Is Torvalds reducing bloat in Linux 2.6.35 ?

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Linus Torvalds has commented in the past that he thought that the Linux kernel was too bloated. To date though, not much (if anything) has been done to combat Linux bloat, but that might just be changing with the upcoming Linux 2.6.35 release.

On Saturday Torvalds posted the Linux 2.6.35 rc2 release and in his release announcement he makes specific mention of the size.

“I’m slightly unhappy with its size – admittedly it’s not nearly as big as
rc2 was the last release cycle, but that was an unusually big -rc2,” Torvalds wrote. “And I
really hoped for a calmer release cycle this time.

In fact, for once I’m going to enforce -rc3 being sane, because the
upcoming week is the last week of school for my kids. And when the kids
get out of school, I’m going be offline for a while. And as a result, I
_really_ don’t want to pull anything even half-way scary in the next week
for -rc3.”

So yes, in a (small) way Torvalds is taking aim at the expanding size of the Linux kernel, but it’s not because of some larger goal of reducing size — but rather the practical realities of life.