From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail From: Eli Zaretskii Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Windows emacs-25.1 i686 vs x86_64? Date: Sun, 06 Nov 2016 17:48:12 +0200 Message-ID: <83wpggip8j.fsf@gnu.org> References: <6e2cffe5-942b-48d4-9ed5-ef39803bcd30@googlegroups.com> <87mvhgsf21.fsf@russet.org.uk> <8360o4monq.fsf@gnu.org> <87vaw4gq0j.fsf@russet.org.uk> <83oa1vlnkk.fsf@gnu.org> <87d1iba6od.fsf@russet.org.uk> <83ins2jq88.fsf@gnu.org> <87eg2p8swx.fsf@russet.org.uk> <831sypjmst.fsf@gnu.org> Reply-To: Eli Zaretskii NNTP-Posting-Host: blaine.gmane.org X-Trace: blaine.gmane.org 1478447316 19941 195.159.176.226 (6 Nov 2016 15:48:36 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@blaine.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 6 Nov 2016 15:48:36 +0000 (UTC) Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org, phillip.lord@russet.org.uk To: Paul Eggert Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Sun Nov 06 16:48:32 2016 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([208.118.235.17]) by blaine.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.84_2) (envelope-from ) id 1c3PgC-0003HO-1Q for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Sun, 06 Nov 2016 16:48:20 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:44398 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1c3PgF-0005GJ-2a for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Sun, 06 Nov 2016 10:48:23 -0500 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::10]:55734) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1c3Pff-0005G2-3i for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sun, 06 Nov 2016 10:47:48 -0500 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1c3Pfc-0004gr-I7 for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sun, 06 Nov 2016 10:47:47 -0500 Original-Received: from fencepost.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::e]:48957) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1c3Pfc-0004gi-E8; Sun, 06 Nov 2016 10:47:44 -0500 Original-Received: from 84.94.185.246.cable.012.net.il ([84.94.185.246]:4675 helo=home-c4e4a596f7) by fencepost.gnu.org with esmtpsa (TLS1.2:RSA_AES_128_CBC_SHA1:128) (Exim 4.82) (envelope-from ) id 1c3Pfb-0006P8-NE; Sun, 06 Nov 2016 10:47:44 -0500 In-reply-to: (message from Paul Eggert on Sun, 6 Nov 2016 01:10:26 -0700) X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.2.x-3.x [generic] X-Received-From: 2001:4830:134:3::e X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.21 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: "Emacs-devel" Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:209209 Archived-At: > Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org > From: Paul Eggert > Date: Sun, 6 Nov 2016 01:10:26 -0700 > > That is true, but we still try supporting those old systems, as they > are widespread in the 3rd world. > > That may have been true a decade ago, but Windows 9x is no longer a practical porting target even in the third world. For what it's worth, statcounter.com lists WinME's popularity as dropping from 0.37% of China's desktop market in March 2014 to 0.01% in August of this year, and they no longer even bother measuring its popularity in Africa. Windows/ME was never popular, even when it was released, as it's a botched OS. A more interesting statistics is the sum total of all 9X systems. Also, even 0.01% in China could be quite a lot of machines. In any case, the non-removal of support for Windows 9X was an explicit request from Richard, an opinion which AFAIU he still held 5 years ago: http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2011-07/msg00827.html http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2011-07/msg00839.html > Besides, at this point it borders on technical malpractice to suggest to users that it's OK to use Windows 9x to run Emacs. How can this be a malpractice, technical or otherwise? It _is_ okay to do that for users that don't have access to newer systems. We are talking about the same binary, available from the GNU FTP site, that other users run on the latest Windows systems. If it's okay on any other Windows system, it's okay on Windows 9X.