Don't forget about Google Chrome dropping support for 32-bit Linux

[Guest LilBambi]

Yep, March 2016 ... Google Chrome will get no further updates for 32-bit Linux OSes as noted below in my Fran's Computer Services article posting today about the upcoming April 2016 drop of support for the other two operating systems as well as March 2016 dropping of support for 32-bit Linux.

 

Older versions of Windows and Mac are not the only users to be abandoned/axed by Google Chrome in early 2016. ALL 32-bit Linux distribution versions are also being abandoned — this month — March 2016 as noted in BetaNews, Slash Dot, and PCWorld and other news outlets back in November and December 2015.

 

Even though many and maybe even most computers these days are 64-bit, there are still a lot of 32-bit computers and 32-bit operating systems in use around the world today so this may be a move forward for 64-bit, but it is also a sad day for all the 32-bit hardware/operating systems worldwide.

 

Of course, there are still several browsers like Firefox, Opera and Pale Moon available for Linux 32-bit computers — just as there are for Windows and Mac users. There are also somealternative browsers based on Firefox available (Pale Moon noted earlier here is included), and distro-specific versions of Firefox like Iceweasel in Debian Linux, etc.)

 

For all users of Google Chrome, there are some Flash blocking or control Extension possibilities that can protect everyone, but particularly these older users from having Flash run all the time if they choose to continue to use Google Chrome:

• uBlock Origin
  
• Flash Control
  

[raymac46]

From the look of it, Chromium will still be supported in 32 bit Linux.

I have a couple of old netbooks with first gen Atom processors that only support 32 bit, but otherwise all my hardware will support 64 bit. Even stuff going back 10 years.

[V.T. Eric Layton]

Chromium is a better choice, anyway, in my opinion. It requires manual updating, though.

[Guest LilBambi]

I am not thrilled with Chromium but if that's all that's available for 32-bit...It is NOT just like Chrome and it gets wonky when mix and match with your account on the two at times.

[V.T. Eric Layton]

What's not to be thrilled about. I ran Google Chrome and Chromium side-by-side in Slackware last year to test them. I could not find any real differences to speak of. The main diff that I saw was Google Chrome used the Google logo and Chromium uses the blander Chromium two-tone blue logo. There were some minor under-the-hood differences, but they were not noticeable at all to me in regular everyday usage. I could even use Google Sync to sync them together.

[Guest LilBambi]

Yeah, I hear ya. One would think there wouldn't be that much but when I tried it, things were not the same in areas I felt the differences. There is nothing wrong with Chromium and I will be using it in Linux. I just prefer Google Chrome.

Having said that, Google Sync didn't always work well between them (Google Chrome and Chromium) at times on some OSes (Raspberry Pi for one - could have been a lack of RAM memory on the Pi). Not all the time. But it has to work right all the time because I have things I do not want to lose.

There are some other extension differences as well (I do not remember which ones because it was quite a while back when I tried this) but they didn't come into play for me as I only use a few extensions.

[raymac46]

I would rather use Chrome (and I do on any 64 bit machine.) However Chromium will do on 32 bit. Syncing has worked OK for me between Chromium and Chrome - even to Chrome on Windows.

[securitybreach]

What's not to be thrilled about. I ran Google Chrome and Chromium side-by-side in Slackware last year to test them. I could not find any real differences to speak of. The main diff that I saw was Google Chrome used the Google logo and Chromium uses the blander Chromium two-tone blue logo. There were some minor under-the-hood differences, but they were not noticeable at all to me in regular everyday usage. I could even use Google Sync to sync them together.

 

Well the major differences are that Chrome includes flash (pepper) and pdf support whereas you have to install these separately on chromium. There are a few other things too though:

http://www.howtogeek.com/202825/what%E2%80%99s-the-difference-between-chromium-and-chrome/

[Hedon James]

besides user preferences, why not just use Firefox? Firefox is open source and, AFAIK, has 32-bit support. You can also sync bookmarks, etc.. with Firefox sync. I have Firefox on my Linux, Android, and 1 Windows OS VM, with Firefox syncing flawlessly across all devices, FWIW.

 

I've got nothing against Chrome or Chromium; in fact, I have them installed as backup software for emergencies (I prefer 2 versions of everything....I'm a paranoid conspiracy theorist!), and for Google Chat with the daughter at college. But as long as I have the choice, I prefer Firefox...

[securitybreach]

I find Firefox to be much slower than chrome and it was a bit buggier the last time I used it. Plus I do not like how it handles the tab bar when you have a lot of tabs open.

[V.T. Eric Layton]

I used to be a big FF user and fan for a long, long time. I had to finally give it up, though, because Mozilla was just dragging their feet on resolving the horrendous memory leakage issues that FF has had forever. Also, I got sick and tire of the ridiculous update schedule; a new friggin' FF every week or so. It was tiresome. I'm older now. I don't like to tinker too much and I don't like CHANGE. Can you tell why I like Slackware so much?

[Guest LilBambi]

I also used to be a big FF user and still do use it and Opera for specific tasks, but Google Chrome has become my mainstay for the most part.

[Hedon James]

Fair enough on the Firefox comments. Who am I to say what someone else should PREFER?!

 

My point was simply that if one prefers 32-bit Chrome, but it's no longer an option; and Chromium isn't for you, Firefox is a viable option for 32-bit machines and will replace most or all of Chrome functions. I haven't had the memory leak issues; or maybe I do, but it's not significant enough to be noticed. Firefox has been rock solid for me since I switched over to Linux in 2009. IMO, that's pretty stable and reliable. I've got no beef with Chrome or Chromium though, and I have them as backup browsers on many of my systems, as well as to access Google-specific apps, like Google Hangouts & Chat.

 

Google may have left 32-bit Chrome users hanging, but Linux has not. We have other viable options. Maybe not PREFERRED options, but viable...and as Linux users, we're used to that!

Edited March 25, 2016 by Hedon James

[ebrke]

I haven't had the memory leak issues; or maybe I do, but it's not significant enough to be noticed.

I haven't either AFAIK, but I know people have had issues with this--Eric's been saying it for years. Maybe because I don't work with a large number of open tabs as many people do? I rarely have more than 2 or 3 open and I close FF when I leave the machine for any length of time.

[securitybreach]

I rarely have more than 2 or 3 open and I close FF when I leave the machine for any length of time.

 

That's it? Heck, I have 7 sticky tabs that autostart on every session. Of course, most people do not use as many tabs as I do.

[V.T. Eric Layton]

The most tabs I probably have open on any browser at any time is maybe 5 or 6. They're never open constantly; just temporarily. Once I visit the tab and do whatever was necessary, I close it. In normal use, my browsers have only two tabs open; my custom_dial locally served page, which uses nil resources, and my active page. That's it.

 

Back when I finally got fed up with FF, it was a bloated cow. I don't know how much progress they've made since then, but any progress would be a good thing. I still use FF occasionally for odd things here and there. Sometimes, like just last night, I was at a site that didn't like some of my Chromium script-blocking and anti-tracking extensions. Rather than turn them all off and have to restart them later, I just opened FF and did what I needed to do in there. The FF browsers on my machines are 100% stock/vanilla; right out of the box.

[saturnian]

I brought in updates today in Debian and in Arch. Chromium updates were available for both distros (to chromium-49.0.2623.108-1-i686 in Arch). However, from AUR:

 

==> ERROR: chromium-pepper-flash is not available for the 'i686' architecture.
The build failed.

 

What's the actual cut-off date for 32-bit Chrome updates? Has anyone seen anything more precise than "this month" or "April?" Looks like 32-bit Chrome is no longer available for downloading, so perhaps the updates for Chrome have already stopped coming as well?

 

I use Chromium instead of Chrome. Over the past few months, I've gone back to using Firefox (or Iceweasel, in Debian) most of the time, but I also keep Chromium installed. Seems to me that Firefox is indeed more bloated and slower than Chromium, but that isn't such a big deal to me.

[securitybreach]

I brought in updates today in Debian and in Arch. Chromium updates were available for both distros (to chromium-49.0.2623.108-1-i686 in Arch). However, from AUR:

 

==> ERROR: chromium-pepper-flash is not available for the 'i686' architecture.
The build failed.

 

What's the actual cut-off date for 32-bit Chrome updates? Has anyone seen anything more precise than "this month" or "April?" Looks like 32-bit Chrome is no longer available for downloading, so perhaps the updates for Chrome have already stopped coming as well?

 

I use Chromium instead of Chrome. Over the past few months, I've gone back to using Firefox (or Iceweasel, in Debian) most of the time, but I also keep Chromium installed. Seems to me that Firefox is indeed more bloated and slower than Chromium, but that isn't such a big deal to me.

 

Did you try editing the PKGBUILD and changing:

 

arch=('x86_64')

 

to

 

arch=('any')

[securitybreach]

The reason I think that it could simply be a typo is that chromium-pepper-flash-standalone's PKGBUILD shows both architects.

[saturnian]

See the comments at https://aur.archlinu.../?comments=all.

 

"i686 support was dropped since google drop support of 32-bit linux in google chrome"

[raymac46]

I've decided to use Midori with the memory challenged 32 bit netbooks I have. Midori works OK with text based sites and I'm not playing videos or web based games on the old machines anyway.

On my more powerful 64 bit machines I stick with Chrome. Firefox is OK but I have gotten used to Chrome.

[Guest LilBambi]

Same with me regarding Midori on power challenged systems.

[Cluttermagnet]

There's still a lot to be said for FF. Bloated, yes, but it continues to get the

job done. I'm going to put myself out there as a very, very bad example of

open tabs. Would you believe I've let certain machines accumulate literally

hundreds of open tabs? No, I'm not kidding. In fact, on a couple of boxes

open tabs exceeded 1000-1200. What amazed me is that it continued to

run albeit somewhat sluggishly. Crashes do happen, but are remarkably

rare- which I find somewhat stunning when I think about it.

 

I think I'm really using tabs more like bookmarks- heh!

Edited May 4, 2016 by Cluttermagnet