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Linux 7.1 Removes Drivers for Bus Mouse Support

phoronix.com

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Re: Linux 7.1 Removes Drivers for Bus Mouse Support

#11

Post by cestith »

trollbridge wrote: post #8
bastawhiz wrote: post #4

This is the kind of spring cleaning I crave. Deleting busted drivers that haven't worked in over a decade? Fantastic! Some of this hardware likely has exactly zero users because the material it's made from can't possibly have survived. Look at the cord on the mouse in the photo: you might be able to plug it in, but I wouldn't bet money signal can still make it down the wire.

My bus mouse still works just fine; things built in the 80s tended to be pretty solid. However, it would be hard pressed to find a machine with ISA slots with enough resources to run Linux 7.1 acceptably.

There are still ISA slots in new systems with fairly modern processors and plenty of RAM, if you don’t mind buying specific models of industrial PCs for way too much money.

For $1100 or so you, too, could have a 4th generation Core i3 machine. https://www.rampcsystems.com/product/2-isa-slot

Or maybe you need 4 PCI and 9 ISA for some reason. DuroPC’s got you, if you can drop $1800 on a system with the same generation of processor. https://duropc.com/product/r810-4p9i-4

Re: Linux 7.1 Removes Drivers for Bus Mouse Support

#12

Post by estimator7292 »

trollbridge wrote: post #8
bastawhiz wrote: post #4

This is the kind of spring cleaning I crave. Deleting busted drivers that haven't worked in over a decade? Fantastic! Some of this hardware likely has exactly zero users because the material it's made from can't possibly have survived. Look at the cord on the mouse in the photo: you might be able to plug it in, but I wouldn't bet money signal can still make it down the wire.

My bus mouse still works just fine; things built in the 80s tended to be pretty solid. However, it would be hard pressed to find a machine with ISA slots with enough resources to run Linux 7.1 acceptably.

Most things.

Plastics and rubbers tend to not survive well a lot of the time just because of the chemistry. There's really no way around plastic embrittlement and rubber decomposing. You can prolong it with the right storage conditions, but those molecules are gonna break down sooner or later.

Re: Linux 7.1 Removes Drivers for Bus Mouse Support

#13

Post by M95D »

cestith wrote: post #11
trollbridge wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My bus mouse still works just fine; things built in the 80s tended to be pretty solid. However, it would be hard pressed to find a machine with ISA slots with enough resources to run Linux 7.1 acceptably.

There are still ISA slots in new systems with fairly modern processors and plenty of RAM, if you don’t mind buying specific models of industrial PCs for way too much money. For $1100 or so you, too, could have a 4th generation Core i3 machine. https://www.rampcsystems.com/product/2-isa-slot Or maybe you need 4 PCI and 9 ISA for some reason. DuroPC’s got you, if you can drop $1800 on a system with the same generation…

ISA slots are all identical. If you have one slot, you can multiply it to 100 slots just by connecting the wires.

Re: Linux 7.1 Removes Drivers for Bus Mouse Support

#14

Post by augusto-moura »

xiphias2 wrote: post #7

Microkernels have lost the open kernel wars because of their speed problems, but this is a great example of a driver that should have been running in userspace a long time ago, just like how Windows has been moving in that direction. Isn't Linux planning to do the same?

I guess things are going into that direction naturally, but not officially. eBPF is helping with getting deep kernel aspects into userspace. And there's some ressurgence of out-of-tree graphics drivers, specially for gaming.

I believe userspace drivers are much more powerful and easy to build than 10 years ago, but it is not from a requirement from the kernel.

Who knows, maybe we will get a smaller (instead of bigger) kernel in 10-20 years

Re: Linux 7.1 Removes Drivers for Bus Mouse Support

#15

Post by FpUser »

bastawhiz wrote: post #4

This is the kind of spring cleaning I crave. Deleting busted drivers that haven't worked in over a decade? Fantastic! Some of this hardware likely has exactly zero users because the material it's made from can't possibly have survived. Look at the cord on the mouse in the photo: you might be able to plug it in, but I wouldn't bet money signal can still make it down the wire.

My Z840 server I use for self hosting has both bus original IBM keyboard and bus mouse attached. Either works just fine.

Re: Linux 7.1 Removes Drivers for Bus Mouse Support

#16

Post by M95D »

advisedwang wrote: post #10
flohofwoe wrote: post #5

Raises the question whether a bug in code that's never called actually exists ;)

Code that is never normally used can sometimes still be gotten to run by an attacker, and therefore can still be a security risk.

But that code would have to be selected in menuconfig, compiled, and the module loaded. I assume that nobody does that for bus mice, and even if someone, by mistake, selects one of the drivers, that's 1 machine in a billion. Who would target that?

Same argument for any retro-tech. What hacker would spend hours/days to hack my bare-metal DOS box running Arachne + a packet driver just to mine bitcoins on a K6-2 for a couple of hours until I turn it off from the AT power switch (not button).

Re: Linux 7.1 Removes Drivers for Bus Mouse Support

#17

Post by cestith »

M95D wrote: post #13
cestith wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are still ISA slots in new systems with fairly modern processors and plenty of RAM, if you don’t mind buying specific models of industrial PCs for way too much money. For $1100 or so you, too, could have a 4th generation Core i3 machine. https://www.rampcsystems.com/product/2-isa-slot Or maybe you need 4 PCI and 9 ISA for some reason. DuroPC’s got you, if you can drop $1800 on a system with the same generation…

ISA slots are all identical. If you have one slot, you can multiply it to 100 slots just by connecting the wires.

That’s one of those facts that’s always good to know, but in practice people tend to put one card in one slot with no expanders.

Re: Linux 7.1 Removes Drivers for Bus Mouse Support

#19

Post by kube-system »

bastawhiz wrote: post #4

This is the kind of spring cleaning I crave. Deleting busted drivers that haven't worked in over a decade? Fantastic! Some of this hardware likely has exactly zero users because the material it's made from can't possibly have survived. Look at the cord on the mouse in the photo: you might be able to plug it in, but I wouldn't bet money signal can still make it down the wire.

The mouse in the photo was made somewhere between 1987-1993. I have computers older than that which work just fine.
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