3.10. /lib<qual> : Alternate format essential shared libraries (optional)

3.10.1. Purpose

There may be one or more variants of the /lib directory on systems which support more than one binary format requiring separate libraries. [13]

3.10.2. Requirements

If one or more of these directories exist, the requirements for their contents are the same as the normal /lib directory, except that /lib<qual>/cpp is not required. [14]



[13] This is commonly used for 64-bit or 32-bit support on systems which support multiple binary formats, but require libraries of the same name. In this case, /lib32 and /lib64 might be the library directories, and /lib a symlink to one of them.

[14] /lib<qual>/cpp is still permitted: this allows the case where /lib and /lib<qual> are the same (one is a symbolic link to the other).