Re: [PATCH] bfs: remove the filesystem

["Lorenzo Stoakes (ARM)" <ljs@kernel.org>]

On Fri, Sep 04, 2026 at 08:10:54AM -0700, Darrick J. Wong wrote:
> On Fri, Sep 04, 2026 at 12:43:09PM +0200, Christian Brauner wrote:
> > On Fri, 04 Sep 2026 01:29:19 -0700, Ethan Nelson-Moore wrote:
> > > bfs: remove the filesystem
> >
> > I agree.
>
> At the moment, I don't.  Nowhere in this thread does anyone mention what
> someone with a B(oot)FS filesystem image should do if they want to
> extract whatever's stored in the filesystem.  Are there userspace tools
> for that purpose (ala efs)?  Does "binwalk -e $bfs_image" suffice for
> that purpose?  Or is there solid evidence that there isn't even a single
> user (ala freevxfs) who strongly wants it to stay in?
>
> I'm all for getting rid of old cruft but there still needs to be a
> documented offramp for users.

Use an older/downstream version of linux? :)

It's like the museum piece arch stuff - people argue vigorously in favour of
nommu (which btw is a variety of linux that _doesn't implement forking_ :)))
gesticulating at talks given at conferences etc.

But then never quite answer the 'why not use an older version of linux' or 'why
not just maintain it downstraem for the 3 people who need it'.

Also worth consider what the Venn diagram overlap of bfs users and people
running even-vaguely-tip kernels/likely to ever upgrade is. Quite likely zero I
expect?

I get the desire not to lose people their data, but the code's not gone away
forever :)

>
> --D
>
> > ---
> >
> > Applied to the vfs-7.4.bfs branch of the vfs/vfs.git tree.
> > Patches in the vfs-7.4.bfs branch should appear in linux-next soon.
> >
> > Please report any outstanding bugs that were missed during review in a
> > new review to the original patch series allowing us to drop it.
> >
> > It's encouraged to provide Acked-bys and Reviewed-bys even though the
> > patch has now been applied. If possible patch trailers will be updated.
> >
> > Note that commit hashes shown below are subject to change due to rebase,
> > trailer updates or similar. If in doubt, please check the listed branch.
> >
> > tree:   https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/vfs/vfs.git
> > branch: vfs-7.4.bfs
> >
> > [1/1] bfs: remove the filesystem
> >       https://git.kernel.org/vfs/vfs/c/e36781a626b2
> >
> >

--
Cheers, Lorenzo