Linus Torvalds releases the first release candidate (rc1) of the 5.16 Linux kernel. Among other things, the release introduces the Memory Folios functionality, which improves kernel and Postgres workload performance.
The update was developed relatively quickly. Linux godfather Torvalds notes that the version in question is not a major release. Its main innovation is the ‘Memory Folios’ functionality. With Memory Folios, file systems and the page can cache larger chunks of memory than the current ‘page_size’ allows.
This can improve the performance of workloads responsible for building the kernel and running Postgres in a stable state. Said workloads not only reside in GPU, networking, sound or other applications, but all hardware components. Memory Folios also helps workloads that reside in architecture code.
Other updates
In addition to the above, the RC1 version of Linux 5.16 introduces updates to the file system, networking functionality and basic kernel code. Adherent documentation and tooling support are available.
3 hours ago
