Re: Future of 32-bit platforms (including i386)
- In reply to: Mark Millard : "Re: Future of 32-bit platforms (including i386)"
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Date: Tue, 25 Jul 2023 05:10:51 UTC
On Mon, Jul 24, 2023 at 2:59 PM Mark Millard <marklmi@yahoo.com> wrote: > John Baldwin <jhb_at_FreeBSD.org> wrote on > Date: Mon, 24 Jul 2023 19:33:57 UTC : > > > On 5/23/23 4:46 PM, John Baldwin wrote: > > > On 4/27/23 10:19 AM, John Baldwin wrote: > > >> For 13.0, i386 was demoted from Tier 1 to Tier 2. In the announcement > > >> of this for 13.0, the project committed to an update on i386's future > > >> around the time of 14.0. The announcement at the time suggested that > > >> i386 would be supported less in 14.x than in 13.x. > > >> > > >> My proposal is that for 14.x we treat i386 like any other Tier 2 > > >> platform. That is, release images and packages would only be provided > > >> on a best-effort basis, and we would not guarantee providing them. I > > >> think we should also stop shipping binary updates for the base system > > >> (freebsd-update) for 14.x for i386. > > >> > > >> A larger question is what to do about 32-bit platforms moving forward. > > >> My proposal for powerpc, i386, and armv[67] is that we say publicly > > >> that we anticipate not supporting them in 15. That is, that we may > > >> remove them outright from the tree, or we may leave them in the tree, > > >> but we do not plan on building packages or release images. Another > > >> option to consider for 32-bit platforms perhaps in 15 is to remove > > >> kernel support and only retain the ability to build userland. The > > >> goal of saying this now-ish (or about the time 14.0 is going to ship) > > >> would be to give time for users and developers to respond in the > > >> window between 14.0 and 15.0 so we can evaluate those responses as an > > >> input into the final decision for 15. > > > > > > We discussed this topic during the 15.0 developer summit and the > consensus > > > among the folks present (which is only a subset of our community), is > > > that there is still interest in supporting armv7 kernels in 15.0, but > not > > > kernels for other platforms. In addition, no one expressed a need for > > > full 32-bit world support for i386 and powerpc, only for compat32 > support > > > in the kernel, and lib32 (cc -m32) support in userland. > > > > > > One question for this is if we think we will have sufficient developer > > > resources to maintain armv7 kernels for the life of stable/15. We can > > > largely punt on the final decision for that until close to the release > of > > > 15.0. I think for what we announce for 14.0 we can still say that we > > > are generally planning to remove 32-bit kernel and world support in > 15.0, > > > but may consider keeping armv7. > > > > I've posted a couple of reviews to add a WARNING to dmesg during the boot > > of 32-bit kernels as well as to add a note to RELNOTES to serve as the > > starting point for the note in the release notes: > > > > https://reviews.freebsd.org/D41163 > > https://reviews.freebsd.org/D41164 > > > > Also, Mike Karels has been working on lib32 support for aarch64 that > should > > be included in 14.0. > > I see no wording about armv6 being removed earlier. > > At one time Warner had written: > > >> On Tue, Dec 13, 2022 at 11:48 AM Mark Millard <marklmi@yahoo.com> > wrote: > >> FYI: The old 2021-Oct-28 message related to armv6 removal > >> sequencing/timing has a new follow up finally: > >> > >> > https://lists.freebsd.org/archives/freebsd-arch/2022-December/000313.html > >> > >> (Nothing about this changes the armv7 status.) > > > > Nope. > > > > tl;dr: armv6 packages will stop, we'll stop doing -current armv6 > snapshots, we'll move armv6 to > > an 'extra' architecture in universe for stable/14. post stable/14 we'll > tear down support for armv6 > > in base and later in ports. Ports mention armv6 ~500 times, maybe 1/4 of > them also mention armv7, > > and the vast majority of them mark things as broken in some way (though > there are exceptions). > > > > Warner > I'm still hoping to get to this... I think it's the last time on my 'wanna get done before 14' checklist. It is orthogonal to the 32-bit stuff. Warner