32bit libraries in 64

I was wondering, do I need to have 32bit libraries in my system, if I want only 64bit apps to exist.
I am asking as I am unaware of this issue in Linux architecture.

I want to have a 100% 64bit system. If I want an app, that is not available in 64bit,
guess I will look for some other app from the sane category. If none exist, then wait till
one will be available.

The only thing that I think I'll keep 32bit, is w32codecs pack, as I have seen it only in 32bit,
and I really need those for movie viewing.

Also, what is the difference between x586 adn x686 packages or source files?

As long as you are going to use 64 bit only apps, then you don't need the 32 bit libraries. If you are using something, like w32codec pack AFAIK, you will need the 32 bit libraries so that you can back down to 32 bit for that short time.

Interestingly, you do need 32-bit libraries for a few applications in SUSE such as konqueror. SUSE has integrated both libs homogeneously. For several apps. I even believe OO is also this way.

Yups, I noticed after installing clean 9.2 64bit, that there were tons of 32bit libraries.

I tried to see what happen if I delete one, well, dependency probs, as usual !

A pure 64-bit environment is extremely rare. There are only a few distros in which one actually could do it -- VidaLinux/Gentoo 2005.0 without multilib, *maybe* Debian, and Slackware, if Slack ever creates a 64-bit environment.

All the rest are still somewhat 32-bit reliant, as E@zyVG found out.

~~ Andrew D.

I have successfully built a couple pure 64 bit Gentoo boxes. I started with 2004.2 and 2004.3. I don't know if the 2005.0 will allow a pure 64 without some work. Honestly, it is really nice having the ability to run both libs on the same processor.

You managed to build pure64 with or without KDE?

This may not really be on-topic, but I was wondering how to compile a program as 32-bit while running SuSE x86_64. The HP printer driver package "hplip" compiles and works fine in SuSE 32-bit. It will compile in x86_64 but I haven't been able to get it to work and was thinking that if I could compile it to be 32-bit it might. How does one do this?

Steve

If you remember which 32 bit development libraries you used while compiling before,
just install those 32 bit libraries and then compile the driver.

Though it is very rare for 32 bit drivers to function properly under 64 bit system, as far as I understand, after all you are running 64 bit kernel.
Try searching for 64 bit drivers, the one which is already compiled for 9.2 x86-64.

Originally posted by E@zyVG@Apr 15 2005, 02:09 PM


Though it is very rare for 32 bit drivers to function properly under 64 bit system, as far as I understand, after all you are running 64 bit kernel.

There is no 32-bit drivers that work in 64-bit kernel... it is no possible and it is not logic... how it will be possible to make a executable file that support instruction sets for two different CPUs???
i can see in the forum that slackware could be build in a completely 64-bit system... is this possible? is there any iso ready to for download? or i have to do it my self???