Fedora Linux May Further Demote i686 Support

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Fedora Linux May Further Demote i686 Support

Fedora Linux developers are looking at further demoting i686 hardware support by making bugs pertaining to x86 32-bit not release blockers...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Fedora-i686-Non-Blocking

[wargames]

Yes, please.

[scottishduck]

A wise decision really. Fedora no longer ships any graphics drivers for older systems and it would be fair to assume that anything with supported drivers has a 64-bit CPU.

[milkylainen]

Way to early to demote regular x86 (stop saying i686...).
I still think anything regarding the platform x86 is release blockers.

[r1348]

Way to early to demote regular x86 (stop saying i686...).
AMD started producing 64-bit CPUs around the 2003-2004 shift and Intel perhaps a year later in full scale.
I still think hardware from that era is fully capable to do everyday stuff with.
I recently purchased a Broadwell (what a piece of shit btw) machine to replace my aging, but perfectly functional Penryn from 2007.
While Penryn has x86_64, it is not that far from the cutoff line.
Stick 4G RAM in a x86 machine which does not gobble RAM like x86_64 and you have a perfectly functional day-to-day machine.
It's not like it's a big chore to keep regular x86 distros around.
A lot of people in the world don't have access to recent hardware.
Even if you have x86_64 but only have 4G RAM, you'd still be better off in 32-bit mode because of cache and memory hogging as compared to 64-bit.
Raw execution speed would suffer but you would gain in RAM and cache contention.

Well I scrapped my Penryn laptop last year too, but I always ran x86_64 on it. 4Gb of RAM, I don't remember it swapping even once. If your workload requires lots of RAM, you're better off on x86_64 anyway, and it's been like that since 5 years at least. Considering I can run 32bit binaries on 64bit systems anyway (I'm looking at you, steam...) I really don't see the point in wasting further development time for a legacy platform only a tiny fraction of users still use.

[mark45]

Burn i686 with fire then beat it over the head with a rubber dildo!

[duby229]

Yeah this should have been done in like 2006.. There wouldn't be any game studios or software developers still releasing 32bit binaries today if this move was made when it should have been. I still think i686 should still be supported, but only for hardware that isn't 64bit like Athlon XP and P4 and such.

[adler187]

Way to early to demote regular x86 (stop saying i686...).
I still think anything regarding the platform x86 is release blockers.

In all these discussions about dropping i386 support (like so many other things in life), it always comes down to cost (Are there resources to support this architecture fully?) vs benefit (How many users will benefit from this investment?). Josh Boyer doesn't think the cost is worth the benefit; you seem to disagree. Fedora is a community project, so unless they're working on it on behalf of their employer and their employer is telling them what to work on, Fedora developers are free to do whatever they like. If enough developers feel it's in Fedora's best interest to drop i386, they can.

If you don't like this, too bad. Either become a developer, pay someone else to become a developer to do what you want, or move to a different distro that caters to your needs. I'm sure as more mainstream distros drop i386 support, we'll see more speciality distros pop up to service that need (probably some even based on Fedora).

Don't get me wrong, I think that supporting i386 is certainly needed for the next 5 years or so especially for the developing world, but I don't think that Fedora, Ubuntu, openSUSE, or other mainstream distros need to necessarily shoulder this burden. Not every distro needs to cater to all users.

[gens]

so much hate from idiots

x86 != i686
and no, there is no reason to drop i686
there is no reason to drop x86 as some things work better on x86 (you go make everyone use x32 if you'r so smart)
not that it matters 'cuz nobody is forcing you asses to install x86 instead of amd64


dropping x86 would be just plain stupid
for one there are many people in poorer countries that can't afford amd64 hardware
(bringing internet to africa is important, for political, social, as well as economical reasons)
for the other x86 uses less power in some operating cases

EDIT:
to add
blocker bugs, like the one listed, won't slow down the progress of OSS
it would just delay the release by a few days, that would be good for fedora in particular

[duby229]

so much hate from idiots

x86 != i686
and no, there is no reason to drop i686
there is no reason to drop x86 as some things work better on x86 (you go make everyone use x32 if you'r so smart)
not that it matters 'cuz nobody is forcing you asses to install x86 instead of amd64


dropping x86 would be just plain stupid
for one there are many people in poorer countries that can't afford amd64 hardware
(bringing internet to africa is important, for political, social, as well as economical reasons)
for the other x86 uses less power in some operating cases

What I think should happen is if you have a 64bit CPU then it should have to be a 64bit OS. But if you are on a 32bit CPU then it should obviously have to be a 32bit OS. I don't think there should be any 32bit or 16bit modes at all and that it should only have a compatibility context for running 32bit binaries on a 64bit kernel + userspace.

It's people just like you that are the reason why game studios and everybody else refuse to release 64bit binaries. If you really want to run a 32bit OS, then I'm sure you can find a P4 in a dumpster somewhere.

EDIT: Who cares? It doesn't matter about cache misses so much. Cache sizes are going to continue increasing. DUH!