Proposed JEP - Deprecate the Windows x86-32 Port

[Alan Bateman]

On 27/02/2023 11:04, George Adams wrote:
>
> Hi all,
>
> I’ve been asked to socialize my proposed JEP to deprecate the Windows 
> x86-32 port on this mailing list.
>
> A link to the draft JEP can be found 
> here:https://bugs.openjdk.org/browse/JDK-8303167
>
> In summary, the main motivation for this JEP is that there is 
> currently no implementation of JEP 436 (Virtual Threads) 
> <https://openjdk.org/jeps/436> for 32-bit platforms and without a 
> vendor stepping forward to implement this it's unlikely that OpenJDK 
> will be able to continue supporting 32-bit architectures. Another 
> motivation is that Windows 10 (the last Windows operating system to 
> support a 32-bit installation) will reach EOLon October 14, 20251.
>
>
When you build JDK 19+ to target windows-x86 then it will use an 
alternative implementation of virtual thread that creates a kernel 
thread for each virtual thread. So it doesn't scale but it's good enough 
for Zero and ports that are a bit behind.

That said, it's a good topic to bring up. I don't expect dropping 
windows-x86 will remove the burden of keeping the x86_32 port working, 
to do that would require dropping linux-x86 too. So maybe the discussion 
should be broadened to ask if the time is approaching to remove the 
x86_32 port? At one point, one of the arguments to keep linux-x86 
working was reconditioning older computers but I don't know if this is 
still the case. I see a mail to jdk-dev from Mark Yagnatinsky that talks 
about JNI libs or drivers that are 32-bit only. There isn't much context 
but it would be surprising for something that is actively maintained to 
not have a 64-bit build in 2023. He also mentions limiting resources but 
that may be a case where an OS container should be used. It might be 
that you expand the Motivation in draft JEP to cover these points.

-Alan
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