Torvalds: Linux Ready To Go Green

[HardOCP News]

During Australia’s largest Linux conference, Linus Torvalds said that the infrastructure and tools are in place for Linux to become a green operating system.

In an interview at the linux.conf.au conference, the developer of the Linux kernel admitted that the operating system was lagging behind on power-management and energy-diagnosis tools. It is an area we were pretty weak in a few years ago and just building up the infrastructure took a long time, but now we are at a point where we have most of it done," Torvalds said.

 

[Methadras]

UGH!!! What the hell is this? This green movement nonsense is getting out of hand.

 

[InorganicMatter]

*yawn*

Linux lost in my book. BSD is where it's at.

 

[Fumosus]

Meth, you've got the wrong mind set about this. Like it or not, the "Green" movement is well at hand and very much moving forward. There is so much R&D going into new "green" tech that this will only benefit us consumers in the long run. If Linux doesn't keep up, it risks being dismissed by an ever growing number of people. In other words, get on the boat, or get left behind.

 

[soulman901]

It's not that easy being green;
Having to spend each day the color of the leaves.
When I think it could be nicer being red, or yellow or gold...
or something much more colorful like that.

It's not easy being green.
It seems you blend in with so many other ord'nary things.
And people tend to pass you over 'cause you're
not standing out like flashy sparkles in the water
or stars in the sky.

But green's the color of Spring.
And green can be cool and friendly-like.
And green can be big like an ocean, or important like a mountain,
or tall like a tree.

When green is all there is to be
It could make you wonder why, but why wonder why?
Wonder, I am green and it'll do fine, it's beautiful!
And I think it's what I want to be.

 

[phide]

There is so much R&D going into new "green" tech that this will only benefit us consumers in the long run.

While I personally don't have any objections toward a "greener" future, it is necessary to note that certain enviro-friendly technologies may cost the consumer more money to be able perform a given task with a given product. One case in point is the MacBook Air: certain cost-increasing green materials and technologies were used to build the Air in place of ordinary, non-green materials (such as plastic) and technologies. This inevitably increases the price of the end product.

If R&D is being done by a given company, that company is passing the cost of that R&D onto the consumer through its products or services. In the technology sector, the recuperation of R&D costs tends to be a significant portion of every dollar a product takes in (though this obviously isn't a factor with Linux), so the green movement can have its drawbacks from the consumer's perspective.

 

[HOCP4ME]

While I personally don't have any objections toward a "greener" future, it is necessary to note that certain enviro-friendly technologies may cost the consumer more money to be able perform a given task with a given product. One case in point is the MacBook Air: certain cost-increasing green materials and technologies were used to build the Air in place of ordinary, non-green materials (such as plastic) and technologies. This inevitably increases the price of the end product.

If R&D is being done by a given company, that company is passing the cost of that R&D onto the consumer through its products or services. In the technology sector, the recuperation of R&D costs tends to be a significant portion of every dollar a product takes in (though this obviously isn't a factor with Linux), so the green movement can have its drawbacks from the consumer's perspective.

The health of Earth, the planet that provides a home to six billion souls: priority # 1

Whether or not you must pay another $20 for your laptop: priority # 2

 

[phide]

The health of Earth, the planet that provides a home to six billion souls: priority # 1

Whether or not you must pay another $20 for your laptop: priority # 2

Those are your priorities, not necessarily mine (or anyone else's for that matter).

 

[HOCP4ME]

Those are your priorities, not necessarily mine (or anyone else's for that matter).

I'm sure you would agree, however, that one faction's desire to save $20 on laptops should not be allowed to destroy the home of itself and everyone else.

If one person wants to die, is he allowed to do so by nuclear bomb and take thousands of others with him?

 

[soulman901]

Hey I would like to point out that the Intel Processors have been a lot more green than ever considering that you are getting much more preformance that runs much more cooler with a reduction in the consumption of energy.
I do agree that the use of the term Green is a bit over used. I think most likely you are paying for more just for the name, that it is "Green" which the companies are over-stating.
Here's what everyone should really do.

Cut down on the amount of paper waste
Walk/Ride Bicycle/Skate Board
Recycle your crap(Paper, Can's, Glass, Electronics(Give away or send them in for recycling)
Cut down on the amount of electricity you are using.
Drive Less(Do you really need to drive around aimlessly while pissing off other drivers on the road?)

Those are some of the things that you can do to be "Green" or Conserve, whatever you want to call it.
The Hippies want to call it going Green, I just call it being Smart about what you use.

 

[HOCP4ME]

Hey I would like to point out that the Intel Processors have been a lot more green than ever considering that you are getting much more preformance that runs much more cooler with a reduction in the consumption of energy.
I do agree that the use of the term Green is a bit over used. I think most likely you are paying for more just for the name, that it is "Green" which the companies are over-stating.
Here's what everyone should really do.

Cut down on the amount of paper waste
Walk/Ride Bicycle/Skate Board
Recycle your crap(Paper, Can's, Glass, Electronics(Give away or send them in for recycling)
Cut down on the amount of electricity you are using.
Drive Less(Do you really need to drive around aimlessly while pissing off other drivers on the road?)

Those are some of the things that you can do to be "Green" or Conserve, whatever you want to call it.
The Hippies want to call it going Green, I just call it being Smart about what you use.

Those are all good ideas, but there are some environmental concerns only large manufacturers can address, such as the use of plastics and VOCs.

 

[RoffleCopter]

To celebrate this momentous occasion, I'm going to buy me a Range Rover

 

[A Shiny Demon]

If this means Ubuntu will get better than one minute per battery percentage on my laptop, I'm all for it. That's about the only reason I'm still running Vista on it at this point, especially since I've seen Source-engine games running on Linux.

 

[brucedeluxe169]

Those are all good ideas, but there are some environmental concerns only large manufacturers can address, such as the use of plastics and VOCs.

if the consumer votes with their dollars, the large manufacturers will fall into line. if the consumer would just stop buying bottled water (less wasted plastic), buy smaller cars, eat more locally grown foods, walk/bike to more places, live closer to work, etc etc etc all these things together would change the ways corporations to business...

it scares me though... people (including me) just dont have the willpower to make the sacrifices.... i really do fear for my future kids' generation.... at this point I almost feel as if having kids would be an immoral thing to do

 

[KingPariah777]

I'm sure you would agree, however, that one faction's desire to save $20 on laptops should not be allowed to destroy the home of itself and everyone else.

If one person wants to die, is he allowed to do so by nuclear bomb and take thousands of others with him?

Try convincing me to spend an extra 20 bucks on a laptop for your little "cause" and I will tell you to F yourself.

I guess that's why you need the government to put a gun to peoples heads and force them to act according to the way you think they should, because convincing individuals isn't working too well for people like you, is it?

 

[movax]

Software can be green now? WTF.

That article had one para about green-i-ness, another about kernel development and the third was the tired OSS vs DRM thing. Bleeeeeeh.

I still think Pb-free/RoHs was a bad idea; a solder that's harder to work with, tin whisker'd, and neccessitates the purchase of new equipment that can melt the shit in the first place, and a harder solder that would rather crack instantly... All because the treehugging landed on some ears that listened.

Hopefully leaded solder will be around for years to come for hobbyists/tinkerers.

But back on topic, maybe my laptop will play nice with Linux power management now? It'd be nice!

 

[eeyrjmr]

Software can be green now? WTF.

That article had one para about green-i-ness, another about kernel development and the third was the tired OSS vs DRM thing. Bleeeeeeh.

I still think Pb-free/RoHs was a bad idea; a solder that's harder to work with, tin whisker'd, and neccessitates the purchase of new equipment that can melt the shit in the first place, and a harder solder that would rather crack instantly... All because the treehugging landed on some ears that listened.

Hopefully leaded solder will be around for years to come for hobbyists/tinkerers.

But back on topic, maybe my laptop will play nice with Linux power management now? It'd be nice!

The kernel can be "green" yes

TICKLESS KERNEL FTW!!!!

pre-2.6.20 there was an internal clock for the kernel for ~250ms (windows has a similar one but the windows one can be changed for more responsive or more dedicated . 1000hz kernel tick is great for gaming or such BUT if you are just browsing a webpage why does the kernel need to wake up ever ms to do....

tickless enables the kernel to skip beats effectily, if it doesn't need to wake up why should it cause every wakeup takes loads of CPU power.


Intel have a great app called PowerTOP to assess how efficient yr system is. Pre tickless the kernel would wake everything up and eat power. with a tickless kernel the system was dormant for longer leading to other apps that were waking up far to often to become noticed

kernel 2.6.24 now has tickless in majority of architectures.


to give you an idea a std Dell laptop would run for ~4h on battery, going tickless and disabling/changing wakups of other app streatches this to 7h


now think abt all the servers around the world hosting webpages and how much electrical power they use

http://www.lesswatts.org/projects/powertop/

 

[HOCP4ME]

if the consumer votes with their dollars, the large manufacturers will fall into line. if the consumer would just stop buying bottled water (less wasted plastic), buy smaller cars, eat more locally grown foods, walk/bike to more places, live closer to work, etc etc etc all these things together would change the ways corporations to business...

it scares me though... people (including me) just dont have the willpower to make the sacrifices.... i really do fear for my future kids' generation.... at this point I almost feel as if having kids would be an immoral thing to do

I totally agree. The unfortunate thing is, most people would not pay any extra money at all to help the environment if given a choice. Take light bulbs for example. Compact fluorescent bulbs have been around for a while now. They don't take 90% of their energy and completely waste it, they use less electricity to produce the same amount of light (saving the consumer money in the long run), and they burn out less often (saving the consumer money in the long run). And yet, because the up-front cost is higher, most people still don't use them.

That's why I'm not against government bans of wasteful technology. We all live on the same Earth, and those who don't care about it shouldn't be allowed to ruin it for those who do care.

I wish people like you would fucking die

Try convincing me to spend an extra 20 bucks on a laptop for your little "cause" and I will tell you to F yourself.

I guess that's why you need the government to put a gun to peoples heads and force them to act according to the way you think they should, because convincing individuals isn't working too well for people like you, is it?

Calm down, buddy. No, I don't want the government to "put a gun to peoples heads and force them to act according to the way I think they should". But I do want the government to prevent other people's greed and/or lack of foresight from decreasing my life expectancy.

 

[phide]

They don't take 90% of their energy and completely waste it, they use less electricity to produce the same amount of light (saving the consumer money in the long run), and they burn out less often (saving the consumer money in the long run). And yet, because the up-front cost is higher, most people still don't use them.

I don't use them because I don't like the way they work. Icandescent bulbs don't exhibit a noticeable distracting flicker and do emit a less fatiguing light. It isn't because of cost, and I'm sure I'm not alone here.

But I do want the government to prevent other people's greed and/or lack of foresight from decreasing my life expectancy.

Can you elaborate as to how my theoretical cheap plastic laptop shortens your life expectancy?

To get back on topic, I'm looking forward to my first real foray into Linux pretty damn soon, and I'm glad Torvalds is at least interested in competing with Microsoft in this respect. I'm not foolish enough to turn down a good features (even if I likely won't ever use them)

 

[sc3252]

UGH!!! What the hell is this? This green movement nonsense is getting out of hand.

It seems like half of you guys didn't even read the article. It only has a sliver of anything talking about utilities to make Linux more energy efficient. It mostly talks about retirement and DRM.

"The question comes up but it is not something I really worry about. There are other people who could take over what I do. I would like to think that they would be worse at it, but it is not like (Linux) would go away or be in trouble," said Torvalds.

That had me chuckling for a minute.

 

[The Red]

Those are your priorities, not necessarily mine (or anyone else's for that matter).

Is this an admission that you compromise the well-being of the majority? not good for the hive? rejected by the gander? detrimental to co-existance or a flaw in progress as defined by the good of the majority over the minority?

 

[pxc]

It's about time.

For those who don't get it: it might save you a few cents on your power bill (or much more for data centers), or more concern to most people, it could possibly help squeeze out more battery life for mobile devices.

 

[sabrewolf732]

I wish people like you would fucking die

He will, thanks to non-green assholes like you