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Linux 4.17 Kernel Offers Better Intel Power-Savings While Dropping Old CPUs (phoronix.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Linus Torvalds has released Linux 4.17-rc1. This kernel comes with a significant amount of new capabilities as outlined by the Linux 4.17 feature overview. Among the new features are AMDGPU WattMan support, Intel HDCP support, Vega 12 GPU enablement, NVIDIA Xavier SoC support, removal of obsolete CPU architectures, and even better support for the original Macintosh PowerBook 100 series. Phoronix testing has also revealed measurable power savings improvements and better power efficiency on Intel hardware. The kernel is expected to be stabilized by June.
They were dropped because there are no developers to maintain the code, If you want to pick up the slack, I'm sure the community will be more then willing to rummage through their junk-piles to send you testing hardware
I'm curious what's considered an "obsolete CPU architecture" if a Powerbook 100 is still supported.
I'm curious what's considered an "obsolete CPU architecture" if a Powerbook 100 is still supported.
Obsolete = Nobody is stepping up to maintain the code.
Obviously someone still cares about the Powerbook 100 enough to do the maintenance work.
Proprietary software drops support when they no longer care. Open source drops support when you no longer care.
Things like Unicore, Hexagon, S+core, OpenRISC, M32R, Cris i.e. stuff most people didn't even heard about.
The long version at (as always) excellent LWN:
https://lwn.net/Articles/74807... and
https://lwn.net/Articles/74929...
:wq
What kind of mental gymnastics do you have to go through to keep 68000 but drop the much newer Blackfin DSP
No mental gymnastics required. You just need a developer willing to support the 68k, and not have a developer for the Blackfin.
The 68k is kind of baseline for that tree, and relatively simple even for people without specialized knowledge, so it may stick around for a while. It's harder to maintain more complex architectures where you need instruction order and cache management to think about as well.
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
If that's the case, just say you're dropping unmaintained architectures due to lack of interest or active maintainers. Talking about dropping "obsolete" architectures is somewhat misleading when the architectures being dropped are still in being manufactured or developed, but undeniably obsolete architectures are still being actively supported.
Typically old hardware isn't dropped if we know someone is using it. Of course there are exceptions when a stack gets a major rewrite. If there is discussion about dropping support for something you use, just let us know on lkml.
NTFS doesn't seem that stable on Windows 10. On Linux, when a filesystem error occurs, the filesystem is set as read-only until reboot, which prevents further errors, and really encourages people to fix the problem. On Windows 10, when a filesystem error occurs, a directory may give a "Permission Denied" status message when you try to read a file, rename it, etc., but otherwise the system runs as usual. This means errors go unreported, and the system just feels vaguely untrustworthy. Often the directory in question doesn't even exist after a reboot, but the system just says "Permission Denied" after every operation. (This is with Administrator permissions.)
I've had to reboot at least three times in the past week because various operations required file deletion and Windows wasn't cooperating. That's not to mention the common obvious problems, like Windows and other Microsoft software filling up the C: drive instead of the location it was installed.
So I wouldn't say the Windows distro is smooth sailing.
A cat can't teach a dog to bark.
I'm curious what's considered an "obsolete CPU architecture" if a Powerbook 100 is still supported.
The full list of dropped CPUs is Blackfin, CRIS, FRV, M32R, Metag, MN10300, Score, and Tile. Also under consideration are Unicore32 and Hexagon, but they are not officially gone yet. Apparently this change removes about half a million lines of code, a substantial reduction in complexity. I had never heard of any of these before and I suspect most other people haven't either, so I don't think they will be missed.
If you're an audio engineer, the Blackfin is used by the legendary Bricasti Model 7 (actually, the M7 uses six Blackfin processors). It's also used in devices like the DR-70D. I'm actually surprised they are dropping support for it.
Just FYI, Mikrotik's latest Cloud Core Routers use the Tile CPUs. I sure hope this mean's Tile isn't the end of the line for Mikrotik!
code may not change, but new bugs and vulnerabilities are always discovered, if you don't have people actively supporting that code base then it is both a stability and security risk as well as pointless bloat which there is already enough of.
... these days. Even before flakey audio and bluetooth management.
Seriously. Every other OS get's an easy 8 hours out of todays regular portable hardware, only Linux barely scrapes 4 hours. I'm a big Linux and FOSS fan but this is a problem that is really annoying and needs fixing ASAP. Windows, macOS and even Chrome have been on top of this for the better part of a decade and the Linux kernel still wastes gobs of energy. Unacceptable. This update is a step in the right direction. I hope it continues that way. Thumbs up for the kernel crew.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
things like Power4, Blackfin, M32R etc.
Which are all newer than the motorola 68000 in the powerbook 100.
"Newer" has nothing to do with "less obsolete". There is a link in TFA, describing eight dropped architectures as "without active users". POWER4 was dropped because POWER4 support is broken since two years already and no fix or rework available (and apparently no urge to fix it).
So yes, a newer architecture can be obsolete when an older one is still alive and kicking.
Seriously. Every other OS get's an easy 8 hours out of todays regular portable hardware, only Linux barely scrapes 4 hours... Windows, macOS and even Chrome have been on top of this for the better part of a decade and the Linux kernel still wastes gobs of energy.
you do know that chromeOS uses the linux kernel?
On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
Albeit no doubt modified. However those modifications should have been pushed upstream to the main line.
The power wastage in desktop systems probably comes from the bloated GUIs that tend to come as the default on linux these days (hello Gnome and KDE) which seem to have their processes permantly at the top of the "top" cpu usage list if my system is anything to go by.
fwiw a lot of that can be fixed by turning down the brightness on your laptop screen. The backlight draws a lot of power, and Apple aggressively dims the screen.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Instead of rebooting, open Process Explorer (https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/process-explorer)
hit ctrl+f and type in the file name or folder name
click a result, it'll highlight a file handle in the main window
right-click on it and select close handle
Windows 10 is not designed to provide an inferior experience
So, this was just a happy accident?
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You're right about the stability; that's just the nature of the beast. When they refer to supporting the 68000, they're probably using a NOMMU system which is a quirky thing but within its several limits it DOES work. As you noted, some features of modern CPUs and MMUs such as memory protection are not available. uClinux's kernel work was folded into the Kernel during the 2.5.x series. As of 2016 they were still alive and kicking.
junk pile of hardware? that would be so nice, I currently mostly need an AAUI adapter (Apple AUI, Ethernet) https://www.youtube.com/watch?... If you find other goodies, let me know. Other most wanted is some Sgi Octane HD tray, or this Mac 8100/80 HD and CD-ROM tray: https://rene.rebe.de/wishlist/
Which is quite interesting, given my experience with a Thinkpad Carbon X1 4th gen. I get around 10 hours on that running Windows, and can squeeze that to almost an extra hour if I really push hard on running nothing but Scrivener - but that requires Windows Update to behave, which it usually doesn't, pushing battery life below 9 hours.
Running Linux, with Scrivener in Wine, I get 12-14 hours on it without even trying.
In both cases WiFi is on, screen brightness at near minimum, and I'm using it pretty much constantly.
So now I have removed Windows.
I read the release notes, most of it was already broken on those dropped architectures.
I'd say "nonworking and unmaintained"