| name | simplification-history |
| description | Detailed changelog of the 2026-06 simplification campaign - platform/feature removals (Windows/OS2/VMS, Android, SSL/Kerberos, K&R C, obsolete platform macros, dead makefile targets, ifdef COMMENT blocks) and the macro-expansion modernizations, with per-change caveats and pointers to the SIMPLIFY_*/report files. Use when investigating why code, macros, files, or makefile targets are absent; before removing anything as "obsolete"; or when planning/writing a new simplification. |
Simplification history (2026-06-12 → 2026-06-16)
doc/BASE_20260616.md is the consolidated overview of the whole campaign
(initial-without-windows-or-vms = 5a8fc5a → base-20260616 = 2eab866, 60 commits). This
skill keeps the per-change caveats that matter for future work. The premise throughout: this is
a Linux/macOS/Unix-only tree.
Platform & feature removals
- Windows/OS2/VMS removed 2026-06-12, before the initial commit (
doc/SIMPLIFY_20260612.md):
all ckv* files deleted, #ifdef blocks stripped with unifdef.
- Android removed the same day, commit
ad4139f (doc/SIMPLIFY_20260612_2.md).
- SSL/TLS + Kerberos removed 2026-06-13 (
doc/SIMPLIFY_20260613.md): the whole Telnet
authentication/encryption stack (KRB4, SRP, DES/CAST). The ck_* security files plus
ckuath.*/ckuat2.h deleted; all +ssl/+krb*/+srp makefile targets removed.
- Non-ANSI / K&R C removed, commit
20bf398 (doc/SIMPLIFY_20260613_2.md): CK_ANSIC is
assumed always defined; all pre-ANSI fallback branches stripped.
- 26 obsolete platform macros removed from the C source, commit
c1c710b
(doc/SIMPLIFY_20260613_3.md, doc/OS_FLAGS_20260613.md): AS400 __386BSD__ C70 CIE SINIX SNI544 SNI543 SNI541 POWERMAX ICL_SVR4 XF68R3V6 XF88R32 IX370 PCIX sxaE50 RTU TRS16 _386BSD OU8 UW7 NEUTRINO LYNXOS UTS24 VXVE ZILOG AMIX treated as permanently undefined; dead branches
deleted with unifdef.
- Dead makefile targets removed in waves (
doc/SIMPLIFY_20260613_4.md, _5.md, _6.md,
doc/OS_SIMPLIFY_20260613.md, doc/OS_SIMPLIFY_PLAN_20260613*.md): first the 38 targets defining
those macros (commit aca665a), then 64 Xenix/ancient-BSD/SunOS-3-4 targets (commit
86e1cb0), then all remaining foreign-Unix families and the orphaned generic bases
bsd/bsd42/bsd44/bsd44c/posix. The makefile keeps only Linux, macOS, and
modern-BSD (FreeBSD/NetBSD/OpenBSD/MirBSD) targets; linuxa is kept — linux/
gnu-linux dispatch to it. makefile: 9,520 → ~1,200 lines. Some stale foreign-Unix
comment prose remains — harmless, recipe-less text.
Method caveat for future stanza removal: GNU make treats blank/comment lines between
tab-prefixed recipe lines as part of one recipe; boundary detection must consume the whole
recipe to its last tab-line or it orphans recipe fragments onto kept targets.
#ifdef COMMENT dead-code blocks removed, commit 3201982 merged via f5456b8
(doc/SIMPLIFY_SUMMARY_20260613.md): COMMENT was never #defined anywhere, so
#ifdef COMMENT … #endif was C-Kermit's "comment out a region" idiom. All 731 guards
(704 #ifdef + 27 #ifndef) across 37 files removed (~6,300 lines); build provably
unchanged. Surviving uses of the word "COMMENT" are correct and must stay: the
user-facing Kermit COMMENT script command (ckuus2.c/ckuusr.c), SSH key-comment fields,
the directive escaped inside /* */ in ckuusx.c, and prose mentions.
Source modernization (behavior-preserving)
_PROTOTYP() expanded and removed (doc/SIMPLIFY_20260615.md): all 1,175 pre-ANSI
prototype-forwarding macro invocations expanded to plain ANSI prototypes; the #define
deleted from ckcdeb.h. Byte-identical build.VOID/CKVOID/CONST aliases expanded and removed (doc/PROTOTYP_PLAN_20260615_2.md):
688 exact-token substitutions to void/const; no portability alias macros remain in the
tree. Sibling macros sharing substrings (MAINISVOID, TPUTSISVOID, TPUTSARG1CONST,
PAM_CONST, …) and the Kermit VOID script-command help string were correctly left alone.
The ckuusx.c #undef VOID curses guard became a no-op and was removed. Byte-identical.- Signal modernization —
SIGTYP/SIGRETURN expansion, the ck_signal() sigaction
wrapper, and the ck_sig_t typedef: see the signal-handling skill
(doc/SIGTYPE_PLAN_20260615.md, doc/SIGACTION_PLAN_20260615.md, doc/SIGACTION_MACOS_20260615.md,
doc/CK_SIG_T_20260616.md, doc/SIGNAL_TYPE_20260615.md).
ckuver.h herald selector flattened and clang-format
SortIncludes/InsertBraces enabled with ckcdeb.h pinned first: see the
format-and-editor-tooling skill (doc/SIMPLIFY_SUMMARY_20260613.md §3,
doc/MOVE_CKCDEB_H_20260615.md, doc/ENABLE_SORTINCLUDES_20260615.md, doc/INSERT_BRACES_20260615.md).- Dead/unused file deletions:
ckcsym.h (doc/CKCSYM_H_DELETION_20260615.md), ckusig.h
(superseded by ckcsig.h — ckusig.c is kept and still built), ckcmdb.c, cku2tm.c,
ckustr.c/ckustr.sed, plus build cruft (.cmake-format.py ckpker.mak ckubs2.mak makecmd.sh). See doc/BASE_20260616.md §3.
Rules distilled from the campaign
- Do not remove
SVR4, SVR3, or ATTSV (also in CLAUDE.md): live on macOS/BSD via the
MACOSX10 → MACOSX → BSD44 → SVR4 → SVR3/ATTSV implication chain in ckcdeb.h;
undefined only on the linux build.
- Before declaring any macro "always undefined", check the macOS/BSD builds
(
gcc -E -DMACOSX10 … / -DBSD44), not just make linux.
ckcpro.w is the source of truth for the protocol state machine; after editing it,
regenerate ckcpro.c (make wart && make ckcpro.c) — see the build-and-verify skill.- Every simplification gets a dated
*_20260NNN.md report under doc/ and a verification
at the strongest applicable level (byte-identical / per-object / token proof / runtime —
see the build-and-verify skill).
- Build test reports:
doc/UBUNTU_TEST_20260612.md, doc/UBUNTU_TEST_20260613.md.
