Zack's Kernel News
Zack's Kernel News
Zack Brown discusses preventing the kernel from tainting, encrypting printk() output, and a new kernel bug reporting bot.
Preventing the Kernel from Tainting
Matthew Garrett recently posted a patch to allow users to select at compile time whether the kernel would be "tainted" when loading unsigned modules. In the Linux world, tainting refers to whether the kernel is entirely open source or not. For example, if a user loads a binary-only module from a third-party vendor, it would taint the kernel because the module is not open source. The reason this is significant is that the Linux developers don't want to respond to bug reports that could be related to closed-source blobs of code to which they don't have access. Typically if a user sends in a bug report using a tainted kernel, the Linux developers will ask that user to reproduce the bug using an untainted kernel.
It wasn't immediately clear why Matthew wanted this code added to the kernel. He only said, "Distributions may wish to provide kernels that permit loading of unsigned modules based on certain policy decisions."
Rusty Russell said Matthew's explanation was too vague and asked for clarification.
[...]
Buy this article as PDF
(incl. VAT)
Buy Linux Magazine
US / Canada
UK / Australia
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.
News
-
TuxCare Announces Support for AlmaLinux 9.2
Thanks to TuxCare, AlmaLinux 9.2 (and soon version 9.6) now enjoys years of ongoing patching and compliance.
-
Go-Based Botnet Attacking IoT Devices
Using an SSH credential brute-force attack, the Go-based PumaBot is exploiting IoT devices everywhere.
-
Plasma 6.5 Promises Better Memory Optimization
With the stable Plasma 6.4 on the horizon, KDE has a few new tricks up its sleeve for Plasma 6.5.
-
KaOS 2025.05 Officially Qt5 Free
If you're a fan of independent Linux distributions, the team behind KaOS is proud to announce the latest iteration that includes kernel 6.14 and KDE's Plasma 6.3.5.
-
Linux Kernel 6.15 Now Available
The latest Linux kernel is now available with several new features/improvements and the usual bug fixes.
-
Microsoft Makes Surprising WSL Announcement
In a move that might surprise some users, Microsoft has made Windows Subsystem for Linux open source.
-
Red Hat Releases RHEL 10 Early
Red Hat quietly rolled out the official release of RHEL 10.0 a bit early.
-
openSUSE Joins End of 10
openSUSE has decided to not only join the End of 10 movement but it also will no longer support the Deepin Desktop Environment.
-
New Version of Flatpak Released
Flatpak 1.16.1 is now available as the latest, stable version with various improvements.
-
IBM Announces Powerhouse Linux Server
IBM has unleashed a seriously powerful Linux server with the LinuxONE Emperor 5.