Fwd: FreeBSD 14: Poll armv6 deprecated or removed

Greetings armv6 users

Please see the following thread on freebsd-arch@ about the future of armv6
support in FreeBSD 14.

Warner


---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Warner Losh <imp@bsdimp.com>
Date: Thu, Oct 28, 2021 at 9:37 AM
Subject: FreeBSD 14: Poll armv6 deprecated or removed
To: freebsd-arch@freebsd.org <freebsd-arch@freebsd.org>


Greetings,

Given that the number of available and useful armv6 boards has fallen to
almost zero, the time has come to look hard at armv6.

There's a number of options.

1. Keep it as is. This will only happen if there's a lot more users than we
think (and we think there's nearly zero users of FreeBSD 13 and newer that
would want to run FreeBSD 14).

2. Stop building packages. Given it's small to non-existent user base, it
makes no sense to provide a package building service for it.
2a. We should likely do this anyway for all stable branches since it's a
net negative in terms of cost/benefit analysis: lots of effort to produce,
very little use.

3. Disconnect it from universe: This will mean it will rot, though. It's a
necessary step in removal.

4. Remove support for armv6 in base entirely. This will orphan any RPiB and
RPi0 users out there. However, the RPiB hasn't been sold in a few years,
and the RPI0's connectivity is severely lacking given no SDIO support.

So, which of these steps do we do before FreeBSD 14 and which before
FreeBSD 15?

My vote would be to do 1-4 for 14 including 2a.

Warner