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I hear that argument very frequently and I don’t buy it. Think about all the gas that is saved because people don’t have to drive to the library, all the plane

by jupp0r 7y ago

I hear that argument very frequently and I don’t buy it. Think about all the gas that is saved because people don’t have to drive to the library, all the plane trips saved by video conferencing, all the photo film, all the sheets of paper in file cabinets, all the letters being sent as emails, all the mail order catalogues, ... you get the idea. Does anybody know of a comprehensive study on this?

johnr2 7y ago
> Think about all the gas that is saved because people don’t have to drive to the library.... You're right that computers have saved huge amounts of energy compared with the things you mention. My point here was that even more could be saved with a bit of thought about efficiency in programming.
UweSchmidt 7y ago
If websites and business software were as lean as they could be, most computers could have amazingly weak, low-powered processors. I'm quite disenchanted with software myself. It takes way too long to open any program, for this JIRA ticket to properly display. One thing that has improved was boot times, I seem to remember that Windows 7 was quite a bit faster than XP. Maybe someone in upper management wanted it to be as fast as MacOS? So speed IS possible, if it is prioritized.
- Wowfunhappy 7y ago
  > One thing that has improved was boot times, I seem to remember that Windows 7 was quite a bit faster than XP. Maybe someone in upper management wanted it to be as fast as MacOS? So speed IS possible, if it is prioritized. I seem to remember boot times being a frequent topic of discussion the early 2000s, because people turned off their computers. In a way, this is a great little microcosm of the problem. Just fix habits instead of fixing the software.
TeMPOraL 7y ago
It's not either-or. I don't buy the argument that if we didn't shovel garbage that we call "software" today, we wouldn't have equivalent but better software at all. It's a multi-agent problem, and a lot of it is driven by business dysfunction, not even actual complexity or programmer laziness. In my - perhaps limited - work experience, there's enough slack in the process of software development that I don't buy the "time to market" argument all that much.

by jupp0r 7y ago

johnr2 7y ago

> Think about all the gas that is saved because people don’t have to drive to the library.... You're right that computers have saved huge amounts of energy compared with the things you mention. My point here was that even more could be saved with a bit of thought about efficiency in programming.

UweSchmidt 7y ago

If websites and business software were as lean as they could be, most computers could have amazingly weak, low-powered processors. I'm quite disenchanted with software myself. It takes way too long to open any program, for this JIRA ticket to properly display. One thing that has improved was boot times, I seem to remember that Windows 7 was quite a bit faster than XP. Maybe someone in upper management wanted it to be as fast as MacOS? So speed IS possible, if it is prioritized.

Wowfunhappy 7y ago
> One thing that has improved was boot times, I seem to remember that Windows 7 was quite a bit faster than XP. Maybe someone in upper management wanted it to be as fast as MacOS? So speed IS possible, if it is prioritized. I seem to remember boot times being a frequent topic of discussion the early 2000s, because people turned off their computers. In a way, this is a great little microcosm of the problem. Just fix habits instead of fixing the software.

TeMPOraL 7y ago

It's not either-or. I don't buy the argument that if we didn't shovel garbage that we call "software" today, we wouldn't have equivalent but better software at all. It's a multi-agent problem, and a lot of it is driven by business dysfunction, not even actual complexity or programmer laziness. In my - perhaps limited - work experience, there's enough slack in the process of software development that I don't buy the "time to market" argument all that much.