The eBPF functionality in RHCK is updated to align with the upstream version 6.8 Linux Kernel.

The following notable changes are included in this update:

• Exceptions can include asserting conditions in BPF programs that should never be true but are hard for the verifier to infer.

• Improved working with per-cpu objects.

• Several new open-coded iterators for task, task_vma, css, and css_task.

• Added kfunc, kernel functions, as an alternative to helper functions to provide functionality to get the associated cgroup of a task within a specific cgroup v1 hierarchy.

• BPF link_info for uprobe multi-link along with bpftool integration.

• Various improvements and bug fixes in the BPF verifier for more precise program verification, improved logic, and better control over tail calls and fentry/fexit programs.

• Added ability to pin the BPF timer to the current CPU.

• bpffs mounts include uid and gid options.

The Intel® Quick Assist Technology (QAT) kernel driver is updated to handle 420xx devices. This update also includes a new device driver that enables updates to the firmware loader and other capabilities.

The updated driver is only available in RHCK.

A new noswap option is available for tmpfs mounts that are used for the quick sharing of information across processes inside POSIX shared memory. Blocks in tmpfs can be swapped out during a memory shortage, but this can result in performance and privacy costs. The noswap mount option disables swap for the tmpfs mount.