Gentoo Archives: gentoo-dev

From: Duncan <1i5t5.duncan@×××.net>
To: gentoo-dev@l.g.o
Subject: [gentoo-dev] Re: Packages up for grabs
Date: Tue, 25 Jun 2013 06:16:58
Message-Id: pan$198fc$4ed8fff1$1174df9a$d90fdd72@cox.net
In Reply to: Re: [gentoo-dev] Re: Packages up for grabs by Tom Wijsman
1 Tom Wijsman posted on Tue, 25 Jun 2013 01:18:07 +0200 as excerpted:
2
3 > On Mon, 24 Jun 2013 15:27:19 +0000 (UTC)
4 > Duncan <1i5t5.duncan@×××.net> wrote:
5 >
6 >> Throwing hardware at the problem is usable now.
7 >
8 > If you have the money; yes, that's an option.
9 >
10 > Though I think a lot of people see Linux as something you don't need to
11 > throw a lot of money at; it should run on low end systems, and that's
12 > kind of the type of users we shouldn't just neglect going forward.
13
14 Well, let's be honest. Anyone building packages on gentoo isn't likely
15 to be doing it on a truly low-end system. For general linux, yes,
16 agreed, but that's what puppy linux and etc are for. True there's the
17 masochistic types that build natively on embedded or a decade plus old
18 (and mid-level or lower then!) systems, but most folks with that sort of
19 system either have a reasonable build server to build it on, or use a pre-
20 built binary distro. And the masochistic types... well, if it takes an
21 hour to get the prompt in an emerge --ask and another day or two to
22 actually complete, that's simply more masochism for them to revel in. =:^P
23
24 Tho you /do/ have a point.
25
26 OTOH, some of us used to do MS or Apple or whatever and split our money
27 between hardware and software. Now we pay less for the software, but
28 that doesn't mean we /spend/ significantly less on the machines; now it's
29 mostly/all hardware.
30
31 I've often wondered why the hardware folks aren't all over Linux, given
32 the more money available for hardware it can mean, and certainly /does/
33 mean here.
34
35 >> Truth is, I used to run a plain make -j (no number and no -l at all) on
36 >> my kernel builds, just to watch the system stress and then so elegantly
37 >> recover. It's an amazing thing to watch, this Linux kernel thing and
38 >> how it deals with cpu oversaturation. =:^)
39 >
40 > If you have the memory to pull it off, which involves money again.
41
42 What was interesting was doing it without the (real) memory -- letting it
43 go into swap and just queue up hundreds and hundreds of jobs as the make
44 continued to generate more and more of them, faster than they could even
45 fully initialize, particularly since they were packing into swap before
46 they even had that chance.
47
48 And then with 500-600 jobs or more (custom kernel build, not all-yes/all-
49 mod config, or it'd likely have been 1200...) stacked up and gigs into
50 swap, watch the system finally start to slowly unwind the tangle.
51 Obviously the system wasn't usable for anything else during the worst of
52 it, but it still rather fascinates me that the kernel scheduling and code
53 quality in general is such that it can successfully do that and unwind it
54 all, without crashing or whatever. And the kernel build is one of the
55 few projects that's /that/ incredibly parallel, without requiring /too/
56 much memory per individual job, to do it in the first place.
57
58 Actually, that's probably the flip side of my getting more conservative.
59 The reason I /can/ get more conservative now is that I've enough cores
60 and memory that it's actually reasonably practical to do so. When you're
61 always dumping cache and/or swapping anyway, no big deal to do so a bit
62 more. When you have a system big enough to avoid that while still
63 getting reasonably large chunks of real work done, and you're no longer
64 used to the compromise of /having/ to dump cache, suddenly you're a lot
65 more sensitive to doing so at all!
66
67 >> Needlessly oversaturating the CPU (and RAM) only slows things down and
68 >> forces cache dump and swappage.
69 >
70 > The trick is to set it a bit before the point of oversaturating; low
71 > enough so most packages don't oversaturize, it could be put more
72 > precisely for every package but that time is better spent elsewhere
73
74 Indeed. =:^)
75
76 > Not everyone is a sysadmin with a server; I'm just a student running a
77 > laptop bought some years ago, and I'm kind of the type that doesn't
78 > replace it while it still works fine otherwise. Maybe when I graduate...
79
80 Actually, I use "sysadmin" in the literal sense, the person taking the
81 practical responsibility for deciding what goes on a system, when/if/what
82 to upgrade (or not), with particular emphasis on RESPONSIBILITY, both for
83 security and both keeping the system running and getting it back running
84 again when it breaks. Nothing in that says it has to be commercial, or
85 part of some huge farm of systems. For me, the person taking
86 responsibility (or failing to take it) for updating that third-generation
87 hand-me-down castoff system is as much of a sysadmin for that system, as
88 the guy/gal with 100 or 1000 systems (s)he's responsible for.
89
90 My perspective has always been that if all those folks running virus
91 infested junk out there actually took the sysadmin responsibility for the
92 systems they're running seriously, the virus/malware issue would cease to
93 be an issue at all.
94
95 Meanwhile, I'll admit my last system was rather better than average when
96 I first set it up (dual socket original 3-digit Opteron, that whole
97 spending all the money I used to spend on software, on hardware, now,
98 thing, my first 64-bit machine and my first and likely last real dual-
99 CPU... socket); in fact, compared to peers of its time it may well be the
100 best system I'll ever own, but that thing lasted me 8+ years. My goal
101 was a decade but I didn't make it as the caps on the mobo were bulging
102 and finally popping by the time I got rid of it. (The last month or so I
103 ran it, last summer here in Phoenix, it'd run if I kept it cold enough,
104 basically 15C or lower, so I was dressing up in a winter jacket with long
105 underwear and a knit hat on, with the AC running to keep it cold enough
106 to run the computer inside, while outside it was 40C+!)
107
108 But OTOH, that was originally a $400 mobo alone, for quite some time
109 worth probably 2-3 grand total as I kept upgrading bits and pieces of it
110 as I had the money. But FTR, I /am/ quite happy with the 6-core
111 Bulldozer-1 that replaced it, when I finally really had no other choice.
112 And the replacement was *MUCH* cheaper!
113
114 But anyway, yeah, I do know a bit about running old hardware, myself, and
115 know how to make those dollars strreeettcchh myself. =:^)
116
117 --
118 Duncan - List replies preferred. No HTML msgs.
119 "Every nonfree program has a lord, a master --
120 and if you use the program, he is your master." Richard Stallman