Rewriting perfectly functional mysql code to use mysqli is not a trivial move, just as are the problems of re-writing PHP5.2 code to work cleanly on 5.4. ISP's are stuck between keeping customers - who are most likely not even very computer literate - working while fighting the problems that changes such as removing mysql will cause them.
I wonder if there have been any plans or suggestions (while dropping the old ext/mysql code) to provide some sort of seamless migration/alternatives (similar way it has been done in case of libmysql and mysqlnd)?
In short - just aliasing the old mysql_* to mysqli_* functions (as most used like _query, _fetch_row/assoc have just mixed variable order)?
rr