How to find 32-bit libraries in 64-bit Linux and delete them?

Question

I am running 64-bit OpenSUSE. My partition is filling up and running out of space.I need to delete some programs and librarires. How can I find all 32-bit libraries and delete them? Can I use yast to delete all 32-bit programs and libraries?

Answer 1

Programs are installed as either 64-bit or 32-bit versions, removing 32-bit versions will remove those programs from your system completely.

So when it comes to freeing up diskspace there is no point in differentiating between 64 or 32-bit, you should simply uninstall programs you don't want to use anymore or remove some other data.

Answer 2

To look up binaries that are 32 bit long :

 find $(echo $PATH | tr ":" " ") -type f -exec bash -c '
      file $(readlink -f "$1") | grep "ELF 32" | cut -d: -f1
 ' -- {} \;