Re: [GIT PULL] x86 fixes

Linus Torvalds
2015-08-17T16:47:04Z

On Mon, Aug 17, 2015 at 1:01 AM, Ingo Molnar <mingo@kernel.org> wrote:
>
> Any objections against removing all of math-emu in v4.3? This would simplify the
> FPU code in various places beyond math-emu/.

Hmm. I guess we could just try. The fact that you argue that the FP
emulation likely hasn't worked for a few years is a pretty powerful
argument that nobody has cared. And if somebody does, and ends up
having a use case and willing to test, we can always re-animate the
zombie that is math emu support.

Considering that we don't support the old i386 any more, the only chip
I know of that needs it is the i486sx. However, there are probably
several clone chips that did the "we're a 486" thing by adding the few
integer instructions but not doing a FPU. And there might well be
various embedded versions of the 486 that might even be in use still.
But afaik most distributions have required Pentium of P6-level
capabilities for some time, and I guess any existing old systems
aren't going to upgrade their kernels anyway.

Linus