On Tue 11 Apr 2017 at 12:39:00 (+0000), GiaThnYgeia wrote: > > > Felix Miata: > > My opinion is that people who want ancient hardware to continue to be > > supported for the longest possible period of time must participate in > > the development phase by testing on the very hardware that they want to > > stay working when it's hardware that developers either no longer have or > > no longer have motivation to use, and they must do so throughout > > development, not only in the final weeks before release is expected. > > I'll stick to the "people who want ancient hardware" and ask whether you > perceive those people as having a choice to "want ancient" hardware or > whether this is "all" they have.
I would opine, from what I read, that if you want to run mainstream linux on ancient hardware, then Debian is a pretty good choice to make. If Debian doesn't support it because it lacks some feature now seen as essential, then I think you have to look to a specialist distribution/project run by people who just see these things as a challenge rather than as systems to use for productive work. > Do you anticipate those same people to > be able to start their computing career in developing systems? No idea what that means. > Which relates to that world do we want Debian to prevail. The "free" > world or the "non-free" world in which we live in? No point in using the word "free" without saying which meaning you're using. > > When a problem is found, it needs to be timely reported according to > > distro policy in the proper place and manner. Reports in the debian-user > > mailing list are insufficient to fulfill this purpose. > > By who? By the person who just lost all graphical access to the system? > By a bug-reporting system that I have yet to see ever working? > Is a person installing debian expected to know how to access and > communicate on the command screen of the -recovery mode? Yes, it's clever that...sort of Catch 22. That's why car breakdown companies invented Home-Start services, because you can't get to the garage. > > You, not we. I'm not here to discuss any policy other than whether this > > thread's content is suitably located, and with this post I'm finished > > with this sub-thread. > > Me too ... dealing with such responses > > > Did including iomem=relaxed on your cmdline solve your problem, or did > > it not? > > I wouldn't know, the person for which I installed Debian for will not > dare switch to Stretch after this experience, will not even talk about > it. So you're not the owner/user of this 2.33Mhz 650kRam PC but are supporting those who are? I doubt the wisdom of that. But it does explain why you also want a DE. By the time you add a browser and some modern web pages, I wonder what sort of performance they'll get. I got the impression from "What do you really expect the X0org.log to look like and how helpful would this be to someone with a single machine?" that you were afraid of breaking the system (in which case, why are you desparate to upgrade to stretch?). But then I looked further back and found that originally "it was just an exercise to fix and backup old data from a WinXP that had become a mesh". So I can't understand why you ask a question here and, when an answer is given, just refuse to try it, invent strange reasons to justify not trying it, and then rubbish Debian and the people here who try to help. > Did you read about the person who used zsh as a login shell and > upgraded Jessie to testing and got locked out of his system because zsh > vanished? Good thing he knew how to deal with that crisis. No, but when everything depends on one machine, you don't do stupid things like upgrading to testing. > > If yes, say so. > > Are you talking to me? I am one of this privileged well off people to > have hardware that can run Stretch and Sid and all kinds of things. > Send some snail-mail to the less privileged who have lost access to the > net to ask them. > > > Supporting ancient hardware forever is not going to happen. > > A 2.33Mhz Celeron pc is by no means ancient compared to the Debian claims. Debian is fulfilling its part of the bargain. It writes "Debian GNU/Linux comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by applicable law." People here support others out of the goodness of their hearts, but they are human. It you demand support tailored to yourself, then go and pay for it. There's no encumbrance from Debian; there might be some from the hardware and firmware manufacturers and you'll have to deal with that yourself. If you choose to go cheap by using ancient hardware, there's a trade-off: time and knowledge. If you run a vintage car, you'd better know how to fix it, or employ a chauffeur. If you drive one, you'd better know how to double de-clutch, adjust your mixture, advance the ignition, and so on. And, of course, you help others along the way. Cheers, David.
