[PATCH v2 16/19] ARM: mark footbridge as deprecated

Arnd Bergmann <[email protected]> Wed, 1 Jul 2026 23:23:50 +0200
Newsgroups dev.linux.lists.soc,org.infradead.lists.linux-arm-kernel,org.kernel.vger.linux-kernel
Message-ID <[email protected]>
From: Arnd Bergmann <[email protected]>

Along with RiscPC and SA1100, these are the last remaining Intel StrongARM
machines. The Corel NetWinder used to be particular popular in the late
1990s, but was discontinued during the bankruptcy of rebel.com in 2001.
The other machine is the DEC (later Intel) EBSA285 evaluation board that
was made in small numbers in 1997 for software developers.

The footbridge/netwinder platform was the main target for the first Debian
2.0 "Hamm" release on the Arm architecture back in 1998, but was dropped
in Debian 6.0 "Squeeze" in 2011, which only supported ARMv4T and higher
with the EABI based ports as ARMv4 hardware had fallen already out of
use by that time.

Link: http://netwinder.org/
Cc: Linus Walleij <[email protected]>
Cc: Russell King <[email protected]>
Cc: Ralph Siemsen <[email protected]>
Acked-by: Linus Walleij <[email protected]>
Acked-by: Marc Zyngier <[email protected]>
Signed-off-by: Arnd Bergmann <[email protected]>
---
 arch/arm/mach-footbridge/Kconfig | 7 +++++--
 1 file changed, 5 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)

diff --git a/arch/arm/mach-footbridge/Kconfig b/arch/arm/mach-footbridge/Kconfig
index 78189997caa1..96a74d447028 100644
--- a/arch/arm/mach-footbridge/Kconfig
+++ b/arch/arm/mach-footbridge/Kconfig
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 # SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0-only
 menuconfig ARCH_FOOTBRIDGE
-	bool "FootBridge Implementations"
+	bool "FootBridge Implementations (DEPRECATED)"
 	depends on ARCH_MULTI_V4 && !(ARCH_MULTI_V4T || ARCH_MULTI_V5)
 	depends on !(ARCH_MOXART || ARCH_GEMINI || ARCH_SA1100)
 	depends on ATAGS
@@ -12,7 +12,10 @@ menuconfig ARCH_FOOTBRIDGE
 	select NEED_MACH_MEMORY_H
 	help
 	  Support for systems based on the DC21285 companion chip
-	  ("FootBridge"), such as the Simtec CATS and the Rebel NetWinder.
+	  ("FootBridge"), used in the EBSA285 and the Rebel NetWinder.
+
+	  Support for these machines will go away in 2027,
+	  unless there are any remaining users that speak up.
 
 if ARCH_FOOTBRIDGE
 
-- 
2.39.5