[CVALE] Running x86 programs on a 64 bit processor...

[Landon Blake]

-----Original Message-----
From: cvale-bounces at lists.fire2wire.com
[mailto:cvale-bounces at lists.fire2wire.com] On Behalf Of Robert Johnston
Sent: Friday, May 11, 2007 12:32 PM
To: cvale at cvale.org
Subject: Re: [CVALE] Running x86 programs on a 64 bit processor...

Robert Grunsky wrote:
> Hmmm Good question. I kinda know some of the words that has been 
> described as the process for this, But I really can't remember at the 
> moment. I just decided to stick with 32 bit and save myself the 
> hassle. But I would like to know if you still have to create a 
> seperate 32 bit environment and stuff... Is there no way to just 
> emulate 32 bit? sorry I couldn't help but maybe if there's 2 people 
> asking, there'd be more inclination to answer ;)
>
It's not really a question of emulation.  The amd64 class of processors 
(Opteron/Turion64/Althlon64) are able to natively execute the i386 
instruction set.  The thing is, most userland apps aren't statically 
linked with all of the libraries they might depend on.  Rather the 
dynamic linker (ld) dynamically links in the shared libraries  (the .so 
files) that the executable depends on at runtime.  This optimization 
allows both the on-disk and in memory executable image to be smaller.  
You can't link a 32-bit executable with a 64-bit library (or 
vice-versa).  So if you download a 32-bit binary you will need to have 
32-bit versions of all of the libraries it depends on and your dynamic 
linker will need to be smart enough to find them.

As another person already mentioned, the ability to do this is probably 
rather distro-specific - i.e. your mileage will vary

rob

Rob,

What you said makes a lot of sense. Thank you.

So basically you find all the libraries that your 32-bit system depends
on and install them, or you compile the source code for the program and
make a 32-bit binary.

Is this correct?

Landon

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