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So Ubuntu is taking a little heat for not being the world’s largest contributor to the Linux kernel.org community. BUT they are about to finally join a major effort to improve Linux kernel quality for all.
Ubuntu is on the verge of fully participating in the Kernel Oops project run by Intel’s Arjan van de Ven (i’ve interviewed him before, great guy and an awesome project). Kernel Oops is an incredibly valuable effort that tracks ‘oopses’ on Linux and provides information so kernel developers can fix bugs. So far Kernel oops has been part of the default installation on Red Hat’s Fedora and is available to Novell OpenSUSE users as well..it soon may beavailable by default to Ubuntu users too.
Ubuntu/Canonical CTO Matt Zimmerman noted in a blog post that he has done some work on integrating kerneloops.
“The result is that kernel oopses can be captured as Apport problem reports with full detail, and semi-automatically filed as bugs, in addition to being counted on kerneloops.org’s statistics,” Zimmerman wrote. ” I’ve put an initial version into Ubuntu and sent the patch to Arjan for merging upstream, and we’re exploring the addition of kerneloops to our default installation to provide testing feedback to kernel developers from our users.”
‘What will be very interesting to see in say 6 months time, is how many reports Ubuntu users submit to Kernel Oops vs other distros. I wonder if the reports will be any different (are Ubuntu users using different configs?) and the value that those reports provide.
Without a doubt, more information is better and we should all commend Zimmerman for his efforts in trying to get Kernel Oops into Ubuntu as it will inevitably lead to a better Linux experience for all.