4 ms·

Maybe the OS and everything we run today will be considered "lightweight" 50 years from now...

• johnwalkr 5y ago
  Maybe, but in that case it will be lightweight on current hardware, not on 50 year old hardware. I wouldn't be surprised if a midrange microcontroller used for a one-off application, in 50 years has the equivalent of docker (x2, one for the development environment and one for the microcontroller). That would hopefully work for another 50 years. On the other hand, look at any small microcontroller vs a complex CPU today. In laymen's terms, arduino vs raspberry pi. For controlling some devices, a small microcontroller is faster booting, faster to react, has fewer unnecessary states, is deterministic, testable, more reliable, uses less power. That will probably never change and in 50 years 8 bit micros will still be used for a lot of applications. Even after 50 years of development you probably don't want the brake controller in your self-driving car to run something in python 2.7.19 in docker in windows 39. I also wouldn't be surprised (and hope) it goes the other way and in 50 years development using FPGAs is as easy banging stuff out in an IDE and making ASICs is as easy compiling and dollars per chip in small quantities.