# Julia v1.6.0-rc1 is now available

**URL:** <https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775>\
**Category:** Announcements\
**Tags:** release\
**Created:** [February 7, 2021, 6:36am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775 "2021-02-07T06:36:14Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 20\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![ararslan](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/ararslan/32/3825_2.png) [@ararslan](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/ararslan)\
**Post date:** [February 7, 2021, 6:36am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/1 "2021-02-07T06:36:14Z")

</div>

The Julia developers are pleased to announce that the first release candidate for Julia v1.6.0 is now available. You can download binaries at [Download Julia](https://julialang.org/downloads) in the “upcoming release” section for macOS, FreeBSD (x86-64), Windows (32-, 64-bit), glibc Linux (i686, x86-64, AArch64, PowerPC), and [musl](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musl) Linux (x86-64). Check out the [NEWS file](https://github.com/JuliaLang/julia/blob/v1.6.0-rc1/NEWS.md) to see what will be new in 1.6.0.

As a release candidate, this should **not** be considered production-ready. Rather, it’s intended to give users, especially package developers, a chance to try our their code with 1.6.0 prior to a full release. Note that 1.6 on Travis, [AppVeyor](https://github.com/JuliaCI/Appveyor.jl), and [Cirrus](https://github.com/ararslan/CirrusCI.jl) now refers to 1.6.0-rc1. This will be the case for [GitHub Actions](https://github.com/julia-actions/setup-julia) soon as well.

Let us know in the [issue tracker](https://github.com/JuliaLang/julia/issues) if you run into any issues. Please note that any bugs you may encounter should be posted there rather than being discussed in this thread to ensure visibility to the developers.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![GZhang](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/7993a0/32.png) [@GZhang](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/GZhang)\
**Post date:** [February 7, 2021, 7:50am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/2 "2021-02-07T07:50:55Z")

</div>

thanks

发自我的iPhone

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![dilumaluthge](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/dilumaluthge/32/29283_2.png) [@dilumaluthge](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/dilumaluthge)\
**Post date:** [February 7, 2021, 8:26am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/3 "2021-02-07T08:26:54Z")

</div>

> [@ararslan](#):
>
> Note that 1.6 on Travis, [AppVeyor](https://github.com/JuliaCI/Appveyor.jl), and [Cirrus](https://github.com/ararslan/CirrusCI.jl) now refers to 1.6.0-rc1. This will be the case for [GitHub Actions](https://github.com/julia-actions/setup-julia) soon as well.

Just a couple of notes regarding GitHub Actions:

1. It will take approximately 24 hours for 1.6.0-rc1 to become available on GitHub Actions.
2. In order to use 1.6.0-rc1 on GitHub Actions, you must set your version specifier to `"^1.6.0-0"`.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![StatisticalMouse](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/statisticalmouse/32/43370_2.png) [@StatisticalMouse](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/StatisticalMouse)\
**Post date:** [February 7, 2021, 6:59pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/4 "2021-02-07T18:59:16Z")

</div>

Are there really 32-bit users out there for Julia?

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![oschulz](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/oschulz/32/2998_2.png) [@oschulz](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/oschulz)\
**Post date:** [February 7, 2021, 7:14pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/5 "2021-02-07T19:14:52Z")

</div>

> Are there really 32-bit users out there for Julia?

There are, e.g. on ARMv7-a.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![oschulz](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/oschulz/32/2998_2.png) [@oschulz](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/oschulz)\
**Post date:** [February 7, 2021, 7:23pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/6 "2021-02-07T19:23:01Z")

</div>

> Are there really 32-bit users out there for Julia?

And Linux i686 is a very convenient platform for CI-testing packages on 32-bit in general. This catches problems in the code like implicit assumptions that Int is 64-bit wide.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![StatisticalMouse](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/statisticalmouse/32/43370_2.png) [@StatisticalMouse](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/StatisticalMouse)\
**Post date:** [February 7, 2021, 7:27pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/7 "2021-02-07T19:27:55Z")

</div>

That’s a nice CI ‘trick’.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![sylvaticus](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/sylvaticus/32/203883_2.png) [@sylvaticus](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/sylvaticus)\
**Post date:** [February 7, 2021, 8:41pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/8 "2021-02-07T20:41:54Z")

</div>

I played a bit with code on many areas, using tens of different packages, on Juno, running it on Julia 1.3 and 1.6… and Julia 1.6 is damn more reactive… it isn’t just the precompilation on installstion, all code evaluation seems much faster… Bravo to the dev team !  
As others have said, this is the first release that cover the small nuisances that however matter the most…

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![davidanthoff](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/davidanthoff/32/223493_2.png) [@davidanthoff](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/davidanthoff)\
**Post date:** [February 7, 2021, 11:50pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/9 "2021-02-07T23:50:05Z")

</div>

> [@dilumaluthge](#):
>
> In order to use 1.6.0-rc1 on GitHub Actions, you must set your version specifier to `"^1.6.0-0"` .

Could we make `1.6` also download the release candidate? That would make it a lot easier for folks that maintain a lot of packages to start testing this, because we could just once now add `1.6` to our version matrix, and not have to update things again when 1.6 is released. I also see no real benefit of _not_ having 1.6 download the RC during a time when no released build of 1.6 is out there.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![dilumaluthge](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/dilumaluthge/32/29283_2.png) [@dilumaluthge](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/dilumaluthge)\
**Post date:** [February 8, 2021, 12:12am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/10 "2021-02-08T00:12:48Z")

</div>

> [@davidanthoff](#):
>
> Could we make `1.6` also download the release candidate?

I do think that this would be a nice feature to add.

@saschamann can probably speak to whether or not this would be feasible.

I think one of the issues is that we currently use [node-semver](https://github.com/npm/node-semver) for parsing version specifiers.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![dilumaluthge](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/dilumaluthge/32/29283_2.png) [@dilumaluthge](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/dilumaluthge)\
**Post date:** [February 8, 2021, 12:14am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/11 "2021-02-08T00:14:15Z")

</div>

> [@davidanthoff](#):
>
> That would make it a lot easier for folks that maintain a lot of packages to start testing this, because we could just once now add `1.6` to our version matrix, and not have to update things again when 1.6 is released.

FWIW, when 1.6 is released, the version specifier `"^1.6.0-0"` will automatically switch to using the latest stable 1.6.x release.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![StatisticalMouse](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/statisticalmouse/32/43370_2.png) [@StatisticalMouse](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/StatisticalMouse)\
**Post date:** [February 8, 2021, 11:40am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/12 "2021-02-08T11:40:14Z")

</div>

Will Julia 1.6 have a smaller sysimage as this is release blocking?  
[https://github.com/JuliaLang/julia/issues/39504](https://github.com/JuliaLang/julia/issues/39504)

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![kristoffer.carlsson](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/kristoffer.carlsson/32/22_2.png) [@kristoffer.carlsson](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/kristoffer.carlsson)\
**Post date:** [February 8, 2021, 11:54am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/13 "2021-02-08T11:54:45Z")

</div>

> [@StatisticalMouse](#):
>
> Will Julia 1.6 have a smaller sysimage as this is release blocking?

1.6 will likely not have a smaller sysimage and the issue there isn’t really related to that.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Tomas\_Pevny](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/tomas_pevny/32/25466_2.png) [@Tomas\_Pevny](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Tomas_Pevny)\
**Post date:** [February 8, 2021, 12:14pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/14 "2021-02-08T12:14:54Z")

</div>

I have observed a huge performance regression with Zygote. I have filed an issue on Zygote.jl.

[https://github.com/FluxML/Zygote.jl/issues/898](https://github.com/FluxML/Zygote.jl/issues/898)

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![SaschaMann](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/saschamann/32/2852_2.png) [@SaschaMann](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/SaschaMann)\
**Post date:** [February 8, 2021, 8:43pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/15 "2021-02-08T20:43:00Z")

</div>

> [@dilumaluthge](#):
>
> @saschamann can probably speak to whether or not this would be feasible.

It’s not easily possible without having to consider a large number of edge cases, hard-coding the version or assuming things about versions that may not always be true. At least I haven’t been able to come up with a nice solution. Happy to accept suggestions or PRs though. I’d also like `1.6` to work with RCs without breaking other things.

> [@davidanthoff](#):
>
> because we could just once now add `1.6` to our version matrix, and not have to update things again when 1.6 is released

As Dilum said, you can already do this with the tilde or caret ranges and `-0` (or `-rc1`). See the action’s [README](https://github.com/julia-actions/setup-julia#examples) or this [demo](https://repl.it/@SaschaMann/setup-julia-version-logic) in a JS REPL for examples. It doesn’t look as nice as only having `1.6` but functionally it’s the same.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![ImreSamu](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/imresamu/32/20677_2.png) [@ImreSamu](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/ImreSamu)\
**Post date:** [February 9, 2021, 8:52am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/16 "2021-02-09T08:52:03Z")

</div>

:julia: 🐋 :julia: 🐋:julia: 🐋:julia: 🐋:julia: 🐋:julia: 🐋  
As I see - the julia 1.6.0-rc1 docker image is ready !!!

available `1.6-rc1` tags:

- [https://hub.docker.com/\_/julia/?tab=tags&page=1&ordering=last\_updated&name=1.6.0-rc1](https://hub.docker.com/_/julia/?tab=tags&page=1&ordering=last_updated&name=1.6.0-rc1)
  - `julia:1.6.0-rc1-buster` ( `linux/386`,`linux/amd64`,`linux/ppc64le` )
  - `julia:1.6.0-rc1-windowsservercore-1809` (`windows/amd64` 2.4 GB)
  - `julia:1.6.0-rc1-windowsservercore-ltsc2016` (`windows/amd64` 5.53 GB)

quick test:

```julia
docker pull julia:1.6.0-rc1-buster
docker run -it --rm julia:1.6.0-rc1-buster

```

expected:

```julia
# docker run -it --rm julia:1.6.0-rc1-buster
               _
   _ _ _(_)_ | Documentation: https://docs.julialang.org
  (_) | (_) (_) |
   _ _ _| |_ __ _ | Type "?" for help, "]?" for Pkg help.
  | | | | | | |/ _` | |
  | | |_| | | | (_| | | Version 1.6.0-rc1 (2021-02-06)
 _/ |\ __'_|_|_|\__'_| | Official https://julialang.org/ release
|__/ |

julia> versioninfo()
Julia Version 1.6.0-rc1
Commit a58bdd9010 (2021-02-06 15:49 UTC)
Platform Info:
  OS: Linux (x86_64-pc-linux-gnu)
  CPU: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5-2630 v4 @ 2.20GHz
  WORD_SIZE: 64
  LIBM: libopenlibm
  LLVM: libLLVM-11.0.1 (ORCJIT, broadwell)
Environment:
  JULIA_PATH = /usr/local/julia
  JULIA_GPG = 3673DF529D9049477F76B37566E3C7DC03D6E495
  JULIA_VERSION = 1.6.0-rc1

```

important links:

- [https://github.com/docker-library/julia](https://github.com/docker-library/julia)
- the julia:alpine-1.6(musl) version is WIP: [https://github.com/docker-library/julia/pull/51](https://github.com/docker-library/julia/pull/51)

disclaimer: I am only the messenger + power user

:julia: 🐋 :julia: 🐋:julia: 🐋:julia: 🐋:julia: 🐋:julia: 🐋

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![StatisticalMouse](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/statisticalmouse/32/43370_2.png) [@StatisticalMouse](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/StatisticalMouse)\
**Post date:** [February 9, 2021, 9:21am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/17 "2021-02-09T09:21:43Z")

</div>

If you want to run Jupyterlab 3 on that image, type:

```julia
docker pull statisticalmice/julia-jupyter:1.6-buster
docker run -it --rm -p 8888:8888 statisticalmice/julia-jupyter:1.6-buster

```

expected:

```julia
docker run -it --rm -p 8888:8888 statisticalmice/julia-jupyter:1.6-buster
[I 2021-02-09 09:18:44.330 ServerApp] jupyterlab | extension was successfully linked.
[I 2021-02-09 09:18:44.340 ServerApp] Writing notebook server cookie secret to /home/arthur/.local/share/jupyter/runtime/jupyter_cookie_secret
[I 2021-02-09 09:18:44.510 ServerApp] nbclassic | extension was successfully linked.
[I 2021-02-09 09:18:44.554 LabApp] JupyterLab extension loaded from /home/arthur/miniconda3/lib/python3.8/site-packages/jupyterlab
[I 2021-02-09 09:18:44.554 LabApp] JupyterLab application directory is /home/arthur/miniconda3/share/jupyter/lab
[I 2021-02-09 09:18:44.558 ServerApp] jupyterlab | extension was successfully loaded.
[I 2021-02-09 09:18:44.562 ServerApp] nbclassic | extension was successfully loaded.
[I 2021-02-09 09:18:44.562 ServerApp] Serving notebooks from local directory: /home/arthur
[I 2021-02-09 09:18:44.562 ServerApp] Jupyter Server 1.3.0 is running at:
[I 2021-02-09 09:18:44.563 ServerApp] http://608b0ec5f5ee:8888/lab?token=8b96f8a81cb2e16ed2de3c356568e9f273f7a36a938d1876
[I 2021-02-09 09:18:44.563 ServerApp] or http://127.0.0.1:8888/lab?token=8b96f8a81cb2e16ed2de3c356568e9f273f7a36a938d1876
[I 2021-02-09 09:18:44.563 ServerApp] Use Control-C to stop this server and shut down all kernels (twice to skip confirmation).
[W 2021-02-09 09:18:44.566 ServerApp] No web browser found: could not locate runnable browser.
[C 2021-02-09 09:18:44.566 ServerApp] 
    
    To access the server, open this file in a browser:
        file:///home/arthur/.local/share/jupyter/runtime/jpserver-1-open.html
    Or copy and paste one of these URLs:
        http://608b0ec5f5ee:8888/lab?token=8b96f8a81cb2e16ed2de3c356568e9f273f7a36a938d1876
     or http://127.0.0.1:8888/lab?token=8b96f8a81cb2e16ed2de3c356568e9f273f7a36a938d1876

```

Open the link on the last line in a web browser.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Tomas\_Pevny](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/tomas_pevny/32/25466_2.png) [@Tomas\_Pevny](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Tomas_Pevny)\
**Post date:** [February 9, 2021, 1:18pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/18 "2021-02-09T13:18:39Z")

</div>

Above,  
I have mentioned a performance regression in Flux. I have created a MWE

```julia
using Flux
x = randn(Float32, 10, 10);
m = Dense(10,10);
ps = Flux.params(m);

```

Julia Version 1.5.3 (2020-11-09)

```julia
julia> @time gradient(() -> sum(m(x)), ps);
 17.617517 seconds (34.79 M allocations: 1.751 GiB, 4.65% gc time)

julia> @time gradient(() -> sum(m(x)), ps);
  0.082247 seconds (54.12 k allocations: 2.698 MiB)

```

Julia Version 1.6.0-rc1 (2021-02-06)

```julia
julia> @time gradient(() -> sum(m(x)), ps);
 26.537819 seconds (53.83 M allocations: 2.920 GiB, 3.72% gc time, 92.62% compilation time)

julia> @time gradient(() -> sum(m(x)), ps);
  0.094459 seconds (64.25 k allocations: 3.549 MiB, 99.41% compilation time)

```

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Tomas\_Pevny](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/tomas_pevny/32/25466_2.png) [@Tomas\_Pevny](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Tomas_Pevny)\
**Post date:** [February 9, 2021, 1:53pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/19 "2021-02-09T13:53:52Z")

</div>

I have created an issue  
[https://github.com/JuliaLang/julia/issues/39586](https://github.com/JuliaLang/julia/issues/39586)

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![ctkelley](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/ctkelley/32/10684_2.png) [@ctkelley](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/ctkelley)\
**Post date:** [February 9, 2021, 6:14pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775/20 "2021-02-09T18:14:41Z")

</div>

Just got this from a CI failure on 1.6.0. CI passed on 1.5 and the nightly. Using github actions for CI. All was well when I did CI this morning. running on macOS-latest - x64 .

```julia
Run julia-actions/setup-julia@v1
6
Error: Checksum of downloaded file does not match the expected checksum from versions.json.
7
Expected: dafa3431861b8aa4a82f0885f84b21a39332f1e931c09660af70ad25a716eec8
8
Got: 7e6a0298eebe48d408279c6f99cb5df575b39097c44846971e5851a4daf25f0a

```

Anyone know what’s happening? Should I create an issue?

[Next page](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/julia-v1-6-0-rc1-is-now-available/54775.md?page=2)