On Sun, Apr 10, 2011 at 1:13 AM, Gour-Gadadhara Dasa <[email protected]> wrote: > yOn Sat, 9 Apr 2011 14:54:55 -0700 > Jonathan M Davis <[email protected]> wrote: > >> So, yeah, it sucks that dmd is only a 32-bit binary, and there are >> currently no plans for it become a 64-bit binary, > > It's really strange to have 32bit executable on 64bit OS these days > and I?m running 64bit OS for years.
I run 64 bit Windows 7, where around 70% of my applications are 32 bit, and 64 bit Arch Linux, where multilib lets me install the 32 bit version of most applications. If you go through the Linux kernel archives, you'll find that running 32 bit applications on a 64 bit kernel is actually fairly popular because 64 bit applications need ~20% more memory due to increased pointer sizes. > >> Most 64-bit linux distros are multilib, and running >> 32-bit binaries is fairly easy. Maybe it's harder with FreeBSD >> though. I don't know. It's your choice though. > > One of the reasons to switch to FreeBSD was to spend less time > tinkering with the OS and "just use it". > > I?m not familiar enough with FreeBSD, but the message from the subject > is what one gets when attempting to install DMD-2 on x86_64, so I > believe that 32bit executable on 64bit OS is not the right combo on > FreeBSD. > I don't know whether FreeBSD has multilib support, but it's fairly common among 64 bit linux distros these days. I wouldn't be surprised if the Unix folks had it as well. > Considering that, I'm turning to gdc2/ldc2 which may just work out of > the box. They probably will, but they're generally one step behind the reference compiler. Granted, one step isn't much, and they tend to generate slightly better code than the reference compiler, so it's not like this approach is wrong. As has been mentioned, you could also try building DMD as a 64 bit executable. I think I've done it in the past, but I don't remember whether I completely finished or not. I don't remember hitting any large issues though.
