3 ms·

> “The processors in our laptops are over 1,000 times faster than they were thirty years ago. So it’s natural to ask, as Joe Armstrong does, why our programs do

by saghm 4y ago

> “The processors in our laptops are over 1,000 times faster than they were thirty years ago. So it’s natural to ask, as Joe Armstrong does, why our programs don’t run 1,000 times faster.. If I had a choice to swap from the current paradigm of running the programs we have now at the speed we have now or running things 1000x faster but only being able to run programs that were programmed 30 years ago, I don't think I'd take that swap.

drpixie 4y ago
> but only being able to run programs that were programmed 30 years ago Take the swap. I don't think you'll loose much. Most programs are doing pretty much the same thing as 30 years ago, but with hi-res graphics
- eternityforest 4y ago
  30 years ago was Windows 3.1. People still listened to music on CDs commonly until the smartphone era. Using a computer was kind of scary even 10 years ago. They were way buggier and had more exploits. Clicking the wrong link in the WinXP era was not advisable. Programs do the same thing, but they do it more reliably. At least in the GUI world. I don't know what's changed as far as the command line experience.
actionfromafar 4y ago
You know what? I think I might. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiga_productivity_software https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiga_productivity_software https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oberon_(programming_language) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oberon_(programming_language)
- soneil 4y ago
  That was my first thought too, but .. I honestly don't think I'd take that bet. I still have an A1200, and I struggle to think of anything that'd be genuinely improved by having, eg 7GHz instead of 7MHz (to take the article's 1000x figure) processor. 1000x the serial speed would be useful once or twice a year. 1000x the disk access speeds would be a marginal quality of life improvement (I mean I wouldn't say no, but I wouldn't give my modern machine up for it). But making the whole system 1000x faster would realistically achieve what? A hilarious SysInfo screenshot and little else.
  - actionfromafar 4y ago
    Half the argument is not what you would do with it. The hook is that literally everything you could do back then would be instant. I would very much like that. Given that Oberon existed, any green-field development I would have to do in that environment, would be completely feasible and comparable to any advanced environment today. The only thing I would maybe miss is a modern IDE, but on the other hand I was a late-comer to that and used (and still use) Emacs for a long time.
- cosmojg 4y ago
  Better yet: https://plan9.io/wiki/plan9/plan_9_wiki/ https://plan9.io/wiki/plan9/plan_9_wiki/ http://9front.org/releases/ http://9front.org/releases/
AnIdiotOnTheNet 4y ago
Most applications we use really aren't doing very much more useful than their equivalents did thirty years ago, but they are several orders of magnitude slower anyway.
- thewebcount 4y ago
  I don’t agree with this at all. It used to be that, for example, if you wanted to spell-check your word processing document, you had to select “Check Spelling” from a menu, and it would analyze the document and give you the results. Now it happens as I’m typing. There are numerous things like this that we rely on but have forgotten didn’t happen even a short time ago. File search is another. The metadata and contents of files is constantly being indexed so that when you search for something, you get results within seconds if not faster. I remember waiting for Windows search to find a file on a “large” hard drive. It was excruciating sometimes.
  - AnIdiotOnTheNet 4y ago
    None of which can explain why launching an Explorer window takes a perceptible amount of time, or this: https://youtu.be/GC-0tCy4P1U?t=1767 https://youtu.be/GC-0tCy4P1U?t=1767 , or any of thousands of similar atrocities of wasting everyone's computing resources and time to accomplish nothing of note.
    - eternityforest 4y ago
      Because people spouted crap about premature optimization any time someone wanted to do anything like lazy load an uncommonly used feature?
deltarholamda 4y ago
In general, I'd agree. But one of the most productive word processing programs I ever used was WordPerfect 5.1 for DOS. (Not only because while using it you couldn't do anything else that distracted you.) Okay, you couldn't do page layout for the company newsletter in it very well, but based on the .docx files I've gotten over the years, people can't do that now either.

by saghm 4y ago

drpixie 4y ago

> but only being able to run programs that were programmed 30 years ago Take the swap. I don't think you'll loose much. Most programs are doing pretty much the same thing as 30 years ago, but with hi-res graphics

eternityforest 4y ago
30 years ago was Windows 3.1. People still listened to music on CDs commonly until the smartphone era. Using a computer was kind of scary even 10 years ago. They were way buggier and had more exploits. Clicking the wrong link in the WinXP era was not advisable. Programs do the same thing, but they do it more reliably. At least in the GUI world. I don't know what's changed as far as the command line experience.

actionfromafar 4y ago

You know what? I think I might. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiga_productivity_software https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiga_productivity_software https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oberon_(programming_language) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oberon_(programming_language)

soneil 4y ago
That was my first thought too, but .. I honestly don't think I'd take that bet. I still have an A1200, and I struggle to think of anything that'd be genuinely improved by having, eg 7GHz instead of 7MHz (to take the article's 1000x figure) processor. 1000x the serial speed would be useful once or twice a year. 1000x the disk access speeds would be a marginal quality of life improvement (I mean I wouldn't say no, but I wouldn't give my modern machine up for it). But making the whole system 1000x faster would realistically achieve what? A hilarious SysInfo screenshot and little else.
- actionfromafar 4y ago
  Half the argument is not what you would do with it. The hook is that literally everything you could do back then would be instant. I would very much like that. Given that Oberon existed, any green-field development I would have to do in that environment, would be completely feasible and comparable to any advanced environment today. The only thing I would maybe miss is a modern IDE, but on the other hand I was a late-comer to that and used (and still use) Emacs for a long time.
cosmojg 4y ago
Better yet: https://plan9.io/wiki/plan9/plan_9_wiki/ https://plan9.io/wiki/plan9/plan_9_wiki/ http://9front.org/releases/ http://9front.org/releases/

AnIdiotOnTheNet 4y ago

Most applications we use really aren't doing very much more useful than their equivalents did thirty years ago, but they are several orders of magnitude slower anyway.

thewebcount 4y ago
I don’t agree with this at all. It used to be that, for example, if you wanted to spell-check your word processing document, you had to select “Check Spelling” from a menu, and it would analyze the document and give you the results. Now it happens as I’m typing. There are numerous things like this that we rely on but have forgotten didn’t happen even a short time ago. File search is another. The metadata and contents of files is constantly being indexed so that when you search for something, you get results within seconds if not faster. I remember waiting for Windows search to find a file on a “large” hard drive. It was excruciating sometimes.
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 4y ago
  None of which can explain why launching an Explorer window takes a perceptible amount of time, or this: https://youtu.be/GC-0tCy4P1U?t=1767 https://youtu.be/GC-0tCy4P1U?t=1767 , or any of thousands of similar atrocities of wasting everyone's computing resources and time to accomplish nothing of note.
  - eternityforest 4y ago
    Because people spouted crap about premature optimization any time someone wanted to do anything like lazy load an uncommonly used feature?

deltarholamda 4y ago

In general, I'd agree. But one of the most productive word processing programs I ever used was WordPerfect 5.1 for DOS. (Not only because while using it you couldn't do anything else that distracted you.) Okay, you couldn't do page layout for the company newsletter in it very well, but based on the .docx files I've gotten over the years, people can't do that now either.