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The Latest Transmeta Rumor
Today's Transmeta rumor is from Red Herring. Their story gives more details than the c't article we pointed to earlier this week, but is still full of unattributed info. Supposedly Transmeta's "real" Web site will debut with ruffles and flourishes Monday evening when Linus Torvalds gives his Comdex keynote speech, and all these little advance leaks are supposed to pique our curiosity about what he's going to say. Okay, mine's piqued. How about yours?
It is becoming clear that "Transmeta" is a big, big joke on the lot of us.
I would like to thank everyone involved in the prank for all the entertainment they have given us over the past few months.
Getting Linus involved was a masterstroke.
Thanks again, guys.
All I know is that if it turns out to be really lame like a giant abacus.. I'm going to be really, really disappoointed!
Fish! LipHo
That reminds me of an old joke that was in an early adult adventure game on the Sinclair ZX81 -
There was a dirty toilet in a pub and if you read the walls the graffiti said
"Computer programmers PEEK before they POKE".
... I never did understand that
A little planning goes a long way...
Ooh, ohh, Transmeta news again! So fscking what; its hype like this that leads to vaporware. I want to see a somewhat operating beta, or even a crappy alpha, before I start buying into any rumored tech. It seems a bit odd that Slashdot would be the one's to contribute to the reduction of the signal/noise ratio, as they're usually pretty good about checking rumors. But this one invokes the name of the mighty Linus, so of course people stand up and take notice. I'm as big a Linux fan as the next bloke and would certainly love to see Transmeta as a reality, but all of this fanfare over baseless speculation (um, Transmeta isn't actually scheduled. To quote the article in reference: "Pundits predict Linus Torvalds, Linux operating system creator and Transmeta software engineer, will let the cat out of the bag. That's not the plan." Great source, those pundits) is becoming tiresome.
Deosyne
On one hand, the chip will run Java faster than anything out there, because it will "morph" Java Virtual instructions into real instructions.
On the other hand, if this chip run just about
any machine code, it makes the need for Java
less of an issue.
Though eventually, people will want to code to a common binary format. This universal instruction set could be Java if Sun loosens up.
Haven't we heard this before somewhere else? Didn't Mr. Gates always tell us: "We're working on something that is really beautiful and will make the way we do our computing more fun." and then proceeds to give us windos 9x? I sure hope TM doesn't pull that joke on us...
According to Netcraft, they are using Apache 1.1.1, which is OLD! Old old old old old! Ancient, even!
As for the rumours, we'll know when we know, and not before. Amiga proved that, rather better than they'd hoped, and certainly not in the way they intended.
If there's a major announcement on Monday, it'll be just in time to send major shock-waves through the stock markets (already reeling from the Microsoft "finding of fact"), and (depending on what any such announcement even is) may make the hardware industry rather jittery. We're approaching the year 2000, and many companies are bracing for lawsuits, computer & hardware failures within their own sites, and other such pleasentry. Revolutionary hardware, which redefines what a computer is, is not on the list of things IT managers want, right now.
But we don't even know what it is that Transmeta is doing! We have a handful of patents, most of old technology (according to the dates) and we've no idea if any final product released will make use of any of it. It might, it might not. We don't know, we have no way of knowing, we don't even know if these were real, or defensive smokescreens to protect trade secrets.
The only people who -do- know may or may not say anything on Monday, or any other day of the week, any week of the year, any year until the end of the NEXT millenium.
Speculation, at this point, is based on 4 lines of web page, 3 patents of uncertain age & purpose, a job list, and a list of associated companies, none of which mesh in any way that I can see, unless this is a combined graphics, sound & regular processor, any segment of which can emulate in a mix of hardware & firmware any other processor of that type.
This seems improbably complex, unless Transmeta have moved to wafer-scales (which I'd like to see) but since they don't fab and no other plant can do 0.18 micron wafer-scale, with any reliability, it seems unlikely.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Regardless of what product Transmeta eventually produces (assuming they actually do produce a product someday), you must admit they have a brilliant, practically Zen approach to Public Relations.
It doesn't matter if their product turns out to be vaporware, or the second coming of Christ in the form of a microprocessor, they've got us all so worked up over it that Linus could just walk up to the podium and eat a bowl of cereal at Comdex and we'd provide days of analysis and discussion on what we thought his body language revealed. Fscking *brilliant*
In a world becoming increasingly accustomed to ridiculous amounts of needless information on simply *everything* they've distinguished themselves from the pack in the only way possible: by providing no information whatsoever.
(Note that by [not] distinguishing themselves in this way, they've actually created a higher information density...)
I'm simply in awe, and undoubtedly waiting just as eagerly as the rest of you...
Anthony
^X^X
Segmentation fault (core dumped)
"I think any time you expose vulnerabilities it's a good thing." -Attorney General Janet Reno
On the other hand, they continue to get themselves confused as to the merits of the processor design that "falls out of the patent list."
But laptops aren't that different. And Intel keeps on increasing transistor counts on CPUs, whilst prices don't rise (much), which means that the simple passage of time combined with Moore's law will push them into the "bloody" battle eventually.
If a "Transmeta 400" can sit in a box beside my desk and execute IA-32 instructions, then it is isomorphic to the Pentium Pro that sits in a box beside my desk and executes IA-32 instructions.
In effect, they're basically the same. Even if Transmeta has some slick new ways of getting those IA-32 instructions to be executed, the fact that they're doing the same thing undercuts the argument that they're somehow different.
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
Hmm, I just thought I would like to get my personal prediction onto /. now so that when I'm right I can link back to this and show people how clever I was :-)
I think it's gonna be a chip designed for use in laptop / palm size devices that will run (at least one) full-scale O/S. It will have in-built support for various communications protocols (in much the same way as MMX has support for various multimedia tricks right now) and the reprogrammability of the chip will allow for upgrading with further protocols in the future.
The potential dream use? A "tricorder" style device, basically a fully sized computer with instant always-on wireless access to the Internet.
Even if it's not this, can someone please get their asses in gear and make one g'dammit!
A little planning goes a long way...
Maybe they have been waiting for MSFT to have a bit of slippage, with the intent to pounce at that point.
(Although Paul Allen, investor, also holds lots of MSFT stock, and thus would get hurt by this... Not too plausible...)
They're using old technology. There are connections to Europe.
Perhaps this is actually an End of Days scenario; they plan to make an announcement that will help Imminnetize the Eschaton (sp? I've not read the RAW trilogy in quite some time).
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
Yes... I feel your pain...but as a former first poster (I scored mine a couple months ago) I know what you went through. Here's where you screwed up though.. YOU DIDN'T PULL THE TRIGGER. You didn't carpe diem..
Yep... When I saw that nice clean article with no posts I didn't hesitate, yes the adrenaline was surging... my palms were wet, heart pounding. I was standing at the peak of greatness... I knew I had but one thing to do, there was no turning back now... I rapidly typed in a one word post.. then with no hesitation I navigated my mouse over the submit button...and WHAM..seconds later I was looking at my feeble post with a #1 attached to the header. At that mmoment I knew a feeling that only few will ever know...I was at one with Slashdot... Zen masters and Kings will relate I'm sure. That one sweet moment when the ying and the yang converge..bliss... eternal bliss..ahhh
Then I smoked a cigarette and went to bed.
What has changed since then? Linus Torvalds, the god of Linux and the hero of the OSS revolution is working for a company that files patents on all of its ideas and *GASP* requires NDAs in order to see their work. Why has no one noticed this? *sarcasm>Is it because it's Linus, and He can do no wrong */sarcasm>? Or are people realising that there is a time and a place for OSS and the GPL, and this might not be it?
Oh, I see what they're doing....
Nothing! They wait for speculations to converge, and then work towards realising that goal. It is quite brilliant. They're letting the industrys wildest dreams and fantasies define their product line.
This way, when they deliver what everyone has, in effect, suggested to them, they'll be hailed as visionaries and innovators of the greatest caliber.
It's like Microsoft's focus-group driven market research, only in the open-source way... They didn't solicit. Whatever we thought was useful, we gladly contributed to creating....
Or maybe they're just openning up a penguin farm.
-- What you do today will cost you a day of your life.
You think Transmeta is in with the AISB? I'd always wondered to what extent the 5 were involved with the creation of Linux. My bet is that Linus is actually a deep cover agent for the ELF...
The Eschaton will shortly be Immanentized. "The Great Convergance" will imho be the vehicle this time around fnord.
For further information, consult your pineal gland. All Hail Eris. Prosecutors will be transgressicuted.
Anthony DiMarco, KSC
^X^X
Segmentation fault (core dumped)
"I think any time you expose vulnerabilities it's a good thing." -Attorney General Janet Reno
(in a Charlton Hestonian accent) It's People !!!!!!!! It's People !!!!!!!!!!!! Transmeta Is People !!!!!!!!!!!!
Hates people who have stupid little sigs
Hopefully this will start another trend. Every single good software company creates their own distro. Not good because of the confusion and compatibility problems, but really good because of the amount of competition that will be generated, new money pouring in, clueless newbies willing to pay 50$/hr for support (hint, hint), more exposure, more eyeballs, less bugs, more momentum, etc.
+&x
Transmeta updated their site! It now says (drumroll...) :
This web page is not here yet!
...but it is Y2K compliant.
Wow.
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
I'd be willing to bet they're chaste too.
Mapping emulated instructions onto the "true" instructions on the processor that's doing the emulating is nicely representative of the notion of "isomorphism." Whatever compiler tools are involved will need to provide some sort of one-to-one mapping of sets of IA-32 instructions onto sets of "Transmeta Chip" instructions; if that is not an isomorphism, I don't know what is.
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
Naaah - serious man!
I distinctly remember a game package (can you believe it) for the ZX81 called "Can O Worms" which had "adult" games.
Around the same time, there was definitely an adventure, which was a kind of text based "Leisure Suit Larry" type game, where the quote comes from.
I remember it so clearly because I was only about 11 at the time and I *really* wanted to get a look at those games, but only ever got a chance to read the reviews in Computer & Video Games.
A little planning goes a long way...
>>According to the comments, there are also definitely no typos in the web page.
No, there are no *tyops* in the web page...
-- There are no secret messages in the source code to this web page. --
-- There are no tyops in this web page. --
:-)
None of these have really gone anywhere in terms of influencing Java deployment.
The only way they would have been important is if:
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
It was advertised in good 'ol 80 Microcomputing with nothing more "explicit" than a attractive woman with subtly suggestive cleavage. (None of the "WWF World Class Implant" thing games selleers use these days...)
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
I'm in awe too, even before Y2K! :-)
Ref: Fawn's in AWE
(Abacus or no abacus)
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra