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#* Unfortunately, it's a pricey niche system, and there's no guarantee that big-endian OS options will be maintained for long. | #* Unfortunately, it's a pricey niche system, and there's no guarantee that big-endian OS options will be maintained for long. | ||
# Running a native, older big-endian development system: | # Running a native, older big-endian development system: | ||
#* Examples include buying an older G4 or G5 Apple PowerPC system, or an older SPARC64 Sun station. They can often be bought second hand at very reasonable prices. | #* Examples include buying an older G4 or G5 Apple PowerPC system, or an older SPARC64 Sun station<ref>Some MIPS and ARM boards also exist, but their quality can vary a lot, and although the MIPS and ARM architectures are theoretically bi-endian, in practice these development boards often only run in little-endian mode, nowadays. They can be useful for strict-alignment testing, though.</ref>. They can often be bought second hand at very reasonable prices. | ||
#* However, running a modern development environment on them in getting harder (but not impossible), because the big-endian desktop ecosystem receives less and less maintenance, so things often tend to break. G5 systems (in particular) also require careful maintenance and can be very power-hungry. | #* However, running a modern development environment on them in getting harder (but not impossible), because the big-endian desktop ecosystem receives less and less maintenance, so things often tend to break. G5 systems (in particular) also require careful maintenance and can be very power-hungry. | ||
# '''Emulating a big-endian development system from your regular development machine''': | # '''Emulating a big-endian development system from your regular development machine''': | ||
#* Any reasonably powerful desktop system should be able to emulate a big-endian architecture, thanks to [https://www.qemu.org QEMU]. | #* Any reasonably powerful desktop system should be able to emulate a big-endian architecture, thanks to [https://www.qemu.org QEMU]. |
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