On Sun, Sep 3, 2017 at 11:07 PM, Robin Laing <MeSat@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > Myself have two i686 machines running. One will be disposed of in the next > month or two. The second one is great for emergencies and as a travel > (where stupid spy/scan laws prevail) throw away computer. > > If support is dropped, the second machine will survive on the latest version > that runs it until hardware is dead. > > My choice is to see i686 to finally end. You are in the majority on this, but ... > On the other side of the coin, support for economies where used computers > are being used, as the cost of new hardware is beyond the level of income > for these locations. i686 is a way to provide a working computer system > without the extra costs. Support for many of these machines may be > necessary to provide a level of security. Exactly! And not just in other economies. In the U.S., you can still find hardware that will suffice for many uses for next to nothing. Sure, it might not be a big deal if you are picking up one or two, but how about 20? I mean, with dirt cheap hardware that is good enough you can: * Run a camp for teaching kids to code * ... or do basic graphical design with Inkscape or gimp * Teach basic office skills to those not fortunate enough to have regular access to a computer * Set up a community center providing access to e-mail and other online services Those are all common examples in the U.S. that, in many cases, require access to cheap hardware in order to be viable. > > BUT. How many of these places are actually running Linux at all? This is a > question to be asked. If the usage is small, then dropping support may be > an matter of economy of development resources. Yes, this is a very important part of the question. If there isn't enough interest within the community to actually support i686, or any feature for that matter, then it makes sense to move on. One of the great things about the Fedora community is that it quite supportive of such things - if there is enough interest to drive it. jeff -- Jeff Backus jeff.backus@xxxxxxxxx http://github.com/jsbackus _______________________________________________ users mailing list -- users@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx To unsubscribe send an email to users-leave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
