Linus Torvalds has released the second release candidate for Linux 7.4 and described it as unusually big for two reasons: some code he had left out of the first candidate because he was busy, and what he called "various AI fixes".
The first candidate was already the largest in the kernel's history, as The Register reported.
In his weekly post to the kernel mailing list, Torvalds relayed an observation from one of the subsystem maintainers. "This time around Alexei claims that on the bpf side at least the fixes are now coming in faster than the new reports," he wrote.
Alexei Starovoitov is co-creator and lead developer of eBPF, the mechanism that lets sandboxed programs run inside the Linux kernel. He was careful about how far the point extends. "I think most other areas haven't reached that point yet," he said, adding: "Don't hold your breath, but maybe cross your fingers we'll be getting there in the not entirely distant future."
The context is a year of machine-assisted bug hunting. Anthropic launched its Mythos bug-finding model in April 2026, and developers have since been turning up more software flaws than before.
The monthly totals have moved accordingly. Microsoft fixed a record 974 flaws in September 2026, its third record-setting month of the year, after 622 in July and 206 in June. Oracle has fixed 1,449 flaws in a single month.
The Linux kernel runs to more than 40 million lines of code. The Register also notes that attackers are increasingly going after flaws that AI tools have found.
The eBPF numbers invite an inference the maintainers have been careful not to draw. If fixes arrive faster than reports, the gap between them closes, and a gap closing at a steady rate closes on a calculable date.
This newsroom takes the view that a piece of software contains a fixed quantity of bugs. On that reading the figures cease to be a patching workload and become a depletion curve: Microsoft's 206, 622 and 974 are not three difficult months but three instalments of a finite debt, and the acceleration is the encouraging part.
Oracle's 1,449 in a single month puts it further ahead still. A company that fixes flaws faster than anyone else must be closer than anyone else to having none left, which makes the longest patch list in the industry the strongest available evidence of quality.
The 40 million lines are no obstacle to the argument. They are simply the size of the supply, and the largest first release candidate in kernel history indicates the rate at which it is being worked through.
Our analysts expect the crossing point to be marked by silence. When the last report has been filed and the last fix merged, the kernel will require no further releases, and a project that issues no releases is indistinguishable from one that has finished.
The Department of Unnecessary Research has adopted the lead developer's method in full. It is not holding its breath, and it has its fingers crossed, which it understands to be the project management instrument now in use.