Hi folks,
So, Kernel 3.4 got released a couple of days ago, and the merge window has reopened for the 3.5 Kernel release.
We have put lots (and I mean it!) of work towards making a huge progress in the Intel Linux Graphics kernel driver for the 3.4 kernel, but things look yet even more brighter for the next one – namely, 3.5!
As a picture speaks louder than 1000 words, I’ve done a simple chart comparing the number of changes in the drivers/gpu/drm/i915 directory over the Linux Kernel releases since the 2.6.30 release some years ago:
Linux Kernel commits rate between 2.6.31 up to 3.5.0 (so far)
Between 3.3 and 3.4 Kernel versions, we had an astonishing number of 152 commits related to the drivers/gpu/drm/i915 directory (e.g., the Intel graphics driver in the kernel). This number looks impressive – but it is pale if we compare it to the 343 commits we had so far for the 3.5 Linux kernel merge window
So far, we are just 2 patches away from the all-time high of the 2.6.37 Kernel – and we are just getting into the 3.5 Kernel development cycle yet.
In case it is easier to read the absolute numbers instead of graphs, here is the full picture, generated from the git log --oneline <<kerner_version>>^1..<kernel_version>> drivers/gpu/drm/i915 command, for all the kernels between 2.6.29 and 3.5 (up to date):
2.6.30 98
2.6.31 122
2.6.32 119
2.6.33 144
2.6.34 69
2.6.35 155
2.6.36 184
2.6.37 345
2.6.38 247
2.6.39 113
3.0.0 109
3.1.0 131
3.2.0 126
3.3.0 78
3.4.0 152
3.5.0(next) 343
I’ll try to cover some of the highlights of the next Kernel release in the next post (ppgtt? haswell? valley view? DRI1 ? RC6? I2C? VBT? Those are just some of the keywords) – but this kinda answers the question whether the Intel Linux Graphics driver is alive.
Yes, it is.
And it rocks 
.
