All users of the Linux 4.8 kernel branch must update

Oct 16, 2016 21:25 GMT  ·  By

Today, October 16, 2016, renowned kernel developer Greg Kroah-Hartman was proud to announce the general availability of the second point release to the Linux 4.8 kernel series.

That's right, Linux kernel 4.8.2 is here, and it arrives a little over a week after the first maintenance update. According to the appended shortlog and the diff from Linux kernel 4.8.1, the new version changes a total of 52 files, with 487 insertions and 213 deletions. Overall, the Linux 4.8.2 kernel looks pretty small when it comes to changes, with the exception of some ARM and x86 improvements and the updated drivers.

"I'm announcing the release of the 4.8.2 kernel. All users of the 4.8 kernel series must upgrade," says Greg Kroah-Hartman. "The updated 4.8.y git tree can be found at: git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux-stable.git linux-4.8.y and can be browsed at the normal kernel.org git web browser: http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/stable/linux-stable.git;a=summary."

Users are urged to update their systems as soon as possible

As mentioned before, Linux kernel 4.8.2 ships today with improvements for the ARM, ARM64 (AArch64), PowerPC (PPC), MIPS, and x86 hardware architectures, a couple of KVM (Kernel-based Virtual Machine) fixes, and an updated sound stack. Moreover, it updates Bluetooth, CPUIdle, MFD, PCI, PHY, POWERCAP, and USB drivers. We recommend checking out the appended shortlog (link above) for more details.

In the meantime, if you're using a GNU/Linux distribution powered by a kernel from the Linux 4.8 series, we strongly recommend that you update your system as soon as possible. OS vendors are urged to download the Linux kernel 4.8.2 sources right now from the kernel.org website or via ours, compile and tweak the release for their supported platform(s) and push it to the stable repos for users to update immediately.