[LAU] Bye Bye 32 bit

[Len Ovens]

On Tue, 26 Dec 2017, Will Godfrey wrote:

> It seems everyone is dropping support for 32 bit machines these days - including
> a number of Linux distros.

Which is a bummer... but it looks like Ubuntu lts (18.04) will have a 32 
bit option which will stay around as long as the lts. (but don't quote me 
on that) I have 3 (or 4) 32 bit machines here and the thing is they seem 
to be from a time when things were made to last a bit longer. (I have over 
10year old PATA drives in them) Actually I have a 1998 NEC that still runs 
around here too, but it is pretty slow.

> It makes me wonder how long it will be before single core machines go the same
> way. Has anyone seen any hint of that yet?

The only single core machines I have are 32 bit, but I don't see single vs 
multicore being the same problem. For a distro 64 vs 32 bit means two 
kernels and two complete software sets. I don't know of any sw that 
requires multicore, and there is no second set of sw required for it 
either. so there is no real push to switch people over to multicore.

In other words the 32 bit thing is to gain more room without adding more 
drives. I am sure people have been looking at how many people download 
32bit images and feel it is not worth the upkeep. Lubuntu will continue to 
support 32bit machines, but I expect that they will not be able to keep 
the whole 32bit eco system up to date... so audio software and other 
specialized software will likely vanish in the 32 bit form. 32bit single 
core machines seem to do audio very well and so that will leave a hole for 
sure. I think some people are running FW interfaces in this way too.

However, if they keep the kernel going and most basic libs, one can always 
build anything else.

--
Len Ovens
www.ovenwerks.net