Saturday 12 May 2018

Re: Proposal: Let's drop i386

On 11 May 2018 at 16:32, Fiedler Roman <Roman.Fiedler@ait.ac.at> wrote:
>
> > Von: ubuntu-devel [mailto:ubuntu-devel-bounces@lists.ubuntu.com] Im
> >
> > Hello,
> >
> > Less and less non-amd64-compatible i386 hardware is available for
> > consumers to buy today from anything but computer part recycling centers.
> > The last of these machines were manufactured over a decade ago, and
> > support from an increasing number of upstream projects has ended. ...
> >
> > ...
> >
> > We still have a relatively high number if i386 downloads but that doesn't
> > mean users machines are not capable of amd64. For the flavors remaining
> > today on i386 here are some i386 to amd64 ratios for 18.04:
> >
> > Lubuntu cdimage - 0.87
> > Lubuntu tracker - 0.64
> > ...
>
> This decision is not only about numbers, but somehow also about ethics. The number of e.g. wheel-chair users or other disabled persons might not be relevant for a society/economy in terms of numbers. But we honor the value of freedom, also for those, who are not that well off than we are. Those would not be able to participate in the same way, if we would not assist them by providing support for that minority.
>
> So for the i386 discussion, there might be only two distinct groups of users worth considering:
>
> a) Those, who cannot afford newer systems due to economical reasons.
>
> b) Those, who do not want to consume more resources due to ethical considerations (that's the one for me): how many people could fed or how much CO2 prevented, if all systems were some percent smaller on disk/RAM, including IT-system production and operation related resource usage? Wasting resources is also about freedom, as we deprive others who cannot afford them/fight for them in the same way we can do.
>

"Consume more resources" is a bit vague. Environmental impact is
correlated with performance-per-watt measurements. That improves with
the newer generation of lithography, better support of newer and more
efficient instruction sets, ability to dynamically clock-down cpu
cores etc. Thus newer generation CPUs are better performance wise on
environment front. Depending on how much newer it is, it may even make
economic sense to upgrade old hardware. Unless one operates complete
off-grid, on self-harvested renewable energy, e.g.
https://identi.ca/joeyh/note/mSMKXM3gSluoeC5mP1xIsw

An example of this is comparing Intel Core Duo (65nm litography) as
used in the last 32bit only Macbook from 2006 with the MacBook Retina
(14nm) from 2015 about 10 years gap. The same number of cores, with
comparable maximum frequency, Yet Thermal Design Power went down from
31W to 4.5 W (turbo 6W, low 3.5W, target average 4.5W). Dissipated
heat is a proxy measurement for environmental impact. And the fact
that later models are now fan-less, indicates better thermal dynamics,
less power consumption, and overall nicer for the environment.

I beat myself up a bit for still using a 22nm Ivy Bridge CPU with TDP
of 77W, when I can get a new tower for less than 300 quid, which would
come with a 14nm processor and TDP of just 35W. Electric saving alone
for me would be at least 40 quid per annum.
I have at least migrated my always-on servers to ARM64.

HDDs consume more energy than SSDs; similarly newer (faster
clock/dynamicly clocked, and operating at a lower voltage / amps) RAM
consume less energy. If newer platforms were not more power efficient,
we would not see public clouds / datacentres upgrading their platforms
as aggressively as they do.

The question comes down to, that some users simply cannot afford any
upgrades at all. That makes me feel sad, and it is an indicator of
poverty to me. I hope such users have access to and are better served
by mobile phones / tablets with ARM processors for basic computing,
information and communication needs. But I also fear that such users
cannot afford to download security updates and choose to spend their
MBs on downloading web pages and communicating instead.

Doing a brief search in the UK there appear to be charities /
sponsored schemes for affordable computing
https://www.choose.co.uk/guide/free-computer-schemes-on-benefits.html
and for around 100 quid one can get multi-core 64-bit based, 3GB of
RAM desktops, laptops, netbooks. See for example
http://www.getonlineathome.org/ . I do not see it as prohibitively
unattainable, but I do guess this is still a luxury and not the case
for many other countries around the world.

--
Regards,

Dimitri.

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