While Linux 2.6.36 development continues apace, a number of new stable releases iron out various quirks in previous versions. New versions of PowerTop and graphics drivers for AMD and NVIDIA graphics chips offer numerous enhancements and bug fixes

A new version of the nv driver supports later NVIDIA GPUs. Drivers giving 3D support for later Radeon GPUs are making progress, and so is code for running the X server without root rights.

Almost simultaneously with the first series 1.8 X Server, the developers have also updated Mesa3D and various drivers. Four new stable kernels offer bug fixes and minor improvements

The X.org and kernel developers are working on drivers to support the DirectX 11 graphics cards in AMD's Radeon HD 5000 series. The kernel developers have released numerous new stable kernels and are discussing the integration of utrace in great detail.

The development of Linux 2.6.34 has started and is causing heated discussions on the LKML. LWN.net has analysed Linux 2.6.32.9 for security fixes and found almost twenty of them. Linux-Libre removes proprietary files from the kernel, and new graphics drivers for Radeon cards offer numerous improvements

On May 28th, 2008, NVidia decided to please the Linux world and launched version 173.14.05 of their graphics drivers, which brought preliminary support for X.org Server 1.5 (used in bleeding-edge distributions, such as Fedora 9). A few days ago, they decided to make the Linux users happy again, by releasing yet another bugfix version of their graphics drivers, Nvidia 173.14.09.

Although some X.org drivers have been updated for X server 1.7, development work is running behind schedule. New drivers from AMD, Intel and Nvidia and new Linux versions mean a number of corrections and enhancements in the graphics system. 3D support for newer Radeon GPUs is now adequate for Compiz. DRBD should make it into the main Linux kernel development tree in 2.6.32.

Much attention goes toward mainline kernel releases, but relatively few users are actually running those kernels. Instead, they run kernels provided by their distributors, and those kernels, in turn, are based off the stable kernel series. The practice of releasing stable kernels has been going for well over five years now, so perhaps it's time to look back at how it has been going.

Enhancements to the ALSA code for HD audio codecs, a V4L/DVB driver for the Mantis TV chip, drivers for MSI laptops and drivers for newer AMD CPUs are just some of the improvements to Linux hardware support.