Date: Fri, 06 Apr 2007 23:44:31 -0700 From: Garrett Cooper <youshi10@u.washington.edu> To: freebsd-current@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Do we need this junk? Message-ID: <46173DCF.1040200@u.washington.edu> In-Reply-To: <20070405.135306.78791677.imp@bsdimp.com> References: <ef10de9a0704050258l4ea754b3n99a1239a81b844a0@mail.gmail.com> <20070405.135306.78791677.imp@bsdimp.com>
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Warner Losh wrote: >> legacyfree1# grep -irsn isa ./ | grep -i include > >>From the system: no. From your kernel, absolutely. > > Warner Sorry if I go out of order, but I'm viewing this in the threaded format in Thunderbird (it's easier to keep track of crazy long threads like this). Personally, I don't think that we (as a community) should give up support in any particular architecture or device. Instead, we should in fact maybe prioritize our energies in useful things, like what has been largely done in the CURRENT branch for some time. Regardless of any operating system getting rid of support for devices or architectures, there will always be some level of backwards compatibility built into modern day architectures that support older architectures. Take Pentium 4's for example. (correct me if I'm getting this wrong, but) Pentium 4's largely support all functionality way back to the original 386 microprocessor, and even further (I think PC98) with certain features like Real mode, architectural operators, and the like. Why? Maximum compatibility. Because it stinks at the end of the day when you try and run a binary and it doesn't work on machine A) because they ruled the hardware / instruction set to be obsolete. Same goes for other things, like Perl. Intel (I work for them as an intern) still uses ancient versions of perl for internal tools. Why? Because we have tools that require ancient versions of Perl. Same goes for many IT groups supporting software and OSes. It's a big thing when you say, "sorry, we don't support you anymore", because there may be a large group of people out there that still use the hardware that we'd isolate. Granted, I agree in EoL and the like, and I think that some things could stand to maybe be removed to some extent, but I think that justifying such actions based on such a limited set of statistics isn't correct because you're robbing many people of a "freedom of computing". That's basically what I feel like with OSes like Vista, where you are required to purchase new hardware, just to run the OS. We don't need to keep up with the Joneses over in Redmond, WA :). Furthermore keep in mind, while we run excellent machines in this section of the world I've heard of other people running much older, lower class machines (Romania / Czechoslovakia for instance) in internet cafes, and they think that their PCs are the best things since sliced bread, even though they just run Win 3.11. Although I think that the ultimate goal of this thread can be good, it needs to be brought back down to a safe level so we can discuss about this topic more rationally and less with our emotions. Cheers and good luck to all, -Garrett
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