The future of 32-bit support

[wilcal]

Mageia is in the process of putting together the features and functions of M7.

https://wiki.mageia.org/en/Category:ProposedFeatureMageia7

One question that's been coming up for quite some time is support for 32-bit. While Mageia, and it’s predecessors, have long supported 32-bit it’s becoming increasingly difficult to do so. I myself took my last 32-bit platforms to the recycler few weeks ago. We have an outstanding bug for an upgrade of the nvidia driver and it seems that no one in QA has an official 32-bit nvidia equipped hardware platform to test it on. While installing a 32-bit iso a on 64-bit platform is a partial work around is that all we have left?

My proposal is to point out that at least for the next release there will be a 32-bit net install boot.iso available. Some folks are promoting continued publishing of at least a light weight GUI like Xfce in 32-bit format.

Please share your thoughts. Thanks

[wintpe]

I had the same problem at work with people still needing 32 bit support, and so i ended that with not offering it on redhat 6 as none of our hardware is 32 bit.
but then i think about a few people who have old laptops that they still hang onto for sitting and browsing while watching TV. One of my neighbors does exactly that and i keep telling her to get a tablet.
You will often see me adding a footnote to any linux discussion about slowness, not to think of modern linux versions as a way to rekindle use out of something that used to run windows XP, and wont work with windows 7. there's also a chance its too slow for a nice experience on linux.
people, take a look on ebay, there are so many 64 bit motherboards out there with chips, and graphics cards, that will cost you next to nothing, that will upgrade your current internals of your PC, someone in your friends/family must be technical enough to do it, even my sister can do it, and shes had no technical training at all.
and then of course there's ARM. Its probably true to say that ARM is now more powerful then a fast 32 bit processor.
So while i dont want to make people who still have old HW feel unloved, I do want to help them to get something newer so that the burden of support on our dev/test team is reduced.
I personalty fully support abandoning 32 bit.
maybe as a result we can create another section in the forum upgrading your hardware, I know many on here could act as validators for people who are not sure what will work together.
And ill happily look at any ebay item for someone if they are not sure if its a good choice, or look at there existing PC via pictures/spec to see what it can upgrade with. If you want my creds on that ive built over a 1000 PC;s and have a background in electronics.
regards peter

[wilcal]

Note: One of the positions for continuing support for 32-bit is that it creates a light weight Vbox client who's purpose can be a very focused application.

[Germ]

Well, I'm hoping 32-bit support continues for a while.

My laptop and desktop are both 32-bit and I don't need or plan on replacing either one anytime soon.

[wilcal]

Well, I'm hoping 32-bit support continues for a while.

My laptop and desktop are both 32-bit and I don't need or plan on replacing either one anytime soon.

I don't see any intention of not supporting 32-bit on M7. IMO what we may see is the GUI is limited to just
something like Xfce. Also the 32-bit boot.iso is there. Maybe no Plasma 32-bit Live-DVD iso which we don't have now.
Just my sense of where this may be going. M8 may be an entire deal.

[marja]

I do still have, and use, a 32bit system that is incapable of running 64bit software, even if I live in a rich country. I hope that I won't have to switch to another distro to keep using it.

I'm sure there are still many users in "not rich" countries who still use very old hardware. If your family's total income is e.g. €200 a month, then you'll be happy with anything that's old and cheap and that still works.

Mageia 4.1 had to be released, because Mageia 4 contained a bug (which affected my old system, too) which made it impossible for half of our Russian users (and probably users from many other countries, too) to install Mga4. It hadn't affected the newer hardware of any of our testers.

I wasn't surprised when I read Dave's mail:

Subject: [qa-discuss] Mageia 6 download stats
Date: Fri, 15 Sep 2017 10:49:57 -0400
From: "David W. Hodgins" (via qa-discuss Mailing List) <qa-discuss@ml.mageia.org>
Reply-to: qa-discuss@ml.mageia.org
To: qa-discuss@ml.mageia.org

While we have no way of keeping track of how many downloads there are for each of the iso images (no access to stats from mirrors, etc.), here
are some stats from torrent after seeding for 54 days.

Again, this is only what I've seen from my system, so may not be similar
to overall stats. The share ratios vary from 6.70 to 10.22 ...

x86_64 10.22
Xfce_i586 9.02
Plasma-x86_64 8.96
GNOME-x86_64 8.08
Xfce_x86_64 7.06
i586 6.70

At the start, I was expecting there to be very few requests for i586, and
for the x86_64 iso to be the most downloaded. I was surprised by how
little difference there is between the various iso images.

Regards, Dave Hodgins

[wintpe]

I do have a 32 bit complete system board sitting on the desk (not 32 bit capable)
and my backup system has a 32 bit atom board that i run rel6/32 on that i might upgrade to one of the many 64 bit spare boards i have.
that will leave me two complete 32 bit boards that i can use to test 32 bit.
now that i see the stats i too think theres a need for at least a base 32 bit, that can be built up with online packages.
regards peter

[Germ]

...i too think theres a need for at least a base 32 bit, that can be built up with online packages....

Won't work for me. I'm on a slow dial-up connection. Only affordable option I have out here in the sticks... (very rural area)

[wilcal]

i too think theres a need for at least a base 32 bit, that can be built up with online packages.

Could that be as simple as continuing to publish a net install iso ( Mageia-6-netinstall-i586.iso)?
But no Live-DVD or Classic Installer isos.

[wintpe]

ive dusted off my last 32 bit machine, an asus termination DDR with an athlon 2400.

its got theSiS 740/SiS 962L, so pretty obscure, but common in 2002 when i bought it.

i installed and updated mageia 6 last night on it, ill try to keep updating it and reporting any issues to the testing team.

and ill start installing mga7 as soon as they release a alpha dvd.

seems to perform relatively well, took an hour to install, and about 15 mins to update.

regards peter

[wilcal]

i installed and updated mageia 6 last night on it, ill try to keep updating it and reporting any issues to the testing team
and ill start installing mga7 as soon as they release a alpha dvd.
seems to perform relatively well, took an hour to install, and about 15 mins to update.

Kool. Keep that ole thing a going. )

I've got a Win 3.1 Laptop from the early 90's here that still boots to a working screen.
Paid $2000 for it.
Unfortunately Microsoft no longer issues updates for it. :-O

[benmc]

ill start installing mga7 as soon as they release a alpha dvd.

if you have a reasonable bandwidth available, you can likely upgrade to cauldron right now. (I did over the weekend).

gotchas:
1/ both recent upgrades to cauldron for me ( from Mga6 32 + 64) failed partway due to rpm database corruption. remove and rebuild rpm database.

2/ I run an all desktop install with about 9.8G /, install failed due to lack of space (I run separate /swap and /home). suggest a larger / if space available.

already logged 1 bug, but I am unable to devote a lot of time to it.

best regards

[wintpe]

im also unable to devote time to it, ill be running the lxde desktop, as nothing else is appropriate
for me and that screen.
ill update it as often as i update my 64 bits, and check what i can.

i can also use it to validate behavior that other people see so they know if its, just their install, or the distribution at fault.

regards peter

[Weatherlawyer]

A lot of cheap laptops are availabe I plan to give some away I would like to do so on Mageia systems I take it they wqill all be allowed acces to DVD players at the moment i am not allowed to use the Laptop I have, this may be due to a bug an I have not cleaned it from its windows system yet but I need to know that 32 bit will be carrying support for long enough to bother.

Thanks in advance

[sturmvogel]

Sorry, but it is really hard to understand what your question is. The lack of decent punctuation makes it really hard...Even with a translator i didn't get your actual question (and normaly i don't need a translator for english).

[papoteur]

Hello,
there is no plan to withdraw 32 bits support.

[JoesCat]

This might help @sturmvogel ...re-arranged some words from Weatherlawyer message.
(I have) a lot of cheap laptops available.
I plan to give away some of these cheap laptops.
I would like to do this running Mageia.
I take it they will all be allowed access to DVD players.
At the moment i cannot use the Laptop I have.
This may be due to a bug.
I have not cleaned it from using Windows system yet.
... but I need to know that Mageia will be carrying 32bit support for long enough for me to bother.

Thanks in advance
--------------
From my point of view, I will still like to see continued 32bit support - understandably, it will be more and more difficult with time as programs begin breaking the need for 32bit or more (example files and data larger than 2GB).

[Germ]

I certainly hope 32bit continues. My laptop and desktop are both 32bit. They do everything I need and I have no desire to replace them.

[JoesCat]

I see a lot of programs that use "int" without any real regard for the 32bit vs 64bit behaviours.
In 32bit, you have a positive value for 31bits, then it becomes a negative value.
This means, positive from zero up to 2GB minus 1 == 2147483648-1, then it flips to negative.
In 64bit, an int just keeps being positive for 63bits, so it's a positive value for a long way.
We went thought this sort of problem with 16bit going to 32bit.
You'd probably see it as when computers went from DOS with Windows3.1 went to Windows95.

Then there's also newer/nicer ways of doing things, which leaves older programs abandoned.
For example, right now I'm looking at two abandoned programs, and adding Desktop and some config lets them be visible by others outside of debian.
https://github.com/JoesCat/xball
https://github.com/JoesCat/xinv3d

...and then there's speed. Today's latest computers leave older slower computer in the dust.
Old programs used a DOS timer for speed control, but those old 16bit timers were too small for everyone's faster 32bit computers.
Now we see similar problems with older 32bit computers vs newer 64bit PCs.
For example, the xinv3d mentioned might work fine on your/mine 32bit PCs, but like the 16bit timer overflow, also suffers a similar problem too.
I suspect there may be a fix in xball that could be carried across into xinv3d, but fixes take time to find and fix.

When you see problems happening on your 32bit PC, it's worth mentioning it as upstream as you can - it only helps preserve your 32bit PC a bit further before we eventually need to upgrade out of necessity.

Happy Holidays Everyone!

[Germ]

This is embarrassing...

For some reason I decided to do some research. My laptop is 64bit. Intel Celeron 530....