Bug#876908: Is blcr completely useless?

[Bastian Germann]

Control: retitle -1 RM: blcr -- RoQA; unmaintained; broken for several releases
Control: reassign -1 ftp.debian.org
Control: block 575848 by -1

Please remove blcr from Debian. I do not think that there are users left at
this point and nobody reacted to Adrian's request.

On Fri, 5 Mar 2021 14:48:15 +0200 Adrian Bunk  wrote:

3.5 years later the situation looks unchanged,
please let me know if you see any reason for
still keeping blcr in Debian.

Adrian


On Tue, Sep 26, 2017 at 08:52:08PM +0100, Alan Woodland wrote:
> On 26 September 2017 at 20:28, Adrian Bunk  wrote:
> >
> > Source: blcr
> > Version: 0.8.5-2.1
> > Severity: serious
> > Tags: buster sid
> >
> > As far as I can see:
> > 1. blcr is dead upstream since 2013.
> > 2. blcr requires both userspace and kernel parts.
> > 3. The -dkms package is removed in unstable.
> > 4. The beta version in experimental has an RC bug against
> >the -dkms package that the module does not build
> >with the jessie (sic) kernel.
> >
> > mpich is linked with the userspace library,
> > but does that make any sense without the kernel part?
> 
> There was some activity in 2014 - 0.8.6 beta4, but the last I heard it

> still had some issues with PPC64 that meant it wasn't worth uploading
> to experimental and my plan was to hold out. Since there haven't been
> any new versions released since then I'm inclined to agree. That'll
> need a patch to the MPI build config though to stop linking against
> and requiring the blcr userspace libraries as a precursor to actually
> removing BLCR from sid.
> 
> In theory people could still be running old kernels to keep support

> alive and if that's the case then we should try to avoid breaking
> things, but certainly I've not actively been using BLCR in my work for
> quite some time now.
> 
> Alan

Bug#876908: Is blcr completely useless?

[Adrian Bunk]

3.5 years later the situation looks unchanged,
please let me know if you see any reason for
still keeping blcr in Debian.

Adrian


On Tue, Sep 26, 2017 at 08:52:08PM +0100, Alan Woodland wrote:
> On 26 September 2017 at 20:28, Adrian Bunk  wrote:
> >
> > Source: blcr
> > Version: 0.8.5-2.1
> > Severity: serious
> > Tags: buster sid
> >
> > As far as I can see:
> > 1. blcr is dead upstream since 2013.
> > 2. blcr requires both userspace and kernel parts.
> > 3. The -dkms package is removed in unstable.
> > 4. The beta version in experimental has an RC bug against
> >the -dkms package that the module does not build
> >with the jessie (sic) kernel.
> >
> > mpich is linked with the userspace library,
> > but does that make any sense without the kernel part?
> 
> There was some activity in 2014 - 0.8.6 beta4, but the last I heard it
> still had some issues with PPC64 that meant it wasn't worth uploading
> to experimental and my plan was to hold out. Since there haven't been
> any new versions released since then I'm inclined to agree. That'll
> need a patch to the MPI build config though to stop linking against
> and requiring the blcr userspace libraries as a precursor to actually
> removing BLCR from sid.
> 
> In theory people could still be running old kernels to keep support
> alive and if that's the case then we should try to avoid breaking
> things, but certainly I've not actively been using BLCR in my work for
> quite some time now.
> 
> Alan

Bug#876908: Is blcr completely useless?

[Adrian Bunk]

On Tue, Sep 26, 2017 at 08:52:08PM +0100, Alan Woodland wrote:
>...
> In theory people could still be running old kernels to keep support
> alive and if that's the case then we should try to avoid breaking
> things,
>...

The last Debian release with blcr-dkms was wheezy,
and #776920 seems to make it clear that even the
jessie kernel is too new for blcr.

Running a pre-jessie kernel in buster is nothing that is supported, 
jessie userspace is likely the most recent that will work properly
with such old kernels.

> Alan

cu
Adrian

-- 

   "Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
   "Only a promise," Lao Er said.
   Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

Bug#876908: Is blcr completely useless?

[Alan Woodland]

On 26 September 2017 at 20:28, Adrian Bunk  wrote:
>
> Source: blcr
> Version: 0.8.5-2.1
> Severity: serious
> Tags: buster sid
>
> As far as I can see:
> 1. blcr is dead upstream since 2013.
> 2. blcr requires both userspace and kernel parts.
> 3. The -dkms package is removed in unstable.
> 4. The beta version in experimental has an RC bug against
>the -dkms package that the module does not build
>with the jessie (sic) kernel.
>
> mpich is linked with the userspace library,
> but does that make any sense without the kernel part?

There was some activity in 2014 - 0.8.6 beta4, but the last I heard it
still had some issues with PPC64 that meant it wasn't worth uploading
to experimental and my plan was to hold out. Since there haven't been
any new versions released since then I'm inclined to agree. That'll
need a patch to the MPI build config though to stop linking against
and requiring the blcr userspace libraries as a precursor to actually
removing BLCR from sid.

In theory people could still be running old kernels to keep support
alive and if that's the case then we should try to avoid breaking
things, but certainly I've not actively been using BLCR in my work for
quite some time now.

Alan

Bug#876908: Is blcr completely useless?

[Adrian Bunk]

Source: blcr
Version: 0.8.5-2.1
Severity: serious
Tags: buster sid

As far as I can see:
1. blcr is dead upstream since 2013.
2. blcr requires both userspace and kernel parts.
3. The -dkms package is removed in unstable.
4. The beta version in experimental has an RC bug against
   the -dkms package that the module does not build
   with the jessie (sic) kernel.

mpich is linked with the userspace library,
but does that make any sense without the kernel part?