How complex is a message queue? That sounds like kindergarden technology to me.
Large industrial and financial systems use message queues to control and monitor stuff. These systems form complex networks of messaging. The message queue software must be very scalable and reliable.
Generally, a message queue product is expected to be ACID. For message queues this means exactly one delivery of a message; no dups, no loss, regardless of network or hardware failures. Messages may have multiple destinations. Delivery of particular message may or may not require a guarantee. Messages may be prioritized. All of these properties are defined through configuration, as opposed to coding. Recently the desire to do this across platforms and languages has become a big priority.
An example; Imagine you're WalMart and you want to monitor cash register activity worldwide. At any given moment a percentage of all uplinks from the stores to the corporate network will be down because lots of backhoes are mangling lots of cables. The volume of data is vast and continuous because the sun never sets on WalMart. You can't tolerate lost data due to any one of; upgrades, hardware failures, network failures, administrative blunders, scheduled downtime, etc. Further, you want to minimize the complexity of computing system that must reside at each site. Finally, you need your solution to survive a changing environment; you might turn over your cash register assets every few years, changing vendors in the process.
To deal with this you establish a message queue network. You feed transactions into distributed collection queues as early as practically possible (on-site). These feed into larger, faster queues across the network, whenever it happens to become available. Finally, the data is asynchronously pulled from the destination queues and (generally) recorded into some sort of database.
This same model applies to no end of large scale systems. ATMs, cell networks, any sort of dispatch operation, manufacturing... The software is generalized; you can pass damn near anything across it and it comes out the other side with perfect fidelity regardless of version, platform, transient conditions, etc. The software is efficient; minimum latency, extremely high volumes, etc. without long-hair geeks frobing arcane knobs all day.
Clever people having used message queues to distribute computation. Multiple receivers can pull from a queue as they become available. Receivers can be added and removed dynamically. Simple, reliable, load balanced cluster computing!
It isn't kindergarden stuff. It is rarified; systems complex enough to justify message queues are generally very expensive "core" systems. If a message queue system fucks up it's going to get noticed at the top where some household name CEO type deals with the people who deal with the problem. It is also an old idea; IBM has been selling MQ for most of it's computing history.
The first question that should pop into your head right now is why we would need HDMI on the PC when it physically does the job of DVI particularly considering how few people actually use DVI instead of analog connections! The answer is, again, copy protection.
Four years ago Cox wrote something in LKML that has stuck in my head since: So you cant tap the data anywhere.
Think
encrypted music fed to an encrypted audio controller to speakers which decrypt and add watermarks
encrypted video decrypted and macrovision + watermarked only in buffers the CPU cant access
audio input that has legally mandated watermark checks and wont record watermarked data.
That is the dream these people have. They'd also like the OS to scan for "illicit" material and phone the law if you do, and to have a mandatory remote shutdown of your box
(and if you read the MS media player license anyone who agrees to it signed up to that)
I was fascinated by this site when I first found it a few years ago. Unfortunately I failed to bookmark it at the time, and several attempt via Google failed. Thanks for digging it up for me!
Celebrate myself? The arrogance detector just blew a fuse.
For those of you who live a nice sheltered existence among other `techies', here's a clue; National Techies day may as well be National Wealthy Persons day, or National Smarter-Than-You day. Don't go around bragging about National Techie's day to your non-techie associates because deep down they resent their ignorance and your competence.
The majority of non-techies have occupations that suck the soul dry. They do not, like you, hang out at the SlashDot equivalent for whatever trade they practice happens to have simply because they can't get enough of it. They don't like what they have to do and they really don't like people who enjoy their work. They would rather you hate your work and strive, as they do, to have maximal `fun' whenever you can get away with it.
OTOH, life is short and they were born to be unhappy. Screw'em:)
Unreal is my favorite 3D shooter. It has more character than any of the Quakes (including QW and Q3). Playability of the current Unreal is still better than the latest Q3test. The maps that have been created by Unreal players are, in my opinion, second to none. I have a Windows 95 partition _only_ to run Unreal. You could easily triple the price of a Linux port and I would buy it immediately.
To Epic Games;
If you are told that Linux users won't pay because they only use free software please ignore it. I have personally purchased WordPerfect for Linux, Quake II for Linux and Civilization for Linux. When Quake 3 is available I will buy that too. My employer has purchased XIG X server licenses and will soon purchase Oracle licenses and 7/24 support for Linux at my direction. Linux users will pay for good products, and UT qualifies.
Storing frequently utilized data in a L1 cache is not the same as using an execution unit resident data/address pair. This patent is describing a system where-by the execution unit will cache its own data in 'a first register of the execution unit.' Presumably, this implies a simple case of one unit of data for the purposes of describing the mechanism for the patent. A real processor would require a vast quantity of such register pairs.
The second point under claim 7 is rather interesting. This point is repeated in claim 13;
* software for translating instructions from a target instruction set to instructions of the host instruction set;
The term 'code morphing' makes an appearance in claims 20 and 26;
* code morphing software for translating programs written for a target processor having a second different instruction set into instructions of the first instruction set for execution by the host processor
This point is rather confusing. To my reading it implies that the data/address register pair may also reference translated code sequences which may change, forcing a retranslation, i.e. self modifying code.
* software implemented means responsive to an exception generated by the comparator for retranslating into a new code sequence without storing memory data in the first register which is frequently utilized by the host processor during a code sequence and executing the new code sequence.
My (admittedly non-expert) reading of this document tells me that this is not simply a rehash of existing technology. I think the claim that this is a bogus patent is a simple knee-jerk reaction, probably the result of not having read it and/or not understanding it.
Communication monopolies are no longer acceptable. It simply does not require much technology to move a little noise from one place to another. It takes only slightly more technology to move data. Each day wasted allowing some miserable monopoly to take profits and control access is another wasted day.
At this point, I am willing to consider any alternative to my local phone and cable company. The place I live is populated by _only_ 130,000 people. As a result, neither the phone company or the cable company consider it profitable to provide more than voice media to myself and the other customers living here.
I would feel privileged to pay $150 per month for continuous broadband access. Unfortunatly, people like myself are shut out because the bureaucratic monopolies can not see a means by which to profit from this. I am certain that given the opportunity, smaller more efficient providers could _earn_ enormous profits from people like myself.
Until the Telstra's of the world are set back on their heals and told to start earning their revenue, nothing will change. I for one feel no hesitation. Monopolies _always_ breed mediocrity and waste. For whatever benevolence these institutions have shown, they have been compensated lavishly. Now is the time for change, progress and bandwidth.
Who is to say astronauts didn't get stranded on the moon? NASA could have made up the rest of several of the voyages in a studio. For all you know, NASA established a permanent base and left astronauts behind on purpose!:)
All my life, the moon shots have been the subject of television commercials. I appreciate the enormity of these events, but when I see an astronaut bounding along to surface of the moon, luxury cars and life insurance spring to mind.
Look, what the hell would you expect NASA to do in such a situation? Stranded astronauts begging for help which would never arrive while they run out of air is not how you, me or any of the thousands of people involved in those projects would want them to be remembered.
Frankly, I am forever amazed by the fact that no one did die on the moon. Fretting over NASA's contingency plans for the very likely possibility of someone being stranded on the moon is the sort of naive ignorance that provides millions of lawyers with gainful employment. Perhaps it provides an incite into the reasons why, after thirty some odd years, we haven't made it any further.
In short, those of you who feel a chill crawl up your spine when you consider these matters; grow up. Sometimes people in hopeless situations have to be left behind or put down. I am certain that if NASA's horrible plot was known to the astronauts before hand not one would have hesitated to go anyhow.
He should know better
on
Wired on RMS
·
· Score: 1
Richard should know that _anything_ he says about Linus which is not completely and totally complimentary will be rebroadcast as whining. Here's a clue Rick; don't waste what credibility you have by lamenting Linus's good fortune. Share in it and build upon it.
My understanding is that Unixware holds more of the Intel/Unix market than any other commercial vendor. Is that what you meant by lowest? How much actual experience do you have outside of Linux?
Linux appears to be ascending rapidly as the default choice in high-end research. It seems only natural that researchers would choose a system with very low cost, high performance, consistent behavior and total freedom of customization. Linux becomes a sort of generic research tool. Why not?
In the long run, this will establish credibility for Linux. The contributions of research institutions have already become a significant source of improvements to the system. This relationship is so natural it seems render irrelevant the alternatives.
...to pull stunts like this. FireWire(tm) may have had a chance, but I don't think Compaq or the other major PC vendors will ever agree to a per port fee. To be honest, although FireWire(tm) seems an elegant solution, I'm real happy with SCSI and USB.
I will not begrudge Apple's right to exercise its precious patents according to its own will. Apple has a right to be as stupid as it wants. FireWire(tm) will now digress into a proprietary Imac only feature.
* FireWire is a trademark of Apple Computer Corp. Too bad.
I'm sorry to hear you received some unfavorable feedback after introducing changes to your site. I'm afraid that I did not have the opportunity to see these changes myself; New Years actually managed to keep me away from my machines for a bit, and I missed its debut.
This whole deal; Open Source, Linux, *BSD, multitudes of open source projects and commercial vendors playing catch-up, etc., is all about merit. The meritocracy is composed of those who put forth the effort to contribute results. You are one of those people. I am certain that those from whom the flames were received are not. I know this because contributing members of the meritocracy appreciate the talent and effort required to build such systems enough to withhold unbridled criticism when something, which is the result of hard work, is not precisely to their liking. The rest are useless trolls.
I have always appreciated Freshmeat and admired the work being done. I can't tell you how many times I've come to Freshmeat looking for a solution to a problem that works in FreeBSD or Linux. Freshmeat is my first choice, every time. I have also noted that Freshmeat is significantly more reliable than some of it's contemporaries; I greatly appreciate that as I check your site regularly throughout my day.
What has happened here is success. You are experiencing some of the downside to being successful in your endeavors. You have amassed such a large following of readers that a certain percentage are inevitably going to be loud-mouthed simpletons with too much time on their hands. Because of this success, I can guarantee you that every significant change you attempt from this point forward will always be accompanied by lousy feedback from these same boneheads. If you watch carefully each time, you will notice it remains confined to the same little group of knuckheads. I recommend that you ignore them. If you feel compelled to respond to this sort of feedback, the best response is 'Do better or shut-up'. If they do then perhaps they have a point (i.e. merit). They won't.
As for myself, I miss Freshmeat. I look forward to seeing the results of your hard work and I have no doubt that I will be impressed.
Slashdot Mirror
How complex is a message queue? That sounds like kindergarden technology to me.
Large industrial and financial systems use message queues to control and monitor stuff. These systems form complex networks of messaging. The message queue software must be very scalable and reliable.
Generally, a message queue product is expected to be ACID. For message queues this means exactly one delivery of a message; no dups, no loss, regardless of network or hardware failures. Messages may have multiple destinations. Delivery of particular message may or may not require a guarantee. Messages may be prioritized. All of these properties are defined through configuration, as opposed to coding. Recently the desire to do this across platforms and languages has become a big priority.
An example; Imagine you're WalMart and you want to monitor cash register activity worldwide. At any given moment a percentage of all uplinks from the stores to the corporate network will be down because lots of backhoes are mangling lots of cables. The volume of data is vast and continuous because the sun never sets on WalMart. You can't tolerate lost data due to any one of; upgrades, hardware failures, network failures, administrative blunders, scheduled downtime, etc. Further, you want to minimize the complexity of computing system that must reside at each site. Finally, you need your solution to survive a changing environment; you might turn over your cash register assets every few years, changing vendors in the process.
To deal with this you establish a message queue network. You feed transactions into distributed collection queues as early as practically possible (on-site). These feed into larger, faster queues across the network, whenever it happens to become available. Finally, the data is asynchronously pulled from the destination queues and (generally) recorded into some sort of database.
This same model applies to no end of large scale systems. ATMs, cell networks, any sort of dispatch operation, manufacturing... The software is generalized; you can pass damn near anything across it and it comes out the other side with perfect fidelity regardless of version, platform, transient conditions, etc. The software is efficient; minimum latency, extremely high volumes, etc. without long-hair geeks frobing arcane knobs all day.
Clever people having used message queues to distribute computation. Multiple receivers can pull from a queue as they become available. Receivers can be added and removed dynamically. Simple, reliable, load balanced cluster computing!
It isn't kindergarden stuff. It is rarified; systems complex enough to justify message queues are generally very expensive "core" systems. If a message queue system fucks up it's going to get noticed at the top where some household name CEO type deals with the people who deal with the problem. It is also an old idea; IBM has been selling MQ for most of it's computing history.
From the article:
The first question that should pop into your head right now is why we would need HDMI on the PC when it physically does the job of DVI particularly considering how few people actually use DVI instead of analog connections! The answer is, again, copy protection.
Four years ago Cox wrote something in LKML that has stuck in my head since:
So you cant tap the data anywhere.
Think
encrypted music fed to an encrypted audio controller to speakers which
decrypt and add watermarks
encrypted video decrypted and macrovision + watermarked only in buffers
the CPU cant access
audio input that has legally mandated watermark checks and wont record
watermarked data.
That is the dream these people have. They'd also like the OS to scan for
"illicit" material and phone the law if you do, and to have a mandatory
remote shutdown of your box
(and if you read the MS media player license anyone who agrees to it signed
up to that)
Alan
For those of you who do not instantly associate that name with anything, a link.
I was fascinated by this site when I first found it a few years ago. Unfortunately I failed to bookmark it at the time, and several attempt via Google failed. Thanks for digging it up for me!
Plop down $4760.00 for an Ultra[tm] 10 and you get IDE.
Ultra is a trademark of Sun Microsystems, and don't you forget it.
Oh, and don't forget My Sun . How cute.
Celebrate myself? The arrogance detector just blew a fuse.
:)
For those of you who live a nice sheltered existence among other
`techies', here's a clue; National Techies day may as well be National
Wealthy Persons day, or National Smarter-Than-You day. Don't go
around bragging about National Techie's day to your non-techie
associates because deep down they resent their ignorance and your
competence.
The majority of non-techies have occupations that suck the soul dry.
They do not, like you, hang out at the SlashDot equivalent for
whatever trade they practice happens to have simply because they can't
get enough of it. They don't like what they have to do and they
really don't like people who enjoy their work. They would rather you
hate your work and strive, as they do, to have maximal `fun' whenever
you can get away with it.
OTOH, life is short and they were born to be unhappy. Screw'em
!! National Techies Day !!
Unreal is my favorite 3D shooter. It has more character than any of
the Quakes (including QW and Q3). Playability of the current Unreal
is still better than the latest Q3test. The maps that have been
created by Unreal players are, in my opinion, second to none. I have
a Windows 95 partition _only_ to run Unreal. You could easily triple
the price of a Linux port and I would buy it immediately.
To Epic Games;
If you are told that Linux users won't pay because they only use free
software please ignore it. I have personally purchased WordPerfect
for Linux, Quake II for Linux and Civilization for Linux. When Quake
3 is available I will buy that too. My employer has purchased XIG X
server licenses and will soon purchase Oracle licenses and 7/24
support for Linux at my direction. Linux users will pay for good
products, and UT qualifies.
Storing frequently utilized data in a L1 cache is not the same as
using an execution unit resident data/address pair. This patent is
describing a system where-by the execution unit will cache its own
data in 'a first register of the execution unit.' Presumably, this
implies a simple case of one unit of data for the purposes of
describing the mechanism for the patent. A real processor would
require a vast quantity of such register pairs.
The second point under claim 7 is rather interesting. This point is
repeated in claim 13;
* software for translating instructions from a target instruction
set to instructions of the host instruction set;
The term 'code morphing' makes an appearance in claims 20 and 26;
* code morphing software for translating programs written for a
target processor having a second different instruction set into
instructions of the first instruction set for execution by the
host processor
This point is rather confusing. To my reading it implies that the
data/address register pair may also reference translated code
sequences which may change, forcing a retranslation, i.e. self
modifying code.
* software implemented means responsive to an exception generated by
the comparator for retranslating into a new code sequence without
storing memory data in the first register which is frequently
utilized by the host processor during a code sequence and
executing the new code sequence.
My (admittedly non-expert) reading of this document tells me that this
is not simply a rehash of existing technology. I think the claim that
this is a bogus patent is a simple knee-jerk reaction, probably the
result of not having read it and/or not understanding it.
Communication monopolies are no longer acceptable. It simply does not
require much technology to move a little noise from one place to
another. It takes only slightly more technology to move data. Each
day wasted allowing some miserable monopoly to take profits and
control access is another wasted day.
At this point, I am willing to consider any alternative to my local
phone and cable company. The place I live is populated by _only_
130,000 people. As a result, neither the phone company or the cable
company consider it profitable to provide more than voice media to
myself and the other customers living here.
I would feel privileged to pay $150 per month for continuous broadband
access. Unfortunatly, people like myself are shut out because the
bureaucratic monopolies can not see a means by which to profit from
this. I am certain that given the opportunity, smaller more efficient
providers could _earn_ enormous profits from people like myself.
Until the Telstra's of the world are set back on their heals and told
to start earning their revenue, nothing will change. I for one feel
no hesitation. Monopolies _always_ breed mediocrity and waste. For
whatever benevolence these institutions have shown, they have been
compensated lavishly. Now is the time for change, progress and
bandwidth.
Who is to say astronauts didn't get stranded on the moon? NASA could :)
have made up the rest of several of the voyages in a studio. For all
you know, NASA established a permanent base and left astronauts behind
on purpose!
All my life, the moon shots have been the subject of television
commercials. I appreciate the enormity of these events, but when I
see an astronaut bounding along to surface of the moon, luxury cars
and life insurance spring to mind.
Look, what the hell would you expect NASA to do in such a situation?
Stranded astronauts begging for help which would never arrive while
they run out of air is not how you, me or any of the thousands of
people involved in those projects would want them to be remembered.
Frankly, I am forever amazed by the fact that no one did die on the
moon. Fretting over NASA's contingency plans for the very likely
possibility of someone being stranded on the moon is the sort of naive
ignorance that provides millions of lawyers with gainful employment.
Perhaps it provides an incite into the reasons why, after thirty some
odd years, we haven't made it any further.
In short, those of you who feel a chill crawl up your spine when you
consider these matters; grow up. Sometimes people in hopeless
situations have to be left behind or put down. I am certain that if
NASA's horrible plot was known to the astronauts before hand not one
would have hesitated to go anyhow.
TopSpin
Sun doesn't even make these any more. Are you sure you can
qualify this as a 'major' e-commerce venture?
> think I'll check out real estate elsewhere.
When?
Richard should know that _anything_ he says about Linus which is
not completely and totally complimentary will be rebroadcast as
whining. Here's a clue Rick; don't waste what credibility you
have by lamenting Linus's good fortune. Share in it and build
upon it.
Feeling a little overhyped?
Deal with it.
My understanding is that Unixware holds more of the Intel/Unix
market than any other commercial vendor. Is that what you meant
by lowest? How much actual experience do you have outside of
Linux?
Linux, OSF1, Solaris and FreeBSD. HP-UX soon. All at work, some at home. I can't imagine life without it. :)
Linux appears to be ascending rapidly as the default choice in
high-end research. It seems only natural that researchers would
choose a system with very low cost, high performance, consistent
behavior and total freedom of customization. Linux becomes a sort
of generic research tool. Why not?
In the long run, this will establish credibility for Linux. The
contributions of research institutions have already become a
significant source of improvements to the system. This relationship
is so natural it seems render irrelevant the alternatives.
...to pull stunts like this. FireWire(tm) may have had a chance,
but I don't think Compaq or the other major PC vendors will ever
agree to a per port fee. To be honest, although FireWire(tm) seems
an elegant solution, I'm real happy with SCSI and USB.
I will not begrudge Apple's right to exercise its precious patents
according to its own will. Apple has a right to be as stupid as
it wants. FireWire(tm) will now digress into a proprietary Imac
only feature.
* FireWire is a trademark of Apple Computer Corp. Too bad.
Merit
I'm sorry to hear you received some unfavorable feedback after
introducing changes to your site. I'm afraid that I did not have the
opportunity to see these changes myself; New Years actually managed to
keep me away from my machines for a bit, and I missed its debut.
This whole deal; Open Source, Linux, *BSD, multitudes of open source
projects and commercial vendors playing catch-up, etc., is all about
merit. The meritocracy is composed of those who put forth the effort to
contribute results. You are one of those people. I am certain that
those from whom the flames were received are not. I know this because
contributing members of the meritocracy appreciate the talent and effort
required to build such systems enough to withhold unbridled criticism
when something, which is the result of hard work, is not precisely to
their liking. The rest are useless trolls.
I have always appreciated Freshmeat and admired the work being done. I
can't tell you how many times I've come to Freshmeat looking for a
solution to a problem that works in FreeBSD or Linux. Freshmeat is my
first choice, every time. I have also noted that Freshmeat is
significantly more reliable than some of it's contemporaries; I greatly
appreciate that as I check your site regularly throughout my day.
What has happened here is success. You are experiencing some of the
downside to being successful in your endeavors. You have amassed such a
large following of readers that a certain percentage are inevitably
going to be loud-mouthed simpletons with too much time on their hands.
Because of this success, I can guarantee you that every significant
change you attempt from this point forward will always be accompanied by
lousy feedback from these same boneheads. If you watch carefully each
time, you will notice it remains confined to the same little group of
knuckheads. I recommend that you ignore them. If you feel compelled to
respond to this sort of feedback, the best response is 'Do better or
shut-up'. If they do then perhaps they have a point (i.e. merit). They
won't.
As for myself, I miss Freshmeat. I look forward to seeing the results
of your hard work and I have no doubt that I will be impressed.