# Does ck-sources has a stable version in the future?

## ligq

As title.

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## asturm

You can try yourself and open a stable request on bugs.gentoo.org.  :Wink: 

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## ligq

OK. I will try this kernel on my T400s.

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## cach0rr0

i dont recall the last time ive actually seen any revision of ck-sources marked stable

not because it's unstable, but because there's simply not the manpower to give the level of review to every patchset that's given to e.g. gentoo-sources, hardened-sources, etc. - dont quote me on that, though, i dont know if it's entirely true, but it would make sense

just had a quick peek and git-sources, pf-sources, zen-sources, ck-sources, none of these have a build that isnt ~arch. Some supported, some unsupported, none with a release marked stable. 

Again, just to be clear, something not being keyworded as "stable" doesnt mean it's unstable. To each their own, but i would have zero personal reservations about running an ~arch kernel (do it at work on mission-critical systems, just make sure i give a fair bit of QA first)

may be the case it's already been given the necessary level of review, without the administrative task of unkeywording it being completed yet. Dunno. Bugzilla may be your best bet on that one

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## aCOSwt

1/ I fail to understand what would be the added value of such an initiative.

a/ You take some gentoo-sources stable kernel then you fetch Take me to all the stable 3.0 patches Then you get the theoretically stablest ck-sources.

b/ You wait for some gentoo-sources version to be flagged stable, then you select the ck-sources version that implements the same set of upstream + gentoo patches.

2/ OK... option a/ wont work all the times !   :Evil or Very Mad: 

And this is certainly one good reason gentoo kernel maintainers cannot follow some stabilization policy with ck-sources.

For example, take what one could consider being the latest stablest gentoo-sources, that is to say the last stable version of the long-term supported linux.

At the time of this post, it is : 3.0.17-r2

Apply the 3.0 -ck patchset ! Well... this will result in a couple of unsuccessful hunks.

There has been a discussion among gentoo kernel maintainers on gentoo bugzilla (search for it) concluding in a policy for stabilizing gentoo-sources.

I doubt this policy can apply with ck-sources.

3/ If you make a stable version of ck-sources and do not accept ~arch for ck-sources, then, when emerging --update, you will not be presented with the latest versions of the package. And, because the ck patchset is in active development, the last ck patchset is always the most efficient so, for the sake of coherency with the reasons that motivate your choice for a -ck-patched kernel, you should almost always upgrade to the latest available version.

So... if stability is a concern for you, well, I mean the concept of the stable keyword, then opt for 1.b and... enjoy !   :Cool: 

(I have been happily doing this up to 2.6.38 )

Oh wait : Some other thread would tend to show that I am no longer happy with this...   :Very Happy: 

Well... that is another problem for stabilizing :

Why do we want ck-sources ? For a better latency !

OK, we all know that it will be to the expenses of A, B and C.

Suppose that (And this is the case for me from ck 2.6.38 to ck 3.2.1) a new version comes that ensures the same latency but to the expense of D or to a greater expense of C.

What do we get ? A regression !

How can you decently flag stable such a package. Moreover, I do care about D or C and you might care less.

As an advice I would suggest with things as touchy as ck patches :

Do not care about stable-for-everybody flags !

Are you personally happy with / not happy with is of greater value.

consider the typical load of your system, make a personal benchmark of the characteristics that are important for you / this typical load.

Install some ck-source version then run with it.

When a new ck-sources version comes into the tree then benchmark it.

Is it any better ? Then you want this version irrespective of any flag.

Is it worse ? Then you do not want this version !

That's simple ! Is'nt it ?

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## ligq

First, thanks for your replies.

I just want to install Linux on my laptop (Thinkpad T400s) as a desktop environment. So, I don't want upgrade more often. If there isn't big different between gentoo-sources and ck-sources, it seems that gentoo-source is a good choice.

I am sorry that I don't have any experience on how to do a test to compare these two kernels.

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## asturm

The performance advantage of the ck-patchset is hard to determine, it's more something that you should feel. If you can't, then it probably isn't made for your system workload anyway. Personally, I had sound glitches with the ck-patchset last time I tried it (probably a year ago) and my kernel is back to normal since then (well, mostly).

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## aCOSwt

 *genstorm wrote:*   

> The performance advantage of the ck-patchset is hard to determine.

 

Not at all !

- Take some buggy process running an rt prio of 99. Let's say JACKD for example.   :Confused: 

- When it starts bugging under a Gentoo-sources, you can open qjackctl window and stop JACKD.

- When it starts bugging under a ck-source... well... Switching the power supply off is your unique solution...   :Twisted Evil: 

Well... this at least easily proves that, thanks to the -ck patchset, you actually can grant 100% of the resources to a process !   :Cool: 

- builds on a dual core using make -j2 ending sooner than under non-patched kernels using make -j3

- No jackd Xruns,

And, as I noticed that latency under non patched kernels increased by 25% since the 3.0 series, the difference with -ck patched kernels is certainly even more noticeable than it was when you last tested it

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## cach0rr0

 *ligq wrote:*   

> First, thanks for your replies.
> 
> I just want to install Linux on my laptop (Thinkpad T400s) as a desktop environment. So, I don't want upgrade more often. If there isn't big different between gentoo-sources and ck-sources, it seems that gentoo-source is a good choice.
> 
> I am sorry that I don't have any experience on how to do a test to compare these two kernels.

 

nice laptop! I'm on the verge of buying a new T-series myself. love those things

anyway, one of the nice things here, there's no reason you can't keep a ck-sources kernel AND a gentoo-sources kernel on your machine

build both, add entries for both into grub.conf, spend some time booted with your ck-sources kernel, spend some time booted with your gentoo-sources kernel, see what you like best. 

All of the benchmarking in the world can't override user experience  :Smile: 

As a perfect example, I very frequently switch between ck-sources and gentoo-sources on one of my laptops. The ck-sources build i used for a while was a bit flaky on the wireless side, but the responsiveness of the desktop was better. Finally came a ck-sources build that seemed to make wireless worse, so i switched to gentoo-sources. I'll generally find a kernel that's stable for me, run with it for a few months, then try out the other set of sources again and see how they fare. 

So I basically end up with 2 ck-sources kernels and 2 gentoo-sources kernels. Sometimes the overall experience is better with ck-sources, sometimes it's better with gentoo-sources. It is a very inexact science. Since it's very easy to have all of these available, and it does no harm, no reason not to!

That would be my honest suggestion. Emerge ck-sources, emerge gentoo-sources, configure both, install both to /boot, set up grub.conf to allow you to choose either of the two. When you've found the one you'd like to use as your default, set grub.conf to use it as its default. If in a few months you want to see if the issue that made whichever kernel the "loser" has been resolved, emerge whichever-sources again, reconfigure/reinstall the kernel to /boot, add another grub entry, and test it out. And if testing shows it's still not stable enough for your liking? Easy! You still have your other kernel there that you can boot to as a failsafe, as the "old faithful".

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