FCP-0101: Deprecating most 10/100 Ethernet drivers

[Doug Hardie]

I have a number of production servers that only have bge and I don't see that listed in either category.  None of them are running FreeBSD 12 yet as it has not been released.  Also there are some with rl.  Those are add-on boards so they could be changed, but would require extensive effort as the machines are about a 4 hour drive from here and would require reconfiguration (an error prone process when you are tired).

I also have two production machines with ue devices.  There is no provision for replacing them.  They are running an early version of 12 as 11 doesn't run on those machines.  I don't see ue listed in either category.

-- Doug

> On 3 October 2018, at 14:05, Brooks Davis <brooks at freebsd.org> wrote:
> 
>>>> Please direct replies to freebsd-arch <<<
> 
> FCP-01010 (https://github.com/freebsd/fcp/blob/master/fcp-0101.md)
> outlines a plan to deprecate most 10/100 Ethernet drivers in FreeBSD 12
> and remove them in FreeBSD 13 to reduce the burden of maintaining and
> improving the network stack.  We have discussed this within the
> core team and intend to move forward as proposed.  We are solictiting
> feedback on the list of drivers to be excepted from removal.
> 
> The current list of drivers slated for REMOVAL is:
> 
> ae, bfe, bm, cs, dme, ed, ep, ex, fe, pcn, rl, sf, smc, sn,
> ste, tl, tx, txp, vx, wb, xe
> 
> The current list of drivers that will STAY in the tree is:
> 
> dc, ffec, fxpl, hme, le, sis, vr, xl
> 
> The criteria for exception are:
> - Popular in applications where it is likely to be deployed beyond the
>   support lifetime of FreeBSD 12 (late 2023).
>   - 5 reports of uses in the wild on machines running FreeBSD 12 will be
>     deemed satisfy the "popular"
>     requirement.
> - Required to make a well supported embedded or emulation platform usable.
> - Ported to use iflib (reducing future maintenance cost.)
> 
> Please reply to this message with nominations to the exception list.
> 
> The full FCP-0101 is included below.
> 
> -- Brooks
> 
> ---
> authors: Brooks Davis <brooks at freebsd.org>
> state: feedback
> ---
> 
> # FCP 101: Deprecation and removal of 10/100 Ethernet drivers
> 
> Deprecate most 10 and 10/100Mbps Ethernet drivers and remove them before
> FreeBSD 13.
> 
> ## Problem Statement
> 
> Each network driver creates drag for the project as we attempt to
> improve the network stack or provide new features such as expanded
> 32-bit compatibility.  For example, the author has edited every single
> NIC driver more than once in the past year to update management (`ioctl`)
> interfaces.  We could improve this situation by converting drivers to
> iflib, but each additional driver takes work.
> 
> 10 and 100 megabit Ethernet drivers are largely irrelevant today
> and we have a significant number of them in the tree.  The ones that
> are no longer used and/or are not known to be working need to be
> removed due to the significant ongoing 'tax' on new development.
> 
> For at least a decade, most systems (including small embedded
> systems) have shipped with gigabit Ethernet devices and virtual
> machines commonly emulate popular gigabit devices.  We wish to
> retain support for popular physical and virtual devices while
> removing support for uncommon ones.  With a few exceptions these
> drivers are unlikely to be used by our user base by the time FreeBSD
> 12 is obsolete (approximately 2024).
> 
> ## Proposed Solution
> 
> We propose to deprecate devices which are not sufficiently popular.  This
> will entail:
> - (October 2018) Send this list to freebsd-net and freebsd-stable.
> - (Before FreeBSD 12.0-RELEASE - October 2018) Update the manpages and
>   attach routines for each device to be removed and merge those changes
>   to FreeBSD 12.
> - (One month after FreeBSD 12.0-RELEASE - January 2018) Remind
>   freebsd-net and freebsd-stable users of pending deletion.
> - (Two months after FreeBSD 12.0-RELEASE - February 2019) Delete deprecated
>   devices.
> 
> Through out this process, solicit feedback on additions to the exception
> list and update this document as required.  For a device to be placed on
> the exception list the device must meet one of the following criteria:
> - Popular in applications where it is likely to be deployed beyond the
>   support lifetime of FreeBSD 12 (late 2023).
>   - 5 reports of uses in the wild on machines running FreeBSD 12 will be
>     deemed satisfy the "popular"
>     requirement.
> - Required to make a well supported embedded or emulation platform usable.
> - Ported to use iflib (reducing future maintenance cost.)
> 
> ### Exceptions to removal
> 
> Device | Reason
> -------|-------------------------------------------------
> ffec   | Onboard Ethernet for Vybrid arm7 boards
> fxp    | Popular device long recommended by the project.
> dc     | Popular device for CardBus card.
> hme    | Built in interface on many supported sparc64 platforms.
> le     | Emulated by QEMU, alternatives don't yet work for mips64.
> sis    | Soekris Engineering net45xx, net48xx, lan1621, and lan1641.
> vr     | Soekris Engineering net5501, some Asus motherboards.
> xl     | Popular device for CardBus card.
> 
> Note: USB devices have been excluded from consideration in this round.
> 
> ### Device to be removed
> 
> ae, bfe, bm, cs, dme, ed, ep, ex, fe, pcn, rl, sf, smc, sn,
> ste, tl, tx, txp, vx, wb, xe
> 
> ## Final Disposition
> 
> TBD