Switch SPARC GNU coreutils+bash from 32 to 64bit[PSARC/2008/351SelfReview]

[Joseph Kowalski]

Joerg Schilling wrote:
> On amd64, all 64 bit binaries typically (with a few exceptions) run ~ 30% 
> faster than their 32 bit couterparts.
>
> Shouldn't we take take care of this difference? Is there no way to treat amd64
> different from sparcv9?
>   

Ah, the topic everyone seems to avoid talking about.

There is a small set of "correction" issues on SPARC.  There are *some* 
applications which are faster as 32-bit.  There are *some* applications 
which are faster as 64-bits.  All kind of worth a huge yawn.

There is a significant performance issue on amd64 [1].  Its all about 
the registers.  Unfortunately, since we still attempt to produce one 
"IA" distribution *and* support 32-bit IA processors, we are stuck at 
the lowest common denominator.

Every Linix'ish distro I know of has both 64 and 32 bit variants.  Sun 
has not shown a significant interest in producing a 64-bit, IA 
distribution.  OpenSolaris certainly could.

That said, its not this case, right?

- jek3

[1]   Replace "amd64" with your choice of: i386, i486, i586, i686, x86, 
ia86, ia64, x64, amd64, IA64,....    :-)