Linux 3.11 Pays Tribute to Windows 3.11: Happy 20th Birthday

Twenty years ago today, Windows 3.11 was officially released, revolutionarily introducing networking, plug-and-play technology, and LAN functionality—a very critical step in Microsoft's system history. Today, Linus Torvalds released the Linux 3.11-rc5 kernel, paying tribute to this old system and long-time rival.

Originally, Torvalds had planned to release the official version of Linux 3.11 today, celebrating the 20th anniversary of Windows 3.11 in the most passionate way possible. Unfortunately, plans didn't go as smoothly as expected.

He stated: "It's disappointing that the numerical magic didn't work out. It would have been great to release the final version of 3.11 today, but it didn't happen. However, we do have 3.11-rc5."

The changes in this version are relatively minor, with the main improvement being to the Radeon graphics card driver, along with enhancements to dynamic power management, though these remain off by default. There are also media corrections, architecture upgrades, and small modifications to the file system.

Torvalds has not yet determined the exact date for the official release of version 3.11.