Updates to Google Chrome Linux support

[Dirk Pranke]

Hi Everyone,

To provide the best experience for the most-used Linux versions, we will end support for Google Chrome on 32-bit Linux, Ubuntu Precise (12.04), and Debian 7 (wheezy) in early March, 2016.  Chrome will continue to function on these platforms but will no longer receive updates and security fixes.

We intend to continue supporting the 32-bit build configurations on Linux to support building Chromium. If you are using Precise, we’d recommend that you to upgrade to Trusty.

Kind Regards,

-- Dirk

[ bcc: chromi...@chromium.org ]

[Sorin Toma]

Well then, farewell Chrome! If I can not use the same browser on all my platforms, I will not use it at all. Firefox might be slower, but it works on my old 32bit only laptop.

[Mārtiņš Možeiko]

Does this affect only binary releases or Chromium source in general?

If I'm running Chromium on Linux with 32-bit ARM hardware, does this mean no more security fixes after next March?

[Ilja Friedel]

On Mon, Nov 30, 2015 at 8:04 PM, Mārtiņš Možeiko <martins...@gmail.com> wrote:

Does this affect only binary releases or Chromium source in general?

The announcement below is carefully worded. No more official Linux 32 bit *Chrome* binaries will be released by Google, but there is the "intend to continue supporting the 32-bit build configurations on Linux to support building *Chromium*."

 

If I'm running Chromium on Linux with 32-bit ARM hardware, does this mean no more security fixes after next March?

I am pretty sure ChromeOS and Android will continue to build and release 32 bit ARM binaries based on Chromium sources for quite some time. Hence external 32 bit ARM *Chromium* builds should continue working with minor effort (the usual disclaimer).

 

On Monday, November 30, 2015 at 3:19:37 PM UTC-8, Dirk Pranke wrote:

Hi Everyone,

To provide the best experience for the most-used Linux versions, we will end support for Google Chrome on 32-bit Linux, Ubuntu Precise (12.04), and Debian 7 (wheezy) in early March, 2016.  Chrome will continue to function on these platforms but will no longer receive updates and security fixes.

We intend to continue supporting the 32-bit build configurations on Linux to support building Chromium. If you are using Precise, we’d recommend that you to upgrade to Trusty.

Kind Regards,

-- Dirk

[ bcc: chromi...@chromium.org ]

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[Mike Frysinger]

Google has released 32bit ARM devices this quarter.  that means Chromium will be supported on 32bit ARM for at least 5 years.  in fact, every time a 32bit ARMv7 device is released, it's another 5 years of support.

-mike

[Dirk Pranke]

On Mon, Nov 30, 2015 at 8:32 PM, Ilja Friedel <i...@chromium.org> wrote:

On Mon, Nov 30, 2015 at 8:04 PM, Mārtiņš Možeiko <martins...@gmail.com> wrote:

Does this affect only binary releases or Chromium source in general?

The announcement below is carefully worded. No more official Linux 32 bit *Chrome* binaries will be released by Google, but there is the "intend to continue supporting the 32-bit build configurations on Linux to support building *Chromium*."

 

If I'm running Chromium on Linux with 32-bit ARM hardware, does this mean no more security fixes after next March?

I am pretty sure ChromeOS and Android will continue to build and release 32 bit ARM binaries based on Chromium sources for quite some time. Hence external 32 bit ARM *Chromium* builds should continue working with minor effort (the usual disclaimer).

Everything Ilja wrote above is correct :). The same applies to 32-bit x86 builds as well.

-- Dirk 

[Bryan Quigley]

Right now on my 64 bit machine the download page default to 32-bit.  Will that change sooner?

If you've installed 32 bit on a 64 bit capable OS will it transition automagically to a 64 bit Chrome at EOL?

Can you share the usage percentages behind the decision?

Thanks!

Bryan

[1] https://www.google.com/chrome/browser/desktop/index.html

On Monday, November 30, 2015 at 6:19:37 PM UTC-5, Dirk Pranke wrote:

[Dirk Pranke]

On Tue, Dec 1, 2015 at 8:06 AM, Bryan Quigley <gqu...@gmail.com> wrote:

Right now on my 64 bit machine the download page default to 32-bit.  Will that change sooner?

By default are you referring to the radio button defaulting to a 32-bit .deb package (out of the 4 choices)?

If so, that'll certainly change when we stop offering the 32-bit download, but changing that to default to 

64-bit even before then is a good suggestion. I've filed crbug.com/564194 for this.

 

If you've installed 32 bit on a 64 bit capable OS will it transition automagically to a 64 bit Chrome at EOL?

That is not currently implemented. I've filed crbug.com/564198 for the suggestion, but it's not immediately

obvious that that's a good idea (there's a risk that we might break something locally in the upgrade, and

users might be surprised by the change more than they are by a normal version upgrade). 

We will notify users on startup that the browser is stale and they should switch, so hopefully that's good

enough.

Thanks,

-- Dirk

Thanks!

Bryan

[1] https://www.google.com/chrome/browser/desktop/index.html

On Monday, November 30, 2015 at 6:19:37 PM UTC-5, Dirk Pranke wrote:

Hi Everyone,

To provide the best experience for the most-used Linux versions, we will end support for Google Chrome on 32-bit Linux, Ubuntu Precise (12.04), and Debian 7 (wheezy) in early March, 2016.  Chrome will continue to function on these platforms but will no longer receive updates and security fixes.

We intend to continue supporting the 32-bit build configurations on Linux to support building Chromium. If you are using Precise, we’d recommend that you to upgrade to Trusty.

Kind Regards,

-- Dirk

[ bcc: chromi...@chromium.org ]

--

[Bryan Quigley]

> By default are you referring to the radio button defaulting to a 32-bit .deb
> package (out of the 4 choices)?

Yup.

Thanks for filling bugs on both issues. I'm following them.

As for percentages I'm mostly curious about the ratio of 32 bit users
to 64 bit. I'm hoping the data could help give Linux distros another
data point on when they might be able to drop 32 bit.

Thanks again,
Bryan

[Mike Frysinger]

i feel like, in most cases where people are running 32bit chrome, it's not possible to "upgrade" it to 64bit because they're running a 32bit userland, not a 64bit one.  you can't just drop the 64bit chrome into such an environment and expect it to run ... you'd need to include all the other 64bit packages.  i'm not sure how many distros even support 64bit multilib with the default being 32bit.

-mike

[Jeff Dewe]

What is wrong with google??? It just doesn't make sense to close the official doors on 32bit pc's/laptops, Its not like they stopped making them years ago, hell they still make them, I will not change my pc and laptops to 64 bit just because google decides to drop support. Sad day for for Linux and google and who ever decided this should be Fired!!. Really its not like your compiling them every day of the week, for a new release. Its just the guy who compiles it, just being a lazy bastard. Distro's like puppy Linux is like 90% 32bit users. So basically your wiping the whole distro away.

[Craig Millsap]

Can someone please clarify that this is an end to ALL 32-bit x86 Linux distributions?

The last sentence is confusing. I manage a lot of 32-bit Trusty netbooks.  Did you mean to say we recommend you upgrade to 64-bit Trusty?

Thanks,

Craig

[Peter Kasting]

On Tue, Dec 1, 2015 at 2:19 PM, Jeff Dewe <jeff...@gmail.com> wrote:

What is wrong with google??? It just doesn't make sense to close the official doors on 32bit pc's/laptops,

Chromium will still support these for a long time, we're simply not releasing Chrome builds; many distros didn't use Chrome builds anyway but built their own versions of Chromium, in which case this won't even have a visible effect.

 

I will not change my pc and laptops to 64 bit just because google decides to drop support.

OK.  We weren't asking you to.

 

Sad day for for Linux and google and who ever decided this should be Fired!!

Please keep criticism constructive.  This list is not for angry venting, it's a professional development list.  If you want to object, do so in a professional manner.

 

Really its not like your compiling them every day of the week, for a new release. Its just the guy who compiles it, just being a lazy bastard.

You should avoid asserting things about areas where you're not well informed.  There is no "guy who compiles it" to be "lazy", and we do in fact have a set of official builders that compiles these sorts of builds constantly.  Inventing a reason why you think this is happening and then criticizing it is simply attacking a strawman.

 

Distro's like puppy Linux is like 90% 32bit users. So basically your wiping the whole distro away.

As mentioned above and repeatedly in this thread, Chromium continues to support 32-bit builds and will for quite some time to come.

PK 

[Ilja Friedel]

Please take a deep breath before calling people "bastards". It takes a lot of human effort to release tested binaries. This effort could be better spent on projects with more users. (Fyi the build infrastructure compiles and stores binaries hundreds of times a day.)

In your case you will be able to switch to

http://puppylinux.org/wikka/Chromium

instead of

http://puppylinux.org/wikka/Chrome

On Tue, Dec 1, 2015 at 2:19 PM, Jeff Dewe <jeff...@gmail.com> wrote:

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[Dirk Pranke]

On Tue, Dec 1, 2015 at 2:27 PM, Craig Millsap <cmil...@gentrypioneers.com> wrote:

Can someone please clarify that this is an end to ALL 32-bit x86 Linux distributions?

That is correct, we will no longer be distributing any official Google Chrome 32-bit 

x86 builds, regardless of distro or version of distro.

Separately, we are dropping support for Precise and wheezy for the 64-bit x86-64 builds as well.

It will be possible for distros to continue to build and publish their own versions of Chromium

for either 32-bit or 64-bit as long as they wish to do so.

The last sentence is confusing. I manage a lot of 32-bit Trusty netbooks.  Did you mean to say we recommend you upgrade to 64-bit Trusty?

You will either need to upgrade to 64-bit Trusty (if your hardware is capable of it) and 64-bit Google Chrome,

or use a 32-bit distro-provided version of Chromium.

I hope that clarifies things.

-- Dirk

Thanks,

Craig

On Monday, November 30, 2015 at 5:19:37 PM UTC-6, Dirk Pranke wrote:

Hi Everyone,

To provide the best experience for the most-used Linux versions, we will end support for Google Chrome on 32-bit Linux, Ubuntu Precise (12.04), and Debian 7 (wheezy) in early March, 2016.  Chrome will continue to function on these platforms but will no longer receive updates and security fixes.

We intend to continue supporting the 32-bit build configurations on Linux to support building Chromium. If you are using Precise, we’d recommend that you to upgrade to Trusty.

Kind Regards,

-- Dirk

[ bcc: chromi...@chromium.org ]

--

[Jeff Dewe]

Listen I've compiled hundreds and hundreds of apps for people and its not that hard, but when you get apps with very large backends like chrome it only makes sense for Chrome to release 32bit, It takes so much resources for each distro times say 400 linux distro to compile there own 32bit. or Get one guy from chrome or 400 guys around the world. Really at the end of the day who wants to waste hrs and hrs compiling 1 app in a 1gb+ directory. I don't think anyone on puppy linux every compiled chrome, It just takes too long, takes too much space and a lot of added deps. Usually we just get the ubuntu releases, We tend to compile Firefox and seamonkey and a few QT based browsers, but Chrome has always been over blown. Would be nice if you came out with a smaller version?? Chrome is usually double or tripple the size of FF or Opera. Smaller based distros like having smaller browsers. Really a basic browser with flash block, ad-block and youTube downloader is what most people want and need. Oh yeah and being able to move the tabs under the URL bar is a common want. Anyways Chrome is your baby, how you raise it, will define your success or lack of it.

[Jason Gray]

AFAIK you couldn't compile Chrome if you wanted to. It's got propriety "Chrome only" bits, that's what separates it from Chromium. You could always, and still can compile Chromium. As far as your "400" distros goes they will continue to do what they always have for Chromium, compile their own version in whatever architecture or use their parent distro's package. Distros AFAIK have never compiled their own versions of Chrome. All this means is that Google will stop releasing 32bit versions of Chrome for Linux. It changes very little to nothing for Chromium. 

[SYSTEMA CORE]

 Thanks Google, I've just acquired a bunch of cheap (even refurbished and 2nd hand) x86 Chromebooks with the explicit purpose of making them lubuntu+chrome machines... These are 2 gigs systems with low end CPU's like celeron's, they will never handle a 64 bit distro+64 bit chrome well and they were functioning just fine with 32 bit lubuntu+32 bit chrome, in fact MUCH BETTER than 32 bit firefox.

 Canonical never keeps the chromium in the repos updated not to mention the fact the overall CHROME it's a much better experience.

 Being a company with so much money this is a nasty move to pull and you are clearly doing this because you are seeing a lot of chromebooks being repurposed as linux distro machines...  I had a project with 50+ machines for a charity for the IT illiterate, disavantaged, unemployed people, anyone who needed a laptop really... you should see their faces when they hold a cheap chromebook like it's the most precious thing they have ever seen.

 So the next time you think  "why are we bothering with XXXX ? who uses this? linux geeks right? fuck them " you should clearly consider all the ramifications of your decision to save a few dollars.

 reckless at best, malicious if you ask me.

 thanks for nothing

[SYSTEMA CORE]

... and one more thing, just to really convey the disapointment and perplexity I'm feeling now: CHROME's performance has been stellar in Linux, it is by far the best browser one can use in linux (32 or 64). This is, of course, hardly due to the kindness of Google but simply because they are optimizing chrome to work well under their own gentoo based Chrome OS system.

 And this is what is really obscene: Google made millions (billions?) on the back of the linux kernel (Chrome OS, Android, all the services etc) and this is how they give back? No one is no longer asking for native drive clients or anything of the sort but now they want to take away from linux their most core software (a browser)

 
  SHAME

[Igor Kovalchuk]

How about the Pepper Flash Player? Will it be available on 32-bit Linux systems?

[Igor K.]

Will be there security updates for 32-bit Linux Pepper Flash Player somehow?

[Michael Pardee]

I support public libraries with hundreds of 32-bit computers - now they only have 3 months to buy new hardware?    Chrome provides the only decent Flash implementation for Linux these days, so chromium won't help.  I know flash stinks, but a lot of web sites still require it.   I can understand a change like this but organizations need more than 3 months to adapt to major changes - does Google publish a roadmap of hardware/software support?  If not, I guess organizations cannot rely on Google for any critical function.

[Ralph Bromley]

On Wednesday, December 2, 2015 at 11:00:22 AM UTC-5, Michael Pardee wrote:

I support public libraries with hundreds of 32-bit computers - now they only have 3 months to buy new hardware?    Chrome provides the only decent Flash implementation for Linux these days, so chromium won't help.  I know flash stinks, but a lot of web sites still require it.   I can understand a change like this but organizations need more than 3 months to adapt to major changes - does Google publish a roadmap of hardware/software support?  If not, I guess organizations cannot rely on Google for any critical function.

Actually there is the seperate chromium-pepperflash package in Ubuntu and I dont think that will go away as long as chromium is still around.

As for this decision,I still think its a dumb one as there are a lot of people who use linux on old hardware but at the same time there is still chromium.

The only sucky thing about chromium is there is no drm html5 so no netflix

[Ralph Bromley]

On Wednesday, December 2, 2015 at 9:26:14 AM UTC-5, Igor K. wrote:

Will be there security updates for 32-bit Linux Pepper Flash Player somehow?

Actually pepperflash itself is 32bit only due to adobe ditching the 64bit version of flash 

[Ralph Bromley]

Still I think anger is justfied, if I were still using 32bit hardware I would use so much foul language it would look like George Carlin was on Tomas the Tank Engine his entire career 

[Anthony LaForge]

It's worth noting that Ubuntu provides an official Flash Player plugin package for Chromium called adobe-flashplugin.  You can find instructions, on how to install it, here.

Big kudos to both Adobe and Canonical for making that available!

Kind Regards,

Anthony Laforge
Technical Program Manager
Mountain View, CA

--

[Michael Pardee]

Actually there is the seperate chromium-pepperflash package in Ubuntu and I dont think that will go away as long as chromium is still around.

I am having trouble finding out exactly what differences there are between the flash version built into chrome and the chromium pepper flash plugin available for Ubuntu.  If Google is dropping 32-bit chrome support, how long until they drop 32-bit flash plugin support?  Where is the roadmap?  If the flash plugin functionality is similar to the current plugin for firefox that is only getting security updates, its not really viable.  Many ( poorly programmed ) sites won't work with the firefox flash plugin anymore.

 

[Anthony LaForge]

Adobe provides the same builds to both Google and Canonical, so they should be identical.

I'm not sure what their deployment timing/ hand-off policies might be, nor what Adobe's plans are for 32-bit support of Linux... but I can say with confidence that they should mirror what we are deploying with Chrome.

Kind Regards,

Anthony Laforge
Technical Program Manager
Mountain View, CA

On Wed, Dec 2, 2015 at 4:33 PM, Michael Pardee <opensense...@gmail.com> wrote:

Actually there is the seperate chromium-pepperflash package in Ubuntu and I dont think that will go away as long as chromium is still around.

I am having trouble finding out exactly what differences there are between the flash version built into chrome and the chromium pepper flash plugin available for Ubuntu.  If Google is dropping 32-bit chrome support, how long until they drop 32-bit flash plugin support?  Where is the roadmap?  If the flash plugin functionality is similar to the current plugin for firefox that is only getting security updates, its not really viable.  Many ( poorly programmed ) sites won't work with the firefox flash plugin anymore.

 

--

[Michael Pardee]

Adobe provides the same builds to both Google and Canonical, so they should be identical.

At first glance it does appear that the flash built into chrome is the same as libpepflashplayer.so for chromium, which makes chromium + pepper flash a viable alternative to chrome. ( except for netflix and a few other things )

 However:

I'm not sure what their deployment timing/ hand-off policies might be, nor what Adobe's plans are for 32-bit support of Linux... but I can say with confidence that they should mirror what we are deploying with Chrome.

That is exactly what I am worried about - if flash support mirrors chrome's abandonment of 32-bit.  Right now chromium gets the flash plugin for "free" since it was already developed for Chrome, but once the 32 bit version is no longer made for Chrome I doubt they'll still make it just for use with Chromium.  Will there be any advance warning or will it just be discontinued in 3 months?    I had assumed google was developing the flash plugin themselves, or at least paying Adobe to do it (otherwise why wouldn't Firefox get an updated version too?)   - if this is completely up to Adobe I'm not very optimistic.

How can we get an official answer about the future of the 32-bit flash plugin for chromium?

On another note, if anyone from Google cares anything about public relations, they should be explaining this move more.  There are probably some better reasons than "To provide the best experience for the most-used Linux versions" - like specific library dependencies.  If it was a simple matter of development time/money I wonder if we could crowdfund another year of 32-bit development to buy some time for new hardware purchases.  Linux users are pretty technical people and some vague marketing statement is just going to make them angry.

[Mike Frysinger]

as mentioned earlier in the thread, Chrome OS x86 32-bit support is sticking around until at least July 2016.

-mike

[PhistucK]

Actually, unless I am blind or GMail missed some posts on the thread, this is not mentioned anywhere in the thread (at least when I search for "July" or "2016").

☆PhistucK

[Mike Frysinger]

CrOS devices have at least 5 years of life, so when you look up the last 32bit x86 device and see it was released in July 2011, the logical computation gets you July 2016.

-mike

[Michael Pardee]

I found this that talks about the 5 year policy: https://www.google.com/intl/en/chrome/devices/eol.html

But I don't see any specifics about what is guaranteed for 5 years - possibly it is just the operating system.  I could see them excluding third party software/plugins like flash.  

[Mike Frysinger]

that's extremely unlikely

-mike

On Thu, Dec 3, 2015 at 9:19 AM, Michael Pardee <opensense...@gmail.com> wrote:

I found this that talks about the 5 year policy: https://www.google.com/intl/en/chrome/devices/eol.html

But I don't see any specifics about what is guaranteed for 5 years - possibly it is just the operating system.  I could see them excluding third party software/plugins like flash.  

--

[Михаил Гаврилов]

To provide the best experience for the most-used Linux versions, we will end support for Google Chrome on 32-bit Linux

Too bad :( 

32-bit version of Google Chrome for Linux is not less popular than the 32-bit version of Google Chrome for windows. especially on machines with 512Mb - 2Gb RAM. 

[Bob Good]

That's all well and good, Dirk, but Chromium doesn't include 32bit  pepperflash. No 32bit Chrome means no 32bit pepperflash. No more "borrowing" pepperflash to run in Chromium 32bit (like I've done in the past). This is a sad day for my older 32bit laptops which are still quite functional.

Can the devs still provide a 32bit pepperflash for those migrating from Chrome to Chromium?

Sign me as disappointed.

Bob 

[Sol Dowdal]

I highly doubt 64-bit linux is the most used, yes it may be the future, but why would they think that segregating a good portion of of a already small portion of users could at all benefit anyone? That entire group of users isnt going to rush out to buy new laptops, Almost every person in that group will switch to firefox, because thats usually peoples backup browser, just like chrome is typically firefox users backup

[Devin Lane]

Dirk:

I use Ubuntu 12.04 LTS in 64bit mode, and am currently waiting until 16.04 LTS is released to update. Would it be at all possible to continue Chrome updates for 12.04 (64bit) until 16.04 is out? I realize that 14.04 LTS was released almost 2 years ago, but the LTS schedule is for 5 years. I imagine there are other Chrome users in my scenario that have chosen LTS releases due to this long support timeline.

Thanks!

[Lei Zhang]

At least with Ubuntu 10.04, IIRC it was not possible to directly
upgrade to 14.04. One has to upgrade to 12.04 first. Assuming directly
upgrading from 12.04 to 16.04 is similarly not possible, then my
recommendation is to just upgrade to 14.04 now.

[Devin Lane]

Lei:

This is a reasonable suggestion for an individual computer, but this is a work environment where I have ~40 machines running 12.04 that work with a build system including custom libraries compiled for 12.04. Since C++ lacks a stable ABI, the libraries are particular to a GCC version. So to do this upgrade path I would have to compile a bunch of stuff for 14.04, then a month later redo it all for 16.04. None of this is important to Chrome of course, but given that March is so close to April's 16.04 release, I'm wondering if a month.5 extension wouldn't be out of the question.

Thanks,

[Lei Zhang]

AFAIK, there's no plans to extend Chrome Linux support for the
platforms marked for deprecations in the announcement from 3 months
ago.

The conversation about your organization's specific situation is
probably not appropriate for the chromium-dev mailing list. You are
welcome to email me privately if you want my opinion on how to
proceed.

[Dirk Pranke]

Correct, we have no plans to extend the support window at this time. Sorry!

Waiting until 16.04 is out seems a bit dodgy anyway since there's no telling

how long it'll be before that release is stable (i.e., is April really good enough,

or do we need to wait until May/June/etc.)?

-- Dirk

[Matt Giuca]

I think given Ubuntu is one of the major Linux distributions, it would make sense to wait for 16.04 if there were problems with 64-bit Chrome on 14.04 (the last LTS release). But I don't see any reason we should wait because some people haven't upgraded from 12.04 yet. (If the argument is that 12.04 has a 5-year support life from Canonical, then the release of 16.04 doesn't change anything; under that argument we should still support it through to 2017.) Chromium/Chrome is not beholden to Canonical's support lifecycle. I think it is reasonable for us to stop supporting 12.04 by now.

[Michael Pardee]

I just noticed that now google docs says chromium 32-bit is an unsupported browser.  Is this really the case or is the check temporarily incorrect?  The exact message that appears at the top of the screen when you compose a new document is:

"This version of Google Chrome is no longer supported.  Please upgrade to a supported browser. Dismiss"

Hitting Dismiss only remove the message temporarily - it comes right back when you compose a new document.

There have been comments made about Chromium being supported on 32-bit ARM for 5 years, but if google docs and other google services don't work it won't mean much.

[Lei Zhang]

You need to ask Google Docs / Drive about their browser support.
Chromium developers cannot help you with this issue.

One important detail you left out is the version of Chromium you are
running. If you are using Chromium 11 from many many moons ago, for
example, then I would not be surprised if Google Docs says it is not
supported.

[Michael Pardee]

Yes, embarrassingly I spoke too soon - I was looking at the current version of chromium packaged in Ubuntu 12.04 32bit which is version 37 with security updates.  I'm hoping the message goes away in version 48 32bit. 

[Torne (Richard Coles)]

There isn't any "version 37 with security updates"; if you are running 37 you are using a version with over a year's worth of known security bugs. Upgrade to something current.

[jan deruiter]

what a greedy awful decision by Google. We refurbish old computers to put into depleted and completely broke public schools in philadelphia. Most students don't have anything at home in terms of technology. The District did set up Google EDU for every student but now they will not be able to use Chrome much longer on the older machines we are putting into classroom, libraries, PTA rooms, etc. With all the money Google has (and which it blows on nonsense every day), this argument of it being a burden to maintain Chrome distributions for older platforms is BS. We will have to look for alternatives now (anything but Google). To your credit, Google has provided us with a perfect example to illustrate two-faced corporate greed to the 135,000 students in our district.

[PhistucK]

If your distribution maintains Chromium, you can still use that...

☆PhistucK

On Fri, Feb 12, 2016 at 8:12 PM, jan deruiter <most...@gmail.com> wrote:

what a greedy awful decision by Google. We refurbish old computers to put into depleted and completely broke public schools in philadelphia. Most students don't have anything at home in terms of technology. The District did set up Google EDU for every student but now they will not be able to use Chrome much longer on the older machines we are putting into classroom, libraries, PTA rooms, etc. With all the money Google has (and which it blows on nonsense every day), this argument of it being a burden to maintain Chrome distributions for older platforms is BS. We will have to look for alternatives now (anything but Google). To your credit, Google has provided us with a perfect example to illustrate two-faced corporate greed to the 135,000 students in our district.

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[Thiago Farina]

On Friday, February 12, 2016, PhistucK <phis...@gmail.com> wrote:

If your distribution maintains Chromium, you can still use that...

Are you sure they are using a Linux distribution there? As he says it is very likely, but there is nothing there that we could take that conclusion. They may be using Windows XP. Who knows?

--

Thiago Farina

[PhistucK]

Mm... because this thread is about Linux, I assumed it was on topic. :)

☆PhistucK

[Brian Anon The Root]

Could the PPA/repository be fixed? I keep getting the following error when updating the packages, this is on the 64-bit release. It's affecting everybody.

Enter code here...W: Failed to fetch http://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/dists/stable/Release  Unable to find expected entry 'main/binary-i386/Packages' in Release file (Wrong sources.list entry or malformed file)

E: Some index files failed to download. They have been ignored, or old ones used instead.

[PhistucK]

You can search crbug.com for an existing issue and star it. If you cannot find one, file a new issue using the "New issue" link on the same page.

Please, do not add a "+1" or "Me too" or "Confirmed" (or similar) comment. It just wastes the time of Chrome engineers and sends unnecessary e-mails to all of the people who starred the issue.

You can reply with a link to the found or created issue and might get triaged (and fixed) faster.

Thank you.

☆PhistucK

--

[Manuel Barallobre Seoane]

You only have to edit your source.list find the line

deb http://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable main

and change for another this

deb [arch=amd64] http://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable main

[Jonathan Garbee]

The repository is certainly messed up to some degree here. Even using Ubuntu 14.04, which is still supported, the x86 error occurs. This completely prevents system updating until people figure out how to permanently fix the issue.

Just editing the /etc/apt/sources.list.d/google-chrome-{stable,unstable}.list file is no good. It only works once, then it is overwritten again by the system.

--

[Mark Greaves]

Google need to fix this in their .deb package.

They need to change the line:-

deb http://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable main

to:

deb [arch=amd64] http://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable main

in /etc/apt/sources.list.d/google-chrome.list

and the two lines:-

REPOCONFIG="deb http://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable main"
SSLREPOCONFIG="deb https://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable main"

to

REPOCONFIG="deb [arch=amd64] http://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable main"
SSLREPOCONFIG="deb [arch=amd64] https://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable main"

in /opt/google/chrome/cron/google-chrome .. otherwise cron will keep overwriting the changes daily

[Michael Moss]

This is crbug.com/591480, and there is a pending fix out for it. Also, I don't believe this "completely prevents system updating", does it? The error suggests that apt-get is proceeding, but with old data (for the 32-bit packages). The only thing that should be broken by it is that your system might think there are still i386 packages in the repo when there aren't (not that anybody on amd64 systems probably cared about those anyhow). Are you seeing actual problems installing or updating the 64-bit packages?

Michael

--

[Mark Greaves]

No it's not 'breaking update functionality, just confusing the heck out of a lot of people who think updates are broken .. I'm unsure if it blocks google-chrome-stable updates, but the error message suggests it might not be updating that repo contents to the package cache.

[Brian Anon/The Root]

Yeah, I noticed that. It worked once, then it screwed up again.

Sent from my BlackBerry 10 smartphone.

From: Jonathan Garbee Sent: Thursday, March 3, 2016 2:25 PM To: Chromium-dev Reply To: jonatha...@chromium.org Subject: Re: [chromium-dev] Re: Updates to Google Chrome Linux support

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[Steve Johnson]

Slimjet, a browser based on Chromium, still maintains 32-bit binary builds for linux. 

On Monday, November 30, 2015 at 7:16:19 PM UTC-6, Sorin Toma wrote:

Well then, farewell Chrome! If I can not use the same browser on all my platforms, I will not use it at all. Firefox might be slower, but it works on my old 32bit only laptop.

[Mark Greaves]

Hey Michael Moss, why have permissions for people to view the progress of http://crbug.com/591480 been removed ?

On Thursday, 3 March 2016 20:51:38 UTC, Michael Moss wrote:

[Jonathan Garbee]

Ah yes, it does not block upgrading. Sorry, network issue happened that I didn't catch which was the cause of that failure.

[Michael Moss]

I think that was accidental. It's open again.

[Christopher Barnes]

Dear Google,

I would just like to say a big thank you, I'm loving Opera 32 BIT on Linux. All friends, associates and family will also be upgraded to Opera 32 BIT on Linux.

It's faster than Chrome and so much fun, I love the side bar and speed dial that is easy to work with.

[Jeff Tiberend]

That's pretty pathetic Google. I guess you want to let Firefox overtake Chrome. Why would people waste their time using a browser that doesn't work on all their computers and phones? This is just stupid and asinine.

Jeff Tiberend, KC9WLZ

[Noah Difference]

I fail to see how dropping support for this platform in any way would "provide the best experience for the most-used Linux versions..."

Your logic fails, at least in the language you are using.  Perhaps a better way of saying this would be something like "in order to reduce our overhead costs, we will end support for Chrome on 32 bit platforms and we are very sorry for this inconvenience."

Sure, it says the same thing, but it is honest and not logically inconsistent with itself.  You cannot provide the best experience of something by eliminating it entirely.  I don't have time to update all my systems to 64bit, especially on such short notice.

[Markus Gutschke (顧孟勤)]

I wasn't involved with any of the decisions to migrate Chrome/Linux away from 32bit, but I do understand at least some of the rationale. Chrome has always been about offering the most secure browser possible. And several of the security features in Chrome work much better in 64bit mode. So, as much as it was a big pain to move my remaining (personal) 32bit machine to 64bit, I do thank Google for making me do what I should have done a long time ago.

Most people probably should just reinstall their machines in 64bit mode, but for completeness' sake, I point out: http://www.ewan.cc/?q=node/132 This website has instructions on how to crossgrade a running Ubuntu system from 32bit to 64bit. I can confirm that these instructions work for Trusty 14.04 LTS. But I have to warn that it is time-consuming, it probably requires a bit of manual intervention every so often, and if you don't know much about Ubuntu, there is a good chance that you could break your system in the process; and then you are back to reinstalling from scratch anyway.

Having said that, most of the PCs sold in the last 10+ years probably can run 64bit Linux. There were a small number of early 64bit systems that Linux didn't support for while, but I believe that has since been fixed. If in doubt, install a more recent kernel.

Markus

--

[Emerson Maningo]

Dear Dirk,

    I understand this decision, however it seems a lot of things being missed here :

->If a user is using 32-bit Linux (even Ubuntu 14.04 LTS), one simply could not upgrade to 64-bit without a fresh install.

->This means that if a 32-bit Linux system has been fully running with a lot of sensitive programs and highly customized applications, all of this would soon be running with insecure version of Chrome (because it's no longer updated).

->we can still use Chromium, no questions for that. But for me , working in a web. We often Chrome for testing. We need them frequently updated. 

I'm quite disappointed with this. I could hardly believe I could no longer update my Chrome copy. Please bring back the 32-bit version of Chrome for users that are stuck with 32-bit Ubuntu LTS 14.04. And give us to upgrade to 64-bit once another LTS is available. 

I think the best decision for both of us (Google and users) would be to drop the 32-bit support once another LTS of Ubuntu is available (after 14.04), so users can freshly install finally to 64-bit and use 64-bit Chrome. I think this decision should be win-win to everyone. Do you agree? Thanks for your time.

Cheers,

Emerson

[Christian Biesinger]

FYI, Ubuntu 16.04 LTS will be released next month: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Releases

-Christian

--

[Dirk Pranke]

On Wed, Mar 30, 2016 at 6:58 AM, Emerson Maningo <emersonro...@gmail.com> wrote:

Dear Dirk,

    I understand this decision, however it seems a lot of things being missed here :

->If a user is using 32-bit Linux (even Ubuntu 14.04 LTS), one simply could not upgrade to 64-bit without a fresh install.

->This means that if a 32-bit Linux system has been fully running with a lot of sensitive programs and highly customized applications, all of this would soon be running with insecure version of Chrome (because it's no longer updated).

->we can still use Chromium, no questions for that. But for me , working in a web. We often Chrome for testing. We need them frequently updated. 

I'm quite disappointed with this. I could hardly believe I could no longer update my Chrome copy. Please bring back the 32-bit version of Chrome for users that are stuck with 32-bit Ubuntu LTS 14.04. And give us to upgrade to 64-bit once another LTS is available. 

I think the best decision for both of us (Google and users) would be to drop the 32-bit support once another LTS of Ubuntu is available (after 14.04), so users can freshly install finally to 64-bit and use 64-bit Chrome. I think this decision should be win-win to everyone. Do you agree? Thanks for your time.

Cheers,

Emerson

Hi Emerson,

I'm sorry, but no, we have no plans to bring back the 32-bit release at this time.

Regards,

-- Dirk

 

On Tuesday, December 1, 2015 at 7:19:37 AM UTC+8, Dirk Pranke wrote:

Hi Everyone,

To provide the best experience for the most-used Linux versions, we will end support for Google Chrome on 32-bit Linux, Ubuntu Precise (12.04), and Debian 7 (wheezy) in early March, 2016.  Chrome will continue to function on these platforms but will no longer receive updates and security fixes.

We intend to continue supporting the 32-bit build configurations on Linux to support building Chromium. If you are using Precise, we’d recommend that you to upgrade to Trusty.

Kind Regards,

-- Dirk

[ bcc: chromi...@chromium.org ]

--

[Sven-Haegar Koch]

On Wednesday, March 30, 2016 at 6:52:02 PM UTC+2, Dirk Pranke wrote:

On Wed, Mar 30, 2016 at 6:58 AM, Emerson Maningo <emersonro...@gmail.com> wrote:

->If a user is using 32-bit Linux (even Ubuntu 14.04 LTS), one simply could not upgrade to 64-bit without a fresh install.

->This means that if a 32-bit Linux system has been fully running with a lot of sensitive programs and highly customized applications, all of this would soon be running with insecure version of Chrome (because it's no longer updated).

If you have 64 bit compatible hardware, use Debian or Ubuntu, for historical reasons still use a 32 bit linux install, and want to avoid completely reinstalling just to use 64 bit Chrome maybe multiarch support can help - just did this on my TV laptop:

1. Activate multi-arch: dpkg --add-architecture amd64 ; apt-get update

2. Make sure you are already using a 64bit kernel. (uname -a output should contain "x86_64 GNU/Linux", search for other docs describing how to get it)

3. Install 64 bit google chrome on your otherwise 32 bit system:

apt-get install google-chrome-stable:amd64

4. Install some additional packages needed to be able to run chrome, without them it just exits with "Aborted" or outputs other error messages:

        apt-get install libudev1:amd64
        apt-get install libgl1-mesa-glx:amd64 libgl1-mesa-dri:amd64
        apt-get install libasound2-plugins:amd64

Works for me(tm) on i386 Debian Unstable with all current updates applied.

Greetings
Haegar

[Hayden Livingston]

It's quite strange that 32-bit releases are gone considering they are
way faster than 64-bit builds. You don't seem to be removing 32-bit
Windows builds.

Oh that's right, Windows gets special status. Linux is now finally
getting around to x86 on x64 (similar to Wow64 on Windows) and this is
the treatment we get.

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[Mike Frysinger]

i don't know what sources you're using (if any), but Linux has supported a 32-bit x86 userland since day 1 with x86_64 kernels.  it also has supported multilib (32-bit & 64-bit) since the initial toolchain merges.

-mike

[PhistucK]

On Thu, Apr 7, 2016 at 12:26 AM, Hayden Livingston <halivi...@gmail.com> wrote:

You don't seem to be removing 32-bit
Windows builds.

Oh that's right, Windows gets special status

​32 bit Chrome on Windows being the default (as opposed to Linux, I suppose? But even if it is not) plus a vastly different (huge) market share​ means that it is currently impossible to stop support for it. You are pretty much comparing apples to oranges here, in my opinion.

You should remember that Google is still a company and business-wise, it does not make a lot of sense to put resources into a configuration with almost no market share, it is better to make the majority have a better experience.

☆PhistucK

[Edward Meeker]

Really, chearful bastards I see while you disregard  how this effects others. Could you have least left a copy somewhere. This is in no way providing the best experience, it is a corporate weasel in motion. 
On Monday, November 30, 2015 at 3:19:37 PM UTC-8, Dirk Pranke Hi Everyone,

[Jesse Helka]

If you are still answering questions on this topic, give me a straight answer with no technobabble. I have a 32-bit Linux running Lubuntu(Ubuntu) 16.04, I have Firefox and Chromium installed. I am stuck with Flashplayer 11.2 and cannot get anything newer without Chrome.

Tell me; How do I get Chrome?

On Monday, November 30, 2015 at 6:19:37 PM UTC-5, Dirk Pranke wrote:

[Mike Frysinger]

reinstall Lubuntu using their 64-bit release

-mike

--

[Ralph Bromley]

You dont, google dont give a crap about 32bit linux fans.

There is a bvetter alternative anyway, its called vivaldi

https://vivaldi.com/?lang=en_US

Just install chromium, pepperflash along side of it and it will work

[Jesse Helka]

Thank you, I'm clueless when it comes to Linux, its just so difficult to understand when everything is explained like I'm already an expert. Which one do I install?

[Ralph Bromley]

You will have to be a little more specific, what linux are you using?

[Jesse Helka]

I'm using Ubuntu 16.04

On Thursday, May 12, 2016 at 6:07:17 PM UTC-4, Ralph Bromley wrote:

You will have to be a little more specific, what Linux are you using?

On Thursday, May 12, 2016 at 6:04:34 PM UTC-4, Jesse Helka wrote:

Thank you, I'm clueless when it comes to Linux, its just so difficult to understand when everything is explained like I'm already an expert. Which one do I install?

On Thursday, May 12, 2016 at 5:57:27 PM UTC-4, Ralph Bromley wrote:

You don't, Google doesn't give a crap about 32bit Linux fans.

There is a better alternative anyway, its called vivaldi

[Jesse Helka]

OK, I installed Vivaldi, it looks amazing! Now how do I get Pepper flash?

[Mike Frysinger]

get the 64-bit version here:

http://www.ubuntu.com/download/desktop/thank-you/?version=16.04&architecture=amd64

install that.  if you have troubles, ask on the ubuntu forums:

http://community.ubuntu.com/contribute/support/ubuntu-forums/

-mike

On Thu, May 12, 2016 at 6:10 PM, Jesse Helka <jessem...@gmail.com> wrote:

I'm using Ubuntu 16.04

--

[Mike Frysinger]

sorry, but this isn't the place for such questions.  e-mail people privately (not me though), or use Vivaldi's forums:

https://vivaldi.net/forum

-mike

--

[Jon Kirton]

Is there any way of getting rid of the warning message permenantly, I only need to read it once but every time I open chrome?  I may be happy to live without support and still use chrome but the message being there isn't helping.  The message its self makes me think of using another browser now.

[PhistucK]

Well, you probably should use another browser (assuming it is a browser that supports your operating system, of course). That means the warning message actually works. ;)

☆PhistucK

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[Katie MC]

damn it! i hate this update!!! because of google i have to download a whole 1.4 GB ubuntu cuz i have 32 bit os installed!!
but i love the web designer anyway, so i guess i have no choice :(

[Brian Anon/The Root]

Verify if your machine is in act 64-bit. Or just use mozilla firefox like I have. If the website uses flash, use quickjava to disable it, and use a user agent spoofer (firefox on android/mobile/iOS) to make the site default to HTML5.

Works for me.

From: Katie MC Sent: Tuesday, May 24, 2016 8:16 AM To: Chromium-dev Reply To: dj-rebe...@outlook.com Subject: [chromium-dev] Re: Updates to Google Chrome Linux support

damn it! i hate this update!!! because of google i have to download a whole 1.4 GB ubuntu cuz i have 32 bit os installed!!
but i love the web designer anyway, so i guess i have no choice :(

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[Dave Chiodo]

You do realize that you can't upgrade to a 64 bit OS if the CPU only support 23 bit, right? This isn't just a matter of updating the kernel or the distro release. 

It effectively makes it impossible to use chrome on LOTS of older but otherwise perfectly viable hardware that would have been perfect for a low end web/email use using chrome.

This decision smacks of either  leverage from the CPU or PC makers, to force people to buy new hardware, or perhaps google didn't like people using older cheap laptops instead of buying chromebooks.

And even worse then just "no new versions" google isn't even making the last 32 bit version that did exist available anymore. So if you've got an older chrome on a 32 bit box, you're stuck with whatever version you have. And if you need to reinstall for some reason, then no more chrome for you.

Either way BOOOOOOOOOOO to this horrible decision.

Google has benefited GREATLY from the linux hacker/dev community (that likes to reuse old hardware instead of throwing it away), and it sure would be nice if they considered that when they were looking at making bone-headed decisions like this.

[PhistucK]

On Sun, Jun 12, 2016 at 10:34 PM, Dave Chiodo <mega...@gmail.com> wrote:

And even worse then just "no new versions" google isn't even making the last 32 bit version that did exist available anymore. So if you've got an older chrome on a 32 bit box, you're stuck with whatever version you have. And if you need to reinstall for some reason, then no more chrome for you.

​The intention is that those users will not use a non-updating Chrome​, but choose Firefox (if it is updating) or any other updating browser instead. Using Chrome on those system is a security risk.

However, you should search for a Chromium alternative as some distributions may maintain an updating 32 bit edition of Chromium. You will not be able to use Flash (I think) or play H.264 or DRM protected videos, but those are not "low-end web/mail" anyway, so you should be fine.

Please, remember that Google is a business and the very low market share of Chrome users that use 32 bit Linux probably does not justify its maintenance cost.

☆PhistucK