linux/Documentation/feature-removal-schedule.txt

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The following is a list of files and features that are going to be
removed in the kernel source tree. Every entry should contain what
exactly is going away, why it is happening, and who is going to be doing
the work. When the feature is removed from the kernel, it should also
be removed from this file.
---------------------------
cfg80211: Add new wireless regulatory infrastructure This adds the new wireless regulatory infrastructure. The main motiviation behind this was to centralize regulatory code as each driver was implementing their own regulatory solution, and to replace the initial centralized code we have where: * only 3 regulatory domains are supported: US, JP and EU * regulatory domains can only be changed through module parameter * all rules were built statically in the kernel We now have support for regulatory domains for many countries and regulatory domains are now queried through a userspace agent through udev allowing distributions to update regulatory rules without updating the kernel. Each driver can regulatory_hint() a regulatory domain based on either their EEPROM mapped regulatory domain value to a respective ISO/IEC 3166-1 country code or pass an internally built regulatory domain. We also add support to let the user set the regulatory domain through userspace in case of faulty EEPROMs to further help compliance. Support for world roaming will be added soon for cards capable of this. For more information see: http://wireless.kernel.org/en/developers/Regulatory/CRDA For now we leave an option to enable the old module parameter, ieee80211_regdom, and to build the 3 old regdomains statically (US, JP and EU). This option is CONFIG_WIRELESS_OLD_REGULATORY. These old static definitions and the module parameter is being scheduled for removal for 2.6.29. Note that if you use this you won't make use of a world regulatory domain as its pointless. If you leave this option enabled and if CRDA is present and you use US or JP we will try to ask CRDA to update us a regulatory domain for us. Signed-off-by: Luis R. Rodriguez <lrodriguez@atheros.com> Signed-off-by: John W. Linville <linville@tuxdriver.com>
2008-09-10 06:19:48 +00:00
What: old static regulatory information and ieee80211_regdom module parameter
When: 2.6.29
Why: The old regulatory infrastructure has been replaced with a new one
which does not require statically defined regulatory domains. We do
not want to keep static regulatory domains in the kernel due to the
the dynamic nature of regulatory law and localization. We kept around
the old static definitions for the regulatory domains of:
* US
* JP
* EU
and used by default the US when CONFIG_WIRELESS_OLD_REGULATORY was
set. We also kept around the ieee80211_regdom module parameter in case
some applications were relying on it. Changing regulatory domains
can now be done instead by using nl80211, as is done with iw.
Who: Luis R. Rodriguez <lrodriguez@atheros.com>
---------------------------
What: dev->power.power_state
When: July 2007
Why: Broken design for runtime control over driver power states, confusing
driver-internal runtime power management with: mechanisms to support
system-wide sleep state transitions; event codes that distinguish
different phases of swsusp "sleep" transitions; and userspace policy
inputs. This framework was never widely used, and most attempts to
use it were broken. Drivers should instead be exposing domain-specific
interfaces either to kernel or to userspace.
Who: Pavel Machek <pavel@suse.cz>
---------------------------
What: Video4Linux API 1 ioctls and video_decoder.h from Video devices.
When: December 2008
Files: include/linux/video_decoder.h include/linux/videodev.h
Check: include/linux/video_decoder.h include/linux/videodev.h
Why: V4L1 AP1 was replaced by V4L2 API during migration from 2.4 to 2.6
series. The old API have lots of drawbacks and don't provide enough
means to work with all video and audio standards. The newer API is
already available on the main drivers and should be used instead.
Newer drivers should use v4l_compat_translate_ioctl function to handle
old calls, replacing to newer ones.
Decoder iocts are using internally to allow video drivers to
communicate with video decoders. This should also be improved to allow
V4L2 calls being translated into compatible internal ioctls.
Compatibility ioctls will be provided, for a while, via
v4l1-compat module.
Who: Mauro Carvalho Chehab <mchehab@infradead.org>
---------------------------
What: PCMCIA control ioctl (needed for pcmcia-cs [cardmgr, cardctl])
When: November 2005
Files: drivers/pcmcia/: pcmcia_ioctl.c
Why: With the 16-bit PCMCIA subsystem now behaving (almost) like a
normal hotpluggable bus, and with it using the default kernel
infrastructure (hotplug, driver core, sysfs) keeping the PCMCIA
control ioctl needed by cardmgr and cardctl from pcmcia-cs is
unnecessary, and makes further cleanups and integration of the
PCMCIA subsystem into the Linux kernel device driver model more
difficult. The features provided by cardmgr and cardctl are either
handled by the kernel itself now or are available in the new
pcmciautils package available at
http://kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/pcmcia/
Who: Dominik Brodowski <linux@brodo.de>
---------------------------
What: sys_sysctl
When: September 2010
Option: CONFIG_SYSCTL_SYSCALL
Why: The same information is available in a more convenient from
/proc/sys, and none of the sysctl variables appear to be
important performance wise.
Binary sysctls are a long standing source of subtle kernel
bugs and security issues.
When I looked several months ago all I could find after
searching several distributions were 5 user space programs and
glibc (which falls back to /proc/sys) using this syscall.
The man page for sysctl(2) documents it as unusable for user
space programs.
sysctl(2) is not generally ABI compatible to a 32bit user
space application on a 64bit and a 32bit kernel.
For the last several months the policy has been no new binary
sysctls and no one has put forward an argument to use them.
Binary sysctls issues seem to keep happening appearing so
properly deprecating them (with a warning to user space) and a
2 year grace warning period will mean eventually we can kill
them and end the pain.
In the mean time individual binary sysctls can be dealt with
in a piecewise fashion.
Who: Eric Biederman <ebiederm@xmission.com>
---------------------------
What: remove EXPORT_SYMBOL(kernel_thread)
When: August 2006
Files: arch/*/kernel/*_ksyms.c
Check: kernel_thread
Why: kernel_thread is a low-level implementation detail. Drivers should
use the <linux/kthread.h> API instead which shields them from
implementation details and provides a higherlevel interface that
prevents bugs and code duplication
Who: Christoph Hellwig <hch@lst.de>
---------------------------
What: Unused EXPORT_SYMBOL/EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL exports
(temporary transition config option provided until then)
The transition config option will also be removed at the same time.
When: before 2.6.19
Why: Unused symbols are both increasing the size of the kernel binary
and are often a sign of "wrong API"
Who: Arjan van de Ven <arjan@linux.intel.com>
---------------------------
What: PHYSDEVPATH, PHYSDEVBUS, PHYSDEVDRIVER in the uevent environment
When: October 2008
Why: The stacking of class devices makes these values misleading and
inconsistent.
Class devices should not carry any of these properties, and bus
devices have SUBSYTEM and DRIVER as a replacement.
Who: Kay Sievers <kay.sievers@suse.de>
---------------------------
What: ACPI procfs interface
When: July 2008
Why: ACPI sysfs conversion should be finished by January 2008.
ACPI procfs interface will be removed in July 2008 so that
there is enough time for the user space to catch up.
Who: Zhang Rui <rui.zhang@intel.com>
---------------------------
What: /proc/acpi/button
When: August 2007
Why: /proc/acpi/button has been replaced by events to the input layer
since 2.6.20.
Who: Len Brown <len.brown@intel.com>
---------------------------
What: /proc/acpi/event
When: February 2008
Why: /proc/acpi/event has been replaced by events via the input layer
and netlink since 2.6.23.
Who: Len Brown <len.brown@intel.com>
---------------------------
What: libata spindown skipping and warning
libata: implement libata.spindown_compat Now that libata uses sd->manage_start_stop, libata spins down disk on shutdown. In an attempt to compensate libata's previous shortcoming, some distros sync and spin down disks attached via libata in their shutdown(8). Some disks spin back up just to spin down again on STANDBYNOW1 if the command is issued when the disk is spun down, so this double spinning down causes problem. This patch implements module parameter libata.spindown_compat which, when set to one (default value), prevents libata from spinning down disks on shutdown thus avoiding double spinning down. Note that libata spins down disks for suspend to mem and disk, so with libata.spindown_compat set to one, disks should be properly spun down in all cases without modifying shutdown(8). shutdown(8) should be fixed eventually. Some drive do spin up on SYNCHRONZE_CACHE even when their cache is clean. Those disks currently spin up briefly when sd tries to shutdown the device and then the machine powers off immediately, which can't be good for the head. We can't skip SYNCHRONIZE_CACHE during shudown as it can be dangerous data integrity-wise. So, this spindown_compat parameter is already scheduled for removal by the end of the next year and here's what shutdown(8) should do. * Check whether /sys/modules/libata/parameters/spindown_compat exists. If it does, write 0 to it. * For each libata harddisk { * Check whether /sys/class/scsi_disk/h:c:i:l/manage_start_stop exists. Iff it doesn't, synchronize cache and spin the disk down as before. } The above procedure will make shutdown(8) work properly with kernels before this change, ones with this workaround and later ones without it. To accelerate shutdown(8) updates, if the compat mode is in use, this patch prints BIG FAT warning for five seconds during shutdown (the optimal interval to annoy the user just the right amount discovered by hours of tireless usability testing). Signed-off-by: Tejun Heo <htejun@gmail.com> Signed-off-by: Jeff Garzik <jeff@garzik.org>
2007-05-04 19:28:48 +00:00
When: Dec 2008
Why: Some halt(8) implementations synchronize caches for and spin
down libata disks because libata didn't use to spin down disk on
system halt (only synchronized caches).
Spin down on system halt is now implemented. sysfs node
/sys/class/scsi_disk/h:c:i:l/manage_start_stop is present if
spin down support is available.
libata: implement libata.spindown_compat Now that libata uses sd->manage_start_stop, libata spins down disk on shutdown. In an attempt to compensate libata's previous shortcoming, some distros sync and spin down disks attached via libata in their shutdown(8). Some disks spin back up just to spin down again on STANDBYNOW1 if the command is issued when the disk is spun down, so this double spinning down causes problem. This patch implements module parameter libata.spindown_compat which, when set to one (default value), prevents libata from spinning down disks on shutdown thus avoiding double spinning down. Note that libata spins down disks for suspend to mem and disk, so with libata.spindown_compat set to one, disks should be properly spun down in all cases without modifying shutdown(8). shutdown(8) should be fixed eventually. Some drive do spin up on SYNCHRONZE_CACHE even when their cache is clean. Those disks currently spin up briefly when sd tries to shutdown the device and then the machine powers off immediately, which can't be good for the head. We can't skip SYNCHRONIZE_CACHE during shudown as it can be dangerous data integrity-wise. So, this spindown_compat parameter is already scheduled for removal by the end of the next year and here's what shutdown(8) should do. * Check whether /sys/modules/libata/parameters/spindown_compat exists. If it does, write 0 to it. * For each libata harddisk { * Check whether /sys/class/scsi_disk/h:c:i:l/manage_start_stop exists. Iff it doesn't, synchronize cache and spin the disk down as before. } The above procedure will make shutdown(8) work properly with kernels before this change, ones with this workaround and later ones without it. To accelerate shutdown(8) updates, if the compat mode is in use, this patch prints BIG FAT warning for five seconds during shutdown (the optimal interval to annoy the user just the right amount discovered by hours of tireless usability testing). Signed-off-by: Tejun Heo <htejun@gmail.com> Signed-off-by: Jeff Garzik <jeff@garzik.org>
2007-05-04 19:28:48 +00:00
Because issuing spin down command to an already spun down disk
makes some disks spin up just to spin down again, libata tracks
device spindown status to skip the extra spindown command and
warn about it.
This is to give userspace tools the time to get updated and will
be removed after userspace is reasonably updated.
libata: implement libata.spindown_compat Now that libata uses sd->manage_start_stop, libata spins down disk on shutdown. In an attempt to compensate libata's previous shortcoming, some distros sync and spin down disks attached via libata in their shutdown(8). Some disks spin back up just to spin down again on STANDBYNOW1 if the command is issued when the disk is spun down, so this double spinning down causes problem. This patch implements module parameter libata.spindown_compat which, when set to one (default value), prevents libata from spinning down disks on shutdown thus avoiding double spinning down. Note that libata spins down disks for suspend to mem and disk, so with libata.spindown_compat set to one, disks should be properly spun down in all cases without modifying shutdown(8). shutdown(8) should be fixed eventually. Some drive do spin up on SYNCHRONZE_CACHE even when their cache is clean. Those disks currently spin up briefly when sd tries to shutdown the device and then the machine powers off immediately, which can't be good for the head. We can't skip SYNCHRONIZE_CACHE during shudown as it can be dangerous data integrity-wise. So, this spindown_compat parameter is already scheduled for removal by the end of the next year and here's what shutdown(8) should do. * Check whether /sys/modules/libata/parameters/spindown_compat exists. If it does, write 0 to it. * For each libata harddisk { * Check whether /sys/class/scsi_disk/h:c:i:l/manage_start_stop exists. Iff it doesn't, synchronize cache and spin the disk down as before. } The above procedure will make shutdown(8) work properly with kernels before this change, ones with this workaround and later ones without it. To accelerate shutdown(8) updates, if the compat mode is in use, this patch prints BIG FAT warning for five seconds during shutdown (the optimal interval to annoy the user just the right amount discovered by hours of tireless usability testing). Signed-off-by: Tejun Heo <htejun@gmail.com> Signed-off-by: Jeff Garzik <jeff@garzik.org>
2007-05-04 19:28:48 +00:00
Who: Tejun Heo <htejun@gmail.com>
---------------------------
What: i386/x86_64 bzImage symlinks
When: April 2010
Why: The i386/x86_64 merge provides a symlink to the old bzImage
location so not yet updated user space tools, e.g. package
scripts, do not break.
Who: Thomas Gleixner <tglx@linutronix.de>
Merge branch 'master' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/davem/net-2.6 * 'master' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/davem/net-2.6: (867 commits) [SKY2]: status polling loop (post merge) [NET]: Fix NAPI completion handling in some drivers. [TCP]: Limit processing lost_retrans loop to work-to-do cases [TCP]: Fix lost_retrans loop vs fastpath problems [TCP]: No need to re-count fackets_out/sacked_out at RTO [TCP]: Extract tcp_match_queue_to_sack from sacktag code [TCP]: Kill almost unused variable pcount from sacktag [TCP]: Fix mark_head_lost to ignore R-bit when trying to mark L [TCP]: Add bytes_acked (ABC) clearing to FRTO too [IPv6]: Update setsockopt(IPV6_MULTICAST_IF) to support RFC 3493, try2 [NETFILTER]: x_tables: add missing ip6t_modulename aliases [NETFILTER]: nf_conntrack_tcp: fix connection reopening [QETH]: fix qeth_main.c [NETLINK]: fib_frontend build fixes [IPv6]: Export userland ND options through netlink (RDNSS support) [9P]: build fix with !CONFIG_SYSCTL [NET]: Fix dev_put() and dev_hold() comments [NET]: make netlink user -> kernel interface synchronious [NET]: unify netlink kernel socket recognition [NET]: cleanup 3rd argument in netlink_sendskb ... Fix up conflicts manually in Documentation/feature-removal-schedule.txt and my new least favourite crap, the "mod_devicetable" support in the files include/linux/mod_devicetable.h and scripts/mod/file2alias.c. (The latter files seem to be explicitly _designed_ to get conflicts when different subsystems work with them - that have an absolutely horrid lack of subsystem separation!) Signed-off-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>
2007-10-12 02:40:14 +00:00
---------------------------
What (Why):
- include/linux/netfilter_ipv4/ipt_TOS.h ipt_tos.h header files
(superseded by xt_TOS/xt_tos target & match)
- "forwarding" header files like ipt_mac.h in
include/linux/netfilter_ipv4/ and include/linux/netfilter_ipv6/
- xt_CONNMARK match revision 0
(superseded by xt_CONNMARK match revision 1)
- xt_MARK target revisions 0 and 1
(superseded by xt_MARK match revision 2)
- xt_connmark match revision 0
(superseded by xt_connmark match revision 1)
- xt_conntrack match revision 0
(superseded by xt_conntrack match revision 1)
- xt_iprange match revision 0,
include/linux/netfilter_ipv4/ipt_iprange.h
(superseded by xt_iprange match revision 1)
- xt_mark match revision 0
(superseded by xt_mark match revision 1)
- xt_recent: the old ipt_recent proc dir
(superseded by /proc/net/xt_recent)
When: January 2009 or Linux 2.7.0, whichever comes first
Why: Superseded by newer revisions or modules
Who: Jan Engelhardt <jengelh@computergmbh.de>
---------------------------
What: b43 support for firmware revision < 410
When: July 2008
Why: The support code for the old firmware hurts code readability/maintainability
and slightly hurts runtime performance. Bugfixes for the old firmware
are not provided by Broadcom anymore.
Who: Michael Buesch <mb@bu3sch.de>
---------------------------
What: usedac i386 kernel parameter
When: 2.6.27
Why: replaced by allowdac and no dac combination
Who: Glauber Costa <gcosta@redhat.com>
---------------------------
What: remove HID compat support
When: 2.6.29
Why: needed only as a temporary solution until distros fix themselves up
Who: Jiri Slaby <jirislaby@gmail.com>
---------------------------
What: print_fn_descriptor_symbol()
When: October 2009
Why: The %pF vsprintf format provides the same functionality in a
simpler way. print_fn_descriptor_symbol() is deprecated but
still present to give out-of-tree modules time to change.
Who: Bjorn Helgaas <bjorn.helgaas@hp.com>
---------------------------
What: /sys/o2cb symlink
When: January 2010
Why: /sys/fs/o2cb is the proper location for this information - /sys/o2cb
exists as a symlink for backwards compatibility for old versions of
ocfs2-tools. 2 years should be sufficient time to phase in new versions
which know to look in /sys/fs/o2cb.
Who: ocfs2-devel@oss.oracle.com
---------------------------
What: SCTP_GET_PEER_ADDRS_NUM_OLD, SCTP_GET_PEER_ADDRS_OLD,
SCTP_GET_LOCAL_ADDRS_NUM_OLD, SCTP_GET_LOCAL_ADDRS_OLD
When: June 2009
Why: A newer version of the options have been introduced in 2005 that
removes the limitions of the old API. The sctp library has been
converted to use these new options at the same time. Any user
space app that directly uses the old options should convert to using
the new options.
Who: Vlad Yasevich <vladislav.yasevich@hp.com>
---------------------------
What: CONFIG_THERMAL_HWMON
When: January 2009
Why: This option was introduced just to allow older lm-sensors userspace
to keep working over the upgrade to 2.6.26. At the scheduled time of
removal fixed lm-sensors (2.x or 3.x) should be readily available.
Who: Rene Herman <rene.herman@gmail.com>
---------------------------
What: Code that is now under CONFIG_WIRELESS_EXT_SYSFS
(in net/core/net-sysfs.c)
When: After the only user (hal) has seen a release with the patches
for enough time, probably some time in 2010.
Why: Over 1K .text/.data size reduction, data is available in other
ways (ioctls)
Who: Johannes Berg <johannes@sipsolutions.net>
---------------------------
What: CONFIG_NF_CT_ACCT
When: 2.6.29
Why: Accounting can now be enabled/disabled without kernel recompilation.
Currently used only to set a default value for a feature that is also
controlled by a kernel/module/sysfs/sysctl parameter.
Who: Krzysztof Piotr Oledzki <ole@ans.pl>
---------------------------
What: i2c_attach_client(), i2c_detach_client(), i2c_driver->detach_client()
When: 2.6.29 (ideally) or 2.6.30 (more likely)
Why: Deprecated by the new (standard) device driver binding model. Use
i2c_driver->probe() and ->remove() instead.
Who: Jean Delvare <khali@linux-fr.org>
---------------------------
What: fscher and fscpos drivers
When: June 2009
Why: Deprecated by the new fschmd driver.
Who: Hans de Goede <hdegoede@redhat.com>
Jean Delvare <khali@linux-fr.org>
---------------------------
What: SELinux "compat_net" functionality
When: 2.6.30 at the earliest
Why: In 2.6.18 the Secmark concept was introduced to replace the "compat_net"
network access control functionality of SELinux. Secmark offers both
better performance and greater flexibility than the "compat_net"
mechanism. Now that the major Linux distributions have moved to
Secmark, it is time to deprecate the older mechanism and start the
process of removing the old code.
Who: Paul Moore <paul.moore@hp.com>