Netmaker has released its latest version, v0.21.1, of their WireGuard mesh VPN. Netmaker is a platform that automates the creation of fast, secure, and distributed virtual networks.

With Netmaker, users can easily create virtual networks between data centers, clouds, and edge devices without the need for manual configuration. This automation saves time and effort for users, allowing them to focus on other important tasks.

One of the key features of Netmaker is its integration with Kernel WireGuard, which provides maximum speed, performance, and security. This ensures that the virtual networks created with Netmaker are not only efficient but also highly secure.

Netmaker is designed to scale from small businesses to enterprise-level organizations. This means that whether you are a small startup or a large corporation, Netmaker can meet your networking needs.

One of the standout features of Netmaker is its ability to be highly customized. Users can configure Netmaker with WireGuard for various use cases, such as peer-to-peer connections, site-to-site connections, Kubernetes deployments, and more. This flexibility allows users to tailor Netmaker to their specific requirements.

The latest version, v0.21.1, brings several new features and fixes to the Netmaker platform:

What’s New in v0.21.1:

• Remote access client session management: Users now have more control over managing remote access client sessions. Refer to the users section in the documentation for more details.
• Generic DNS entries: It is now possible to create generic DNS entries, providing more flexibility in configuring DNS settings.
• Upgrade client version: Users can now easily upgrade the client version to match the server version directly from the user interface.
• Moved PersistentKeepAlive setting: The PersistentKeepAlive setting has been moved from the node level to the host level, simplifying network configuration.

What’s Fixed in v0.21.1:

• Extclients DNS properly set: The issue of Extclients DNS not being properly set from the ingress DNS value provided has been resolved.
• Role update of OAuth user allowed: Users can now update the role of an OAuth user without any issues.
• Zombie node issue fixed: The issue of zombie nodes has been fixed, ensuring a smoother user experience.

Despite the improvements in v0.21.1, there are still a few known issues that users should be aware of:

• Windows installer does not install WireGuard: Users running the Windows installer may encounter an issue where WireGuard is not installed automatically. This can be resolved by manually installing WireGuard.
• netclient-gui error dialog: If the Netmaker server is offline, the netclient-gui application will continuously display an error dialog. This is a known issue that will be addressed in future releases.
• Mac IPv6 addresses/route issues: Mac users may experience issues with IPv6 addresses and routes. This is a known issue that is currently being investigated.
• Docker client re-join issue: Users may encounter difficulties when trying to re-join a network using the Docker client after complete deletion. This issue is currently being addressed.
• netclient-gui network tab blank: After disconnecting from a network, the network tab in the netclient-gui application may appear blank. This is a known issue that will be fixed in future updates.

Despite these known issues, Netmaker’s latest release, v0.21.1, brings several new features and fixes that further enhance its capabilities as a WireGuard mesh VPN solution. With its automation, scalability, and customization options, Netmaker continues to be a valuable tool for those interested in servers, Linux, DevOps, and home labs.

OpenBSD has released version 7.4, marking the 55th release of the open-source BSD operating system project. OpenBSD 7.4 brings a host of improvements, including new kernel features, enhanced hardware support, security updates, handling updates for the AMD Zenbleed CPU bug, and much more.

Here are some of the key highlights of the OpenBSD 7.4 update:

• Dynamic Tracer (DT) and Utrace support is now available on AMD64 and i386 OpenBSD.
• Power savings have been implemented for Apple Silicon M1/M2 CPUs, allowing for deep idle states when available for the idle loop and suspend.
• Support for the PCIe controller found on Apple M2 Pro/Max SoCs has been added.
• AMD CPU Microcode updating can now be done when a newer patch is available.
• A workaround has been implemented for the AMD Zenbleed CPU bug.
• Various SMP (Symmetric Multiprocessing) improvements have been made.
• The Direct Rendering Manager (DRM) graphics driver support has been updated to the upstream Linux 6.1.55 state.
• New drivers have been introduced to support various Qualcomm SoC features.
• The OpenBSD installer now offers improved support for soft RAID disks.
• Indirect Branch Tracking (IBT) has been enabled on x86_64 processors, and Branch Target Identifier (BTI) has been enabled on ARM64 processors for capable processors.

Source: Phoronix.

Linus Torvalds has released Linux 6.6-rc6 and plans to release the stable version of Linux 6.6 in two weeks, barring any unexpected issues. In the announcement, Torvalds mentioned that the previous week had been calm, with discussions focusing on future changes. He also mentioned a music video documentary that was made about the release. The changes in this release include a fix for a kernel crash when unplugging Logitech USB receivers and a fix for hung systems during shutdowns or reboots, which specifically affects Lenovo, Sony, and Dell systems, particularly recent Intel Alder Lake and Raptor Lake systems. Other fixes include support for the PXN V900 racing steering wheel and a fix for a Zen 4 CPU bug when running with “mitigations=off” or disabling IBRS. The stable release of Linux 6.6 is expected to debut on October 29th, followed by the start of the v6.7 kernel cycle.

Source: Phoronix.

Longhorn, a distributed block storage system for Kubernetes, has released its latest release candidate, Longhorn v1.4.4-rc1. This cloud-native storage solution is built using Kubernetes and container primitives.

Longhorn is known for being lightweight, reliable, and powerful. It can be easily installed on an existing Kubernetes cluster with a single kubectl apply command or by using Helm charts. Once installed, Longhorn adds support for persistent volumes to the Kubernetes cluster.

One of the key features of Longhorn is its implementation of distributed block storage using containers and microservices. It creates a dedicated storage controller for each block device volume and synchronously replicates the volume across multiple replicas stored on multiple nodes. The orchestration of these storage controllers and replicas is done using Kubernetes.

The v1.4.4-rc1 release of Longhorn introduces bug fixes and improvements, primarily focused on stability. Users are encouraged to try out the release and provide feedback. The Longhorn project appreciates all contributions.

For installation, Longhorn supports three methods: Rancher App Marketplace, Kubectl, and Helm. Detailed installation instructions can be found here.

Before upgrading to Longhorn v1.4.4 from v1.3.x/v1.4.x, it is important to read the important notes and ensure that the Kubernetes cluster is at least v1.21. The live upgrade from these source versions is not supported until the GA release. Upgrade instructions can be found here.

There are no deprecations or incompatibilities to note in this release. However, users are advised to check for any outstanding issues after the release on the Longhorn GitHub page here.

The v1.4.4-rc1 release also includes several enhancements, improvements, bug fixes, and stability and resilience updates. Notable improvements include the addition of disk status Prometheus metrics, removal of Longhorn engine path mismatch logs, and prevention of accidental deletion of Longhorn settings. A full list of these enhancements, improvements, and bug fixes can be found in the release notes.

The contributors to this release include @ChanYiLin, @PhanLe1010, @c3y1huang, and many others.

Longhorn continues to be a leading storage solution for Kubernetes, providing users with a reliable and powerful distributed block storage system. The release of Longhorn v1.4.4-rc1 brings important bug fixes and improvements, enhancing the stability of the platform. Users are encouraged to try out the release and provide feedback to further improve the Longhorn project.

The release candidate for FreeBSD 14.0 has been made available as the developers work towards the stable release in early November, reports Phoronix. FreeBSD 14 will be the last series to support 32-bit systems, with FreeBSD 15 dropping support for 32-bit hardware platforms. However, FreeBSD 15 64-bit systems will still be able to run 32-bit binaries. It is expected that 32-bit binary compatibility will be supported until at least FreeBSD 16.

FreeBSD 14 includes several notable changes, including the addition of a new utility called “fwget” for fetching firmware packages. Initially, the fwget utility can retrieve firmware for Intel and AMD GPUs. Other changes in FreeBSD 14 include replacing sendmail with dma, Kinst as a new DTrace provider, makefs adding ZFS support, boottrace for capturing trace events during system boot and shutdown processes, kernel TLS offloading for receive-side offloading of TLS 1.3, initial WiFi 6 support in WPA, sh becoming the default shell for the root user, and an updated LLVM toolchain.

One significant improvement in FreeBSD 14 is the increased support for CPU cores. On ARM64 and AMD64 architectures, FreeBSD 14 now supports up to 1024 CPU cores, up from the previous limit of 256 cores. This is particularly notable with the release of the AMD EPYC Bergamo CPUs, which allow for 128 cores and 256 threads per socket. FreeBSD 14 will now allow users to take advantage of these high core count servers.

In addition to the increased CPU core support, FreeBSD 14 also brings faster reboot times, the removal of ISA sound card support, and a new Intel QAT driver with more features and support compared to the previous FreeBSD QAT driver for QuickAssist Technology. Netflix has also sponsored the removal of several old drivers from FreeBSD.

The release notes for FreeBSD 14 provide more details about the upcoming release. The recent FreeBSD 14.0-RC1 release announcement highlights updates to the Linux KPI, various WiFi updates, and a race condition fix as some of the changes in the release candidate. It is expected that there will be at least two more release candidates before FreeBSD 14.0-RELEASE is made available around November 7th.

Source: Phoronix.

OpenZFS has announced the release of version 2.2.0, an open-source implementation of the ZFS file system and volume manager. This release comes with several new features and performance improvements.

One notable new feature is block cloning, which allows for the creation of shallow copies of files or parts of files. This facility is used to implement “reflinks” or “file-level copy-on-write”. Additionally, Linux container support has been added, including support for Linux-specific container interfaces such as renameat(2), overlayfs, idmapped mounts in a user namespace, and namespace delegation support for containers.

Another important addition is the scrub error log, which allows zpool status to report all affected filesystems, snapshots, and clones when a shared corrupt block is found. The zpool scrub -e command can be used to perform a fast, targeted repair of known damaged blocks.

In terms of performance, this release introduces fully adaptive ARC, which allows the ARC to better adjust to highly dynamic workloads and minimizes the need for manual workload-dependent tuning. It also includes optimized SHA2 and Edon-R checksum implementations, as well as improvements in prefetching and general optimization.

For those interested in the technical details, the complete change log and module options are available in the OpenZFS documentation.

Overall, the release of version zfs-2.2.0 brings exciting new features and performance improvements to the OpenZFS/ZFS on Linux community. It is recommended for users who are looking to enhance their server, Linux, DevOps, and home lab environments.

For more information, please refer to the OpenZFS documentation for Linux and FreeBSD, and the complete change log.