I enjoy reading about new kernel features, and 5.10 is somewhat more newsworthy than others as it's a Long Term Support (LTS) release.

One of the great things about using linux is the kernel really does matter to both users and developers, and every release tends to bring relevant goodies and fixes.

Due to the unparalleled transparency of not just a GPL source but a completely open development model, there's a whole lot more than just a version number to appreciate and investigate if so inclined.

Also having the bulk of drivers in-tree, kernel releases affect a lot more than just core stuff like the scheduler, memory management, and interrupt controllers.

New devices need new drivers or fixes for existing drivers, an anecdotal example is that my new T14 the lid close wasn't detected correctly and it was fixed with a new kernel release, so I was expecting a new kernel release, I'd figure that is the most common reason, linux is ready, but new exciting features are still being actively developed

I am looking forward to it because it is an LTS release that has all the latest io_uring enhancements.

io_uring looks like it will be a big deal, it will probably be a while before it really hits mainstream, but I was waiting on 5.10 before trying it out.

In this case I am excited as this is the first LTS with some new drivers I am waiting for (adafruit MCP2221A usb GPIO board, new drivers expose USB GPIO)

An eye on the Linux kernel is a good way to keep up with what's generally going on in computing. If you haven't built a kernel in awhile, go do it and marvel at the new options. When you see something you are interested in, read up and try it, and you'll be ahead of the proverbial curve.

It matters to kernel API users (see io_uring), gamers and heavy virtualization users to name a few.

I'm waiting for hardware support for my particular laptop model, added in this release.

In 2019 I was compiling my own kernel to include a fix for my logitech racing wheel until the release was out. Also made me find out that its impossible to use the nvidia proprietary drivers on a prerelease kernel so I had to buy an AMD gpu as well.

> Its impossible to use the nvidia proprietary drivers on a prerelease kernel

I managed to on 5.10-rc6? Had to upgrade to the "shortlived" version of the driver, but that went smoothly.

I think it depends on how different the kernel is. At the time I did it, nvidia had no published drivers that were compatible with the linux RC

That seems likely and would make sense.

Same here. Its really exciting to see something you are waiting for go into the kernel. Are you waiting for the lenovo legion and patches by chance?

I do, but then I like to port them to bespoke ARM systems built using complex FPGAs.

I do care. uring mentioned by others, btrfs changes, bcachefs foundation work, anything tracing related, etc are interesting to me.

The whole tracing story in Linux has changed in the recent years. It's really useful in practice.

I do, that's how I learn about how some new hardware work or how a problem I had to do workarounds for was solved.

Changes from one release to the next probably won't matter very much to most individual users, unless something specific you're using is getting support added, but you'll usually find at least one or two major features between LTS releases, including stuff that impacts ecosystems beyond just GNU systems.

Wireguard and exFAT are a couple of notable ones that have been mainlined since 5.4, with the latter impacting basically anything that uses SD cards (as it's a required part of the SDXC spec)

Depends on your hardware. For new AMD cards, they a lot of times bring critical bug fixes. Same applies to a lot of other cases.

The last "big deal" for me was when Wireguard got merged. Oh baby, that was a good one, I think I was excited about that release for like a week - cause I use the shit out of WG - WG all the things. And that was this year (or last?). So, I'm just a +1 to someone who has cared about a recent release.

Currently top post on this thread details an issue fixed I've been facing for years. So yes, interested.

Even if you're running a stable distribution, kernels get backported and so do fixes. Is every kernel release interesting to everyone? No, not any more. Is it worth looking at to see what is happening? I think so.

I care about new APIs, in special io_uring, https://boats.gitlab.io/blog/post/iou/

User extended attributes (xattrs) for NFS (landed in kernel 5.9) was a feature some people, including me, were waiting years for.

Well, I care because this is the first kernel release that supports my laptops WiFi chip (the Killer AX500-DBS, which is a QCA6390 based chip)