<![CDATA[Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/]]>Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/

Here's something I think we all will have to contend with, whether you're an AIgen enthusiast or not: attacking is easier than defending, and these things don't get tired and they *are* very good at finding exploits. None of us will be able to ignore that, and we will probably have to listen to real genuine reports from them, even if we reject AIgen input.

However, I don't think that's actually the right solution, and I don't think it's sustainable. 🧵

]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/topic/d0d2392c-d1f7-4638-8f57-3972753250f7/significant-raise-of-reports-on-the-linux-kernel-mailing-list-https-lwn.net-articles-1065620RSS for NodeMon, 06 Apr 2026 16:39:47 GMTThu, 02 Apr 2026 13:24:49 GMT60<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 22:03:10 GMT]]>
100% microkernels were the right way to go!

They still are.

Alas, something threw a very angry GURU MEDIATION at the "in 1992 or whatever the consumer hardware wasn't up to the task" part of your statement. Amiga Workbench (a microkernel derived from the TripOS provenance) was absolutely the bees' knees on economical consumer hardware in the 1980s, and Commodore hadn't yet declared bankruptcy in 1992.

Heck, it's 2026 and I am pretty sure that there will probably still be Amiga related entries at @revisionparty@icosahedron.website
this weekend (wish I were there, alas $12,000ish USD in debt and it was going to cost around $2k USD just to fly there and have lodgings, so not this year).

Admittedly, the Amigas were pretty awesome insomuch as you could bypass the OS entirely. Kickstart was hella fast. Still is! Pretty sure my Amiga 2000 booted faster decades ago, with a SCSI hard drive (and my A1200 with IDE) than any contemporary "consumer" grade hardware shipping today, despite the Ghz in CPU clockspeeds these days (my Amigas' CPUs were measured in MHz and still sooooo speedy and usable).

CC: @linear@nya.social @cwebber@social.coop
]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://snac.bsd.cafe/teajaygrey/p/1775167390.059125https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://snac.bsd.cafe/teajaygrey/p/1775167390.059125Thu, 02 Apr 2026 22:03:10 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 22:00:42 GMT]]>@cwebber @linear

Sculpt/Genode seems really cool. I have long wanted to be able to hack OS components by working in userspace with languages like Scheme/LISP or Julia or Erlang or whatever. We have enough speed that we could let say firewalling / bridging / Routing be done in slightly less close-to-the-metal languages and gain tremendous flexibility. We can already see this kind of happening with eBPF and nftables and whatnot.

]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://mastodon.sdf.org/users/dlakelan/statuses/116337360389627611https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://mastodon.sdf.org/users/dlakelan/statuses/116337360389627611Thu, 02 Apr 2026 22:00:42 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 21:55:30 GMT]]>@teajaygrey@snac.bsd.cafe @cwebber@social.coop and go learn about Genode / SculptOS]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://nya.social/notes/819d5031bf435e10b3534163https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://nya.social/notes/819d5031bf435e10b3534163Thu, 02 Apr 2026 21:55:30 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 21:54:59 GMT]]>@teajaygrey@snac.bsd.cafe @cwebber@social.coop yes, see further downthread]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://nya.social/notes/819d503144a3d77ef599fb6ahttps://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://nya.social/notes/819d503144a3d77ef599fb6aThu, 02 Apr 2026 21:54:59 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 21:54:35 GMT]]>
Problematically? I don't think any of the L4 kernels were "self hosting" last I checked? Maybe that has changed.

BS such as that, would have received failing grades in the 1980s.

Alas, we live in a different era now, where cross compiling is de rigueur even if it is awful in practice.

If I had a wish granting fairy or whatever? I would totally task someone(s) to make the L4 microkernel family self-hosting, so it doesn't need a Linux to boot strap.

CC: @cwebber@social.coop
]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://snac.bsd.cafe/teajaygrey/p/1775166875.873494https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://snac.bsd.cafe/teajaygrey/p/1775166875.873494Thu, 02 Apr 2026 21:54:35 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 21:51:54 GMT]]>https://marc.info/?l=openbsd-tech&m=171817275920057&w=2

(Wherein Theo de Raadt of OpenBSD responds to someone proposing 10,000 kernel changes due to A"I" identifying possible bugs; this was circa 2024. Thankfully, the individual who proposed such changes? Appears to have not updated their GitHub fork in the ensuing years.)
]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://snac.bsd.cafe/teajaygrey/p/1775166714.918387https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://snac.bsd.cafe/teajaygrey/p/1775166714.918387Thu, 02 Apr 2026 21:51:54 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 21:30:21 GMT]]>@linear @dlakelan I am aware of Sculpt / Genode and have run it on physical hardware before! I am also working on tech that is also part of the answer.

There is real work happening! It's going to take multiple efforts from multiple angles to get there

]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://social.coop/users/cwebber/statuses/116337241031032782https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://social.coop/users/cwebber/statuses/116337241031032782Thu, 02 Apr 2026 21:30:21 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 20:35:48 GMT]]>@btel @cwebber I believe that lies in update cooldowns, IE, specific updates must have been publically viewable (and being tested by the public) for at least x time period before they can be picked up by downstream tools.

]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://calamity.world/ap/users/115999645222845036/statuses/116337026552517843https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://calamity.world/ap/users/115999645222845036/statuses/116337026552517843Thu, 02 Apr 2026 20:35:48 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 19:45:51 GMT]]>@dlakelan @linear @cwebber
The Amiga had a very fast microkernel based OS in the 1980s, though memory protection was unfortunately not part of it.

Something like that in a memory safe language would be nice.

]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://tech.lgbt/users/kirtai/statuses/116336830111370714https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://tech.lgbt/users/kirtai/statuses/116336830111370714Thu, 02 Apr 2026 19:45:51 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 15:28:25 GMT]]>@dlakelan@mastodon.sdf.org @cwebber@social.coop this is to say, what you are asking for exists, and has existed in a usable state for well over a decade, and is in some cases more feature complete than some other open source operating systems that people use and even daily drive

you can run it on a pinephone, too]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://nya.social/notes/819d4ecf5af640f6a5fc35ffhttps://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://nya.social/notes/819d4ecf5af640f6a5fc35ffThu, 02 Apr 2026 15:28:25 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 15:24:51 GMT]]>@linear @cwebber

That's cool! I honestly had not followed any of this. I might have to dedicate an older laptop I have no real use for to this just for fun.

]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://mastodon.sdf.org/users/dlakelan/statuses/116335803873600226https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://mastodon.sdf.org/users/dlakelan/statuses/116335803873600226Thu, 02 Apr 2026 15:24:51 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 15:21:39 GMT]]>@cwebber "- people will finally understand that security bugs are bugs, and that the only sane way to stay safe is to periodically update, without focusing on "CVE-xxx""

I am not sure how this is going to work. How can be sure that the newest update is not a troyan horse (cf. recent axios breach)?

]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://mastodon.social/users/btel/statuses/116335791291399040https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://mastodon.social/users/btel/statuses/116335791291399040Thu, 02 Apr 2026 15:21:39 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 15:18:43 GMT]]>@dlakelan@mastodon.sdf.org @cwebber@social.coop right now, this minute, you can go download SculptOS and have a microkernel-based OS with capability security that can run on a laptop and use its iGPU and run a web browser and virtualize linux and build itself using the Genode framework it is based on. and you can use that framework to swap out the process-level-virtualization-based default microkernel (NOVA iirc) with the formally verified seL4 (or other L4 family kernels) and never have to care about the API/ABI differences between microkernels because it abstracts that for you, nor the code inside the kernel.]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://nya.social/notes/819d4ec67860d7f4e1bd916bhttps://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://nya.social/notes/819d4ec67860d7f4e1bd916bThu, 02 Apr 2026 15:18:43 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 15:16:59 GMT]]>@ska @dalias

i'll 100% co-author that book]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://social.vlhl.dev/objects/972203f6-a9f7-4228-9d09-ed2a7bdaff06https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://social.vlhl.dev/objects/972203f6-a9f7-4228-9d09-ed2a7bdaff06Thu, 02 Apr 2026 15:16:59 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 15:08:24 GMT]]>@BetaRays@p.changeme.fr.eu.org @cwebber@social.coop this would be part of my vision, yes]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://nya.social/notes/819d4ebd0917197ed58f10d2https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://nya.social/notes/819d4ebd0917197ed58f10d2Thu, 02 Apr 2026 15:08:24 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 15:07:46 GMT]]>@linear @cwebber

I agree it would be nice to have, but I honestly think it primarily prevents progress. We'd be wildly better off with microkernel OSes that are at the same level of hackiness as the Linux kernel, and maybe have decent interfaces that could get replaced piecemeal as people came up with alternative implementations in memory safe languages, and then maybe formally verified at a later date.

Right now, you have to be comfortable working in kernel space to even do anything

]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://mastodon.sdf.org/users/dlakelan/statuses/116335736678063424https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://mastodon.sdf.org/users/dlakelan/statuses/116335736678063424Thu, 02 Apr 2026 15:07:46 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 15:05:00 GMT]]>@linear@nya.social @cwebber@social.coop SeL4?

]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://p.changeme.fr.eu.org/objects/9bf43f6b-24dd-43c6-876a-66c4acf53e53https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://p.changeme.fr.eu.org/objects/9bf43f6b-24dd-43c6-876a-66c4acf53e53Thu, 02 Apr 2026 15:05:00 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 14:49:08 GMT]]>@dlakelan@mastodon.sdf.org @cwebber@social.coop i'm glossing over a lot with the "trusted" vs "untrusted" here, and i recognize that. i've been thinking about this for the better part of a decade and conveying my mental model for this is not possible in a few pots in a social media thread

i just have not had the motivation or resources to spend on taking existing work in seL4/genode and assembling it with other pieces into the thing i'd like, writing specs, finding people to collaborate with on this, etc. life is busy and i already have so many projects]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://nya.social/notes/819d4eab62b32ad412fbed50https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://nya.social/notes/819d4eab62b32ad412fbed50Thu, 02 Apr 2026 14:49:08 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 14:42:22 GMT]]>@dlakelan@mastodon.sdf.org @cwebber@social.coop kernel is the bare minimum, i'd also want verification of at least specs around the hardware abstraction layer and how hardware related daemons talk to everything else. but it should definitely be possible for common system components and daemons as well, and i think should be mandatory for trusted daemons that supervise or manage other untrusted ones

i doubt everything will be formally verified, but it is nonetheless a goal that should be worked towards, while finding ways to develop standard practices and make it easier to apply everywhere]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://nya.social/notes/819d4ea530c1445db8de1fcchttps://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://nya.social/notes/819d4ea530c1445db8de1fccThu, 02 Apr 2026 14:42:22 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 14:33:39 GMT]]>@jpetazzo Sadly no. A lot of this is personal experience and stuff I'd *like* to write if I could be motivated to do so.. 🙃

]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://hachyderm.io/users/dalias/statuses/116335602545921204https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://hachyderm.io/users/dalias/statuses/116335602545921204Thu, 02 Apr 2026 14:33:39 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 14:33:17 GMT]]>@linear @cwebber

If you mean formally verifying the microkernel itself... yeah. I'm good with that. Isn't L4 formally verified? If you mean formally verifying every userspace daemon... Nice to have but I'm not holding my breath.

]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://mastodon.sdf.org/users/dlakelan/statuses/116335601123320948https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://mastodon.sdf.org/users/dlakelan/statuses/116335601123320948Thu, 02 Apr 2026 14:33:17 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 14:32:59 GMT]]>@navi @dalias Yeah, the way most people write C with pointers everywhere - because that's what they've been taught - isn't very compatible with that. Again, it comes down to: the way we teach C is really, really bad.

Will you co-author my C book, that I'll write when I retire from coding? (that probably means in two decades or more 😝)

]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://social.treehouse.systems/users/ska/statuses/116335599906007154https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://social.treehouse.systems/users/ska/statuses/116335599906007154Thu, 02 Apr 2026 14:32:59 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 14:32:26 GMT]]>@linear @cwebber I think that might be what CHERI is trying to achieve: https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/research/security/ctsrd/cheri/

]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://hachyderm.io/users/fcbsd/statuses/116335597764613584https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://hachyderm.io/users/fcbsd/statuses/116335597764613584Thu, 02 Apr 2026 14:32:26 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Significant raise of reports (on the Linux Kernel Mailing List) https://lwn.net/Articles/1065620/ on Thu, 02 Apr 2026 14:32:02 GMT]]>@cwebber I like this summary so far. You’re right to ALWAYS has to examine and test out results with every version. That is an odd feeling to remind yourself to question something you read, every time. I am sure young children won’t have that feeling.

In fact, the whole concept of critical thinking is not necessarily taught in public schools any more in the US. This is the way it is if Republicans get into curriculum to ban this. Of course this goes along with banning diversity and inclusion.

I wonder if software has any sort of “critical thinking”. It would only have the task of analyzing how many sources are producing a particular result and using that as a basis to repeat same.

]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://beige.party/users/cobalt123/statuses/116335596164300766https://board.circlewithadot.net/post/https://beige.party/users/cobalt123/statuses/116335596164300766Thu, 02 Apr 2026 14:32:02 GMT