Kernel bugs on Launchpad

I've found what I believe to be a kernel bug, and reported appropriately on Launchpad. But is the kernel bugs reported on Launchpad receive attention from the developers? It is important since, in this case, it was reported not to be distro-specific.

The bug in question is Kernel 2.6.38-7 completely dims screen on Intel GMA 4500M. Please note that this is the very first bug I've reported, and as such I don't know any of the usual values and convention/format of the data that I can conform to.

So, in the example you've supplied, the bug is filed against the kernel package for the Ubuntu operating system. You can tell this by looking at the package listed under the 'Affects' block. In this case, it is linux(ubuntu) so it is distro specific.

Depending on how it is filed, a bug may not get the attention it needs. If it was filed against the 'Linux' project, then it is important to note that this is used as an upstream bug tracker for bugs against related distributions.

If this bug was something that you wanted to be addressed by upstream Linux maintainers, then really the only thing you can do is file it on bugzilla.kernel.org. The site being the bugtracker that Linus and the maintainers use to address kernel issues.

In this case, the Kernel Defect Analyst(me :-) ) would triage your bug and bring it to the attention of the Kernel Release Manager. S/He would then determine whether it needed an Engineer's involvement (this is somewhat ambiguous as the KRM is an Engineer in his/her own right so it may be worked by them as well). At that time it will be acted upon.

It is important to note that not all bugs get actively worked. In the vast majority of cases bugs are left alone if there is work ongoing upstream. If you are aware of the bug upstream, then filing a bug against Ubuntu in launchpad is an important way for us to track the issues as they progress in the upstream kernel. This would be accomplished by adding that upstream watch I mentioned earlier.

Hope that helps you a bit. Let me know if you'd like some clarification of any of the above.