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Yes, linux removes support for stuff over time. But most drivers for old simple peripherals are considered not a problem - as long as they are clean optional co

Yes, linux removes support for stuff over time. But most drivers for old simple peripherals are considered not a problem - as long as they are clean optional components of their respective subsystems, they don't bother anyone. One example of support being removed includes old intel 386 processors, due to multi-core support complications apparently: http://lkml.iu.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/1212.1/01152.html http://lkml.iu.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/1212.1/01152.html (that left intel 486 and later still supported) A bit more recently, a bunch of obscure architectures were removed, mostly because the last compilers to support them are too old or buggy: https://lwn.net/Articles/748074/ https://lwn.net/Articles/748074/ (Linux is in general really great about supporting a range of gcc/binutils versions going back about 7 years ... compare to some other popular projects these days which require a Go or Rust toolchain from just a few months ago.) And occasionally a driver is moved to "staging" to see if anyone complains, before being removed, because it is being a bother and no one seems to be maintaining it: https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=ea2e813e8cc3492c951b9895724fd47187e04a6f https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/lin... This is related to why "upstreaming" a driver can be very different from just releasing the source. Making a driver acceptable for merging into the mainline kernel, means making it clean enough that maintenance costs will be extremely low, for the next 5 to 10 years, even as the linux kernel sustains a surprisingly large amount of change in every single 3 month release cycle.

stinos 6y ago
they don't bother anyone Well, it's been like 2 decades since I last compiled a kernel myself, but back then I was definitely bothered with the pages of obsolete hardware which could be selected from when running make menuconfig. Not sure if/how people configure kernels these days but I assume it didn't get better?
- cbmuser 6y ago
  What's wrong with the kernel supporting a wide variety of hardware? As long as the stuff is actively maintained, I don't see a problem as this means it's actually being used. Linux always has had a very wide hardware support and if you are bothered about that, you can either use the make target "localmodconfig" or just don't build your kernels yourself.
  - stinos 6y ago
    What's wrong with the kernel supporting a wide variety of hardware? I think you misunderstood my reply. I'm not saying the kernel should drop support, I'm merely replying to the 'doesn't bother anyone' with a practical example of why it might bother someone on a particular level.
    - spoopyskelly 6y ago
      It bothers you that the kernel supports hardware you don't have?
      - cesarb 6y ago
        There was a time back in the 90s where one could go through every option in the Linux kernel config, and through every package in the dselect list (does anyone here still remember dselect?), and know what each one was for, and whether it should be selected or not. Nowadays, there are too many options for that (and for dselect, too many packages).
      - stinos 6y ago
        Again, no, that is not what bothers me. I'm not sure if I was really that unclear - twice - or if it's just because it's monday :) So here it goes, in full (similar to sibling poster cesarb's story): once you could, spending some time, just go over pretty much every possible option and select what you needed. Which mattered back then (at least to me), because compilation already took half a day on my machine so the less things to compile the better. Now over the years came more and more support for different hardware. That fact by itself obviously did not bother me, also because it meant I could finally hook up my insert not too common device here. What started to bother me was just that it took more time to go over all options. Whishful thinking because hard to implement, but I would have liked a flag like "ok you can just skip everything for harware which only existed before 1995 because I don't have that". So, reflecting on that period, I'm simply wondering what it must be like today to go through all options. I.e. I wonder if others might be bothered by the sheer amount of options out there.
- ploxiln 6y ago
  No, there are probably more kernel config options than ever ... but they are decently well organized in a tree. I always start with my linux distro's stock kernel config, and then go through and find stuff to add and remove which is familiar enough to me, leaving the majority as-is. There is search, there are other ways to get a good starter config, I'm no expert ...
dis-sys 6y ago
> Linux is in general really great about supporting a range of gcc/binutils versions going back about 7 years ... compare to some other popular projects these days which require a Go or Rust toolchain from just a few months ago 7 years old gcc was released back in 2013, or 36 years after gcc's initial release

stinos 6y ago

they don't bother anyone Well, it's been like 2 decades since I last compiled a kernel myself, but back then I was definitely bothered with the pages of obsolete hardware which could be selected from when running make menuconfig. Not sure if/how people configure kernels these days but I assume it didn't get better?

cbmuser 6y ago
What's wrong with the kernel supporting a wide variety of hardware? As long as the stuff is actively maintained, I don't see a problem as this means it's actually being used. Linux always has had a very wide hardware support and if you are bothered about that, you can either use the make target "localmodconfig" or just don't build your kernels yourself.
- stinos 6y ago
  What's wrong with the kernel supporting a wide variety of hardware? I think you misunderstood my reply. I'm not saying the kernel should drop support, I'm merely replying to the 'doesn't bother anyone' with a practical example of why it might bother someone on a particular level.
  - spoopyskelly 6y ago
    It bothers you that the kernel supports hardware you don't have?
    - cesarb 6y ago
      There was a time back in the 90s where one could go through every option in the Linux kernel config, and through every package in the dselect list (does anyone here still remember dselect?), and know what each one was for, and whether it should be selected or not. Nowadays, there are too many options for that (and for dselect, too many packages).
    - stinos 6y ago
      Again, no, that is not what bothers me. I'm not sure if I was really that unclear - twice - or if it's just because it's monday :) So here it goes, in full (similar to sibling poster cesarb's story): once you could, spending some time, just go over pretty much every possible option and select what you needed. Which mattered back then (at least to me), because compilation already took half a day on my machine so the less things to compile the better. Now over the years came more and more support for different hardware. That fact by itself obviously did not bother me, also because it meant I could finally hook up my insert not too common device here. What started to bother me was just that it took more time to go over all options. Whishful thinking because hard to implement, but I would have liked a flag like "ok you can just skip everything for harware which only existed before 1995 because I don't have that". So, reflecting on that period, I'm simply wondering what it must be like today to go through all options. I.e. I wonder if others might be bothered by the sheer amount of options out there.
ploxiln 6y ago
No, there are probably more kernel config options than ever ... but they are decently well organized in a tree. I always start with my linux distro's stock kernel config, and then go through and find stuff to add and remove which is familiar enough to me, leaving the majority as-is. There is search, there are other ways to get a good starter config, I'm no expert ...

dis-sys 6y ago

> Linux is in general really great about supporting a range of gcc/binutils versions going back about 7 years ... compare to some other popular projects these days which require a Go or Rust toolchain from just a few months ago 7 years old gcc was released back in 2013, or 36 years after gcc's initial release