Keith,
Thanks for the heads up on this article. It's a very interesting read,
and I'm looking forward to getting to read Watson's article now when that
comes out.
-Mike
On Fri, Jan 4, 2013 at 1:15 PM, Keith Lofstrom <[email protected]>wrote:
>
> http://spectrum.ieee.org/podcast/computing/software/computers-its-time-to-start-over
>
> Interesting interview of Dr. Robert Watson of Cambridge ( and on
> the board of the FreeBSD Foundation) about the rearchitecting of
> computer hardware. To a chip designer, Dr. Watson's
> prognostications seem like small steps in the right direction.
>
> The way things are headed, vast swaths of software is being
> replaced with special purpose hardware. As the relative cost of
> a logic gate plummets compared to the time and energy cost of an
> instruction fetch, it is far more cost effective to add graphics
> and radio and network-layer hardware to chips, even if most of
> that hardware isn't ever used in a particular user device.
>
> For example, Intel's latest "single chip processor" for mobile
> devices has 6 radios on it, even though a particular device may
> use only one or two. On-chip radios are far cheaper than the
> wires and board-space and power needed to connect to optimized
> separate-chip radios. Will they become obsolete? You betcha.
> But you will buy a new device for its new features sooner.
> The main thing you should demand is the ability to securely
> and freely transfer your data and capabilities to each new
> device without hassle. Open platforms, open standards!
>
> In time, I expect software will balkanize into a lot of little
> modules, running in separate hardware sandboxes, with interprocess
> communication completely managed by hardware. Software kernels
> as we know them may vanish. Bugs will remain in the design
> process, corrected over time, and exploits will only endure
> until next year's hardware release.
>
> Keith
>
> --
> Keith Lofstrom [email protected] Voice (503)-520-1993
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--
*"...No ethically-trained software engineer would ever consent to write a
DestroyBaghdad procedure. Basic professional ethics would instead require
him to write a DestroyCity procedure, to which Baghdad could be given as a
parameter."* -- Nathaniel Borenstein
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