Date: Fri, 06 Jun 2003 00:56:16 -0700 From: Terry Lambert <tlambert2@mindspring.com> To: Rahul Siddharthan <rsidd@online.fr> Cc: chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Peeve: why "i386"? Message-ID: <3EE04920.7B8EA51F@mindspring.com> References: <20030605165217.A388@online.fr>
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Rahul Siddharthan wrote: > Why do all the BSDs continue to refer to the 32 bit Intel architecture > as i386 even when they typically won't even install on an i386 any > more? Why not call it x86, or ia32, if not in the kernel config then > at least in the release notes and documentation, as everyone else has > been doing for years? I believe the primary reason is the directories named "i386" in various places that, were they renamed, would require a repo-copy in order to maintain proper modification history information, and would additionally require Attic'ing in their current location under their current names to permit the building of historical releases from the release tags. People tend to oppose such changes on general principles, and on the adding of hours to a CVSup time over a 28K modem in Eastern Slobovia. Basically, rewriting history is hard, and the ability to recreate FreeBSD-3.2-RELEASE any time you want to is a compelling argument that someone would have to eat some undesirable overhead, merely to get a name changed, with no real technical benefit. It's kind of like changing the Daemon mascot to something else... -- Terry
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