Wine32 requires 32bit libraries? No fix?

[Zebediah Figura]

On 1/17/20 2:35 AM, Klaus-J. Wolf wrote:
> On Thu, Jan 16, 2020 at 7:21 AM Damjan Jovanovic <damjan.jov at gmail.com
> <mailto:damjan.jov at gmail.com>> wrote:
> 
>     There are no fundamental limitations to running x86 software on
>     x86-64. The CPU supports it. The kernel supports it. Libraries can
>     be built into 32 bit binaries. Compilers/linkers/assemblers support
>     32 bit. The problem is political: lazy distros aspiring to be Apple,
>     that don't want to build 32 bit packages. The solution can also be
>     political: use a distro that allows you to use your computer the way
>     that you want.
> 
> 
> Hmm, when I asked I rather thought of technical problems and their
> solution. I mean, 32bit calls can be translated into 64bit ones, if C
> doesn't, assembler will do, so why not do it?
> 

Taking this approach means compiling (probably JIT) or interpreting the
entirety of the game's code, neither of which are performant or indeed
easy (consider self-modifying code).

If we have no 32-bit libraries (or, in the case of Mac OS, ability to
even load 32-bit libraries if they are present), the best solution seems
to be to run most code in 32-bit mode (after all, the CPU does still
support it) and thunk down to 64-bit when necessary, specifically when
entering a host library or something similar.

But this is still a lot of work, and raises a lot of its own nasty
problems. It's far better just to have 32-bit libraries available to us.