From mboxrd@z Thu Jan  1 00:00:00 1970
Message-ID: <cce0d584dda21c47095f6d7191d1aafb@bellsouth.net>
To: 9fans@9fans.net
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 2009 15:21:51 -0500
From: blstuart@bellsouth.net
In-Reply-To: <433e731961e1aae6df3256c6f0f5bb3d@coraid.com>
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Subject: Re: [9fans] VMs, etc.  (was: Re: security questions)
Topicbox-Message-UUID: e3bd26d8-ead4-11e9-9d60-3106f5b1d025

>> I often tell my students that every cycle used by overhead
>> (kernel, UI, etc) is a cycle taken away from doing the work
>> of applications.  I'd much rather have my DNA sequencing
>> application finish in 25 days instead of 30 than to have
>> the system look pretty during those 30 days.
>
> i didn't mean to imply we should not be frugal with cycles.
> i ment to say that we simply don't have anything useful to
> do with a vast majority of cycles, and that's just as wasteful
> as doing bouncing icons.  we need to work on that problem.

I gotcha.  I guess it depends on what you're doing.  I remember
years ago running a simulation on the 11/750 we had.  It
simulated a DSP chip running 2 seconds of real time.  It
ran for over a week.  (While it was running, I took the time
to write another, faster simulator that was able to run
the simulation in about 2 hours.)  For something like that,
we can certainly use all the cycles we can get.  On the other
hand, I might look for a faster way to compile a kernel
a while back, but now it compiles fast enough on most
any machine that I'm not too concerned about where to
use the cycles.  (I'm speaking of a Plan 9 or Inferno kernel
here; not a *BSD or Linux kernel.)  But I suspect that
virtualization and Dis-style VMs are a pretty good use of
cycles we have to spare.

>> > that, plus the fact that the the mhz wars are dead and
>> > gone.
>>
>> Does that mean we're all playing core wars now? :)
>
> yes it does.  i've got $50 that says that in 2011 we'll be
> saying that this one goes to eleven (cores).

Excellent.  I never expected to see core wars and Spinal
Tap in the same discussion about Plan 9.

BLS