From benh at kernel.crashing.org  Tue Feb 12 23:36:49 2002
From: benh at kernel.crashing.org (benh at kernel.crashing.org)
Date: Tue, 12 Feb 2002 13:36:49 +0100
Subject: binary compatibility question 
In-Reply-To: <200202111743.MAA28102@makai.watson.ibm.com>
References: <200202111743.MAA28102@makai.watson.ibm.com>
Message-ID: <20020212123649.24305@mailhost.mipsys.com>


>John> Will a 32-bit linuxppc application will run on a linuxppc64 system
>John> without recompilation?
>
>	It should, as long as the 32-bit application does not make any
>assumptions which are not defined by the architecture, such as the size of
>cache blocks, e.g., dcbz.

That wouldn't be a problem if applications/glibc used the AUX entries
provided by the kernel as those tell about the cache line size, the
CPU features, etc... (well, they do on the 32 bits kernel, I suppose
this was ported over to ppc64 but didn't check).

Unfortunately, AFAIK, no userland still make use of those informations.

Ben.


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