Re: i686 removal - easy win set

Vít Ondruch via devel <[email protected]> Wed, 22 Jul 2026 10:15:19 +0200
Newsgroups	gmane.linux.redhat.fedora.devel
Message-ID	<[email protected]>
Dne 21. 07. 26 v 23:08 Richard W.M. Jones napsal(a):
> On Tue, Jul 21, 2026 at 07:03:51PM +0000, Mattia Verga via devel wrote:
>> Il 21/07/26 19:37, Richard W.M. Jones ha scritto:
>>> I'm not sure what we're trying to achieve by
>>> unilaterally disabling the i686 subpackages, unless the plan is to
>>> actually remove the architecture entirely.
>> The question is: those 3,400 packages that are claimed to be leaf
>> packages and not useful to build for i686, how much disk space in
>> repositories (and network bandwith transfer for synch) and how much
>> build time consume for nothing? I suspect that both are not
>> negligible... yet there seem to be some reluctance to this change, while
>> on the other end a proposal to enable x86_64v3 is struggling because "we
>> don't have enough resources"...
> I'm pretty sure it is negligible until we actually get rid of i686
> altogether.
>
> And compared to the gigantic build out of AI, or the general nonsense
> that goes on in computing -- vast, wasteful CI; inefficient
> interpreted code, etc etc -- a few thousand i686 subpackages are a
> drop in the ocean.
>
> Again, packagers themselves may decide to remove the leaf packages,
> and that's fine.


I go with default, which is having i686 packages. I assume that most 
others packagers do the same. That means that we keep the status quo and 
the number of i686 package is decreasing only very slowly if at all.

And no, I don't perceive guideline such as "You should include 
`ExcludeArch: %{ix86}` (for new packages)" changing the default.

So if we are able to change the default, then that is the step in right 
direction IMHO. Side effect of changing the default would be review of 
which packages we really need for i686 to re-enable those. And it would 
be sensible to re-enable reasonable small set of packages.

IOW, the idea is that ATM, you should still be able to re-enable i686 
for whatever purpose.


>    Just don't force it on everyone.  This proposal *will*
> cause silent bugs.


I agree with this, but if they bother somebody, they will be fixed, 
won't they?


Vít


> Rich.
>

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