From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Paul Eggert Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: .info files Date: Fri, 04 May 2012 14:33:00 -0700 Organization: UCLA Computer Science Department Message-ID: <4FA44B0C.40807@cs.ucla.edu> References: <831uns3rgj.fsf@gnu.org> <8362cc70la.fsf@gnu.org> <4FA42AF0.2020304@cs.ucla.edu> <83lil7659z.fsf@gnu.org> NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Trace: dough.gmane.org 1336167195 15674 80.91.229.3 (4 May 2012 21:33:15 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@dough.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 4 May 2012 21:33:15 +0000 (UTC) Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org To: Eli Zaretskii Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Fri May 04 23:33:14 2012 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([208.118.235.17]) by plane.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1SQQ7j-0002iC-Nc for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Fri, 04 May 2012 23:33:11 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:57559 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1SQQ7j-0008OZ-3B for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Fri, 04 May 2012 17:33:11 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([208.118.235.92]:49888) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1SQQ7f-0008OH-MN for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 04 May 2012 17:33:08 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1SQQ7e-0004zR-1q for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 04 May 2012 17:33:07 -0400 Original-Received: from smtp.cs.ucla.edu ([131.179.128.62]:59894) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1SQQ7a-0004yf-2w; Fri, 04 May 2012 17:33:02 -0400 Original-Received: from localhost (localhost.localdomain [127.0.0.1]) by smtp.cs.ucla.edu (Postfix) with ESMTP id C28CA39E800B; Fri, 4 May 2012 14:32:59 -0700 (PDT) X-Virus-Scanned: amavisd-new at smtp.cs.ucla.edu Original-Received: from smtp.cs.ucla.edu ([127.0.0.1]) by localhost (smtp.cs.ucla.edu [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10024) with ESMTP id c8JJicC0vtDO; Fri, 4 May 2012 14:32:59 -0700 (PDT) Original-Received: from [192.168.1.10] (pool-71-189-109-235.lsanca.fios.verizon.net [71.189.109.235]) by smtp.cs.ucla.edu (Postfix) with ESMTPSA id 47E0A39E8006; Fri, 4 May 2012 14:32:59 -0700 (PDT) User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux i686; rv:12.0) Gecko/20120430 Thunderbird/12.0.1 In-Reply-To: <83lil7659z.fsf@gnu.org> X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.6 (newer, 3) X-Received-From: 131.179.128.62 X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 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-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:150259 Archived-At: On 05/04/2012 01:49 PM, Eli Zaretskii wrote: > In developing and maintaining code, we meet such problems and solve > them every day. The fact that this one was caused by MS-DOS is just a > coincidence. Yes, it was a coincidence that I happened to run into an MS-DOS-related build problem a few minutes before seeing your email. But it is not a coincidence that MS-DOS support comes at a cost. Supporting MS-DOS is like supporting K&R C compilers, in that it's a minor hassle during development that benefits a small number of users, and we have to estimate whether the benefits are worth the cost. With K&R C we decided the benefits are not worth the cost, and perhaps a similar decision is appropriate for MS-DOS. It's not just MS-DOS. I agree with Glenn that it would also be useful to poll about obsolete Unix variants whose support clutter Emacs's code. This is a normal part of our release process. The Emacs 23.1 release announcement in 2009, for example, said that we plan to remove support for old GNU/Linux systems based on libc version 5, which last shipped around 1998 -- i.e., GNU systems that were more than a decade old. The last version of MS-DOS, if memory serves, was the one that came with Windows ME in 2000, which suggests that it's an appropriate time to consider decommissioning its support as well.