While working for a loony British midget at Cray Computer Corporation, I put the declaration "short volatile *VP;" into the compiler's optimization phase.
A laptop with an integrated high-resolution projection system instead of an LCD display.
Poor statement of OSS requirements
on
Forbes on Linux
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· Score: 1
From the article:
Still, what Linux represents to a lot of people is freedom: freedom of dependence on Microsoft (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people ) and the flexibility to modify the so-called "open source" software. That means that anyone can change or improve upon the OS as long as they make the changes public on the Internet.
Lots of people are going to misunderstand that assessment of the GPL. I wish they'd more clearly stated that publication of changes is required only if you plan to distribute modified software.
No, they come in sets of 3. DNA has only 21 instructions (20 amino acids and 1 punctuator) but it encodes them redundantly in what is effectively a six-bit opcode field. (Kind of like the CDC6600 in a way.)
I just bought a beautiful Inspiron 8100 laptop from Dell. I had no option but Windows XP, even though my helpful sales associate Justin went and begged his boss for me. When I got the machine, I booted Debian from CD, wiped the HD, and installed Linux.
Now I have the OEM media for XP still in their shrink-wraps. I can't sell them on e-Bay. And Dell refused to give me a refund for them.
So basically, if you want to buy a cool laptop from Dell, you have to pay taxes to M$FT. No wonder the bastards are rich.
We started using 3M's Fluorinert in the Cray-2, which first shipped in '84. The Cray-1 and X-MP series were chilled with Freon.
The Cray-2 fully immersed all components in the nert, which flowed cold into the bottom of the tank and was taken hot out of the top. You could watch the bubbles flow upwards and it was extremely cool. It was fun to watch operators top off the nert reservoir occasionally by glugging a gallon into the inlet.
Later machines (Y-MP, C-90, T3D, T3E) ran the nert through channels in the modules, and some had air-cooled versions for smaller configurations. The "LC" or "AC" in a T3E machine designation refers to "liquid cooled" or "air cooled".
On the Cray-3, we ran the nert through a fuel-injector-like nozzle to spray it as a vapor on to the chips. A bunch of other schemes were tried.
Disclaimer: I'm a software guy, not a mechanical engineer.
Is the x86 deficient relative to other instruction set architectures for microprocessing? Of course. Does it matter?
What we lose in the x86 is performance. While I'm quite aware of the heroic measures taken by AMD, Intel, Transmeta, et al. to run x86 code quickly, you can't escape the fact that an optimizing compiler for x86 has extremely limited power of expression.
In computer architecture you want the ISA to be such that the compiler can do what compilers do best (static analyses over large regions) and hardware can do what it does best (dynamic adjustment to unpredictable runtime conditions). A bad ISA can bottleneck both the compiler and the hardware. x86 is poorly balanced in this regard. So's IA-64 (in the other direction), IMO.
On the plus side of the tradeoff, with x86 you get billions of dollars in fab R&D and commodity pricing, not to mention a huge installed base. It's never going to go away. Sigh. But life would be so much better for compiler writers, systems software people, and (indirectly!) users if all this business were centered around a nice 64-bit ISA rather than the x86 monstrosity. I very much enjoyed using the Alpha ISA on the Cray MPP machines and commend it as a model among the publically-known ISAs. No condition codes, delay slots, segments, special-purpose registers; just lots and lots of registers.
I've used CVS since being converted by an ex-Prisma employee back in '89 at Cray Computer. I think it rocks, especially when compared to the in-house developed tools that I've been forced to use over the years.
If you haven't read Richard Dawkins' *The Blind Watchmaker* yet, people, please do. It's the best explanation for the layman (that I know of) on the mechanisms and powers of natural selection. It is also replete with refutations of most of the common misconceptions of Darwinism. Natural selection is not a complicated idea, folks. And it is opposite of randomness. Get the real story about it and arm yourself against the ignorant press, as well as those who try to make it seem confusing, unprovable, or impossible.
... a little playing around with whois shows that lots of evil domain names are still available. For example, if you feel adventurous, why not go register www.evil-monopoly.com and have it link to, say, MSFT just for grins? It's still available.
Well, duh! Those de-commoditized(tm) characters and HTML are integrated(tm) features of Frontpage(tm). I will personally videotape a demonstration (well, a simulation - hehe) to prove that the Demoronizer program does not completely remove these features. No wait, that's perjury. I think I'll have a few of my dolts (I mean, employees) do all the dirty work instead. Then I'll send a senior exec to testify and say things like "Your honor, I think that's the truth, and..." Well, you get the point. I'm just so smart!
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Damn. The big crunch was the only remaining obstacle to M$FT's eternal universal domination.
Where's the IrDA and/or Bluetooth?
Bah.
The Cray-2 used full immersion in Fluorinert (modules, wire mat, power supplies).
The Cray-3 used basically a Fluorinert mist sprayer.
The Y-MP, C-90, T3D, and T3E use Fluorinert running through channels in the modules.
The X1 uses Fluorinert in another way.
Most of these systems ran the primary coolant through a water-cooled heat exchanger, so I guess that they were indirectly water-cooled.
While working for a loony British midget at Cray Computer Corporation, I put the declaration "short volatile *VP;" into the compiler's optimization phase.
Wouldn't be necessary if GCC weren't such a slow bloated pig of a compiler.
A laptop with an integrated high-resolution projection system instead of an LCD display.
Still, what Linux represents to a lot of people is freedom: freedom of dependence on Microsoft (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people ) and the flexibility to modify the so-called "open source" software. That means that anyone can change or improve upon the OS as long as they make the changes public on the Internet.
Lots of people are going to misunderstand that assessment of the GPL. I wish they'd more clearly stated that publication of changes is required only if you plan to distribute modified software.
Which is statistically unlikely when the statement is made by a random citizen, yes.
But it's a different case when the statement is made by a felon already convicted in a court of law of being guilty of, well, shooting people.
Because I never type HTML by hand.
And with Dvorak, BMW is really easy to type!
No, they come in sets of 3. DNA has only 21 instructions (20 amino acids and 1 punctuator) but it encodes them redundantly in what is effectively a six-bit opcode field. (Kind of like the CDC6600 in a way.)
The word "universal" actually never appears in my note. And the first four words are "In the United States..."!
It's the code-name for my project at work.
I just bought a beautiful Inspiron 8100 laptop from Dell. I had no option but Windows XP, even though my helpful sales associate Justin went and begged his boss for me. When I got the machine, I booted Debian from CD, wiped the HD, and installed Linux.
Now I have the OEM media for XP still in their shrink-wraps. I can't sell them on e-Bay. And Dell refused to give me a refund for them.
So basically, if you want to buy a cool laptop from Dell, you have to pay taxes to M$FT. No wonder the bastards are rich.
The Cray-2 fully immersed all components in the nert, which flowed cold into the bottom of the tank and was taken hot out of the top. You could watch the bubbles flow upwards and it was extremely cool. It was fun to watch operators top off the nert reservoir occasionally by glugging a gallon into the inlet.
Later machines (Y-MP, C-90, T3D, T3E) ran the nert through channels in the modules, and some had air-cooled versions for smaller configurations. The "LC" or "AC" in a T3E machine designation refers to "liquid cooled" or "air cooled".
On the Cray-3, we ran the nert through a fuel-injector-like nozzle to spray it as a vapor on to the chips. A bunch of other schemes were tried.
Disclaimer: I'm a software guy, not a mechanical engineer.
Parody? Entertainment's Too Amusing
Prefer Elephants To Anarchists
Please Establish Trademark, Assholes
Perhaps Everyone's Too Anal
PETA Excised Their Assailant
What we lose in the x86 is performance. While I'm quite aware of the heroic measures taken by AMD, Intel, Transmeta, et al. to run x86 code quickly, you can't escape the fact that an optimizing compiler for x86 has extremely limited power of expression.
In computer architecture you want the ISA to be such that the compiler can do what compilers do best (static analyses over large regions) and hardware can do what it does best (dynamic adjustment to unpredictable runtime conditions). A bad ISA can bottleneck both the compiler and the hardware. x86 is poorly balanced in this regard. So's IA-64 (in the other direction), IMO.
On the plus side of the tradeoff, with x86 you get billions of dollars in fab R&D and commodity pricing, not to mention a huge installed base. It's never going to go away. Sigh. But life would be so much better for compiler writers, systems software people, and (indirectly!) users if all this business were centered around a nice 64-bit ISA rather than the x86 monstrosity. I very much enjoyed using the Alpha ISA on the Cray MPP machines and commend it as a model among the publically-known ISAs. No condition codes, delay slots, segments, special-purpose registers; just lots and lots of registers.
If you haven't read Richard Dawkins' *The Blind Watchmaker* yet, people, please do. It's the best explanation for the layman (that I know of) on the mechanisms and powers of natural selection. It is also replete with refutations of most of the common misconceptions of Darwinism. Natural selection is not a complicated idea, folks. And it is opposite of randomness. Get the real story about it and arm yourself against the ignorant press, as well as those who try to make it seem confusing, unprovable, or impossible.
... a little playing around with whois shows that lots of evil domain names are still available. For example, if you feel adventurous, why not go register www.evil-monopoly.com and have it link to, say, MSFT just for grins? It's still available.
- Bill G~++@_&^*&$3
NO CARRIER