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In brief

Jeff Kirsher has restructured the Linux source code downstream of drivers/net/ (for example 1, 2); for instance, all Ethernet hardware drivers are now located in vendor-specific directories inside of drivers/net/ethernet/. The developer moved around a lot of code in the process – another reason for the large number of new and removed lines of code calculated for the kernel that is due in January.

The driver for Gigabit Ethernet chips by Realtek now supports the RTL8111F component, while the Ixgbe driver supports Intel's 82599 chip. The developers have integrated a number of changes into the Bna driver for Brocade's 10G PCIe Ethernet adapter, whose version number has jumped to 3.0.2.1 as a result; some of the changes now enable the driver to provide model 1860 support.

The code for communicating via a CAN (Controller Area Network) now offers functions that allow gateways and routers to be configured via Netlink.

Another new addition is the basic support for IPv6 over Low-power Wireless Personal Area Networks (6LoWPAN/IEEE 802.15.4).

Newly introduced with Linux 3.1, the NFC (Near Field Communication) subsystem now supports the NFC Controller Interface (NCI), which enables communication between controllers and device hosts (DH).

In his main Git-Pull request, network subsystem maintainer David Miller highlights various other internal optimisations (for example 1, 2).

Minor gems

Many further minor, but by no means insignificant, changes can be found in the list below, which contains the commit headers referring to the respective change. Like many of the references in the text above, the links point to the relevant commit in the web front end of the Git branch for the "official" kernel sources maintained by Linus Torvalds at kernel.org. The commit comments available at these links and the patches themselves provide extensive further information on the respective changes.

Every link is preceded by various letters and numbers in square brackets. The letter "C" identifies patches that modify Kconfig files, which contain the help texts and configuration options displayed by "make menuconfig", "make xconfig" and similar tools during kernel configuration. "D" is used for patches that modify the documentation available under Documentation/ in the kernel branch. "N" identifies changes which create a new file. The numbers provide a rough idea of the patch size: for instance, "1" is used for changes between 10 and 20 KBytes including comment, "2" for patches between 20 and 30 KBytes; changes without a number are less than 10 KBytes, while patches marked "9" are 90 KBytes or more.

LAN

WLAN

Various

Further background information about the developments in the Linux kernel area can be found using the search function at The H Open Source. Information about previous Linux kernel releases can be found in The H's Linux Kernel History. New editions of Kernel Logs are also mentioned on Identi.ca and Twitter by @kernellog2. The Kernel Log author also posts updates about various topics on Identi.ca and Twitter as @kernellogauthor.

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