That's understandable. You should have allowed yourself more time to make a complete recovery.
Another example of not being 100% fit and not thinking straight. Hope you meant temporary removal. If not: RECONSIDER!
No apology needed, considering the circumstances.

@Alien Bob

If your personal decision is informed then so be it. However, I do recommend that you think about it and perhaps reconsider.

It may be, he needs some well deserved break which I for one am in favor of, but not leaving.

Slackware without Alien would be like Star Wars without Yoda :-|

Regards.

2 members found this post helpful.

As the maintainer is aware of this thread maybe it's time to invite him to comment on the situation?..

5 members found this post helpful.

BTW, I suspect that behind the maintenance of the Slackware x86_64 port is Eric ...

I also find questionable the work strength of the team, without Eric, talking of the maintaining of the x86_64 and traditional x86 ports.

Maybe it's time for all x86_64 fanboys to try to convince Eric to return...

Otherwise, the question is: of which of the beloved children will care Patrick? x86 or x86_64?

I'm not convinced that this is the issue, but it could be.

If Alien Bob doesn't want to work on it anymore then someone else will have to step in ... or I guess sacrifices will have to be made, like getting rid of probably x86_64.

You may think it is trivial and that there is such a thing as x86_64 fanboys, but you are fooling yourself. Slackware's popularity will suffer if slackware64 dies. There are people with new computers, that use more than 4 GB RAM, sometimes even much more where the overhead of PAE just doesn't cut it. Linus himself said that using PAE with large amounts of RAM is not supported and not sane, and I agree with him.

I suggest you not start a flame war over 32-bit versus 64-bit, because this is not what it is about.

All major distros support 64-bit, and even other architectures, and people are free to choose ... because that's what Linux is about. I don't think that regressing to 32-bit only would help Slackware, and in fact it may hurt it quite a bit. Slackware is already thought of as an ancient out-of-date distro by many, but this is not the case. If you get rid of slackware64, their arguments would be more convincing.

2 members found this post helpful.

Said before by folkenfanel, I have to agree. I have a laptop and a server, both with 32b and more then 4gb.
If 99% of all software I use can be run on 64 or 100% on 32%, I rather keep the 32 and not "contaminate" my machines.
32b is here to stay for a few years more, and I see absolutely no reason to change anything.

Ultimately this is between those directly involved. I for one hope that it's worked out and does not involve anyone leaving the slackware team.

1 members found this post helpful.

*Heading for the church of sub-genius to pray until Alien's update.

Regards.

To succinctly set the record straight: Eric created the 64bit port, but both the 32bit and 64 bit distributions are maintained by Patrick. The package update work flow is basically:

Patrick updates a package and builds it;
or one of the core Slackware team updates it, builds it locally, tests then provides the new source dir to Patrick who does the 'golden' build.

The fixes and suggestions from the Slackware users (by email or in this forum) factor into both of the above.

I don't want to comment on who does what in the team, but suffice to say that Eric's a heavy lifter.

2 members found this post helpful.

Whether I am part of the team or not, Slackware as a distro will not suffer. Nor will Pat have to make any compromises. None of the Slackware architectures will be abandoned, and development will continue as always. Nobody except perhaps Patrick is indispensible.

It's like drmozes said, the team may be doing some of the footwork... but it is, and always has been, Patrick who does the planning, and builds and maintains the 32-bit and 64-bit Intel-compatible distro versions. Drmozes does the ARM port of course, and Mark Post takes care of the S/390 port.

Eric

3 members found this post helpful.

Well, Eric, it's up to you, it's your decision. As you can see, a lot of us will be sorry to see you leave the team.
Not been headhunted by Ubuntu, have you?

Hi,
Most professionals make a life changing decision to move on to better pastures to help themselves and their family. I for one know the family sacrifices that are made in order to enhance one's knowledge & growth.

As a Slackware user I appreciate the work done by everyone on the team and understand the hierarchy necessary to develop and maintain a project. Eric, your involvement and participation with Slackware as a team member speaks volumes for your character and professionalism. Good luck & God speed with your choices for any pasture taken!

I for one respect your decision and believe your decision to move on to other pastures should be respected by other users. You will be missed but believe the team will continue to improve a excellent Gnu/Linux.

A big Thank You to all!

I am not yet done discussing my situation with Patrick.

Eric

I wish you continue, Slackware wouldn't be same without you.

As for 32-bit thing, I need to use 32-bit system on some of my family's old computers. It's nice to have it for that reason. Still, I use 64bit on my own computer. Dropping support for i486 wouldn't do any harm for me though.

Edit: Indeed Eric if you think it's best for you to take a break, then of course go with it. Thanks for all the work you've done. For selfish reasons too, I hope you'll stay