CentOS - Sep 2011 - Cons of disabling *.i386 and *.i686 in a 64bit Distribution

Can anybody give me a reason why this would be a bad idea.  So the premise
for this question is that I setup an exclude=*.i368,*.i686 in my yum.conf.
 While doing a yum update I come across missing package dependencies for
instance mkinitrd for the i386 package.  I noticed there is already one for
x86_64.  I realized during the kickstart install that some of these *.i386
got installed before I could enable the exclude in the yum.conf.

So the questions I pose is... why are some of these *.i386 packages getting
installed on a 64bit distro? is there any harm is removing them all?

I guess I could spin up a virtual and try, but wanted to see what the census
already knows about this matter as well.

Thanks!
-- 

james h nguyen | lead systems architect | www.callfire.com | 1.949.625.4263
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I could not see any issues with it. As you probably know i386 packages will
work on an x86_64 install, and there are some packages written for i386 that
you can't get for x86_64. You could disable it, but my system runs perfect
with it.

--
If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to call me on +61 478 241
896.

Regards,
Christopher Hawker

On Thu, Sep 15, 2011 at 12:52 AM, James Nguyen <james at callfire.com>
wrote:
> Can anybody give me a reason why this would be a bad idea.  So the premise
> for this question is that I setup an exclude=*.i368,*.i686 in my yum.conf.
>  While doing a yum update I come across missing package dependencies for
> instance mkinitrd for the i386 package.  I noticed there is already one for
> x86_64.  I realized during the kickstart install that some of these *.i386
> got installed before I could enable the exclude in the yum.conf.
>
> So the questions I pose is... why are some of these *.i386 packages getting
> installed on a 64bit distro? is there any harm is removing them all?
>
> I guess I could spin up a virtual and try, but wanted to see what the
> census already knows about this matter as well.
>
> Thanks!
> --
>
> james h nguyen | lead systems architect | www.callfire.com |
> 1.949.625.4263
>
> _______________________________________________
> CentOS mailing list
> CentOS at centos.org
> http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos
>
>
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From: James Nguyen <james at callfire.com>
> So the premise for this question is that I setup an exclude=*.i368,*.i686
in my yum.conf.
> While doing a yum update I come across missing package dependencies for
instance mkinitrd for the i386 package.
What about using multilib_policy=best instead?

JD