Debian developers published a plan to transition all packages for the use of a 64-bit type Time_t in the ports of the distribution for 32-bit architectures. This change will be implemented in the upcoming DEBIAN 13 “Trixie” distribution, aiming to address The problem of 2038.
Currently, the 64-bit Time_t type is already utilized in Debian ports for 32-bit architectures X32, RISCV32, Arc, and Loong32. However, the ports for architectures i386, Armel, ArmHF, MIPSEL, HPPA, PowerPC, M68K, and SH4 still employ the 32-bit Time_t type. This 32-bit type is insufficient for processing time beyond January 19, 2038, as it results in an overflow of the counter-seconds since January 1, 1970. Among the 35,960 Time_t types supplied in Debian, only 6,429 are currently using the 64-bit type, with over 1,200 libraries dependent on them.
This type change will require the renaming of libraries and consequently introduce the most substantial update to the application binary interface (ABI) in the history of the Debian project. The experimental branch of DEBIAN already had approximately 500 libraries updated last Monday, with the remaining libraries scheduled for transition to the 64-bit Time_t type this weekend. Once all issues identified during this transition are resolved in the experimental branch, the new options for C libraries with “Abi = Time64” will be loaded into the Unstable repository.