NEWS: Deprecate ia64-linux-gnu

  This reflects to the orpahned status of the ia64 architecture in the
Linux kernel as of commit 96ec72a3425d1515b69b7f9dc34a4a6ce5862a37
("ia64: Mark architecture as orphaned").

---
 NEWS | 3 +++
 1 file changed, 3 insertions(+)
  

On 29/01/2021 13:37, Florian Weimer via Libc-alpha wrote:
> This reflects to the orpahned status of the ia64 architecture in the
> Linux kernel as of commit 96ec72a3425d1515b69b7f9dc34a4a6ce5862a37
> ("ia64: Mark architecture as orphaned").

I am not sure about this, the deprecation issue was also raised on gcc
maillist and Jason step up to be the ia64 maintainer [1].  I also see
that binutils does fix some ia64 issues from time to time.

The Debian community still has working ia64 buildbots, which they
gave access to test the latest releases. They can comment better their
idea of the ia64-linux-gnu port.

My take is once Linux is gone we are free to deprecate without a
warning.

[1] https://gcc.gnu.org/legacy-ml/gcc/2019-06/msg00150.html

> 
> ---
>  NEWS | 3 +++
>  1 file changed, 3 insertions(+)
> 
> diff --git a/NEWS b/NEWS
> index 01cbf282c3..782a6bd0e2 100644
> --- a/NEWS
> +++ b/NEWS
> @@ -84,6 +84,9 @@ Deprecated and removed features, and other changes affecting compatibility:
>    the baseline version (directly from the search path directory) will be
>    loaded.
>  
> +* Support for the ia64-linux-gnu architecture is deprecated and will be
> +  removed from an upcoming glibc release.
> +
>  Changes to build and runtime requirements:
>  
>  * On Linux, the system administrator needs to configure /dev/pts with
>
  

* Adhemerval Zanella:

> On 29/01/2021 13:37, Florian Weimer via Libc-alpha wrote:
>> This reflects to the orpahned status of the ia64 architecture in the
>> Linux kernel as of commit 96ec72a3425d1515b69b7f9dc34a4a6ce5862a37
>> ("ia64: Mark architecture as orphaned").
>
> I am not sure about this, the deprecation issue was also raised on gcc
> maillist and Jason step up to be the ia64 maintainer [1].  I also see
> that binutils does fix some ia64 issues from time to time.
>
> The Debian community still has working ia64 buildbots, which they
> gave access to test the latest releases. They can comment better their
> idea of the ia64-linux-gnu port.
>
> My take is once Linux is gone we are free to deprecate without a
> warning.

Do you mean *remove* without further warning?

Doesn't that itself a warning (as in, a deprecation)?

Thanks,
Florian
  

On 29/01/2021 14:02, Florian Weimer wrote:
> * Adhemerval Zanella:
> 
>> On 29/01/2021 13:37, Florian Weimer via Libc-alpha wrote:
>>> This reflects to the orpahned status of the ia64 architecture in the
>>> Linux kernel as of commit 96ec72a3425d1515b69b7f9dc34a4a6ce5862a37
>>> ("ia64: Mark architecture as orphaned").
>>
>> I am not sure about this, the deprecation issue was also raised on gcc
>> maillist and Jason step up to be the ia64 maintainer [1].  I also see
>> that binutils does fix some ia64 issues from time to time.
>>
>> The Debian community still has working ia64 buildbots, which they
>> gave access to test the latest releases. They can comment better their
>> idea of the ia64-linux-gnu port.
>>
>> My take is once Linux is gone we are free to deprecate without a
>> warning.
> 
> Do you mean *remove* without further warning?
> 
> Doesn't that itself a warning (as in, a deprecation)?

The thing is I am not sure if someone would step up as ia64 maintainer
for Linux.  We have older architectures than ia64 with current upstream
support.

I have cc'ed the Debian developers responsible for the ia64 port,
let see if they have any plan for the ia64 Linux support.
  

(CC'ing two of the Gentoo guys)

Hi!

On 1/29/21 5:51 PM, Adhemerval Zanella wrote:
> On 29/01/2021 13:37, Florian Weimer via Libc-alpha wrote:
>> This reflects to the orpahned status of the ia64 architecture in the
>> Linux kernel as of commit 96ec72a3425d1515b69b7f9dc34a4a6ce5862a37
>> ("ia64: Mark architecture as orphaned").
> 
> I am not sure about this, the deprecation issue was also raised on gcc
> maillist and Jason step up to be the ia64 maintainer [1].  I also see
> that binutils does fix some ia64 issues from time to time.

FWIW, the SH port of the Linux kernel was orphaned for a while as well until
it found two new maintainers. So being orphaned in the kernel doesn't
necessarily mean that a port is slated for removal.

> The Debian community still has working ia64 buildbots, which they
> gave access to test the latest releases. They can comment better their
> idea of the ia64-linux-gnu port.

Speaking for Debian, we're maintaining the port as good as possible but it's
not in the best shape. glibc has many testsuite failures, ia64 support was
removed with Ruby 2.7 and the ia64 backend gcc doesn't have a maintainer
either.

The Linux kernel for ia64 has issues on larger ia64 NUMA machines and doesn't
boot there, smaller ia64 machines have issues with the hpsa driver currently
which have been reported and the problematic commit been located, but the
issue has not been resolved yet.

So, if we want to continue to maintain the port, someone would at least need
to fix the kernel issues.

> My take is once Linux is gone we are free to deprecate without a
> warning.

I agree. But I'm interested to hear the voices from the Gentoo side.

Adrian