Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-06-07 Thread Lisandro Damián Nicanor Pérez Meyer
Hi, late on the thread, but... On Tue, 30 May 2023 at 19:51, Diederik de Haas wrote: > > [Please CC me in replies as I'm not subscribed to this list] > > I hope I'm not too late for this discussion ... > > Steve McIntyre wrote: > > Luca Boccassi wrote: > > >On Fri, 19 May 2023 at 12:42, Steve

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-06-02 Thread Diederik de Haas
On Friday, 2 June 2023 20:59:27 CEST Wouter Verhelst wrote: > "complain on -devel" is not part of the job That wasn't my intend, but I obviously horribly failed at that. Won't happen again o/ signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-06-02 Thread Wouter Verhelst
On Wed, May 31, 2023 at 11:24:15PM +0200, Diederik de Haas wrote: > On Wed May 31, 2023 at 12:44 PM CEST, Wouter Verhelst wrote: [...] > > 20+ year old machines are typically more power hungry, more expensive, > > less performant, and less reliable than an up-to-date raspberry pi. If > > you want

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-06-02 Thread nick black
Adam Borowski left as an exercise for the reader: > Instead of RasPis as suggested by many in this thread, I'd instead suggest > whatever is the current model of Odroid-H2+: I was intrigued, but https://ameridroid.com/products/odroid-h2 suggests it's been out of stock since 2021? -- nick black

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-06-01 Thread Adam Borowski
On Wed, May 31, 2023 at 10:10:56PM +, Andrew M.A. Cater wrote: > As someone who owned and happily used an Asus eePC several years ago: very > nice, silent - it also had a flash disk from the earliest days of flash disks. Instead of RasPis as suggested by many in this thread, I'd instead

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-06-01 Thread Theodore Ts'o
On Wed, May 31, 2023 at 12:51:06AM +0200, Diederik de Haas wrote: > > I would be VERY disappointed if Debian would abandon people who do NOT have > the means to just buy new equipment whenever they feel like it. Debian is a Do-ocracy. Which is to say, it's a volunteer project. People work on

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-31 Thread Paul Wise
On Wed, 2023-05-31 at 00:51 +0200, Diederik de Haas wrote: > I would be VERY disappointed if Debian would abandon people who do NOT have > the means to just buy new equipment whenever they feel like it. There are Debian contributors who are in this position (although perhaps not with i386

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-31 Thread Andrew M.A. Cater
On Wed, May 31, 2023 at 11:24:15PM +0200, Diederik de Haas wrote: > On Wed May 31, 2023 at 12:44 PM CEST, Wouter Verhelst wrote: > > On Wed, May 31, 2023 at 12:51:06AM +0200, Diederik de Haas wrote: > My point is: what about people who don't have the option to *buy* > anything (new or used), for

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-31 Thread Diederik de Haas
On Wed May 31, 2023 at 12:44 PM CEST, Wouter Verhelst wrote: > On Wed, May 31, 2023 at 12:51:06AM +0200, Diederik de Haas wrote: > > While it may be a no-brainer for a person with a $/€ 1000 a month residual > > income to just buy new hardware whenever they feel like it, that is not the > >

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-31 Thread Ansgar
On Wed, 2023-05-31 at 19:48 +0100, Wookey wrote: > On 2023-05-31 07:29 -0500, John Goerzen wrote: > > > > Hanging on to systems using power-hungry chips from 20 years ago instead > > > of > > > intercepting a system such as this is not reducing the number of computers > > > that end up in the

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-31 Thread Wookey
On 2023-05-31 07:29 -0500, John Goerzen wrote: > > Hanging on to systems using power-hungry chips from 20 years ago instead of > > intercepting a system such as this is not reducing the number of computers > > that end up in the waste stream, it just keeps you stuck with a more > > power-hungry

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-31 Thread Gunnar Wolf
John Goerzen dijo [Wed, May 31, 2023 at 07:29:38AM -0500]: > (...) > I guess the question is: is this use case too niche for Debian to > continue supporting? I would suggest that as long as we have 32-bit > ARM, are the challenges for 32-bit x86 really worse? Do note, however, the ARM64 started

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-31 Thread Gunnar Wolf
Alexandre Detiste dijo [Wed, May 31, 2023 at 01:00:42PM +0200]: > Le mer. 31 mai 2023 à 12:44, Wouter Verhelst a écrit : > > 20+ year old machines are typically more power hungry, more expensive, > > less performant, and less reliable than an up-to-date raspberry pi. > > Embedded systems and

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-31 Thread Sven Hoexter
On Wed, May 31, 2023 at 07:29:38AM -0500, John Goerzen wrote: Hi, > I guess the question is: is this use case too niche for Debian to > continue supporting? I would suggest that as long as we have 32-bit > ARM, are the challenges for 32-bit x86 really worse? If I assume for a moment that the

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-31 Thread Sven Hoexter
On Wed, May 31, 2023 at 01:00:42PM +0200, Alexandre Detiste wrote: Hi, > Embedded systems and medical one can be crazily expensive to maintain > and even more to replace but some will run on i386 for a long time more The question is: Is that a target for a future Debian installation and/or a

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-31 Thread John Goerzen
On Tue, May 30 2023, Steve Langasek wrote: > For businesses, the transition from 32-bit to 64-bit was several > depreciation cycles ago. > > In my city, there is a non-profit that accepts donations of old computers, > refurbishes them, installs Linux, and both sells them and provides them free >

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-31 Thread Alexandre Detiste
Le mer. 31 mai 2023 à 12:44, Wouter Verhelst a écrit : > 20+ year old machines are typically more power hungry, more expensive, > less performant, and less reliable than an up-to-date raspberry pi. Embedded systems and medical one can be crazily expensive to maintain and even more to replace but

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-31 Thread Wouter Verhelst
On Wed, May 31, 2023 at 12:51:06AM +0200, Diederik de Haas wrote: > While it may be a no-brainer for a person with a $/€ 1000 a month residual > income to just buy new hardware whenever they feel like it, that is not the > case for everyone. [...] > It's absolutely true that modern machines are

Re: Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-31 Thread James Addison
If there's a well-supported social or technical reason to remove the i386 Debian installer, I think that it would still be disappointing, but acceptable. I don't know what those reasons are yet (I've imagined that they could be maintainer burden -- but as mentioned, I don't think there's much

Re: Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-30 Thread Johannes Schauer Marin Rodrigues
Hi, Quoting Diederik de Haas (2023-05-31 00:51:06) > > If people have strong opinions about that plan, let us know please. > > I have *strong* opinions about this. > > https://lists.debian.org/debian-kernel/2023/01/msg00372.html was a message/ > plea to not forget about supporting OLD systems.

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-30 Thread Steve Langasek
On Wed, May 31, 2023 at 12:51:06AM +0200, Diederik de Haas wrote: > > >+1 for stopping publishing installers for i386, it has been mentioned > > >many times but it's always worth repeating: electricity costs to keep > > >running i386 hardware are already way higher than what it costs to buy > > >a

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-30 Thread Diederik de Haas
[Please CC me in replies as I'm not subscribed to this list] I hope I'm not too late for this discussion ... Steve McIntyre wrote: > Luca Boccassi wrote: > >On Fri, 19 May 2023 at 12:42, Steve McIntyre wrote: > >> I'm planning on stopping publishing installer images for i386 > >> soon. Why? We

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-25 Thread James Addison
On Fri, 26 May 2023 at 00:27, Roger Lynn wrote: > > On 21/05/2023 07:00, James Addison wrote: > > On Fri, 19 May 2023 at 22:58, Ansgar wrote: > >> One of the problems with popcon is that it draws too much attention to > >> old releases which isn't really interesting when talking about future >

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-25 Thread Roger Lynn
On 21/05/2023 07:00, James Addison wrote: > On Fri, 19 May 2023 at 22:58, Ansgar wrote: >> One of the problems with popcon is that it draws too much attention to >> old releases which isn't really interesting when talking about future >> developments. If one looks at arch usage per release (as

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-22 Thread Jonathan Carter
Hi Simon On 2023/05/19 17:30, Simon McVittie wrote: 1. same as in recent Ubuntu: just enough packages (mostly libraries) to configure it as a multiarch foreign architecture on an amd64 system, and run legacy Linux i386 binaries directly or legacy Windows i386 binaries via Wine 2.

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-20 Thread James Addison
On Fri, 19 May 2023 at 22:58, Ansgar wrote: > > On Fri, 2023-05-19 at 19:40 +0100, James Addison wrote: > > Do we know how often the i386 installer is downloaded compared to > > amd64, and could/should we start with updated messaging where those > > are provided before removing users' ability to

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-20 Thread James Addison
On Sat, 20 May 2023 at 09:39, Cyril Brulebois wrote:> > James Addison (2023-05-20): > > Replying individually, but may bring this back on-list depending on > > what I learn: > > > > On Sat, 20 May 2023 at 06:00, Cyril Brulebois wrote: > > > > > > If you're concerned about the impact of no

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Cyril Brulebois
(2-in-1 reply.) Ansgar (2023-05-19): > On Fri, 2023-05-19 at 20:57 +0200, Bjørn Mork wrote: > > Hmm.  I find the netboot installer archives very useful for rescue > > purposes.  This sometimes involves PC hardware too old for amd64. I > > PXE booted a 20+ year old laptop with no DVD/CD drive

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Ansgar
On Fri, 2023-05-19 at 19:40 +0100, James Addison wrote: > Do we know how often the i386 installer is downloaded compared to > amd64, and could/should we start with updated messaging where those > are provided before removing users' ability to install on their > systems? > > (i386 remains the

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Bjørn Mork
Ansgar writes: > On Fri, 2023-05-19 at 20:57 +0200, Bjørn Mork wrote: >> Hmm.  I find the netboot installer archives very useful for rescue >> purposes.  This sometimes involves PC hardware too old for amd64. I PXE >> booted a 20+ year old laptop with no DVD/CD drive (Compaq Evo N410c - CD >>

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Ansgar
On Fri, 2023-05-19 at 20:57 +0200, Bjørn Mork wrote: > Hmm.  I find the netboot installer archives very useful for rescue > purposes.  This sometimes involves PC hardware too old for amd64. I PXE > booted a 20+ year old laptop with no DVD/CD drive (Compaq Evo N410c - CD > drive was part of the

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Bjørn Mork
Steve McIntyre writes: > I had been thinking about doing similar for installer images too, but > with other work going on too I think it got too late in the cycle to > make that change. My plan is therefore to ship i386 installer images > for bookworm as normal (including bookworm point releases

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread James Addison
On Fri, 19 May 2023 at 12:42, Steve McIntyre wrote: > > I'm planning on stopping publishing installer images for i386 > soon. Why? We should be strongly encouraging users to move away from > it as a main architecture. If they're still installing i386 on 64-bit > hardware, then that's a horrible

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Michael Biebl
Am 19.05.23 um 19:23 schrieb Cyril Brulebois: Hi, Andrew M.A. Cater (2023-05-19): I'd honestly suggest *just* publishing DVD1 for i386. Netinst requires internet access: DVD1 can be used to install a basic system without this. Scrap *everything else* for i386 installation media. I'm not

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Guillem Jover
Hi! On Fri, 2023-05-19 at 12:42:32 +0100, Steve McIntyre wrote: > Guillem Jover wrote: > >On Thu, 2023-05-18 at 12:01:40 -0700, Steve Langasek wrote: > >> > […], I'm also dubious about this, and introduces a special case > >> > and complexity that does not seem warranted TBH. If this was the case

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Steve McIntyre
Steve Langasek wrote: > >On Fri, May 19, 2023 at 12:42:32PM +0100, Steve McIntyre wrote: >> >If the main reason is to support non-free binaries, at least to me >> >that does not seem like a very compelling reason. And people can >> >always use old chroots or similar I guess? > >> i386 is in a

partial support for i386 (Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal))

2023-05-19 Thread Michael Biebl
Am 19.05.23 um 17:30 schrieb Simon McVittie: On Fri, 19 May 2023 at 09:19:35 -0500, G. Branden Robinson wrote: 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 see four levels of support that we

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Steve McIntyre
Andrew Cater wrote: >On Fri, May 19, 2023 at 03:03:40PM +0100, Steve McIntyre wrote: >> >> I had been thinking about doing similar for installer images too, but >> with other work going on too I think it got too late in the cycle to >> make that change. My plan is therefore to ship i386 installer

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Steve McIntyre
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

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Cyril Brulebois
Hi, Andrew M.A. Cater (2023-05-19): > I'd honestly suggest *just* publishing DVD1 for i386. > > Netinst requires internet access: DVD1 can be used to install a basic > system without this. Scrap *everything else* for i386 installation media. I'm not sure how dropping one netinst ISO is going

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Andrew M.A. Cater
On Fri, May 19, 2023 at 03:03:40PM +0100, Steve McIntyre wrote: > Luca Boccassi wrote: > >On Fri, 19 May 2023 at 12:42, Steve McIntyre wrote: > >> > >> I'm planning on stopping publishing installer images for i386 > >> soon. Why? We should be strongly encouraging users to move away from > >> it

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Steve Langasek
On Fri, May 19, 2023 at 04:30:56PM +0100, Simon McVittie wrote: > On Fri, 19 May 2023 at 09:19:35 -0500, G. Branden Robinson wrote: > > 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 see four

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Steve Langasek
On Fri, May 19, 2023 at 09:19:35AM -0500, G. Branden Robinson wrote: > I think simulation of 32-bit x86 will get _more_ important as year 2038 > approaches, not less, because in about 2037, people will suddenly notice > they need to test things before deployment. Ah but if Debian doesn't support

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Steve Langasek
On Fri, May 19, 2023 at 12:42:32PM +0100, Steve McIntyre wrote: > >If the main reason is to support non-free binaries, at least to me > >that does not seem like a very compelling reason. And people can > >always use old chroots or similar I guess? > i386 is in a really awkward situation here, I

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Johannes Schauer Marin Rodrigues
Hi, Quoting G. Branden Robinson (2023-05-19 16:19:35) > > If people have strong opinions about that plan, let us know please. > > 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

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Simon McVittie
On Fri, 19 May 2023 at 09:19:35 -0500, G. Branden Robinson wrote: > 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 see four levels of support that we could reasonably have for i386: 1. same as in

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread G. Branden Robinson
At 2023-05-19T15:32:40+0100, Colin Watson wrote: > 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

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Colin Watson
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 >

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread G. Branden Robinson
At 2023-05-19T15:03:40+0100, Steve McIntyre wrote: > Luca Boccassi wrote: > >+1 for stopping publishing installers for i386, it has been mentioned > >many times but it's always worth repeating: electricity costs to keep > >running i386 hardware are already way higher than what it costs to > >buy a

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Steve McIntyre
Luca Boccassi wrote: >On Fri, 19 May 2023 at 12:42, Steve McIntyre wrote: >> >> I'm planning on stopping publishing installer images for i386 >> soon. Why? We should be strongly encouraging users to move away from >> it as a main architecture. If they're still installing i386 on 64-bit >>

Re: i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Luca Boccassi
On Fri, 19 May 2023 at 12:42, Steve McIntyre wrote: > > Guillem Jover wrote: > >On Thu, 2023-05-18 at 12:01:40 -0700, Steve Langasek wrote: > > ... > > >> > > * … but NOT on i386. Because i386 as an architecture is primarily of > >> > > interest for running legacy binaries which cannot be

i386 in the future (was Re: 64-bit time_t transition for 32-bit archs: a proposal)

2023-05-19 Thread Steve McIntyre
Guillem Jover wrote: >On Thu, 2023-05-18 at 12:01:40 -0700, Steve Langasek wrote: ... >> > > * … but NOT on i386.  Because i386 as an architecture is primarily of >> > > interest for running legacy binaries which cannot be rebuilt against a >> > > new >> > > ABI, changing the ABI on i386