[PATCH v4 2/5] docs/about/deprecated: Deprecate the qemu-system-i386 binary
Aside from not supporting KVM on 32-bit hosts, the qemu-system-x86_64
binary is a proper superset of the qemu-system-i386 binary. With the
32-bit host support being deprecated, it is now also possible to
deprecate the qemu-system-i386 binary.
With regards to 32-bit KVM support in the x86 Linux kernel,
the developers confirmed that they do not need a recent
qemu-system-i386 binary here:
https://lore.kernel.org/kvm/Y%2ffkTs5ajFy0hP1U@google.com/
Reviewed-by: Daniel P. Berrangé <berrange(a)redhat.com>
Reviewed-by: Wilfred Mallawa <wilfred.mallawa(a)wdc.com>
Signed-off-by: Thomas Huth <thuth(a)redhat.com>
---
docs/about/deprecated.rst | 14 ++++++++++++++
1 file changed, 14 insertions(+)
diff --git a/docs/about/deprecated.rst b/docs/about/deprecated.rst
index 1ca9dc33d6..c4fcc6b33c 100644
--- a/docs/about/deprecated.rst
+++ b/docs/about/deprecated.rst
@@ -34,6 +34,20 @@ deprecating the build option and no longer defend it in CI. The
``--enable-gcov`` build option remains for analysis test case
coverage.
+``qemu-system-i386`` binary (since 8.0)
+'''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''
+
+The ``qemu-system-i386`` binary was mainly useful for running with KVM
+on 32-bit x86 hosts, but most Linux distributions already removed their
+support for 32-bit x86 kernels, so hardly anybody still needs this. The
+``qemu-system-x86_64`` binary is a proper superset and can be used to
+run 32-bit guests by selecting a 32-bit CPU model, including KVM support
+on x86_64 hosts. Thus users are recommended to reconfigure their systems
+to use the ``qemu-system-x86_64`` binary instead. If a 32-bit CPU guest
+environment should be enforced, you can switch off the "long mode" CPU
+flag, e.g. with ``-cpu max,lm=off``.
+
+
System emulator command line arguments
--------------------------------------
--
2.31.1