[arch-general] [arch-dev-public] The need for /lib64 - testing please

[v01d3r at gmail.com]

2011/7/1 Myra Nelson <myra.nelson at hughes.net>:
> On Thu, Jun 30, 2011 at 23:48, Allan McRae <allan at archlinux.org> wrote:
>> Hi all,
>>
>> I was looking at the /lib64 folder and wondering what it is really needed
>> for...  It just seems clutter to me on a pure x86_64 system (or even with a
>> multilib in lib32 folders like we have). As far as I can tell, most things
>> are perfectly fine without that folder and its two symlinks.
>>
>> I would like some help testing removing this so I can get an idea of what
>> issues people run into.  There is bound to be some software that makes
>> assumptions about /lib64 in its installation and I would like to know (a)
>> how widespread that issue is and (b) how hard it is to work around.
>>
>> If you want to try it out, just remove the /lib64 folder (after making sure
>> it only has symlinks to ld-2.13.so and ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 in it. Run your
>> system as usual for a while and report any issues you come across.
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Allan
>>
>
>
> Allan:
>
> The binary version of VirtualBox from AUR fails without the /lib64 folder.
> I renamed the folder to /lib64.old, rebooted, the tried several apps. VBox
> was the only failure, so far. I tried reinstalling it and rebuilding the kernel
> modules to no avail. The message I get is:
>
> "no such executable. /opt/var/VirtualBox does not exist" From memory
> but very close.
>
> I get the same message when I try to run any of the virtualbox progs.
> The symlink in /usr/bin show to be broken. It shows an 'x' in the lower
> right corner. If I rename /lib64.old to /lib64 it runs with no problems.
> I haven't investigated any farther.
>
> Myra
>
>
> --
> Life's fun when your sick and psychotic!
>

Hmm, never noticed the /lib64 dir. Have removed it in the morning,
just for experiment. Can't notice any difference still, everything
works as before, including winXP in virtualbox.

-- 
--
Sincerely,
Andrew Trabo