On Donnerstag 04 März 2010, Nikos Chantziaras wrote: > On 03/04/2010 08:44 AM, Graham Murray wrote: > > Volker Armin Hemmann<volkerar...@googlemail.com> writes: > >> no, it is not safe to have a 64bit only system. Just choose the multilib > >> profile and start installing. If something needs the 32bit emul libs, it > >> will pull the stuff in. There is nothing you need to care about. > > > > What is unsafe about a 64bit only system? Surely if it were unsafe then > > Gentoo would not offer no-multilib profiles? I have recently built 2 > > systems using a no-multilib profile and have not found any problems, and > > expect to start building a third one today. > > You didn't understand the question Volker was replying to. The question > was not about "safe" as in "security", but rather "safe" as in "I can > rest assured that a no-multilib system can run every software I could > install", which is clearly not the case since some applications need > 32-bit support.
exactly. As Alan explained, there might be a point where you need to run a 32bit app. Maybe some legacy game (Civilization Call To Power comes to mind) or some new- but-the-vendor-sucks software. Without multilib you can either choose not to use that software (which isn't a choice if you really need it) or you can reinstall everything. And all that for a couple of megabytes on a tens, maybe hundreds of gigabytes harddisk. du -h /usr/lib32 362M /usr/lib32 but: rootfs 57G 23G 34G 41% / yeah, shocking. Almost a 114th of the harddisk used for multilib stuff ;)
