Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[andy pugh]

On Fri, 24 Apr 2020 at 12:20, andy pugh  wrote:

> I tried to install Buster on my mill controller to have another test system.
> Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to work.

Nor does stretch (4.9.0.7 kernel)

Interesting.

-- 
atp
"A motorcycle is a bicycle with a pandemonium attachment and is
designed for the especial use of mechanical geniuses, daredevils and
lunatics."
— George Fitch, Atlanta Constitution Newspaper, 1912


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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[andy pugh]

On Fri, 24 Apr 2020 at 14:52, Reinhard  wrote:

> I realized, that the BIOS does not support USB, although it claimes to do so.
> I wasn't able to install from usb or use usb-keyboards ...

I can use USB keyboards in grub and in the BIOS screen, so I think it
has to support USB.
(It has no PS/2 ports.)

-- 
atp
"A motorcycle is a bicycle with a pandemonium attachment and is
designed for the especial use of mechanical geniuses, daredevils and
lunatics."
— George Fitch, Atlanta Constitution Newspaper, 1912


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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[Reinhard]

Hi Andy,

On Freitag, 24. April 2020, 13:20:53 CEST andy pugh wrote:
> I tried to install Buster on my mill controller to have another test system.
> Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to work.
> The board is fairly old, ...

I have similar board (guess its from Asus) with Atom-CPU too, where I have 
similar problems.
I realized, that the BIOS does not support USB, although it claimes to do so.
I wasn't able to install from usb or use usb-keyboards ...

But then I tried to install the harddisk on another mainboard and moved the 
disk into that atom-system after installing ...
... and by cheating bios, the box works fine now.

Well, I don't have keyboard at grubs bootscreen, but after booting linux, 
everything works fine. USB-Keyboard gets recognized and works. 
Same is true for external usb-harddisks ...

cheers Reinhard




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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[andy pugh]

On Sun, 19 Apr 2020 at 17:58, René Hopf via Emc-developers
 wrote:

> I added the EOL date of the official distros to the wiki:
> http://wiki.linuxcnc.org/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?MinimumSoftwareVersions
> Notice that only stretch and buster are not near end of life.

I tried to install Buster on my mill controller to have another test system.
Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to work.
The board is fairly old, a Jetway JNF9C
https://www.jetwaycomputer.com/NF9C.html

The standard Buster installer goes through the first screen OK, where
one chooses an install type, but then freezes (with quiet boot turned
off) at the "freeing unused kernel memory" point.
Both of the RTAI kernels that I have (4.14.174-rtai and 4.19.114-rtai)
do slightly better[1], getting as far as a curses-style screen to
choose the install language. But at that point there is no keyboard
interaction possible (could be USB, but the board is new enough not to
have a PS/2 port.) Or it could be that the initrd.gz from the
installer is built for the 4.19.09 kernel and won't work with others.

So, we might have to support Stretch a little while longer. just for me.

[1] Here is how to run the installer from your own kernels on the HD,
section 5.14: 
https://www.debian.org/releases/wheezy/amd64/ch05s01.html.en#boot-initrd

--
atp
"A motorcycle is a bicycle with a pandemonium attachment and is
designed for the especial use of mechanical geniuses, daredevils and
lunatics."
— George Fitch, Atlanta Constitution Newspaper, 1912


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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[René Hopf via Emc-developers]

>
> > Drop support for anything earlier than Stretch in master, and as soon as
> > python3 support is working, drop support for python2 in master.
> > Python2 is EOL since January, and it's not feasible to support both.
>
> I suggest instead only dropping support for Ubuntu 12.04 Precise in
> master, and keeping Wheezy and newer.  This gets us to gcc 4.7, which
> has nearly complete support for C++11.
>
> Thanks for adding the python3 version. In that case wheezy needs to be
dropped, its python3 is too old, the bindings wont work.
currently Im only targeting buster.

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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[Sebastian Kuzminsky]

On 4/20/20 5:34 AM, andy pugh wrote:

There is one point to remember here:
Does preempt-rt work on 32-bit machines?
Our only good support for 32-bit is the Wheezy / RTAI ISO.


RT-Preempt works well on 32-bit Stretch, it's how i run my Bridgeport. 
I use Mesa hardware, I haven't tried software stepping.


I installed using Jeff's experimental Stretch-rtpreempt ISO:

http://www.linuxcnc.org/testing-stretch-rtpreempt/

That ISO is also linked from http://www.linuxcnc.org/downloads/


32-bit RT-Preempt does *not* work well on Buster, i kept having kernel 
panics in the buildslave VM.  I need to submit a but report to upstream. 
 For now I recommend Stretch for 32-bit RT-Preempt.



--
Sebastian Kuzminsky


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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[Sebastian Kuzminsky]

On 4/19/20 10:58 AM, René Hopf via Emc-developers wrote:

I added the EOL date of the official distros to the wiki:
http://wiki.linuxcnc.org/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?MinimumSoftwareVersions
Notice that only stretch and buster are not near end of life.


Thanks, that's helpful info!

I've seen a misconception in this thread, incorrectly claiming that 
EOL'ed distros cannot be installed or updated.  This is wrong: both 
Debian and Ubuntu still have the apt archives online for all the old 
EOL'ed distros we currently support.  The buildbot runs "apt-get update" 
and uses apt-get to install any missing build dependencies on every 
build, on every platform.


I added the apt sources used to the MinimumSoftwareVersions wiki page 
linked above.




Recently there have been 2 PRs with code that doesn’t work on old compilers.
https://github.com/LinuxCNC/linuxcnc/pull/689
https://github.com/LinuxCNC/linuxcnc/pull/714


That's a real bummer, and a very good argument for dropping support for 
old distros.  However:




I don’t understand why we support distros that have been released 8 years
ago.


It's because of a perception among some of us developers (myself 
included) that our users are not Linux experts, and don't like upgrading 
the OS on their CNC machines.


I *think* a common user behavior is to build or convert a CNC machine, 
install LinuxCNC from whatever ISO is currently on our website, and then 
let the machine auto-update itself from the Debian/Ubuntu deb archive 
and the LinuxCNC deb archive (on www.linuxcnc.org, not the buildbot).


It's pretty easy for non-expert users to notice the little "upgrades are 
available!" notification and click "Install" (and we try hard to make it 
so that never breaks an existing LinuxCNC installation), but it's much 
harder to upgrade a running machine from Ubuntu Precise to Debian 
Buster, or even from Debian Wheezy to Debian Buster.


That's why we've historically tried to support old distros for as long 
as possible.




My proposal:
Keep 2.8 as it is, as it's near the release.


Seconded.



Drop support for anything earlier than Stretch in master, and as soon as
python3 support is working, drop support for python2 in master.
Python2 is EOL since January, and it's not feasible to support both.


I suggest instead only dropping support for Ubuntu 12.04 Precise in 
master, and keeping Wheezy and newer.  This gets us to gcc 4.7, which 
has nearly complete support for C++11.


Precise has gcc 4.6 which predates C++11 support:

https://gcc.gnu.org/projects/cxx-status.html#cxx11

I agree that transitioning from python2 to python3 would be a valuable 
effort.  I added the python3 versions to MinimumSoftwareVersions wiki page.



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Sebastian Kuzminsky


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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[andy pugh]

On Mon, 20 Apr 2020 at 13:09, Gene Heskett  wrote:

> Because no one has found and touted a replacement for the D-525-MW yet?

There are many potential replacements for that (old) board, and it
runs 64bit anyway.
(see the benchmarks here: https://browser.geekbench.com/geekbench2/1523128 )

-- 
atp
"A motorcycle is a bicycle with a pandemonium attachment and is
designed for the especial use of mechanical geniuses, daredevils and
lunatics."
— George Fitch, Atlanta Constitution Newspaper, 1912


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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[Gene Heskett]

On Monday 20 April 2020 07:34:19 andy pugh wrote:

> There is one point to remember here:
> Does preempt-rt work on 32-bit machines?
> Our only good support for 32-bit is the Wheezy / RTAI ISO.
> RTAI for 4.0+ kernels is 64-bit only.
>
> It might be that preempt-rt is a good solution for such machines, I
> simply don't know.
> (And this comes back to the "why are folk using ancient machines"
> question.)

Because no one has found and touted a replacement for the D-525-MW yet?  
I'm running 2 of them. It is both just a wee bit puny-powered, and yet  
enough to get the job well done, but I haven't installed tde on either 
as I think that would stretch them a wee bit.  I've lost a psu and a HD 
as I actually bought the ARK shoebox's.  I've 240GB SSD's enough to 
replace the 250GB junk hd's they came with, which make them run like a 
quart of Geritol.

Cheers, Gene Heskett
-- 
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable.
 - Louis D. Brandeis
Genes Web page 


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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[andy pugh]

There is one point to remember here:
Does preempt-rt work on 32-bit machines?
Our only good support for 32-bit is the Wheezy / RTAI ISO.
RTAI for 4.0+ kernels is 64-bit only.

It might be that preempt-rt is a good solution for such machines, I
simply don't know.
(And this comes back to the "why are folk using ancient machines" question.)

-- 
atp
"A motorcycle is a bicycle with a pandemonium attachment and is
designed for the especial use of mechanical geniuses, daredevils and
lunatics."
— George Fitch, Atlanta Constitution Newspaper, 1912


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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[Chris Morley]

Since you addressed me directly. :)

On 2020-04-19 8:02 p.m., Robert Murphy wrote:

Whilst I agree with you Chris, people just want updates, without really
knowing why. This could be the case when users migrate from Windows &
Mach, but then gain how often does Mach get upgraded ?

Personally if I had an old machine that was pumping out parts with no
issues with Wheezy & 2.7 I be happy just to let it do it's thing.

I might too - but it's not up to us to decide how users update their 
machines.


But more importantly It affects how future releases are handled. For 
instance if it's 2+ years  until 2.9 is out then forcing the use of 
newer distributions is probably less of a big deal. By then we possibly 
_will_ have a bunch of _necessary_ code that needs newer distribution.


If we (lol) happen to release in 6 months to a year then maybe it's 
still just the two _optional_ drives that stops someone from just 
updating linuxcnc rather the the whole distribution. Because updating 
the distribution often is a big PITA when you are talking of kernels and 
motherboards and ethernet cards etc.


We need to remember that linuxcnc packages are for users not developers 
and also that over the years we have tended (unintentionally) to 
encourage the use of master branch.





I found this with the Mint ISOs, I'd do a release with Linuxcnc built
from the latest 2.8 sources and people were wanting to know how to 
update.


I started to think that not many people were actually using the images
to run a machine, as there was very very little feed back on that, they
just wanted to install and be able to update.

One user admitted to not knowing what Mint was but went and installed it
on his machine anyways, then was wanting updated packages for Linuxcnc.

This is because you were making packages for a branch that was still 
being added to. Some guys had qtvcp problems I pushed a fix - they 
didn't get it cause their package doesn't automatically update...


It's really the projects fault for waiting so long to release 2.8. Not 
that was on purpose.



As for updating the OS.. there's enough users have trouble
installing Linuxcnc after being given basic instructions.


This is not a good reason to make limit choices for users.

It may seems like all users have trouble but of course if they had no 
trouble you probably wouldn't hear from them, so it tends to magnify 
that gut feeling.



Ideally a virtual package could be of use, user installs Debian or a
Ubuntu variant, adds the repo to the apt sources, then does "sudo
apt-get install awesome-machine-controller" and it installs a kernel and
the matching linuxcnc version and the deps for qtvcp. Have one each for
RT_PREEMPT & RTAI

Yes I'm sure there are other ways to release - I'm not up on new stuff. 
But it would really help to have more developers active in the project. 
That has been an on going problem too.


Anyways the point was to have a discussion and i think that is done.

Chris



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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[Robert Murphy]

Whilst I agree with you Chris, people just want updates, without really
knowing why. This could be the case when users migrate from Windows &
Mach, but then gain how often does Mach get upgraded ?

Personally if I had an old machine that was pumping out parts with no
issues with Wheezy & 2.7 I be happy just to let it do it's thing.

If someone started selling a "Black Box" cnc controller with Linuxcnc
and the average user was unaware what was inside how often would they be
wanting updates, not often or maybe wouldn't even think about. Even more
so if the install was a Just Enough OS to run Linuxcnc, similar to what
libreelec do with Kodi.

I used to work for a company that installed "Zero Gravity Treadmills"
all the control was done by a PC running Win2k and later it was migrated
to Linux. None of the customers cared about updates just as long the
machine ran. These were installed in gyms, physios and some of the
larger sporting teams, Rugby League, Aussie Rules & Rugby Union. Even
the Australian Institute of Sport had a couple. If the user doesn't know
what's under the hood they don't really care. I just treat my Linuxcnc
machine as "black box" as long as it runs, it's good.

I found this with the Mint ISOs, I'd do a release with Linuxcnc built
from the latest 2.8 sources and people were wanting to know how to update.

I started to think that not many people were actually using the images
to run a machine, as there was very very little feed back on that, they
just wanted to install and be able to update.

One user admitted to not knowing what Mint was but went and installed it
on his machine anyways, then was wanting updated packages for Linuxcnc.

As for updating the OS.. there's enough users have trouble
installing Linuxcnc after being given basic instructions.

Ideally a virtual package could be of use, user installs Debian or a
Ubuntu variant, adds the repo to the apt sources, then does "sudo
apt-get install awesome-machine-controller" and it installs a kernel and
the matching linuxcnc version and the deps for qtvcp. Have one each for
RT_PREEMPT & RTAI

On 20/4/20 4:47 am, Chris Morley wrote:

Why does end of life matter to a machine controller?
Once you have a kernel/motherboard/distro combination that woks,
I wouldn't want to upgrade the distro unless I had to, because it probably will 
become painful.
If it is easy enough to keep support of an old distro then why not?
One optional driver not compiling does not seem a good reason to drop support.
Eventually we will need to but that is not a good enough reason IMHO.

Chris


From: René Hopf via Emc-developers 
Sent: April 19, 2020 4:58 PM
To: emc-developers@lists.sourceforge.net 
Cc: René Hopf 
Subject: [Emc-developers] old distros

Hi,

I added the EOL date of the official distros to the wiki:
http://wiki.linuxcnc.org/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?MinimumSoftwareVersions
Notice that only stretch and buster are not near end of life.

Recently there have been 2 PRs with code that doesn’t work on old compilers.
https://github.com/LinuxCNC/linuxcnc/pull/689
https://github.com/LinuxCNC/linuxcnc/pull/714

I don’t understand why we support distros that have been released 8 years
ago.
Making newer stuff work on legacy software is just a waste of developers
time.
If people can’t be bothered to update the distro, why would they be
bothered to update linuxcnc?
As far as Im aware everything works on stretch.

After a short discussion with jepler on irc, he mentioned that it hasn’t
been decided to drop support, and its unclear on how to decide stuff like
this.

My proposal:
Keep 2.8 as it is, as it's near the release.

Drop support for anything earlier than Stretch in master, and as soon as
python3 support is working, drop support for python2 in master.
Python2 is EOL since January, and it's not feasible to support both.

Rene

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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[Chris Morley]

On 2020-04-19 2:02 p.m., andy pugh wrote:

On Sun, 19 Apr 2020 at 19:47, Chris Morley  wrote:


If it is easy enough to keep support of an old distro then why not?

We are being squeezed at both ends, though. LinuxCNC relies on tools
(and versions of tools) that don't work on the latest OS versions.
Whereas the older OS versions don't necessarily work with the latest tools.
Ubuntu Precise uses gcc 4.6. That implements C++98 by default. C++17
is almost a different language.

And we will have to move to Python3 at some point. The legacy OSes all
have Py3, but whether the associated things (PyGTK etc) will work on
those systems with Py3 is not something I know.


I didn't suggest trying to make all thing compile on all distros.

I read the process you guys tried to get the driver to compile.

At that point the next sane answer would be to just not offer the 
drivers on older distros.



And it is hard to test on all the platforms. I spent much of today
setting up test systems for Precise and Wheezy, to go along with my
triple-boot hardware testing machine that runs Mint, Buster and
Stretch. The buildbot is currently testing builds for 20 different
combinations of OS and realtime. (and I would like to see Buster RTAI
added)


Well the buildbot is the usual process to test software compiling on 
different distros.


If we run out of buildbots - well thats a decent argument for dropping 
distros at least.


It probably highlights that he buildbot is a vulnerability for linuxcnc 
too. There was a guy willing to host a builtbot...



Anyways guys. Since I'm not during any of this work and at least we have 
had a discussion about it. I'll quiet down again :)


Chris



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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[Chris Morley]

On 2020-04-19 2:14 p.m., mar...@r-bechtold.de wrote:



Am 19.04.2020 um 22:46 schrieb Chris Morley :


On 2020-04-19 1:07 p.m., mar...@r-bechtold.de wrote:

the problem is that this distros are that old and EOL that you even can not 
just install it, do to missing repo servers that are shut off

If it's an already installed version then they don't need the repo.

But you need it for setup and testing in development

It's already set up in the buildbot

You have to program around problems fixed in newer distro versions or you have 
to backport fixes just for a hand full of running installations and you have to 
test all off it.

This is part of having a project like this. and of course at some point it 
becomes more trouble then it is worth. I don't see that we are at that point. 
These are optional drivers we are talking of. When motion can not compile any 
more then I agree. and obviously there is a tipping point somewhere in between 
these two extreme examples. I am saying that the first time an optional driver 
can't be easily made to compile that we drop everything thing old.

I mean we are still stuck on python2 - so talking about optional drivers 
holding us back is a bit odd.


Something like this will active prevent innovation for the regular installation 
because you have to backport all feature to a OS you don't have a test 
environment for.
Stucking on python2 is not an argument its a symptom of this problems.


No I didn't suggest that and I didn't suggest supporting old distros 
forever.


You are talking my argument to the extreme.




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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[mar...@r-bechtold.de]

> Am 19.04.2020 um 22:46 schrieb Chris Morley :
> 
> 
> On 2020-04-19 1:07 p.m., mar...@r-bechtold.de wrote:
>> the problem is that this distros are that old and EOL that you even can not 
>> just install it, do to missing repo servers that are shut off
> If it's an already installed version then they don't need the repo.

But you need it for setup and testing in development 

>> 
>> You have to program around problems fixed in newer distro versions or you 
>> have to backport fixes just for a hand full of running installations and you 
>> have to test all off it.
> 
> This is part of having a project like this. and of course at some point it 
> becomes more trouble then it is worth. I don't see that we are at that point. 
> These are optional drivers we are talking of. When motion can not compile any 
> more then I agree. and obviously there is a tipping point somewhere in 
> between these two extreme examples. I am saying that the first time an 
> optional driver can't be easily made to compile that we drop everything thing 
> old.
> 
> I mean we are still stuck on python2 - so talking about optional drivers 
> holding us back is a bit odd.
> 

Something like this will active prevent innovation for the regular installation 
because you have to backport all feature to a OS you don't have a test 
environment for.
Stucking on python2 is not an argument its a symptom of this problems.

>> 
>> That is just wasting valuable Developer time missing in the support of 
>> essential features.
> These weren't essential features.The easiest fix is to just not compile them 
> on older systems - I;m not a make file guru but that doesn't sound like too 
> much effort . There are plenty of bigger reasons we don't have enough 
> 'developer time'
>> Its realy not that Hard to update to a  new distor, if you want to use a 
>> newer Linuxcnc version. You have to port your configs anyway.
>> 
>> Markus
>> 
> That is absolutely not true. (and we are talking uses here not developers).
> 
> Even as a developer I find it a PITA sometimes. my Lathe computer I think is 
> on wheezy because I could not find a kernel that would work with stretch but 
> I do keep updating it fairly often in 2.8 (because master does not support 
> wheezy and 2.8 and master where very close )
> 
> We are the Debian of machine controllers. Slow to upgrade, stable and boring 
> :)
> 
> 
> 
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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[andy pugh]

On Sun, 19 Apr 2020 at 21:46, Chris Morley  wrote:

>  (because
> master does not support wheezy and 2.8 and master where very close )

Master supports Precise. Wheezy is newer than Precise.
http://wiki.linuxcnc.org/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?MinimumSoftwareVersions

-- 
atp
"A motorcycle is a bicycle with a pandemonium attachment and is
designed for the especial use of mechanical geniuses, daredevils and
lunatics."
— George Fitch, Atlanta Constitution Newspaper, 1912


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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[andy pugh]

On Sun, 19 Apr 2020 at 19:47, Chris Morley  wrote:

> If it is easy enough to keep support of an old distro then why not?

We are being squeezed at both ends, though. LinuxCNC relies on tools
(and versions of tools) that don't work on the latest OS versions.
Whereas the older OS versions don't necessarily work with the latest tools.
Ubuntu Precise uses gcc 4.6. That implements C++98 by default. C++17
is almost a different language.

And we will have to move to Python3 at some point. The legacy OSes all
have Py3, but whether the associated things (PyGTK etc) will work on
those systems with Py3 is not something I know.

And it is hard to test on all the platforms. I spent much of today
setting up test systems for Precise and Wheezy, to go along with my
triple-boot hardware testing machine that runs Mint, Buster and
Stretch. The buildbot is currently testing builds for 20 different
combinations of OS and realtime. (and I would like to see Buster RTAI
added)

--
atp
"A motorcycle is a bicycle with a pandemonium attachment and is
designed for the especial use of mechanical geniuses, daredevils and
lunatics."
— George Fitch, Atlanta Constitution Newspaper, 1912


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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[Chris Morley]

On 2020-04-19 1:07 p.m., mar...@r-bechtold.de wrote:

the problem is that this distros are that old and EOL that you even can not 
just install it, do to missing repo servers that are shut off

If it's an already installed version then they don't need the repo.


You have to program around problems fixed in newer distro versions or you have 
to backport fixes just for a hand full of running installations and you have to 
test all off it.


This is part of having a project like this. and of course at some point 
it becomes more trouble then it is worth. I don't see that we are at 
that point. These are optional drivers we are talking of. When motion 
can not compile any more then I agree. and obviously there is a tipping 
point somewhere in between these two extreme examples. I am saying that 
the first time an optional driver can't be easily made to compile that 
we drop everything thing old.


I mean we are still stuck on python2 - so talking about optional drivers 
holding us back is a bit odd.




That is just wasting valuable Developer time missing in the support of 
essential features.
These weren't essential features.The easiest fix is to just not compile 
them on older systems - I;m not a make file guru but that doesn't sound 
like too much effort . There are plenty of bigger reasons we don't have 
enough 'developer time'

Its realy not that Hard to update to a  new distor, if you want to use a newer 
Linuxcnc version. You have to port your configs anyway.

Markus


That is absolutely not true. (and we are talking uses here not developers).

Even as a developer I find it a PITA sometimes. my Lathe computer I 
think is on wheezy because I could not find a kernel that would work 
with stretch but I do keep updating it fairly often in 2.8 (because 
master does not support wheezy and 2.8 and master where very close )


We are the Debian of machine controllers. Slow to upgrade, stable and 
boring :)




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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[mar...@r-bechtold.de]

the problem is that this distros are that old and EOL that you even can not 
just install it, do to missing repo servers that are shut off 

You have to program around problems fixed in newer distro versions or you have 
to backport fixes just for a hand full of running installations and you have to 
test all off it.

That is just wasting valuable Developer time missing in the support of 
essential features.

Its realy not that Hard to update to a  new distor, if you want to use a newer 
Linuxcnc version. You have to port your configs anyway.

Markus



> Am 19.04.2020 um 21:53 schrieb Chris Morley :
> 
> Did you rty making it not try to compile on systems too old?
> I'm not suggesting putting a ton of effort into making it compile on 
> everything.
> 
> That's a huge difference.
> 
> Chris
> 
> From: Sync 
> Sent: April 19, 2020 7:10 PM
> To: emc-developers@lists.sourceforge.net 
> 
> Subject: Re: [Emc-developers] old distros
> 
> On 19.04.20 20:47, Chris Morley wrote:
>> Why does end of life matter to a machine controller?
> 
> It doesn't. It matters for the developers.
> 
>> If it is easy enough to keep support of an old distro then why not?
> 
> Because it isn't.
> 
>> One optional driver not compiling does not seem a good reason to drop 
>> support.
> 
> It's just that one driver now, but forcing developers to use legacy
> versions of their tools will drive people away.
> 
> 
> 
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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[Chris Morley]

Did you rty making it not try to compile on systems too old?
I'm not suggesting putting a ton of effort into making it compile on everything.

That's a huge difference.

Chris

From: Sync 
Sent: April 19, 2020 7:10 PM
To: emc-developers@lists.sourceforge.net 
Subject: Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

On 19.04.20 20:47, Chris Morley wrote:
> Why does end of life matter to a machine controller?

It doesn't. It matters for the developers.

> If it is easy enough to keep support of an old distro then why not?

Because it isn't.

> One optional driver not compiling does not seem a good reason to drop support.

It's just that one driver now, but forcing developers to use legacy
versions of their tools will drive people away.



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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[René Hopf via Emc-developers]

Am So., 19. Apr. 2020 um 20:47 Uhr schrieb Chris Morley <
chrisinnana...@hotmail.com>:

> Why does end of life matter to a machine controller?
> Once you have a kernel/motherboard/distro combination that woks,
> I wouldn't want to upgrade the distro unless I had to, because it probably
> will become painful.
> If it is easy enough to keep support of an old distro then why not?
> One optional driver not compiling does not seem a good reason to drop
> support.
> Eventually we will need to but that is not a good enough reason IMHO.
>

if you dont want to update, dont update. once you have a linuxcnc version
that works for you, keep it.
updating major linuxcnc version is more complicated than updating
the distro, as the config changes.
It isnt easy to support them. its a pain for developers, and scares away
new people.
And stuff on the internet stops working. try watching youtube on ubuntu 8.04
try cloning a git repo that uses https.
eventually developers want to use newer features.




>
> Chris
>
> 
> From: René Hopf via Emc-developers 
> Sent: April 19, 2020 4:58 PM
> To: emc-developers@lists.sourceforge.net <
> emc-developers@lists.sourceforge.net>
> Cc: René Hopf 
> Subject: [Emc-developers] old distros
>
> Hi,
>
> I added the EOL date of the official distros to the wiki:
> http://wiki.linuxcnc.org/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?MinimumSoftwareVersions
> Notice that only stretch and buster are not near end of life.
>
> Recently there have been 2 PRs with code that doesn’t work on old
> compilers.
> https://github.com/LinuxCNC/linuxcnc/pull/689
> https://github.com/LinuxCNC/linuxcnc/pull/714
>
> I don’t understand why we support distros that have been released 8 years
> ago.
> Making newer stuff work on legacy software is just a waste of developers
> time.
> If people can’t be bothered to update the distro, why would they be
> bothered to update linuxcnc?
> As far as Im aware everything works on stretch.
>
> After a short discussion with jepler on irc, he mentioned that it hasn’t
> been decided to drop support, and its unclear on how to decide stuff like
> this.
>
> My proposal:
> Keep 2.8 as it is, as it's near the release.
>
> Drop support for anything earlier than Stretch in master, and as soon as
> python3 support is working, drop support for python2 in master.
> Python2 is EOL since January, and it's not feasible to support both.
>
> Rene
>
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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[Sync]

On 19.04.20 20:47, Chris Morley wrote:
> Why does end of life matter to a machine controller?

It doesn't. It matters for the developers.

> If it is easy enough to keep support of an old distro then why not?

Because it isn't.

> One optional driver not compiling does not seem a good reason to drop support.

It's just that one driver now, but forcing developers to use legacy
versions of their tools will drive people away.


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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[Chris Morley]

Why does end of life matter to a machine controller?
Once you have a kernel/motherboard/distro combination that woks,
I wouldn't want to upgrade the distro unless I had to, because it probably will 
become painful.
If it is easy enough to keep support of an old distro then why not?
One optional driver not compiling does not seem a good reason to drop support.
Eventually we will need to but that is not a good enough reason IMHO.

Chris


From: René Hopf via Emc-developers 
Sent: April 19, 2020 4:58 PM
To: emc-developers@lists.sourceforge.net 
Cc: René Hopf 
Subject: [Emc-developers] old distros

Hi,

I added the EOL date of the official distros to the wiki:
http://wiki.linuxcnc.org/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?MinimumSoftwareVersions
Notice that only stretch and buster are not near end of life.

Recently there have been 2 PRs with code that doesn’t work on old compilers.
https://github.com/LinuxCNC/linuxcnc/pull/689
https://github.com/LinuxCNC/linuxcnc/pull/714

I don’t understand why we support distros that have been released 8 years
ago.
Making newer stuff work on legacy software is just a waste of developers
time.
If people can’t be bothered to update the distro, why would they be
bothered to update linuxcnc?
As far as Im aware everything works on stretch.

After a short discussion with jepler on irc, he mentioned that it hasn’t
been decided to drop support, and its unclear on how to decide stuff like
this.

My proposal:
Keep 2.8 as it is, as it's near the release.

Drop support for anything earlier than Stretch in master, and as soon as
python3 support is working, drop support for python2 in master.
Python2 is EOL since January, and it's not feasible to support both.

Rene

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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[René Hopf via Emc-developers]

if you use 2.8, keep using it on whatever you currently have.
if you want to use master, and we decide to drop support we will have to
make sure there are isos when 2.9 is released.

Am So., 19. Apr. 2020 um 20:21 Uhr schrieb Gene Heskett <
ghesk...@shentel.net>:

> On Sunday 19 April 2020 13:55:28 René Hopf via Emc-developers wrote:
>
> > no one forces you to update, you can just stick with 2.8.
> > if you do want to update, update to buster.
> >
> Where is the install iso?
>
> Cheers, Gene Heskett
> --
> "There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
>  soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
> -Ed Howdershelt (Author)
> If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable.
>  - Louis D. Brandeis
> Genes Web page 
>
>
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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[Gene Heskett]

On Sunday 19 April 2020 13:55:28 René Hopf via Emc-developers wrote:

> no one forces you to update, you can just stick with 2.8.
> if you do want to update, update to buster.
>
Where is the install iso?

Cheers, Gene Heskett
-- 
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable.
 - Louis D. Brandeis
Genes Web page 


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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[René Hopf via Emc-developers]

no one forces you to update, you can just stick with 2.8.
if you do want to update, update to buster.

Am So., 19. Apr. 2020 um 19:51 Uhr schrieb Gene Heskett <
ghesk...@shentel.net>:

> On Sunday 19 April 2020 12:58:13 René Hopf via Emc-developers wrote:
>
> > Hi,
> >
> > I added the EOL date of the official distros to the wiki:
> > http://wiki.linuxcnc.org/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?MinimumSoftwareVersions
> > Notice that only stretch and buster are not near end of life.
> >
> > Recently there have been 2 PRs with code that doesn’t work on old
> > compilers. https://github.com/LinuxCNC/linuxcnc/pull/689
> > https://github.com/LinuxCNC/linuxcnc/pull/714
> >
> > I don’t understand why we support distros that have been released 8
> > years ago.
> > Making newer stuff work on legacy software is just a waste of
> > developers time.
> > If people can’t be bothered to update the distro, why would they be
> > bothered to update linuxcnc?
> > As far as Im aware everything works on stretch.
> >
> > After a short discussion with jepler on irc, he mentioned that it
> > hasn’t been decided to drop support, and its unclear on how to decide
> > stuff like this.
> >
> > My proposal:
> > Keep 2.8 as it is, as it's near the release.
> >
> > Drop support for anything earlier than Stretch in master, and as soon
> > as python3 support is working, drop support for python2 in master.
> > Python2 is EOL since January, and it's not feasible to support both.
> >
> > Rene
> >
> All well and nice in theory. But after some discussion a month or so back
> saying you had perms to use mint for the next release whereas debian was
> dragging their feet, I mention in replying to someone suggesting I
> update that upgrading would change to mint, but then Andy popped in and
> said no. According to the downloads web page, the latest that does a
> full capability install is still wheezy.
>
> If we now are forced to upgrade because support for the older wheezy
> build kit is to be dropped, what do we upgrade to? IOW whats the
> official word and where can I download an install iso for it that is not
> obsoleted by the distro before we can fan the paint is dry.
>
> FWIW, I am haveing great luck building master on an rpi4b to run on an
> rpi4b. I've even figured out how to install a 4.19.71-rt24-v7l+ #1 SMP
> PREEMPT RT kernel from a 30 meg tarball, which has decent latency AND
> support for the video hardware on a late pi board.  Thats your basic
> buster 10.3 install according to raspbian.  Works great and VERY STABLE.
>
> I've had 3 wintel boxes waiting for the next release since the wheezy
> repo's were pulled, what 4 years ago?  Now jessie and stretch are gone
> too.
>
> Cheers, and curious, Gene Heskett
> --
> "There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
>  soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
> -Ed Howdershelt (Author)
> If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable.
>  - Louis D. Brandeis
> Genes Web page 
>
>
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Re: [Emc-developers] old distros

[Gene Heskett]

On Sunday 19 April 2020 12:58:13 René Hopf via Emc-developers wrote:

> Hi,
>
> I added the EOL date of the official distros to the wiki:
> http://wiki.linuxcnc.org/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?MinimumSoftwareVersions
> Notice that only stretch and buster are not near end of life.
>
> Recently there have been 2 PRs with code that doesn’t work on old
> compilers. https://github.com/LinuxCNC/linuxcnc/pull/689
> https://github.com/LinuxCNC/linuxcnc/pull/714
>
> I don’t understand why we support distros that have been released 8
> years ago.
> Making newer stuff work on legacy software is just a waste of
> developers time.
> If people can’t be bothered to update the distro, why would they be
> bothered to update linuxcnc?
> As far as Im aware everything works on stretch.
>
> After a short discussion with jepler on irc, he mentioned that it
> hasn’t been decided to drop support, and its unclear on how to decide
> stuff like this.
>
> My proposal:
> Keep 2.8 as it is, as it's near the release.
>
> Drop support for anything earlier than Stretch in master, and as soon
> as python3 support is working, drop support for python2 in master.
> Python2 is EOL since January, and it's not feasible to support both.
>
> Rene
>
All well and nice in theory. But after some discussion a month or so back 
saying you had perms to use mint for the next release whereas debian was 
dragging their feet, I mention in replying to someone suggesting I 
update that upgrading would change to mint, but then Andy popped in and 
said no. According to the downloads web page, the latest that does a 
full capability install is still wheezy.

If we now are forced to upgrade because support for the older wheezy 
build kit is to be dropped, what do we upgrade to? IOW whats the 
official word and where can I download an install iso for it that is not 
obsoleted by the distro before we can fan the paint is dry.

FWIW, I am haveing great luck building master on an rpi4b to run on an 
rpi4b. I've even figured out how to install a 4.19.71-rt24-v7l+ #1 SMP 
PREEMPT RT kernel from a 30 meg tarball, which has decent latency AND 
support for the video hardware on a late pi board.  Thats your basic 
buster 10.3 install according to raspbian.  Works great and VERY STABLE.

I've had 3 wintel boxes waiting for the next release since the wheezy 
repo's were pulled, what 4 years ago?  Now jessie and stretch are gone 
too.

Cheers, and curious, Gene Heskett
-- 
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable.
 - Louis D. Brandeis
Genes Web page 


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