The developers of the Wine project have reported issues with the delivery of Wine for Ubuntu 19.10, in case this release drops support for 32-bit x86 systems.
In deciding to discontinue support for the 32-bit x86 architecture, the Ubuntu developers the delivery of a 64-bit version of Wine or the use of a 32-bit version in a container based on Ubuntu 18.04. The problem is that the 64-bit version of Wine (Wine64) is not officially supported and has a large number of .
Current Wine builds for 64-bit distributions are based on Wine32 and require the presence of 32-bit libraries.
Typically, in 64-bit environments, the necessary 32-bit libraries are provided in multiarch packages, but Ubuntu has decided to completely cease the creation of such libraries. The Wine developers immediately the idea of a snap package and running in a container, as this is only a temporary solution. It is noted that the 64-bit version of Wine will need to be properly developed, but this will take time.
Moreover, many current Windows applications are still delivered only in 32-bit builds, while 64-bit applications are often supplied with 32-bit installers (to handle installation attempts in Win32), so the 32-bit version of Wine continues to be developed as the primary one. For a long time, Wine64 was positioned solely as a tool for running Win64 applications, not intended to run 32-bit programs, and this feature is reflected in many articles and documentation (now Wine64 can already run Win32 applications, but requires 32-bit libraries).
Similar problems by Valve, many games in its catalog continue to remain 32-bit. Valve intends to support a 32-bit runtime for the Steam Linux client on its own. The Wine developers do not rule out the possibility of using this runtime to deliver a 32-bit Wine in Ubuntu 19.10 until a 64-bit version of Wine is ready, in order to avoid reinventing the wheel and combine efforts with Valve in maintaining 32-bit libraries for Ubuntu.
Source: opennet.ru
