On Mon, Jul 22, 2019 at 7:44 AM Arnd Bergmann <arnd@xxxxxxxx> wrote: > > On Sat, May 4, 2019 at 4:27 PM Greg Ungerer <gerg@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > On 4/5/19 3:06 am, Guenter Roeck wrote: > > > On Fri, May 03, 2019 at 08:16:05AM +0100, Linus Walleij wrote: > > >> On Fri, May 3, 2019 at 8:02 AM Greg Ungerer <gerg@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > >>> Ultimately though I am left wondering if the ks8695 support in the > > >>> kernel is useful to anyone the way it is at the moment. With a minimal > > >>> kernel configuration I can boot up to a shell - but the system is > > >>> really unreliable if you try to interactively use it. I don't think > > >>> it is the hardware - it seems to run reliably with the old code > > >>> it has running from flash on it. I am only testing the new kernel, > > >>> running with the existing user space root filesystem on it (which > > >>> dates from 2004 :-) > > >> > > >> Personally I think it is a bad sign that this subarch and boards do > > >> not have active OpenWrt support, they are routers after all (right?) > > >> and any active use of networking equipment should use a recent > > >> userspace as well, given all the security bugs that popped up over > > >> the years. > > Looking around on the internet, I found that Micrel at some point > had their own openwrt fork for ks8695, but I can't find a copy > any more, as the micrel.com domain is no longer used after the > acquisition by Microchip. > > https://wikidevi.com/wiki/Micrel has a list of devices based on > ks8695, and it seems that most of these are rather memory > limited, which is a problem for recent openwrt builds. > > Only two of the 17 listed devices have the absolute minimum of 4MB > flash and 32MB RAM for openwrt, two more have 8/32 and one > or two have 4/64, but all these configurations are too limited for the > web U/I now. > > > >> With IXP4xx, Gemini and EP93xx we have found active users and > > >> companies selling the chips and reference designs and even > > >> recommending it for new products (!) at times. If this is not the > > >> case with KS8695 and no hobbyists are willing to submit it > > >> to OpenWrt and modernize it to use device tree I think it should be > > >> deleted from the kernel. > > >> > > > > > > That may be the best approach if indeed no one is using it, > > > much less maintaining it. > > > > Well, I for one don't really use it any more. So I don't have a lot > > of motivation to maintain it any longer. > > I came across my patches while rebasing my backlog to 5.3-rc1. > > Should I save the (very small) trouble of sending them out again > and just remove the platform then? Given the lack of response/interest from users, I'm OK with removing it. If someone shows up wanting support, we'll have a good opportunity to discuss testing/modernization involving someone actively using the hardware. -Olof
