Re: [PATCH v2 06/19] ARM: mark CPU_ENDIAN_BE8 as deprecated

Hi, Arnd,

On Wed, Jul 1, 2026 at 2:25 PM Arnd Bergmann <[email protected]> wrote:
> Following the deprecation of big-endian ARMv8 mode in arch/arm64 in commit
> 1cf89b6bf660 ("arm64: Kconfig: Make CPU_BIG_ENDIAN depend on BROKEN"),
> this does the same for ARMv7 (and v6), leaving the code around but
> disabled by default: There are no known products that make use of this
> mode any more, and it only hangs around for testing that it still works.

Nice! Getting rid of ARM big-endian support is long overdue in my
opinion. The patch looks good to me, although see below for a couple
minor questions.

> At the moment, there are no known bugs with big-endian ARMv7 mode, but
> it does break occasionally and require someone to fix it.  By marking
> the code as 'depends on BROKEN' now, it will no longer be covered by CI
> testing. If any users remain, they can keep patching out the dependency
> but are more likely to run into regressions.
>
> The big-endian ARMv5 support (CONFIG_CPU_ENDIAN_BE32) in contrast is
> still used on Intel IXP4xx platform, and is the only currently supported
> mode there, so this one can still be enabled.

If IXP4xx is the only known remaining user, would it make sense for
CPU_BIG_ENDIAN to instead depend on ARCH_IXP4XX || BROKEN? Is BE32
mode known to work correctly on any other platforms?

Ethan