OpenBSD 8.0 is shaping up with a series of significant updates. Clang/LLVM 22 is now the base compiler on clang architectures, including updated libc++, libc++abi, compiler-rt and libunwind support libraries. OpenBSD/sparc64 has also switched to Clang by default, the last major architecture to make the change, making OpenBSD the only operating system to support sparc64 with a modern toolchain.
Since 7.9, Jonathan Gray has continued updating the drm graphics stack, including inteldrm, radeondrm and amdgpu, bringing OpenBSD 8.0 up to Linux 6.18.y/6.18.53. The release adds driver support for Intel Arc A-Series (DG2/Alchemist) cards. Kernel virtual address space on amd64 has been increased to 512G, allowing more than 4G of VRAM to be mapped, which enables GPU compute workloads such as Vulkan.
Virtualization also sees a major step forward. Following extensive work in Edmonton by Mike Larkin and Dave Voutila, vmm/vmd now supports SMP guests with up to 64 VCPUs per VM. Networking gains the qwz(4) driver for Qualcomm WCN7850 "ath12k" Wi-Fi devices, while the new sambat(4) driver monitors battery status and cycle count on Samsung Galaxy Book4 Edge arm64 machines. Swap encryption is now accelerated on amd64 and arm64 using AES CPU instructions.
Other additions include heartbeat LEDs on arm64 and riscv64 boards that blink to reflect system load averages, and new httpd(8) features such as custom response headers and filtering rules based on received HTTP headers like User-Agent. The release cycle also marked the author's first commit to OpenSSH, with many more changes planned for 8.0.
Source: Hacker News · Summarized by HeadlinesBriefing