Date: Wed, 11 Nov 2015 20:17:32 +0000 (GMT) From: Craig Butler <craig001@lerwick.hopto.org> To: John Baldwin <jhb@freebsd.org> Cc: Sean Bruno <sbruno@freebsd.org>, Anna Wilcox <AWilcox@wilcox-tech.com>, Marius Strobl <marius@alchemy.franken.de>, Jordan Hubbard <jkh@mail.turbofuzz.com>, sparc64@freebsd.org, Warner Losh <imp@bsdimp.com> Subject: Re: Sparc64 doesn't care about you, and you shouldn't care about Sparc64 Message-ID: <1411902059.696.1447273047281.JavaMail.craig@w520> In-Reply-To: <4004425.K7Etsx0SLe@ralph.baldwin.cx> References: <563A5893.1030607@freebsd.org> <39947478-4710-47D8-BAB1-FC93979570B6@mail.turbofuzz.com> <f4d1114833994331bd1fd2273f305abc@XCH-RTP-005.cisco.com> <4004425.K7Etsx0SLe@ralph.baldwin.cx>
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----- Original Message ----- > From: "John Baldwin" <jhb@freebsd.org> > To: freebsd-arch@freebsd.org > Cc: "Anna Wilcox" <AWilcox@wilcox-tech.com>, "Marius Strobl" <marius@alchemy.franken.de>, "Sean Bruno" > <sbruno@freebsd.org>, "Jordan Hubbard" <jkh@mail.turbofuzz.com>, sparc64@freebsd.org, "Warner Losh" <imp@bsdimp.com> > Sent: Wednesday, 11 November, 2015 6:32:08 PM > Subject: Re: Sparc64 doesn't care about you, and you shouldn't care about Sparc64 > > On Wednesday, November 11, 2015 04:07:35 PM Brian McGovern wrote: > > I have to step in on Jordan's side on this one. As a > > recently-former lab admin (June), we were - and I assume continue > > to - chucking Sun Sparc hardware as fast as we can EOL the > > products which run on the platform, and to the best of my > > knowledge, we haven't bought new gear since Oracle bought Sun. I > > think I still have an SB150 sitting in a closet collecting dust > > for the emergency case which is predestined to emergency at some > > point, but we're not even considering giving the boxes another > > life as second tier hardware - the x86/64 space offers far > > superior metrics in terms of price/performance/support/replacement > > parts. > > > > This, of course, means that our customers will be eventually follow > > suit as they do their next round of upgrades. While this means > > there will be a ton of Sparc64 hardware around at low prices, I > > have no doubt it'll be a niche community, like BETAMAX, Laserdisc, > > and HD-DVD before... > > > > If there is someone who loves this platform enough to keep it going > > single-handedly, or nearly so, that's one thing. If the discussion > > is to divert project resources to keep it alive just because its > > one more platform, I have a laundry list of things that I suspect > > will have a bigger impact on the broader x86 (and even ARM) > > community; then again, I expect just about everyone has such a > > list. > > This last question is an important one I think. What is the actual > cost to > the project to let sparc64 remain Tier-2? That means we aren't > committed to > building packages, so that mostly lets Sean off the hook. > > The biggest hang up I can see is the question of toolchain. > > On the question of toolchain I think GCC 4.2 continues to become > incredibly > less useful. If we could have an 11 without GCC 4.2 that would be > ideal. > However, clang is only production-viable on x86 right now. Even lldb > doesn't > work on i386 and only works on amd64. If your argument for tossing > sparc64 > is GCC 4.2 then if you are logically consistent you have to toss a > whole lot > of other stuff as well. (Even clang on amd64 is still using binutils > ld) > > Realistically I think FreeBSD needs to support two sets of > toolchains: > clang and modern (GPLv3) GCC/binutils. > > I think it is a laudable goal to have the option of a GPL-free base > system, > but I think we should also make it an option to use a modern GCC > toolchain. > > For platforms that depend on GCC 4.2 I think we should be moving them > to > using newer GCC in some fashion. That is relevant for several > architectures > that we definitely want to keep going forward, not just sparc64, and > it's a > problem we need to solve regardless. Once that is addressed it is > not clear > to me what drain on project resources sparc64 is. > > -- > John Baldwin > _______________________________________________ > freebsd-sparc64@freebsd.org mailing list > https://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-sparc64 > To unsubscribe, send any mail to > "freebsd-sparc64-unsubscribe@freebsd.org" > Just to raise something else as well, port maintainers seem hesitant to push sparc64 fixes in. I have raised a few fixes PR (specifically around the compat[789]x ports) that are still open. There are also some other PR's open that could do with more experienced eyes to help. It would be a shame to see sparc64@ killed off on FreeBSD. I would be keen to keep working on it if someone want a n00b under their wing. Kind Regards Craig Butler
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