Microsoft's Linux Distro Now Ships With NVMe Multi-Path Support, Upgrades More Tools

Microsoft's CBL-Mariner team has published v2.0.20230609 as the newest update to their in-house Linux distribution that is used for a variety of purposes inside and outside the Redmond company.

CBL-Mariner 2.0.20230609 as with most monthly releases brings a wide set of package updates. CBL-Mariner 2.0.20230609 brings updates to networkd-dispatcher, libssh, mtools, libdrm, curl, and more. Some of the core package updates were done in the name of security for addressing outstanding CVEs.

One kernel change to mention with the new CBL-Mariner release is now adding NVMe multi-path by enabling the CONFIG_NVME_MULTIPATH Kconfig switch. NVMe multi-path is the NVM Express specification around multi-pathing with allowing multiple physical routes between the server (system) and the storage device, which allows for more robustness and possible performance benefits. While the CBL-Mariner kernel image now ships with NVMe multi-path support built, it's off by default. Enabling the Linux NVMe multi-path support at run-time can be done via the "nvme_core.multipath=Y" kernel option.

More details on the CBL-Mariner changes that were published on Wednesday can be found via GitHub.