Re: instalation issue
Ron Johnson put forth on 3/15/2010 5:07 PM:
> On 2010-03-15 16:47, Stan Hoeppner wrote:
>> Ron Johnson put forth on 3/15/2010 4:11 PM:
>>
>>> Because of the way that AMD designed the specification, it's possible to
>>> install a 64-bit kernel onto a 32-bit system.
>>
>> You wanna take another stab at that statement Ron?
>
> Nope.
>
> $ uname -m
> x86_64
>
> $ file /bin/bash
> /bin/bash: ELF 32-bit LSB executable, Intel 80386, version 1 (SYSV),
> dynamically linked (uses shared libs), for GNU/Linux 2.6.18,
> stripped
>
> $ apt-cache show linux-image-2.6.33-2-amd64 | grep ^Architecture
> Architecture: i386
>
>
>> Methinks you were suffering momentary thought dyslexia. ;)
>>
>
> Nope. The AMD engineers who designed that architecture had true
> forethought.
Yes, they did, to an extent, but it wasn't akin to leaping tall buildings in
a single bound. If I'm reading your original statement correctly, I don't
think you really understand what that forethought was.
Just to make sure I'm reading your original statement correctly, and that
we're talking about the same thing here, when you state "32-bit system" in
your original statement above, are you referring to the hardware, or are you
referring to replacing a 32 bit kernel on an existing 32 bit Linux
distribution installation with a 64 bit kernel?
If the former, you're smoking crack because it's physically not possible.
If the latter, you're giving credit to the wrong folks, and backing your
statement with a non-applicable reason. The vast majority of the credit for
running 32 bit user space programs on top a 64 bit kernel goes to the Linux
kernel developer community, not the x86-64 engineers. I think you're
attributing a bit of originality to these guys that doesn't apply. A decade
before the x86-64 extensions were conceived and implemented, Alpha, MIPS,
SPARC, and PowerPC engineers did essentially the same thing. In fact, many
Alpha engineers, including AMD's current CEO Dirk Meyer, went to work for
AMD after Compaq bought DEC and killed the Alpha off. Ideas that went into
the 64 bit Alpha implementation were incorporated into x64-64. The concept
wasn't new. The "forethought" occurred a decade earlier when Meyer et al
designed the 21064, which, coincidentally, had to run the 32 bit VAX
instruction set in emulation. All of that experience played a big role in
designing x86-64.
--
Stan
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