I have to say, that despite the secrecy, the team members provided some guidance into the right direction for those who decide what to install a system on a new 64-bit hardware box. I was advised to install Slackware 12.2 with HIMEM kernel support, in favor of something else, along with the hint, that a later upgrade to an official 64-bit Slackware release shouldn't be problem. That was the first indication that the team was actually working on such a release, but there was no hint, how long it would take.

The guys were very clever at that, pointing users in the right direction, without disclosing how close the destination actually was, already. They managed to keep everything under cover, without causing anyone making a wrong decision, such as installing another distro... .

gargamel

Don't think of it as a secret, think of it as a surprise

I agree with you As I have already said, the 64bit port is *not* secret. There are so many clues.

The Slackware team had a lot of fun dropping hints here and there in slackware-current these past few months and watching the reactions :-)

Those with a keen eye have seen it coming for some time. But publicly announcing that a 64bit port was in the works would have put an unacceptable pressure on. Developing slackware-current has the primary focus and it would not have benefited anyone if the 64bit port would have gotten in it's way.

Eric

This a real good way to put it!
It wasn't secret, just "undisclosed" until prime time...

gargamel

So how does a multilib-ready compromise isolate the philosophy of Slackware64 from what I believe is the status quo (among other Linux distributions)? Does it amount to nothing more than saying Slackware64 didn't follow the lead of anyone else? I haven't checked, so I don't know how many "Pure 64" distributions there are. But if the solution of being Pure was absolute (as in being a conceptual pinnacle), there should be no justification for a multilib-ready system. Anything anyone has to add to, is by definition incomplete.

Shingoshi

So much fricking drama, if you like it use it, if you don't like it STFU.

The first real hint I recall was a year or two ago when Pat mentioned in IRC that slackware64.com had been registered and was redirecting to slackware.com. :-)

My apologies if I missed that. Sometimes I find that linuxquestions forums seems to update the 'read' marks on topics even when I haven't read them and I miss some posts. Not sure why this happens, but I suspect it might be something to do with my ISP transparent web proxies - I've had the issue before with other BB boards.


I remember listening to the interview you mentioned and I agree with the policy of keeping it pure 64bit. If you try and jump through too many hoops to maintain backwards compatibility then sooner or later you end up with a mess (as Microsoft has discovered).

Many Thanks!
How does one go about installing the 32 bit libraries?

A year or two ago?... o_O

Ah, I see So, Shingoshi, here is at least one reason to keep it "secret" which is reasonable in my view ;D

>=(o_O)=>

I disagree. There are a number of "Pure 64" distros in the wild including BlueWhite and 64-bit Ubuntu. These require users to jump through hoops with chroot directories or virtualization to run 32-bit proprietary or legacy applications (eg. Skype, Flash 9, others that don't immediately pop into my head).

By making it multilib-ready, they are a delivering a Pure 64-bit distro that can easily accommodate 32-bit proprietary/legacy code when needed but doesn't bloat the system with duplicate libs that most people won't need or want.

Your whole "if it has to be added to it's incomplete" attitude is flawed. There are many unofficial packages that I use because of my job or simply personal preference which are unlikely to ever be included by default in Slackware. That's part of why we have wonderful sites like SBo. People are different and have different needs. If you want to include and maintain every package known to man in the default install go ahead and start a fork.

I think it was a wise decision to make it multilib, in fact I think it's absolutely necessary as a step in the transition to 64-bit. Currently, not every software is available in 64-bit, one of the major ones is wine, and many people need it and other such programs. Going purelib is a radical decision that should only be made some time from now when 32-bit goes the way of 16-bit and 8-bit that came before.