is still messing up the order but I like it better.
Back to top
damentz
Status: Assistant
Joined: 09 Sep 2008
Posts: 1117
Reply Quote
:: Quote ::
The first "-" instead of a "." is still messing up the order but I like it better.


I'll take a look at that next. The objective here was to revert a change that Debian made exactly so that we're in another known working state for the kernel package. Now that I know that works and there's no issues, I'll take a stab at moving the dashes and dots around so it looks better.

For example, we should easily get it to say: menuentry 'Linux Mint 21.1 Cinnamon, with Linux 6.1.8-1-liquorix-amd64' --class linuxmint
Back to top
damentz
Status: Assistant
Joined: 09 Sep 2008
Posts: 1117
Reply Quote
Ok, a new version of the kernel out that codes the version properly, you should see 6.1.8-2 as the version, with the -2 being the package version.
Back to top
Nobodyin
Status: Curious
Joined: 19 Jan 2023
Posts: 7
Reply Quote
Thank you. It works now. This is a summary of my grub.cfg file:

menuentry 'Linux Mint 21.1 Cinnamon, with Linux 6.1.8-x64v3-xanmod1'
menuentry 'Linux Mint 21.1 Cinnamon, with Linux 6.1.8-2-liquorix-amd64'
menuentry 'Linux Mint 21.1 Cinnamon, with Linux 5.15.0-58-generic'

BTW, do you have any influence with the grub maintainers? I have a
suggestion to make the submenus of the distros found by os-prober
look better when using custom themes. Thanks.
Back to top
mhalano
Status: Interested
Joined: 31 Dec 2022
Posts: 10
Reply Quote
I still didn't test the latest package to check how the numbering are working, but I really like the "6.1.8-2" because it's align with the published kernel versions. Congrats.
Back to top
Display posts from previous:   
Page: 1, 2  Next
All times are GMT - 8 Hours