Re: [PATCH v2 00/28] sparc32: sunset sun4m and sun4d

[Magnus Lindholm <linmag7@gmail.com>]

Hi everyone,

On Sat, Mar 09, 2024 at 07:15:21PM +0100, Sam Ravnborg wrote:
> This is the second attempt to sunset sun4m and sun4d.
> See [1] for the inital attempt.
>
> The sun4m and sun4d parts of the kernel have seen no real interest
> for several years now. Last time a few people surfaced, but it was
> either due to a personal project or for nostalgic reasons.
> It is time to let go and drop the parts of sparc32 that in reality
> are not in use.

I'd like to revisit this discussion. I recently got SILO and modern
kernels working on legacy sun4m systems. I missed this discussion the
last time around, but I am glad the series has not been merged.

The kernel patches are available here:

https://lore.kernel.org/sparclinux/20260816075141.3489194-1-linmag7@gmail.com/T/#t

The SILO patches are available here:

https://github.com/linmag7/silo/tree/release

Code that is not tested or maintained will inevitably deteriorate over
time. I hope we can keep sun4m/sun4d support in the mainline kernel. If
the lack of testing and general maintenance was the main reason for
proposing its removal, I would be happy to help with both.

I have plenty of old SPARC32 hardware with various CPU configurations
available for testing, and I am willing to assist with maintaining the
support in any way I can.

Regards,
Magnus