AI speeds up Linux development and adds work for Linus Torvalds

Linus Torvalds, the Linux kernel development leader, reported that due to artificial intelligence, very large kernel updates have become the new norm. In his weekly kernel status reports, he noted that the latest release candidate is "enormous" and even by the standards of the "new norm" it is the largest release candidate 6 in recent years in terms of the number of commits. He expressed no delight but said, "It is what it is: new norms with many fixes, many of which appeared thanks to checks by various AI tools." Earlier, Torvalds criticized the idea that good documentation can compensate for low-quality AI-generated code in the kernel, and complained that the Linux kernel security mailing list became nearly unmanageable due to a flood of AI-generated vulnerability reports, many of which were duplicates. He also said the Linux project will not resist AI. He is still concerned about the size of the seventh release candidate for Linux 7.2, but says there is nothing particularly scary, just a lot of stuff. The biggest changes are fixes to s390/zcrypt, the return of btrfs, and some ipset network filter fixes. Mostly there are small fixes scattered everywhere: in drivers, file systems, network core, and architecture code. This avalanche of small fixes is unlikely to delay the final release of Linux 7.2, which is scheduled for the next weekend.