In the x86 architecture we have various complicated hardware emulation
facilities on x86-32 to support ancient 32-bit CPUs that very very few
people are using with modern kernels. This compatibility glue is sometimes
even causing problems that people spend time to resolve, which time could
be spent on other things.
As Linus recently remarked:
> I really get the feeling that it's time to leave i486 support behind.
> There's zero real reason for anybody to waste one second of
> development effort on this kind of issue.
Implement the first step and remove M486/M486SX/ELAN support:
CONFIG_M486SX
CONFIG_M486
CONFIG_MELAN
[ There's no recent M486=y kernel package for any mainstream x86
32-bit distribution available that I've been able to find, so
actual users should not be impacted, and any legacy users can
keep using older kernels. ]
Suggested-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>
Signed-off-by: Ingo Molnar <mingo@kernel.org>
Reviewed-by: Arnd Bergmann <arnd@arndb.de>
Acked-by: Dave Hansen <dave.hansen@linux.intel.com>
Cc: Ahmed S. Darwish <darwi@linutronix.de>
Cc: Ard Biesheuvel <ardb@kernel.org>
Cc: Arnd Bergmann <arnd@kernel.org>
Cc: H. Peter Anvin <hpa@zytor.com>
Cc: John Ogness <john.ogness@linutronix.de>
Link: https://patch.msgid.link/20251214084710.3606385-2-mingo@kernel.org
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