On Fri, Jul 16, 2004 at 05:16:10AM +0200, Goswin von Brederlow wrote: [Big snip - Raul Miller wrote] > > If we release an amd64 in sarge, we're committing to supporting it. > > If the current port paints us into a corner, that's a good reason to > > not start supporting it yet. > > [Goswin replied] > No, the only thing referencing lib or lib64 is the ld.so. Because of > that existing i386 binaries work with /emul/i386-linux/lib under ia64 > or amd64 already. That placement of libraries can change at any time > without even a special transition (like the c102 names). Binaries need > not be recompiled for this change. > <much useful stuff snipped> > Actually getting amd64 into sarge means that we will have a wide range > of packages available and ready for use with multiarch when that takes > off. Multiarch could be backported to stable and used alongside the > pure64 debs. > > >> The *reality* is that KDE and Gnome aren't the things people are going > >> to need chroot'd, it's things like Oracle (though I've heard even they > >> have an AMD64 version now, though I've heard nothing of a PowerPC one), > >> commercial compilers and other closed-source/binary things. This long post (in a long thread) sums up a couple of problems in support and stuff for amd64. I'm being asked NOW for advice and help by a couple of colleagues who are planning for a potential AMD64 cluster. They haven't bought the hardware yet but are being very sensible and specifying the libraries and applications they want from the cluster vendor (mostly math / physics libraries): they are not explicitly specifying a distribution. They keep asking me - "Is <foo> library / binary available in Linux" and seem surprised when I say "Not in Red Hat Enterprise Linux (or SuSE as far as I know) but it is in Debian" I run a tiny cluster for testing on 32 bit: they know I'm a Debian zealot but they thought all Linux was the same. It isn't :)
I need to convince enterprise bean counters that 64 bit Linux is a valid idea. They'll probably want to buy Red Hat in any event- but probably don't know the extent of the support they'll get outside the base operating system. [I can't imagine RH supporting GMP library problems with enthusiasm, for example]. Pure64 seems to me to be an ideal solution in the short -> medium term: being 64 bit only will probably save the mathematicians the trouble of one more variable quantity :) Can we _please_ stop the arguments: some (few) people need 64 bit Debian _now_ on AMD64. Please put amd64 pure64 into sid ASAP: flag it as the interim solution till sarge+1 / sarge+2 and multiarch. That way, it stands a chance of reaching testing by Sept/October ready for sarge point release whenever :) Just my 0.02 <insert monetary units here> Running Debian on 0.0001 of a decent sized cluster here :) Andy -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
