The End of the Paved Road: Maintaining Linux Kernel 4.4 Beyond LTS
summary
Civil Infrastructure Platform maintains Linux 4.4 as an SLTS kernel beyond upstream LTS by hoovering patches from newer LTS (4.14) with a custom tool that applies patches and emits a detailed log showing what auto-applies, what must be manually backported and why. Policy limits scope, accepts trivial one-line fixes and critical backports but rejects intrusive mitigations (Spectre), uses local compiles plus CIP CI for testing, ships four flavors (vanilla, CIP with member patches, and two RT branches), and promises a minimum ten-year support commitment while current maintainers spend about two days a week each.
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chapters (4)
- 0:00Start
- 13:39The Process: Ingesting patches
- 14:43The Process: Reviewing ingested patches
- 17:40The Process: Testing and reviewing backports
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