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Re: About i386 support

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  Re: About i386 support Ansgar 🙀 <ansgar@43-1.org> - 2024-05-20 13:50 +0200
    Re: About i386 support Paul Gevers <elbrus@debian.org> - 2024-05-20 22:20 +0200
      Re: About i386 support Leandro Cunha <leandrocunha016@gmail.com> - 2024-05-20 22:30 +0200
        Re: About i386 support Andrey Rakhmatullin <wrar@debian.org> - 2024-05-20 23:20 +0200
          Re: About i386 support Leandro Cunha <leandrocunha016@gmail.com> - 2024-05-21 00:20 +0200
            Re: About i386 support Andrey Rakhmatullin <wrar@debian.org> - 2024-05-21 08:40 +0200
              Re: About i386 support Leandro Cunha <leandrocunha016@gmail.com> - 2024-05-21 10:40 +0200

#111834 — Re: About i386 support

Hi,

On Sun, 2024-05-19 at 10:30 -0500, rhys@neoquasar.org wrote:
> I have an N270 system I can use to contribute, if someone is willing
> to explain what I need to do to make it useful. 
> 
> From: Victor Gamper <victor@wenzeslaus.de>
> Sent: Sunday, May 19, 2024 08:03
> To: debian-devel@lists.debian.org
> Subject: Re: About i386 support
> 
> I believe I could swap out the processor on my T60,
> however, I'd both need to have that processor and
> make sure that it is actually possible. It still would
> not really make sense on a platform that only supports
> 3G of physical RAM.
> 
> Anyways, if the only reason why i386 cd images are not
> supported anymore is the lack of contributors,
> I'd be willing to contribute in that area, if it's possible.

If you look at https://release.debian.org/testing/arch_qualify.html
there is at least several things that can be done:

1. Add CPU security mitigations to Linux kernel.
2. Address builds reaching address limit. There were ideas to use
foreign-arch (amd64) compilers to do so.
3. Look at other arch-specific issues (porter); this can also include
baseline violations and other issues for real i386 hardware.

It is also possible to work on finding funding and asking someone else
to do this. I've no idea how much that would cost, but let's say a few
10k USD.

Which leads to the problem: most people who want this, seem to want to
continue to use old hardware (T60, N270). However, continuing to
support i386 has likely costs much higher than the replacement cost of
said hardware... Which is probably why nobody really seems sufficiently
motivated to actually invest resources. (Or do you?)

Ansgar

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#111839

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Hi,

On 20-05-2024 4:50 p.m., Ben Hutchings wrote:
> There is a tension here between the interests of (a) users that want to
> run proprietary i386 binaries on 64-bit CPUs, and (b) those who want to
> keep using 32-bit CPUs.  If i386 is meant for group (a) then the
> baseline should be raised to include the features that 64-bit CPUs
> provide, but if it's also for group (b) then this mustn't happen.

The Release Team expects the Debian i386 official port to go to (a).

Paul, wearing his Release Team hat.

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#111841

Hello,

On Mon, May 20, 2024 at 5:15 PM Paul Gevers <elbrus@debian.org> wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> On 20-05-2024 4:50 p.m., Ben Hutchings wrote:
> > There is a tension here between the interests of (a) users that want to
> > run proprietary i386 binaries on 64-bit CPUs, and (b) those who want to
> > keep using 32-bit CPUs.  If i386 is meant for group (a) then the
> > baseline should be raised to include the features that 64-bit CPUs
> > provide, but if it's also for group (b) then this mustn't happen.
>
> The Release Team expects the Debian i386 official port to go to (a).
>
> Paul, wearing his Release Team hat.

LOL, I hope so too...
However, the future stable version will feature RISC-V (at least it's
expected), which is good news. The end of support for 32 bits will not
affect the lives of almost anyone who has machines purchased after
2011 and who bought them after that, which I know was the year I
bought a machine starting to use Debian 1 year later. Another
interesting development that is underway and is inherent to the topic
would be the time_t transition (the 2038 problem).

-- 
Cheers,
Leandro Cunha

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#111843

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On Mon, May 20, 2024 at 10:57:58PM +0200, William Bonnet wrote:
> > which is good news. The end of support for 32 bits will not
> > affect the lives of almost anyone who has machines purchased after
> > 2011 and who bought them after that
> 
> Does this also mean he support for armhf will be dropped ?
There is no "end of support for 32 bits" yet so no.


-- 
WBR, wRAR

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#111844

On Mon, May 20, 2024 at 6:11 PM Andrey Rakhmatullin <wrar@debian.org> wrote:
>
> On Mon, May 20, 2024 at 10:57:58PM +0200, William Bonnet wrote:
> > > which is good news. The end of support for 32 bits will not
> > > affect the lives of almost anyone who has machines purchased after
> > > 2011 and who bought them after that
> >
> > Does this also mean he support for armhf will be dropped ?
> There is no "end of support for 32 bits" yet so no.
>
>
> --
> WBR, wRAR

When you refer to 32 bits you are referring to i386 (see the subject),
they are different architectures.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I386

-- 
Cheers,
Leandro Cunha

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#111851

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On Mon, May 20, 2024 at 07:16:54PM -0300, Leandro Cunha wrote:
> > > > which is good news. The end of support for 32 bits will not
> > > > affect the lives of almost anyone who has machines purchased after
> > > > 2011 and who bought them after that
> > >
> > > Does this also mean he support for armhf will be dropped ?
> > There is no "end of support for 32 bits" yet so no.
> When you refer to 32 bits you are referring to i386 (see the subject),
No, please don't, this confuses people.

-- 
WBR, wRAR

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#111854

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Andrey,

On Tue, May 21, 2024 at 3:31 AM Andrey Rakhmatullin <wrar@debian.org> wrote:
>
> On Mon, May 20, 2024 at 07:16:54PM -0300, Leandro Cunha wrote:
> > > > > which is good news. The end of support for 32 bits will not
> > > > > affect the lives of almost anyone who has machines purchased after
> > > > > 2011 and who bought them after that
> > > >
> > > > Does this also mean he support for armhf will be dropped ?
> > > There is no "end of support for 32 bits" yet so no.
> > When you refer to 32 bits you are referring to i386 (see the subject),
> No, please don't, this confuses people.
>
> --
> WBR, wRAR

I agree that it can be confusing, but I mentioned that we are
specifically talking about this architecture (i386) that is in the
subject of the email and to avoid confusion.

--
Cheers,
Leandro Cunha

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