Lennart Sorensen via Talk said on Wed, 30 Jul 2025 10:06:59 -0400
On Tue, Jul 29, 2025 at 05:55:11PM -0400, Colin McGregor via Talk wrote:
Below is a story about where Debian 13 (aka: "Trixie") stands regarding the Y2038 issue. In quick summary the Y2038 issue is that time in the current stable Debian release (and to the best of my knowledge all other Linux distributions) stores time as a 32 bit number with the number of seconds since January 1st, 1970 AD. After 03:14:07 UTC on January 19, 2038 you may have Linux systems thinking it is 1970.
All 32 bit linux distributions. 64 architectures always used 64 bit time and are hence not effected.
That's how I've always understood it. 2038 is no problem at all for somebody with a 64 bit computer. This might sound like first world elitism, but the 32 bit Pentium 4 was replaced by the 64 bit Pentium D in 2006. I'm pretty sure that by 1/1/2010 you couldn't buy a 32 bit "personal computer" in laptop or desktop format. So by 2038 a 32 bit computer would be 28 years old. By 2038 one could buy a 64 bit computer that would be 27 years old. 2038? Gimme a break. I worry about climate change. I worry about systemd. I worry about the end of democracy. I worry about H5N1 bird flu. I worry about nuclear war. I worry about Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Amazon, and all the other monopolies increasingly owning our world. Obsolescence of 32 bit computers in 2038? Not so much. By the way, I *AM* very glad Debian/Devuan, Void Linux, and others are keeping 32 bits alive while it's relatively painless to do so. Some of my friends have 32 bit laptops from the days when laptops were rugged and user maintainable. 2038 is still a long way away. SteveT Steve Litt http://444domains.com