Re: [Vm-dev] 64 bits (was: Squeak Oversight Board minutes – 5/01/12)

[Bert Freudenberg]

On 04.05.2012, at 20:16, David Corking wrote:

> 
> On Fri, May 4, 2012 at 6:37 PM, Colin Putney wrote:
>>> IMHO the most urgent need is to make the 32 bit VM compile on a 64 bit machine. Running 64 bit images would be nice, too, but the problem most users run into right now is that they just cannot easily run their current image on that shiny new box.
>> 
>> +1
>> 
>> Basically all operating systems are 64-bit now, and 32-bit
>> applications are now considered "legacy support".
> 
> AFAICT Fedora 14, 15 and 16 shipped a broken VM for x86_64.  Meanwhile
> the Fedora i586 (32 bit) VM works flawlessly on 64-bit Linux: it is
> just a case of downloading the right RPM and installing it. I might
> not be following the right bugzilla issues, or mailing list, as I
> haven't noticed if Fedora has plans to put the i586 VM in the yum
> repositories for x86_64 users.
> 
> Anyone heard anything?
> 
> David


There is no open Fedora bug report on that:

	https://bugzilla.redhat.com/buglist.cgi?component=squeak-vm&product=Fedora

The way this works is that the Fedora maintainer takes the release tar ball and makes a spec file that says how to compile it. That is pushed to the build server (koji) which cranks out a build:

i686/x86_64:

	http://koji.fedoraproject.org/koji/packageinfo?packageID=7779

ARM:

	http://arm.koji.fedoraproject.org/koji/packageinfo?packageID=8845

As you can see, the package has been maintained by Gavin Romig-Koch initially, lately Daniel Drake and Peter Robinson have done it (they're both working closely with SugarLabs/OLPC).

IMHO our best bet is to convince them to package the latest unix VM (currently 4.4.7.2357) which should fix both the problem of not working on x86_64 and not being able to open closure images. Bug reports from users using their packages are pretty convincing (hint, hint).

- Bert -