On Wed, Mar 26, 2008 at 09:23:41AM +0100, Joost Witteveen wrote: > On 26/03/2008, David Fox <dfox94085@gmail.com> wrote: > > On Tue, Mar 25, 2008 at 3:44 PM, Andrew Sackville-West > That means I > > > > get to move up to 64 bit. In keeping with my personal > > > > > preference to *never* reinstall, I've got an opportunity to attempt to > > > migrate a running system from 32 to 64 bit. I also have the > > > opportunity to practice on my laptop which could run 64 bit but > > > > > > Here's a thought. If you can use the laptop, go ahead, but can you > > carve out a small place on your desktop for this? I suggest basically > > doing a new partition, doing a debootstrap of the current version of > > debian you already use, for the amd64 architecture. Prior to doing the > > debootstrap, use dpkg --set-selections and save that in a convenient > > place, then do a dpkg --get-selections to get all the packages you > > already have. > > I'd use the two commands the other way around: > > dpkg --get-selections [package-name-pattern...] > Get list of package selections, and write it to stdout. Without > a pattern, packages marked with state purge will not be shown. > > dpkg --set-selections > Set package selections using file read from stdin. This file > should be in the format '<package> <state>', where state is one > of install, hold, deinstall or purge. Blank lines and comment > lines beginning with '#' are also permitted. > > > But yes, that seems the most sensible way to do it, though it seems OP > isn't really looking for the most sensible way:). I would assume that > with some dpkg abuse it should be possible to install a 64 kernel > (that also can run 32 userland), then maybe copy /lib and /usr/lib to > /lib32 and /usr/lib32 (and add those locations to /etc/ld.so.conf.d), > abuse dpkg some more that it starts installing 64 bit libraries and > executables, and ... > At some points in between you may well end up with a hosed system, but > well, if you don't mind that, it seems like an interesting route:). You've got it exactly. But in my continued research, it seems this process is already complicated enough using deboostrap and chroots. I think I'll take one of the more sensible routes... I am in a position where it wouldn't be a disaster to hose the system (/home on separate partition, good backups etc) but since it seems it will be *many* hours of work either way, better to take the slightly more supported route. Alsom, FTR, I've learned that the biggest hurdle is the fact that you can't complete the debootstrap process without already running a 64bit kernel. You need to be able to chroot into the new install and run *its* binaries to complete the process. That means you need a 64bit kernel running already. Anyway... it will still be plenty of fun. A
Attachment:
signature.asc
Description: Digital signature