Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)
Colin Watson wrote:
>On Fri, May 19, 2023 at 09:19:35AM -0500, G. Branden Robinson wrote:
>> Well, maybe not a strong view, but a sense of vague unease--possibly an
>> ill-informed one. As someone who has used SIMH for "real" work[1], I
>> have to ask how someone would conduct an install to a 32-bit x86 machine
>> running under emulation, assuming no OS on the simulated machine.
>
>I occasionally use 32-bit x86 even today (mostly for not very good
>historical reasons, but nevertheless), and I do it by using a 32-bit
>container on a 64-bit x86 machine instead. It's much faster to run, and
>it doesn't depend on installer support. There are doubtless edge cases
>where you need a completely separate kernel, but they aren't really ones
>I run into.
ACK. For people needing/testing i386 stuff, even just a simple
debootstrap and {s,}chroot will cover the vast majority of
needs. That's how we've been building i386 software already for ages
in Debian already.
More complex things can be done if needed: loopback mount an image,
debootstrap, install a kernel, etc. I don't see this as something we
should be spending much effort on in the future.
--
Steve McIntyre, Cambridge, UK. steve@einval.com
< sladen> I actually stayed in a hotel and arrived to find a post-it
note stuck to the mini-bar saying "Paul: This fridge and
fittings are the correct way around and do not need altering"
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