Linux 3.19 Merge Window Closes Ahead Of Schedule

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Linux 3.19 Merge Window Closes Ahead Of Schedule

Linux 3.18 was released two Sundays ago and the 3.19 merge window opened immediately. Normally the merge window is open for 14 days before Linus Torvalds closes it and tags -rc1. With Linux 3.19, things are different...

http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=MTg2OTY

[bitman]

So it will be what.. Third or fourth unusable version. Still no fix for that lockup. It must be real tricky problem to catch. :|

[Adarion]

Maybe Linus actually wanted to have a few days off to spend with his family?
Or was it just more changes already than was good for a release? Who knows.

> unusable

I'd not say the kernel is unusable. It's nasty that the bug still persists but yet it did not seem to affect a lot of people. And some bugs are just tricky to find and fix.

[bitman]

True i understand, but still. Makes me wonder how those programming gods do not manage to nail it for so long already.

[droste]

The reasons are quite easy:
1. They are not gods :P
2. They have the same problem that every programmer out there has. If you know there's a bug, but this does not happen on your developer machine it can be very very hard to find the solution. And even if you think you have the solution you can't verfiy yourself.

-> Bugs that only happen on a small number of systems are harder to find