Linus Torvalds is back at work, as we already said. Greg has handed over command of kernel development to him after his time out of the lead. Now everything has returned to normal, only with that CoC in force that will control the language that will be used in the LKML to avoid offenses and aggressive language. They will also know that Linux 4.19 LTS version has been released, that is, a branch of the kernel that will have extended support for a long period of time, providing patches for bugs and, especially, security updates for possible vulnerabilities and thus continue its maintenance long-term.
On top of that, it has now been released Linux 4.20RC1, that is, the first Release Candidate of version 4.20. So it is very likely that by the end of December we will have the final version of Linux 4.20. And we all know that Linus doesn't like versions with long numbers. Although the Linux 5.0 release was rumored for this past summer by some comments Torvalds made, it ultimately did not come. Although it could make its appearance in January 2019.
"TWe can all count 20 […]. It's a nice round number. […] I think Linus 5.0 will be out next year, when we run out of fingers (to keep counting). ». That is what Torvalds himself has commented on the matter, so it is understood that after version 4.20 it would not continue with a 4.21, but would lead directly to Linux 5.0 as of January 2019. A new leap in versions, and I hope these new branches are even better and more successful.
You already know that Linux version numbers do not make much sense, they have been taking jumps throughout the history of development without following linearly as many other software projects do. Let us remember that, for example, it went from 2.6 to 3.x, not only being a change in the numbering, but also a new philosophy to designate versions. Before, as you know, the odd versions were used for the development ones, while the even ones were the stable ones. As of 3.x that was changed and the same ones were used for both cases, only that RCs are used to mark the development ones.
"Aprotando patches and updates".