@polpo Same, but I guess you'd not have started the #PicoGUS project (nor would've @rasteri done the #Wee86 & #WeeCee) if that was always the option.

• Personally I want to run @OS1337 on real hardware but a real #i486SX is a pain to acquire and setup, so I'm looking at some #PCI104Plus-based idea to get that going and have a #Bridging / #Archival machine that I can chug in a #QuadFlop!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjNBPHjUSHE

@freedosproject Granted, @rasteri didn't sell the #WeeCee nor #Wee86, but #PixelX86 do...

• video via @lazygamereviews / #LGR.

Personally, I'm looking forward to something like a #tiny486 as testing platform for @OS1337 which per design is aimed at being the closest to a new #i486SX system without the bulkyness of a real one.

• Also a lot of #legacy stuff still needs #ISA slots and that certainly can't be transitioned gracefully AFAICT, so a #fanless #DTX - form factor - ready system would be desireable.
  • Like @TechTangents and others that may need to #archive and #backup old 8" FDDs with a #QuadFlop...

@ChrSt @wyatt and how's "mature architecture"?

• I mean, there are still #i486SX-based #CPU|s being made (i.e. #Vortex86SX)…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I486

@mook except that's not true:

Xorg is going to be a safer bet

Xorg is dead. It's basically braindead and harvested for organs at best.

we can just run old software forever

Good luck with that. Just don't complain that not everyone wants to waste time to support 0,1% of people that run IE6 of that no hardware vendor will bend over backwards to support #EoL'd #Kernel|s & #Userland.

maybe personal computing peaked around 2014 or so and we are entering an age of scientific stagnation

I think we're allowing too much #Enshittification but that's not due to #Wayland and #SystemD, because both are at worst necessary evils because their predecessors (#Xorg & #SysVinit) have refused to fix their issues and thus it's easier to start anew instead.

so forcing everyone to jump onto new unstable thing because 'progress' ..

Look, I don't like #Linux dropping #i386 support either, but I have neither the time nor skills nor spoons to change that.

i think we should have a healthy suspicion of that kind of thinking

Well, I do have. In fact I do better in a a side project (@OS1337) in case you want to use an #i486SX in 80x25 MDA, be my guest…

@philpem maybe search the #changelog|s if support for said SoC / board got yeeted in the meantime?

• Cuz that does happen quite often due to the sheer size of the #ARM "device zoo" and the fact that not everything gets maintained and if noone maintains nor complains broken stuff gets rather yeeted.

Personally I hope #i486 (incl. #i486SX) support remains in the #Linux #Kernel because old / legacy industrial/embedded/critical infrastructure systems quite often still use that stuff or get re-deployed with #Vortex86-SX and other #SoC|s for #ISA support and oftentimes a Linux running ddrescue and/or dd is the only worling and reproduceable way to #backup and/or #restore systems that old.

• It's one of the reasons I started @OS1337.…

@mrmasterkeyboard @hexaheximal I hope not, but then again there were also calls to yeet #i486 / #i486SX support.

• Which would really suck because a lot of newly deployed #embedded systems in #industrial applications are still i486SX-#ISA based like the low-spec #Vortex86 offering #Vortex86SX...

Which you may know from the #Wee86 by @rasteri …

But in the end #support will be up to the #Linux community and @torvalds ...

I.e. #Itanium support as shortly dropped after that got #EoL'd because it was a dead-on-arrival shitshow and basically any buyer stuck with #HPUX on #IA64 anyway…