azakai

60 ms·

631.
by azakai 10y ago
True about AOT coming to the JVM, however, dynamic languages can't be AOT'd well in general, so that won't help Graal+Truffle languages much. Instead, dynamic languages tend to do tiering, which in principle is something Graa
632.
by azakai 10y ago
Graal + Truffle are very, very cool. The main downside is that it only runs on the JVM, which is a substantial limitation. However, I assume one goal of the project is to make the JVM more competitive, which it certainly does.
633.
by azakai 10y ago
I believe those benchmarks are for throughput, though. JS VM startup times (including v8) are highly optimized, while Graal+Truffle run on the JVM which is more optimized for sustained speed. JS VMs also tend to have multiple tiers for that
634.
by azakai 10y ago
High switching costs can make monopolies worse. And yes, it is possible to switch away from Google search. But it's still a monopoly, and it's held in place by various means. For example, the vast majority of people - not tech peo
635.
by azakai 10y ago
Perhaps less, but I would argue that WebAssembly should aim to be no less readable than that.
636.
by azakai 10y ago
The web is different than other platforms, though. It has a culture of people viewing source and tinkering. Minification etc. limit that, but do not eliminate it. And the web is a medium for transmitting and running other people's code
637.
by azakai 10y ago
In theory, but there isn't even good research on this, AFAIK. Fast JITs for languages like JavaScript require unsafety in the state of the art today.
638.
by azakai 10y ago
Linux might be a small (but rising) percentage. But the bigger point is that Linux is a free operating system. If Linux can't run web content, that means 1. You need to pay someone for an OS in order to view the web. 2. The OS market i
639.
by azakai 10y ago
> Look at Netflix's support matrix Looks terrible, there is no mention of Linux at all.
640.
by azakai 10y ago
> some of the biggest tech corporations in the world today support EME Not just support, Google and Microsoft invented it: https://www.w3.org/TR/encrypted-media/ The best way to fight back against EME is to put
641.
by azakai 10y ago
But it doesn't include the competitors.
642.
by azakai 10y ago
IonMonkey is the name of one of the JITs in SpiderMonkey. (For entertainment purposes, the JITs have names ending in -Monkey.)
643.
by azakai 10y ago
There were definitely major problems with Flash and Java. WebAssembly has learned from those, though: * WebAssembly is an open standard, unlike Flash * WebAssembly has multiple compatible open source implementations, unlike Flash (and Java,
644.
by azakai 10y ago
It's still not ready for general usage. On real-world codebases it has correctness issues that need to be sorted out, and there are missing features like longjmp and C++ exceptions.
645.
by azakai 10y ago
Aside from that, the article is full of plenty of dubious claims. For example, > In order to [generate novel ideas], you need both right and left hemispheres working in conjunction with each other. The simplistic idea of the hemispheres
646.
by azakai 10y ago
Building a modern browser takes a large team. For example, there is a team on each of the following: * Layout (HTML, CSS) * JavaScript * Graphics: HTML, 2D canvas, 3D WebGL * Platform integration (windows, os x, gtk, etc.) * Audio * New web
647.
by azakai 10y ago
You don't actually need to calculate the derivative accurately. It's enough to sample several points near the current one and continue the search to the best of those. The point here is that we are descending in a continuous and m
648.
by azakai 10y ago
Being able to calculate the derivative is very useful (the backprop rule, etc.). However it isn't actually necessary here, since you can approximate the slope by just sampling points nearly. Strict differentiability isn't the cruc
649.
by azakai 10y ago
It's also being run using the same VMs as JavaScript. There is some new code, but overall it's the same JITs, so similar security risks.
650.
by azakai 10y ago
It's not good or bad necessarily, but it is incredibly dangerous. Google is a massive corporation with unprecedented information about ordinary people. Information that we would never let governments collect on us. As Google becomes mo
651.
by azakai 10y ago
The difference is scale. As the article says, > But Weismann said the scale of Google’s influence was almost unprecedented. “The revolving door isn’t unique to Google,” Weismann said. “What’s surprising is how aggressively the company ha
652.
by azakai 10y ago
> all of the DRM opposition since the 90s has failed to move public opinion much In the music space, opposition to DRM was very successful. The same could have been true for video, we'll never know, because Google, Microsoft, and Ne
653.
by azakai 10y ago
Flash had video long before HTML5 did, and HTML5 video support has only very recently been consistent (e.g., the codec wars). Those made Flash a better option for a long time, regardless of DRM, and might also be reasons why Flash has stuck
654.
by azakai 10y ago
Obviously "too much" depends on the subject matter. But the point is that, 1. STD gives a lot more weight to outliers than MAD. 2. People constantly hear STD and think it means MAD, for all the reasons the article mentions. The
655.
by azakai 10y ago
Even if no official Android devices use MIPS today, that could change tomorrow. And there are lots of Android forks, I would be very surprised if none of them use MIPS.
656.
by azakai 10y ago
Are those boot times still so good if the first apps you use are Android ones? That would be an apples-to-apples-comparison. If that's true, then I wonder why ChromeOS would boot up so much faster than Android? I suspect it doesn'
657.
by azakai 10y ago
This does, however mean that 1. This depends on closed-source code (libhoudini is Intel code, and it's not open, last I heard). I guess it's not the first piece of closed-source code in Chromebooks, but it's a crucial piece.
658.
by azakai 10y ago
It doesn't have to be. If consumers stop using EME-supporters' browsers, things can change quickly. We have the power, but sadly not the will.
659.
by azakai 10y ago
> The EFF greatly overestimates the amount of influence browser makers have. And you greatly underestimate it. Look at the history of DRM in music.
660.
by azakai 10y ago
> [The W3C] needs to hear from you now. Please share this post, and spread the word. Help the W3C be the organization it is meant to be. This isn't about the W3C. This is about EME, and about the companies that created it and promot

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