Re: [boost] Build breaking changes

Subject: Re: [boost] Build breaking changes
From: Peter Dimov (lists_at_[hidden])
Date: 2018-03-29 13:50:59

James E. King, III wrote:

> The debian project reported that in 2012, downloads of the x86_64 
> architecture surpassed the x86 architecture.

This (a) doesn't have anything to do with Windows and (b) relates to the 
architecture of the OS rather than the code running on it. Most Windows 
installations are 64 bit. Most code running on Windows is still 32 bit, 
although this is changing.

> The addition of the NX bit is a security improvement in amd64 that x86 
> cannot leverage,

I think that 32 bit code under Windows 64 does leverage the NX bit, but I'm 
too lazy to check.

Either way, this thread was not originally about the default address-model. 
It was about what was built by default for `b2 --build-type=minimal` (which 
is the default). Under Linux, this builds the default address-model, which 
is 64 bit on a 64 bit OS. Under Windows, it used to build 32 bit, and I 
changed it to build both 32 and 64 bit.

The reason it built 32 bit was that build-type=minimal on Windows built 
whatever were the default project settings in a new Visual Studio project, 
to make it easier for people trying out Boost to have the project autolink 
correctly.