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1 The following is a list of files and features that are going to be
2 removed in the kernel source tree. Every entry should contain what
3 exactly is going away, why it is happening, and who is going to be doing
4 the work. When the feature is removed from the kernel, it should also
5 be removed from this file.
7 ---------------------------
9 What: RAW driver (CONFIG_RAW_DRIVER)
10 When: December 2005
11 Why: declared obsolete since kernel 2.6.3
12 O_DIRECT can be used instead
13 Who: Adrian Bunk <bunk@stusta.de>
15 ---------------------------
17 What: drivers that were depending on OBSOLETE_OSS_DRIVER
18 (config options already removed)
19 When: before 2.6.19
20 Why: OSS drivers with ALSA replacements
21 Who: Adrian Bunk <bunk@stusta.de>
23 ---------------------------
25 What: raw1394: requests of type RAW1394_REQ_ISO_SEND, RAW1394_REQ_ISO_LISTEN
26 When: November 2006
27 Why: Deprecated in favour of the new ioctl-based rawiso interface, which is
28 more efficient. You should really be using libraw1394 for raw1394
29 access anyway.
30 Who: Jody McIntyre <scjody@modernduck.com>
32 ---------------------------
34 What: sbp2: module parameter "force_inquiry_hack"
35 When: July 2006
36 Why: Superceded by parameter "workarounds". Both parameters are meant to be
37 used ad-hoc and for single devices only, i.e. not in modprobe.conf,
38 therefore the impact of this feature replacement should be low.
39 Who: Stefan Richter <stefanr@s5r6.in-berlin.de>
41 ---------------------------
43 What: Video4Linux API 1 ioctls and video_decoder.h from Video devices.
44 When: July 2006
45 Why: V4L1 AP1 was replaced by V4L2 API. during migration from 2.4 to 2.6
46 series. The old API have lots of drawbacks and don't provide enough
47 means to work with all video and audio standards. The newer API is
48 already available on the main drivers and should be used instead.
49 Newer drivers should use v4l_compat_translate_ioctl function to handle
50 old calls, replacing to newer ones.
51 Decoder iocts are using internally to allow video drivers to
52 communicate with video decoders. This should also be improved to allow
53 V4L2 calls being translated into compatible internal ioctls.
54 Who: Mauro Carvalho Chehab <mchehab@brturbo.com.br>
56 ---------------------------
58 What: remove EXPORT_SYMBOL(insert_resource)
59 When: April 2006
60 Files: kernel/resource.c
61 Why: No modular usage in the kernel.
62 Who: Adrian Bunk <bunk@stusta.de>
64 ---------------------------
66 What: PCMCIA control ioctl (needed for pcmcia-cs [cardmgr, cardctl])
67 When: November 2005
68 Files: drivers/pcmcia/: pcmcia_ioctl.c
69 Why: With the 16-bit PCMCIA subsystem now behaving (almost) like a
70 normal hotpluggable bus, and with it using the default kernel
71 infrastructure (hotplug, driver core, sysfs) keeping the PCMCIA
72 control ioctl needed by cardmgr and cardctl from pcmcia-cs is
73 unnecessary, and makes further cleanups and integration of the
74 PCMCIA subsystem into the Linux kernel device driver model more
75 difficult. The features provided by cardmgr and cardctl are either
76 handled by the kernel itself now or are available in the new
77 pcmciautils package available at
78 http://kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/pcmcia/
79 Who: Dominik Brodowski <linux@brodo.de>
81 ---------------------------
83 What: ip_queue and ip6_queue (old ipv4-only and ipv6-only netfilter queue)
84 When: December 2005
85 Why: This interface has been obsoleted by the new layer3-independent
86 "nfnetlink_queue". The Kernel interface is compatible, so the old
87 ip[6]tables "QUEUE" targets still work and will transparently handle
88 all packets into nfnetlink queue number 0. Userspace users will have
89 to link against API-compatible library on top of libnfnetlink_queue
90 instead of the current 'libipq'.
91 Who: Harald Welte <laforge@netfilter.org>
93 ---------------------------
95 What: remove EXPORT_SYMBOL(kernel_thread)
96 When: August 2006
97 Files: arch/*/kernel/*_ksyms.c
98 Why: kernel_thread is a low-level implementation detail. Drivers should
99 use the <linux/kthread.h> API instead which shields them from
100 implementation details and provides a higherlevel interface that
101 prevents bugs and code duplication
102 Who: Christoph Hellwig <hch@lst.de>
104 ---------------------------
106 What: CONFIG_FORCED_INLINING
107 When: June 2006
108 Why: Config option is there to see if gcc is good enough. (in january
109 2006). If it is, the behavior should just be the default. If it's not,
110 the option should just go away entirely.
111 Who: Arjan van de Ven
113 ---------------------------
115 What: START_ARRAY ioctl for md
116 When: July 2006
117 Files: drivers/md/md.c
118 Why: Not reliable by design - can fail when most needed.
119 Alternatives exist
120 Who: NeilBrown <neilb@suse.de>
122 ---------------------------
124 What: eepro100 network driver
125 When: January 2007
126 Why: replaced by the e100 driver
127 Who: Adrian Bunk <bunk@stusta.de>
129 ---------------------------
131 What: pci_module_init(driver)
132 When: January 2007
133 Why: Is replaced by pci_register_driver(pci_driver).
134 Who: Richard Knutsson <ricknu-0@student.ltu.se> and Greg Kroah-Hartman <gregkh@suse.de>
136 ---------------------------
138 What: Usage of invalid timevals in setitimer
139 When: March 2007
140 Why: POSIX requires to validate timevals in the setitimer call. This
141 was never done by Linux. The invalid (e.g. negative timevals) were
142 silently converted to more or less random timeouts and intervals.
143 Until the removal a per boot limited number of warnings is printed
144 and the timevals are sanitized.
146 Who: Thomas Gleixner <tglx@linutronix.de>
148 ---------------------------
150 What: I2C interface of the it87 driver
151 When: January 2007
152 Why: The ISA interface is faster and should be always available. The I2C
153 probing is also known to cause trouble in at least one case (see
154 bug #5889.)
155 Who: Jean Delvare <khali@linux-fr.org>
157 ---------------------------
159 What: Unused EXPORT_SYMBOL/EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL exports
160 (temporary transition config option provided until then)
161 The transition config option will also be removed at the same time.
162 When: before 2.6.19
163 Why: Unused symbols are both increasing the size of the kernel binary
164 and are often a sign of "wrong API"
165 Who: Arjan van de Ven <arjan@linux.intel.com>
167 ---------------------------
169 What: remove EXPORT_SYMBOL(tasklist_lock)
170 When: August 2006
171 Files: kernel/fork.c
172 Why: tasklist_lock protects the kernel internal task list. Modules have
173 no business looking at it, and all instances in drivers have been due
174 to use of too-lowlevel APIs. Having this symbol exported prevents
175 moving to more scalable locking schemes for the task list.
176 Who: Christoph Hellwig <hch@lst.de>
178 ---------------------------
180 What: mount/umount uevents
181 When: February 2007
182 Why: These events are not correct, and do not properly let userspace know
183 when a file system has been mounted or unmounted. Userspace should
184 poll the /proc/mounts file instead to detect this properly.
185 Who: Greg Kroah-Hartman <gregkh@suse.de>
187 ---------------------------
189 What: USB driver API moves to EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL
190 When: Febuary 2008
191 Files: include/linux/usb.h, drivers/usb/core/driver.c
192 Why: The USB subsystem has changed a lot over time, and it has been
193 possible to create userspace USB drivers using usbfs/libusb/gadgetfs
194 that operate as fast as the USB bus allows. Because of this, the USB
195 subsystem will not be allowing closed source kernel drivers to
196 register with it, after this grace period is over. If anyone needs
197 any help in converting their closed source drivers over to use the
198 userspace filesystems, please contact the
199 linux-usb-devel@lists.sourceforge.net mailing list, and the developers
200 there will be glad to help you out.
201 Who: Greg Kroah-Hartman <gregkh@suse.de>
203 ---------------------------
205 What: find_trylock_page
206 When: January 2007
207 Why: The interface no longer has any callers left in the kernel. It
208 is an odd interface (compared with other find_*_page functions), in
209 that it does not take a refcount to the page, only the page lock.
210 It should be replaced with find_get_page or find_lock_page if possible.
211 This feature removal can be reevaluated if users of the interface
212 cannot cleanly use something else.
213 Who: Nick Piggin <npiggin@suse.de>
215 ---------------------------
217 What: Support for the MIPS EV96100 evaluation board
218 When: September 2006
219 Why: Does no longer build since at least November 15, 2003, apparently
220 no userbase left.
221 Who: Ralf Baechle <ralf@linux-mips.org>
223 ---------------------------
225 What: Support for the Momentum / PMC-Sierra Jaguar ATX evaluation board
226 When: September 2006
227 Why: Does no longer build since quite some time, and was never popular,
228 due to the platform being replaced by successor models. Apparently
229 no user base left. It also is one of the last users of
230 WANT_PAGE_VIRTUAL.
231 Who: Ralf Baechle <ralf@linux-mips.org>
233 ---------------------------
235 What: Support for the Momentum Ocelot, Ocelot 3, Ocelot C and Ocelot G
236 When: September 2006
237 Why: Some do no longer build and apparently there is no user base left
238 for these platforms.
239 Who: Ralf Baechle <ralf@linux-mips.org>
241 ---------------------------
243 What: Support for MIPS Technologies' Altas and SEAD evaluation board
244 When: September 2006
245 Why: Some do no longer build and apparently there is no user base left
246 for these platforms. Hardware out of production since several years.
247 Who: Ralf Baechle <ralf@linux-mips.org>
249 ---------------------------
251 What: Support for the IT8172-based platforms, ITE 8172G and Globespan IVR
252 When: September 2006
253 Why: Code does no longer build since at least 2.6.0, apparently there is
254 no user base left for these platforms. Hardware out of production
255 since several years and hardly a trace of the manufacturer left on
256 the net.
257 Who: Ralf Baechle <ralf@linux-mips.org>
259 ---------------------------
261 What: Interrupt only SA_* flags
262 When: Januar 2007
263 Why: The interrupt related SA_* flags are replaced by IRQF_* to move them
264 out of the signal namespace.
266 Who: Thomas Gleixner <tglx@linutronix.de>
268 ---------------------------