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Re: Using i386 by mistake on 64-bit hardware [was Re: i386 in the future 32-bit archs: a proposal)]



On Sat, 20 May 2023 18:14:52 +0200, Adam Borowski <kilobyte@angband.pl> wrote:
> On Sat, May 20, 2023 at 09:15:00AM +0200, Josh Triplett wrote:
> > How easily could we add 64-bit system detection to the i386 installer,
> > and a message saying something like:
> > 
> > "You're installing the i386 architecture on a 64-bit system. While this
> > will work, this is the last release it'll be supported. We recommend
> > installing the 64-bit amd64 architecture instead.  
> 
> This is not a valid use for i386.  Running the i386 kernel on _modern_
> hardware is insecure, slower (esp. if you have a non-tiny amount of
> memory), etc.  We should put a big fat warnings for _that_.

And future modern hardware is likely to make it impossible:
https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/developer/articles/technical/envisioning-future-simplified-architecture.html
which means it will become increasingly difficult to reliably test i386
kernels on sensible hardware; not on a timescale relevant for Trixie, but
still, worth bearing in mind. VMs and/or emulation will end up being the only
possible ways of running legacy software on modern hardware.

Regards,

Stephen

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