Download Linux Kernel 3.2

Version 3.2 of the Linux Kernel has been released. The kernel is the heart of the operating system and, simply put, it sits as a layer between the hardware and the applications. New in this release are several improvements to the Btrfs file system, the ext4 file system can now handle blocks larger than 4k, and better control over how much processor time is allocated to processes. More information about the improvements in this release can be found at Kernel newbies and The H.

Linux 3.2

This release includes support for Ext4 block sizes bigger than 4KB and up to 1MB, which improve performance with big files; btrfs has been updated with faster scrubbing, automatic backup of critical filesystem metadata and tools for manual inspection of the filesystems; the process scheduler has added support to set upper limits of CPU time; the desktop responsiveness in presence of heavy writes has been improved, TCP has been updated to include an algorithm which speeds up the recovery of the connection after lost packets; the profiling tool “perf top” has added support for live inspection of tasks and libraries and see the annotated assembly code; the Device Mapper has added support for ‘thin provisioning’ of storage, and a new architeture has been added: the Hexagon DSP processor from Qualcomm. Other drivers and small improvements and fixes are also available in this release.