i386 images

[Jeffrey Lane]

On Wed, Oct 25, 2017 at 6:03 PM, Dave Walker <davewalker at ubuntu.com> wrote:
> Server actually made this call before Desktop :) ..
>
> We tried to drop it back in 12.04..  this was the first release where we
> tried to introduce wacky stuff on the installer (MAAS etc).
>
> We kept seeing user issues with i386 installs, the most memorable being:
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/962992 (I proxied that
> bug report on behalf of a very experienced internal user)
>
> We also saw people deploying 32bit virtualisation platforms, and being
> frustrated to learn they could not run amd64 guests.
>
> Discussing with our users, it turned out that many of them were using 32 bit
> because they thought it was the most appropriate download "as they were
> running on Intel not AMD" and such.  So we tried to make the 32 bit harder
> to get.

To be fair, I have never understood why Ubuntu went with amd64 instead
of x86_64 which is the more generic term.  amd64 always meant the AMD
implementation of 64bit, vs the Intel implementation called EM64T.
x86_64 was the generic term.

But I came into that from Red Hat back when x64 first started
appearing and there were separate builds for amd64 and em64t before
being finally ported into one x64 build referred to as x86_64, so for
me, x86_64 or x64 was always the generic 64bit extensions to x86,
where amd64 specifically referred to the AMD extensions.




-- 
Jeff Lane - Server Certification Lead, Tools Developer, Warrior Poet,
Lover of Pie
Ubuntu Ham: W4KDH
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