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Hope For Fixing Longstanding Linux I/O Wait Bug
DaGoodBoy writes "There has been a long standing performance bug in Linux since 2.6.18 that has been responsible for lagging interactivity and poor system performance across all architectures. It has been notoriously difficult to qualify and isolate, but in the last few days someone has finally gotten a repeatable test case! Turns out the problem may not even be disk related, since the test case triggers the bug only by transferring data either between two processes or threads. The test results are very revealing. The developer ran regressions all the way back to version 2.6.15 that demonstrate this bug has more than doubled the time to run the test in 2.6.28. Many, many people working at improving the desktop performance of Linux will be very happy to see this bug die. I know that I, personally, will find a way to send the guy that found this test case his beverage of choice in thanks. Please spread the word and bring some attention to this issue so we can get it fixed!"
The economy is "fixed" just fine on a regular basis, but people don't seem to like that.
Ask yourself this: people have been spending money on worldwide flights, exotic holidays, fancy houses, big cars, cinema outings, fast computers... Now. let's say you work 40 hours a week, and get $40 for that. So that's essentially 40 tokens for work done. If your wage is average, then other people get similar tokens for a similar week of work. Now, how long did that flight take to build/arrange/fly/repair, in man-hours (or tokens)? What about the hotels, and excursions, and beauty treatments? And the big car? And that movie you saw? And the fast computer?
Ignoring what's the norm... do you REALLY think your 40 tokens per week can buy all this? That, if their were no tokens, and you simply had to contribute work on the plane to get a free flight, had to help build the car to get a free car... do you REALLY think you'd have time? Because, essentially, anything those tokens get you that you couldn't have gotten with man hours is borrowed time.
Unfortunately many humans preferred to be greedy and irresponsible with their resource use, gradually spending more than they have to get more than they need over decades as they slowly forget reality. That throws off the economy, and soon everyone's up the creek. Eventually, they realise it, and the whole thing crashes like a rollercoaster, down to much less than its worth and less than is needed. Finally people start to get a sense of normalcy, buying what they need, and everything is good. Until they start to forget where the line is, and then become irresponsible and greedy again.
It's a vicious cycle, that'll never change, until people start to be more responsible and share a little rather than grabbing a lot. BUT, none of this should matter much, to a frugal person who buys what he needs, and saves when he can. Not everyone will be affected by these boom/bust times -- only those who ride the rollercoaster.