On the management of the Video4Linux subsystem tree [LWN.net]

On the management of the Video4Linux subsystem tree

Posted Feb 26, 2009 9:38 UTC (Thu) by hverkuil (subscriber, #41056)
Parent article: On the management of the Video4Linux subsystem tree

Hmm, I regarded the Ubuntu LTS releases as their equivalent of an
enterprise release, so I didn't count it. In this case it is a moot
point, since 2.6.15 hasn't been supported by v4l-dvb since 8 months or
so.

Interestingly, nobody ever complained about that, thus also confirming my
suspicion that the demand for supporting really old kernels from the
end-users is overrated.

(Log in to post comments)

On the management of the Video4Linux subsystem tree

Posted Feb 27, 2009 19:05 UTC (Fri) by giraffedata (subscriber, #1954) [Link]

confirming my suspicion that the demand for supporting really old kernels from the end-users is overrated.

End users? What have we learned about end users, and what difference does it make?

According to the article, the goal of making V4L work on old kernels is to enable testers. I don't consider those end users. And I don't expect that community to have a strong affinity to stable systems.

And the discussion is on the linux-media mailing list, which I will bet is not subscribed to by all V4L users or even a sample -- again, subscribers are probably people who don't value stability much (i.e. they upgrade regularly).

So my guess is that 1) there are plenty of end users who will be disappointed at the loss of new V4L for old kernels; and 2) that doesn't mean you should keep producing it.