A rare mistake in the Linux 6.4 nucleus, which caused the system to hang during loading, has been found and corrected by developer Richard Jones. Jones stumbled onto the issue when he noticed the Linux system failed to fully complete loading when working with virtual machines.
After in-depth analysis, he found that the problem was related to the function that displays time in system logs. In order to verify his hypothesis, Jones used a tool called Guestfish to automatically load and stop Linux, tracking the process. This involved an overwhelming number of repetitions – 292,612 in just 21 hours.
Interestingly, this problem was found to affect AMD processors more often than Intel. Jones persisted in his attempts to solve the issue, showcasing how careful consideration and hard work can unravel the most challenging of problems. This fix ensures Linux remains even more reliable for its users in the future.