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1. Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 (clacke@libranet.de)'s status on Saturday, 05-Feb-2022 03:59:11 UTC Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅
   How well does NixOS work in X32 mode? Is there any other distro that has good X32 support?
   
   I have this super slow laptop that I'd like to speed up while staying in the present distro-wise.
   • jay 🌺 (j12i@weirder.earth)'s status on Saturday, 05-Feb-2022 10:45:24 UTC jay 🌺

     in reply to

     @clacke Slackware 15 is out, I expect it to support 32bits well, and it has a very recent tech stack.
     (after waiting what, six years since 14.2)

   • Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 (clacke@libranet.de)'s status on Saturday, 05-Feb-2022 10:45:24 UTC Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅

     in reply to

     • jay 🌺
     @j12i I mean specifically X32, which is a special ABI using x86_64 extensions like more registers and instructions, but sticking with 32-bit pointers.
     
     Linux can be compiled to support x86_64, X32 and x86 syscalls on an x86_64 CPU, and you can run binaries of all kinds simultaneously.
     
     For normal x86/i686 I would use Debian now that Ubuntu has dropped support, but I'm glad to hear Slackware still going strong!
   • Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 (clacke@libranet.de)'s status on Saturday, 05-Feb-2022 10:47:30 UTC Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅

     in reply to
     If there is no good X32 distro, it would be interesting to see whether an x86 distro runs better on an x86 or x86_64 Linux.
   • LinuxWalt (@lnxw48a1) {3EB165E0-5BB1-45D2-9E7D-93B31821F864} (lnxw48a1@nu.federati.net)'s status on Saturday, 05-Feb-2022 14:10:56 UTC LinuxWalt (@lnxw48a1) {3EB165E0-5BB1-45D2-9E7D-93B31821F864}

     in reply to
     I don't think I've ever heard of an X32 distro. Just i686/X86 and AMD64/X86_64
     
     I haven't checked in a long time, but some of the Mandriva derivatives seemed to have i686 RPMs long after I stopped seeing 32-bit Debs.
     
     I assume that if they go to all that trouble, they have an OS installer made for that platform.
     
     I'd have to look to see what distro names I was using at the time.
   • LinuxWalt (@lnxw48a1) {3EB165E0-5BB1-45D2-9E7D-93B31821F864} (lnxw48a1@nu.federati.net)'s status on Saturday, 05-Feb-2022 14:13:55 UTC LinuxWalt (@lnxw48a1) {3EB165E0-5BB1-45D2-9E7D-93B31821F864}

     in reply to

     • LinuxWalt (@lnxw48a1) {3EB165E0-5BB1-45D2-9E7D-93B31821F864}
     Mageia was the last one I used and the one I used the most. There was also OpenMandriva, but for some reason, I quickly switched back to Mageia.
     
     I haven't checked to see whether they still exist or whether they still have X86 versions of their operating systems.
   • Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 (clacke@libranet.de)'s status on Saturday, 05-Feb-2022 20:50:50 UTC Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅

     in reply to

     • jay 🌺
     @j12i I might try out Devuan while I'm at it. =)
   • jay 🌺 (j12i@weirder.earth)'s status on Saturday, 05-Feb-2022 20:50:51 UTC jay 🌺

     in reply to

     @clacke Ah, I was wondering why you put it that way(X32), but decided to ignore it. I think I even read about that once.
     I feel uncomfortable with systemd so Debian is out for me even if I weren't happy with my setup. I used it at work and it's fine though.

   • Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 (clacke@libranet.de)'s status on Sunday, 06-Feb-2022 02:33:02 UTC Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅

     in reply to
     Debian has an unofficial port with no installer, but debootstrap is supposed to work. The default x86_64 kernel may need to be tweaked to support it:
     
     wiki.debian.org/X32Port
   • Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 (clacke@libranet.de)'s status on Sunday, 06-Feb-2022 03:21:11 UTC Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅

     in reply to
     The Ubuntu x86_64 kernel has CONFIG_X86_X32=y so I don't need to compile one, just reboot with syscall.x32=y.
   • Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 (clacke@libranet.de)'s status on Sunday, 06-Feb-2022 03:42:53 UTC Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅

     in reply to
     Ok, I'm looking at github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/blob/… and it seems the answer is "you can't even specify X32", which is disappointing and a bit surprising.
   • Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 (clacke@libranet.de)'s status on Sunday, 06-Feb-2022 03:49:08 UTC Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅

     in reply to
     Oh no, the x32 debootstrap is currently broken. I had a not entirely dissimilar problem when trying to upgrade to Ubuntu focal on x86, or maybe it was when trying to downgrade back to bionic.
     
     dpkg: regarding .../perl-base_5.34.0-3_x32.deb containing perl-base, pre-dependency problem: perl-base pre-depends on libcrypt1 (>= 1:4.1.0) libcrypt1 is not installed.
   • Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 (clacke@libranet.de)'s status on Sunday, 06-Feb-2022 04:18:28 UTC Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅

     in reply to
     Reboot wasn't necessary as CONFIG_X86_X32_DISABLED is not defined.
   • Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 (clacke@libranet.de)'s status on Sunday, 06-Feb-2022 04:23:49 UTC Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅

     in reply to
     No, that was a red herring, there was a libcrypt1 and perl-base eventually configured itself, but there's another problem:
     
     dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of libtext-iconv-perl:x32: libtext-iconv-perl:x32 depends on perlapi-5.32.0.and that's because perl-base is 5.34.0.
   • Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 (clacke@libranet.de)'s status on Sunday, 06-Feb-2022 04:29:12 UTC Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅

     in reply to
     No sweat, I'll just build them myse... oh right, circular dependency on themselves and perl.
   • Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 (clacke@libranet.de)'s status on Sunday, 06-Feb-2022 05:07:12 UTC Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅

     in reply to
     New plan: debootstrap i386 and then try to gradually replace it with x32, compiling when necessary.
   • Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 (clacke@libranet.de)'s status on Sunday, 06-Feb-2022 05:33:12 UTC Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅

     in reply to
     It's starting to seem like the problem with x32 right now is that some packages were built with gcc 11 but gcc 11 isn't built yet.
     
     On the fun side, it seems like when simply putting x32 as the top line in /var/lib/dpkg/arch and i386 as the second, apt will grab an x32 package whenever it can and fall back to i386. I just did apt install dpkg-dev and it was about half and half. 😀
     
     If you don't want to manually mess with the file, I think you could dpkg --add-architecture x32; dpkg --remove-architecture i386; dpkg --add-architecture i386. Also you'll need to make sure you have both mainline debian and debian-ports in your sources.list.
   • Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 (clacke@libranet.de)'s status on Sunday, 06-Feb-2022 06:24:15 UTC Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅

     in reply to
     Debian's Linux does require syscall.x32=y.
   • Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 (clacke@libranet.de)'s status on Sunday, 06-Feb-2022 06:27:12 UTC Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅

     in reply to
     The way you would specify it, if you look at how Debian names things, is by putting it in the API, as in the triple x86_64-linux-gnux32, but parse.nix currently doesn't define an ABI gnux32.
   • Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 (clacke@libranet.de)'s status on Sunday, 06-Feb-2022 12:55:01 UTC Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅

     in reply to

     • penguin42
     @penguin42 Because I want x32 to be less rare. =)
     
     It's a brilliant idea and Linus and friends have been considering cutting it because nobody uses it.
     
     But yeah what I'll do now is probably to go with an i386 Debian as base and then turn it into a part i386, part x32, part amd64 install. Currently x32 is out of sync with gcc, making libc6 and therefore most of it uninstallable, and i386 is missing e.g. Thunderbird.
     
     I checked nixpkgs and Thunderbird is blocked on i686 there too.
     
     I debootstrapped Debian i386 today and then made it kind of bootable, but then it hung when it got to the dm screen. I'll try a proper install disk install next weekend.
   • penguin42 (penguin42@mastodon.org.uk)'s status on Sunday, 06-Feb-2022 12:55:02 UTC penguin42

     in reply to

     @clacke x32 is pretty rare isn't it? The only thing I've heard using it is some Java builds. Why not try i686 builds?

   • Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 (clacke@libranet.de)'s status on Sunday, 06-Feb-2022 12:57:11 UTC Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅

     in reply to
     Nope, you can't remove the primary arch with the tools, you have to edit the file manually.
   • penguin42 (penguin42@mastodon.org.uk)'s status on Sunday, 06-Feb-2022 14:02:16 UTC penguin42

     in reply to

     @clacke Oh that'll keep you busy for a while :-) I wonder how much stuff actually builds/works when built as x32 - I bet there's lots of things that need fixing.

     Santa Claes 🇸🇪🇭🇰🎅 likes this.