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Alexandre Oliva announced today the release and general availability of the GNU Linux-Libre 5.10 kernel for those who seek 100% freedom for their personal computers.
Based on the Linux 5.10 LTS kernel series, the GNU Linux-libre 5.10 kernel is now available for the GNU/Linux community to deblob any proprietary code and drivers from the upstream kernel release, providing us with a 100% free/libre kernel.
This release introduces deblobbing for a new firmware-loading primitive introduced in Linux kernel 5.10 LTS, disables new blobs in the AMDGPU open-source graphics driver for AMD GPUs and the Intel i915 video and Bluetooth HCI drivers, as well as in the Quallcomm ath11k, Intel iwlwifi, IMX SDMA, and MLXSW Spectrum drivers.
It also disables firmware loading in the newly added drivers for the Cadence MHDP8546 DPI/DP bridge and the Marvell Prestera switch, disables new blobs in the Qualcomm ARM64 (AArch64) ports, and updates the blob loading code for the Broadcom STM DPFE memory and Intel Haswell and HiFi2 sound drivers.
Also, precompiled BPF code was added to the upstream tree along with corresponding sources. Of course, the GNU Linux-libre 5.10 kernel also inherits all of Linux kernel 5.10’s new features, including the performance boost in the Btrfs file system for fsync() operations, the “year-2038” fixes in the XFS file system, and EFI system support for the RISC-V architecture.
It also introduces support for the ARMv8.5 memory tagging extension, support for the SM2 digital-signature algorithm, a much-improved EXT4 file system, and numerous other improvements. On top of that, Linux kernel 5.10 is an LTS (Long-Term Support) series that will probably be supported for the next five years, so I recommend you stick with it for your GNU/Linux distribution.
Those of you wanting to build a 100% free personal computer that doesn’t run any proprietary code can download the GNU Linux-Libre 5.10 kernel right now from the official website. This GNU-powered Linux kernel is compatible with all GNU/Linux distributions, as well as the GNU Operating System.
Last updated 3 years ago
