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Kernel Summit: "The time has come to make it harder for new people to contribute code to the kernel." -- Linus Torvalds reacting to AI assisted code contribution flood (feddit.org)
submitted 1 day ago by HaraldvonBlauzahn@feddit.org to c/linux@lemmy.ml
16 comments fedilink hide all child comments

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/53100937

"Torvalds said that the time has come to make it harder for new people to contribute code to the kernel. People like Kroah-Hartman have spent years trying to teach people how to contribute; it is time to stop doing that, he said."

https://lwn.net/Articles/1099594/

It is difficult to summarize exactly how Linus got to this point. Most of the discussion at this years Summit appears to have been related to AI assisted code and how the maintainers are dealing with the increase in code submissions to LKML. Many of the maintainers expressed varying levels of frustration with AI assisted drive-by code submissions. Linus' train of thought is that they make it intentionally more difficult for humans to contribute. A later suggestion of his was to create an AGENTS. md that makes generating kernel code expensive in compute and token time.

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[-] HaraldvonBlauzahn@feddit.org 30 points 1 day ago

Copied from another thread:

When he came out talking about allowing LLM code contributions everyone told him this would happen.

He has criticized the excessive hype around GenAI/LLMs long before. Torvalds has generally a very pragmatic approach, not a black-and-white one.

[-] HaraldvonBlauzahn@feddit.org 24 points 1 day ago

Three things more:

The Linux kernel is Torvalds project.

The fact that experienced kernel developers can sometimes use LLMs to their advantage does not mean that the average Joe Codemonkey can do it. These algorithms are often described as a kind of competence multiplicator - but experience from education shows that they are more risky than that and can hinder learning.

And third, we should in this question not put too much weight in the opinion of influential people. Behind the GenAI tech are huge corporations which pour billions of money into it. It is likely that they can pressure and bribe people and that they also pay influencers and bloggers to tout their stuff. Making decisions dependent on single influential persons, however competent and acclaimed they are, is therefore dangerous (see Eric Raymond, Eva Kaili or Gerhard Schröder). Torvalds is not Jesus, and I am pretty sure he didn’t apply for that role.

[-] atzanteol@sh.itjust.works 9 points 1 day ago

This was going to happen regardless. Not allowing veteran devs to use AI tools wouldn't stop this.

[-] strop@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 day ago

vErY pRAgmTiC

this post was submitted on 15 Oct 2026
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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).

Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.

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