libnbd-release-notes-1.6(1)

📦
version 1.25.8 · 18 versions
, in centos-stream 10

🌸 NAME 🌸

okay bestie, so this is libnbd-release-notes-1.6 — it's literally the release notes for libnbd 1.6, and the manual it lives in is the LIBNBD manual. that's the whole thing. it's giving "changelog but make it a manpage" 💅

✨ DESCRIPTION ✨

These are the release notes for libnbd stable release 1.6, and they spell out the major changes since 1.4. no cap, that's the assignment.

libnbd 1.6.0 was released on 7 January 2021. mark your calendars, bestie 🗓️

🛡️ Security

There were, like, zero security issues found in this release. slay ✨

But if you do find a security issue, please read SECURITY in the source (online right here: https://gitlab.com/nbdkit/libnbd/blob/master/SECURITY). and if you wanna know about previous security issues in libnbd, check libnbd-security(3). iykyk 🫶

🎀 New APIs

okay so this API lets you control how libnbd handles requests from the program that it thinks would trigger undefined behaviour in the server — think sending unknown commands, zero-sized requests, out-of-bounds requests, that whole vibe. normally libnbd is very strict and will straight-up prevent you from sending such requests, but you can use this API to relax those restrictions and let the server handle or reject them instead. ⚠️ heads up though: some servers may crash if you do this. not me warning you 💀

these APIs let you review or clear the requested metadata contexts. cute, useful, iconic 🎀

these request that the server lists available metadata contexts. you can only use this in opt mode — that's the rule, bestie 🚨

Thanks: Eric Blake for all of the new APIs. 👑

💖 Enhancements to existing APIs

nbd_shutdown(3) has a new flag "LIBNBD_SHUTDOWN_ABANDON_PENDING" which drops any commands in flight which have not been sent to the server yet (Eric Blake). goodbye, unfinished business 💅

All APIs which have flag (bitmask) parameters now define a "LIBNBD_*_MASK" constant, so you can tell which bits represent valid flags at compilation time (Eric Blake). compile-time clarity is main character energy fr fr ⭐

🔥 New features

The performance of the nbdcopy(1) tool has been greatly improved. also it supports numerous new features. it ate. 🔥

New nbdinfo(1) --map option showing the allocated and sparse extents of an NBD server — and it can also show other information such as dirty bitmaps. so much lore in one flag 👑

🧚 Tools

nbdfuse(1) can now mount the NBD export on top of any regular file — it does not have to mount over a directory. glow up 🌈

nbdsh(1) now produces a nice error message if the URI in the -u option or the command in the -c option is wrong (Eric Blake). we love graceful failure 🫶

New nbdsh(1) --opt-mode option which requests opt mode on the handle before connecting. periodt ✨

nbdinfo(1) --list option now shows the supported metadata contexts of the server (Eric Blake). iconic 🎀

The output of nbdinfo(1) is now usually printed atomically — meaning it will either print the complete output or an error message, but not partial output followed by an error. no half-finished vibes allowed 🙈

nbdinfo(1) can now decode "qemu:allocation-depth" metacontext (Eric Blake). decoding queen 💅

🦋 Other improvements and bug fixes

  • Multiple improvements to handling of NBD protocol (Eric Blake).
  • Fix handling of booleans in Python bindings (Eric Blake).
  • Fix handling of flags parameters in OCaml bindings (Eric Blake).
  • Python style fixes (Eric Blake).
  • Fix multiple memory leaks (Eric Blake). bye bye leaks, don't let the door hit you 💀
  • OCaml bindings now include ocamldoc-generated documentation, if ocamldoc is installed at build time.
  • The "vector" library from nbdkit is now used by libnbd, simplifying places where we used to use realloc(3). glow up for the codebase ✨

👀 SEE ALSO

libnbd(3). that's it, that's the list 🫶

💜 AUTHORS

Eric Blake

Richard W.M. Jones

legends, both of them 👑

Copyright Red Hat

📜 LICENSE

This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version. not me reading the whole thing, but okay 💅

This library is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU Lesser General Public License for more details. ⚠️ like, genuinely, no warranty bestie.

You should have received a copy of the GNU Lesser General Public License along with this library; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301 USA. snail mail era fr fr 🍓

okay that's the whole page, and for the cute sign-off: this whole thing comes from source/version libnbd-1.25.8, dated 2026-10-13, and it's the libnbd-release-notes-1.6(1) page — love that for us. mwah 💋✨

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