Call for nommu LTP maintainer [was: Re: [PATCH 00/36] Remove UCLINUX from LTP]

[Rob Landley]

On 1/8/24 03:03, Petr Vorel wrote:
> Hi Rob, all,
> 
> [ Added Niklas Cassel, who is maintainer of qemu_riscv64_nommu_virt_defconfig in
> buildroot ]

Hi Niklas!

>> Buildroot also apparently has an LTP package selectable in menuconfig:
> 
>> https://github.com/buildroot/buildroot/tree/master/package/ltp-testsuite
> 
>> But I haven't tried it...
> 
> I'm the maintainer of the LTP package in buildroot in my private time.
> BTW I spent quite a lot of time fixing LTP (and some other system packages,
> e.g. nfs-utils) compilation on some old legacy architectures reported via
> http://autobuild.buildroot.net/ I've never used in the reality.
> But I certainly don't have time to drive nommu support in my private time.
> I don't even have an interest, I don't use any nommu device.

I do, but I've never done much with LTP, and I have my hands full with toybox
and mkroot already.

> Therefore nobody who is not involved in nommu will not find a time to support it
> in LTP (support does not mean just to add the functionality to the new C API,
> but run tests on nommu and fix failing bugs). I suppose nobody is paid to work
> on nommu platforms, it would have to be a hobby project, right?

A bunch of people are paid to work on nommu platforms, and I've worked with them
a bunch, but none of them talk to linux-kernel. They find the culture toxic,
insular, and categorically dismissive of their interests.

For example, cortex-m is a large nommu platform on which vendors support Linux
BSPs, but notice how page 8 of
https://www.microsemi.com/document-portal/doc_view/132181-linux-cortex-m-users-manual
points at a cross compiler toolchain from _2010_ and page 4 says they're booting
a 2.6.33 kernel?

I'm a bit weird in that I try to get CURRENT stuff to work on nommu, and a lot
of people have been happy to consume my work, but getting any of them to post
directly to linux-kernel is like pulling teeth.

> But as I said, if anybody from nommu decides to maintain it in LTP, I'll try to
> support him in my free time (review patches, give advices). And if nobody
> stands, this patchset which removes the support in the old API will be merged
> after next LTP release (in the end of January).

What does the API migration do? Is there a page on it ala OABI vs EABI in arm or
something?

Rob