Dear Lazarus users,

The Lazarus team has decided to finally phase out support for the Windows 9x platform.

Reasons for doing so are:
1) The platform is not supported anymore by Microsoft.
2) The platform is hardly in use anymore.
3) The new 3.0 series compiler does not support this platform anymore.
4) There is only 1 maintainer of the Windows 9x code base.
5) Cleaning up the Win32 widgetset code will make it easier to maintain and less prone to bugs.

The phasing out wil take place in 2 stages:

Stage 1.
Starting with the upcoming Lazarus 1.6 there will be no more active development in the code that was specifically written for dealing with the Window 9x platform.

However, patches (when supplied in the bugtracker) for bugs in this code can still be applied to the 1.6 fixes branch.

It may (or may not) be necessary to build your application using the 2.6.4 compiler in order to get a functional Windows 9x application.

Stage 2.
Starting with the 1.7 development branch (AKA trunk) all code that was specifically written for the Windows 9x platform will be removed from our codebase.

From that point on software written with this version (or later) of

Lazarus will most likely either not run at all, or not run as expected on the Windows 9x platform.

We are aware of the fact that this decision may affect a niche group of Lazarus users who develop for end-uses that still run Windows 98, but these can still use the 1.6 branch of Lazarus.

Bart

It is, regarding some industrial stuff. Those installations are made for long life, 20y+.

3) The new 3.0 series compiler does not support this platform anymore. 4) There is only 1 maintainer of the Windows 9x code base. 5) Cleaning up the Win32 widgetset code will make it easier to maintain and less prone to bugs.

I understand the motivation.
Go on. ;)

It may (or may not) be necessary to build your application using the 2.6.4 compiler in order to get a functional Windows 9x application.

[...]

We are aware of the fact that this decision may affect a niche group of Lazarus users who develop for end-uses that still run Windows 98, but these can still use the 1.6 branch of Lazarus.

It would be helpful for those few user that
- have running installation of Win9x with fpc/lazarus programs
- have to be able to compile old programs

to know an easy way of getting the correct compiler and maybe lazarus version. I suggest making at least a tagged version in svn and maybe a branch and executable that clearly states "last working version for Win9x" or similar.

Thank for attention,
Marc

Marc Santhoff wrote

I suggest making at least a tagged version in svn and maybe a branch and executable that clearly states "last working version for Win9x" or similar.

The Lazarus SVN branch "fixes_1_6" will always support Win9x. The last release will be 1.6.x (maybe 1.6.4 or 1.6.6) somewhere over a year from now.
That version can be used forever by people who need it.

Juha

Good to know, thank you. Is there a matching wiki page where this implicit information can and should be published?

Marc Santhoff wrote

Good to know, thank you. Is there a matching wiki page where this implicit information can and should be published?

It's here: http://wiki.lazarus.freepascal.org/Version_Numbering (Since today.)

Bart

Well done, thanks.

I'd have done if I knew where.