FreeBSD & Linux benchmarks w/ ZFS

Over the past nearly two months we have been running a lot of Linux benchmarks on the AMD Ryzen 5000 series, but what about the BSD operating systems with these Zen 3 desktop CPUs? Recently I got around to trying out a few of the BSDs on a Ryzen 9 5900X desktop as well as running some FreeBSD 12.2 vs. Ubuntu Linux benchmarks, including with Linux on OpenZFS and Clang.

Considering both Linux & FreeBSD w/ and w/o OpenZFS as well as with an w/o Clang give idea of performance of these technologies on AMD CPUs.

WSL 2 GPU Support for your NVIDIA/CUDA

At Microsoft Build in the first half of the year, Microsoft demonstrated some awesome new capabilities and improvements that were coming to Windows Subsystem for Linux 2 including the ability to share the host machine’s GPU with WSL 2 processes. Then in June Craig Loewen from Microsoft announced that developers working on the Windows insider ring machines could now make use of GPU for the Linux workloads. This support for NVIDIA CUDA enabled developers and data scientists to use their local Windows machines for inner-loop development and experimentation.

My experience with WSL so far was that conceptually, everything was nice but practically some scenarios were just not working because of the fundamental differences between POSIX systems and Windows. Let's hope that this time Microsoft provides a better integrated interoperability experience.

macOS' Metal for OpenJDK Java with project Lanai incl. benchmarks

Most graphical Java applications are written using the Swing UI toolkit, which renders via the Java 2D API. Internally, Java 2D can use software rendering plus a blit to the screen or it can use a platform-specific API, such as X11/Xrender on Linux, Direct3D on Windows, or OpenGL on macOS. These platform-specific APIs typically offer much better performance than software rendering and generally off-load the CPU. Metal is the new Apple platform API for such rendering, replacing the deprecated OpenGL API. (The name has nothing to do with the Swing “Metal” Look and Feel; that is just a coincidence.) We will update existing internal JDK code and create new code to utilize the Metal framework in a similar way as we already utilize the other platform-specific APIs. We will also investigate opportunities to leverage new capabilities of the Metal framework, such as more concurrent rendering.

And these are the OpenGL vs macOS' Metal Java benchmarks.

Run any code on any client – With WebAssembly and Wasmer

Wasmer allows you to run WebAssembly modules either Standalone or Embedded within other languages such as C/C++, Rust, Python, Go, PHP, Ruby... By design, the environment within which a WebAssembly module runs is completely isolated (or sandboxed) from the native functionality of the underlying host system. This means that by default, Wasm modules are designed to perform nothing more than pure computation. Consequently, access to "OS"-level resources such as file descriptors, network sockets, the system clock, and random numbers is not normally possible from WASM. However, there are many cases in which a Wasm module needs to do more than perform pure computation; they must interact with native "OS" functionality.

Finally the interoperability option for client code that was available for backend code for years with microservices.

Access Linux filesystems in Windows and WSL 2

Starting with Windows Insiders preview build 20211, WSL 2 will be offering a new feature: wsl --mount. This new parameter allows a physical disk to be attached and mounted inside WSL 2, which enables you to access filesystems that aren’t natively supported by Windows (such as ext4). So, if you’re dual booting with Windows & Linux using different disks, you can now access your Linux files from Windows!

Linux is getting better and better as a Windows replacement on the desktop. Microsoft is disparately trying to prevent a potential mass exodus to Linux in the coming years, when people recognize that all their apps run inside their browser anyway and Linux is just the slicker browser shell.

SoftBank Nears Deal to Sell Arm to Nvidia

According to those familiar with the matter, a cash-and-stock deal between the two companies could occur early next week and would be valued at over $40 billion, which could potentially be the largest deal ever in the semiconductor industry. SoftBank initially acquired Arm for $32 billion four years ago. The two companies have reportedly been in talks for weeks over a possible deal, and if completed, scrutiny may arise among antitrust regulars since Nvidia itself is currently a customer of Arm. Companies that utilize Arm technology would also not be in favor of a deal without explicit assurances that Arm's instruction set will continue to be available for equal licensing opportunities.

It was a question of time until ARM would lose it's pseudo independence. Maybe AMD & Intel with their x86-64 architecture are not at the end. ARM CPUs are getting hotter and x86 CPUs are getting cooler. The x86 efficiency improved dramatically in the past years, catching up with ARM's efficiency. The big advantage of x86 is that it's not license-locked.

ARM, Nvidia, Intel

JDK 16: Vector API, aka SIMD

Vector computations consist of a sequence of operations on vectors. A vector comprises a (usually) fixed sequence of scalar values, where the scalar values correspond to the number of hardware-defined vector lanes. A binary operation applied to two vectors with the same number of lanes would, for each lane, apply the equivalent scalar operation on the corresponding two scalar values from each vector. This is commonly referred to as Single Instruction Multiple Data (SIMD). Vector operations express a degree of parallelism that enables more work to be performed in a single CPU cycle and thus can result in significant performance gains. For example, given two vectors each covering a sequence of eight integers (eight lanes), then the two vectors can be added together using a single hardware instruction. The vector addition hardware instruction operates on sixteen integers, performing eight integer additions, in the time it would ordinarily take to operate on two integers, performing one integer addition.

The JVM does not want to be outpaced by WASM and adds SIMD capabilities as well.

Java, JVM, JDK16

Intel 11th Gen Core Tiger Lake vs AMD

Intel Tiger Lake will soon begin appearing in laptops with an upgraded CPU architecture, the all new Iris Xe (Gen12) graphics, new AI capabilities, Thunderbolt 4, PCI Express 4.0, WiFi 6, and other new functionality. The Gen12 graphics have me most excited but there should be healthy improvements as well on the CPU side and not to mention improved connectivity. Intel Tiger Lake is better positioned to compete with AMD's current generation Ryzen 4000 (Renoir) series mobile processors but even still the top-end Tiger Lake (U) model still is only four cores / eight threads. TDPs on the new parts range from 7 to 28 Watts.

Looks like Intel is back in the ring. However AMD ist yet to announce their next gen chips. And please, do not think of AMD as this little underdog being an alternative to Intel. Technical it is an alternative but in every other aspect it is just the same in a different shade. Both are USA based companies that can block their exports to any country that does not comply.

Intel, AMD, ARM

Lenovo Starts Offering Up Fedora Linux Pre-Loaded Systems From Their Web Store

As a follow up from the news earlier this summer of Lenovo planning to certify their ThinkPad and ThinkStation lines for Linux from Ubuntu and Red Hat while also offering distribution choices like Fedora, that work is proceeding with Lenovo now offering up their first system from their web store that comes pre-loaded with Fedora. The ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 8 is available with Fedora preloaded while still offering up options from Core i5 through Core i7 10th Gen CPUs, 8GB / 16GB of RAM, a variety of display options (including 14-inch 4K), etc.

Finally a major consumer-accessible offering of a pre-loaded Linux notebook.

Ubuntu, Schenker, Tuxedo

With OxygenOS 11, OnePlus ditches stock Android for Samsung's One UI

The first OxygenOS 11 preview is now live, and we've rounded up all the latest features. The latest version of the interface comes with a host of exciting features, including an always-on display, updated Zen Mode, new system font, optimized system-wide dark mode, and more. But one change that OnePlus users won't be so keen on is the new design. OxygenOS always stood out for its clean user interface that's inspired by stock Android, with the skin likened to Google's Pixel Launcher on steroids. That's changing with OxygenOS 11 as OnePlus introduces a new design language that's more in line with Samsung's One UI than Pixel and Android One phones.

The good side of it: This gives OnePlus room for differentiation and decouples the brand from Google's Android UX. On the other hand for many people this might be actually a bad thing.

Play Store, Huawei, App Gallery, Apple

Apple slams 'Fortnite' maker Epic Games for 'shoplifting' from App Store

The dispute between Apple and the maker of the popular video game Fortnite over in-app purchasing rules continued Sunday with Fortnite hosting a free online competition billed as the last time gamers will be able to play together across all platforms. The #FreeFortnite Cup was scheduled two days after Apple asked a federal judge in California on Friday to deny Fortnite maker Epic Games’ request to have the game returned to the App Store.

Epic pioneers the breakup of the closed ecosystem monopoly of Google & Apple.

Play Store, Huawei, App Gallery, Apple

Apple just kicked Fortnite off the App Store

Apple has removed Epic Games’ battle royale game Fortnite from the App Store after the developer on Thursday implemented its own in-app payment system that bypassed Apple’s standard 30 percent fee The decision marks a significant escalation in the feud between Epic and one of the world’s most dominant mobile software marketplaces. It also comes at an especially fraught time for Apple as the iPhone maker navigates antitrust concerns over its operation of the App Store and the rules it imposes on certain developers.

And therefore stores are not a model of the future. A bazaar is the way to go. A bazaar is open to everybody, without any bias, and cannot lock you down. A bazaar is how WWW and the Internet is designed.

Play Store, Huawei, App Gallery

The industry's highest-performance ARM-based server CPU to date

Overview Huawei Kunpeng 920 is the industry's highest-performance ARM-based server CPU to date. Using the cutting-edge 7nm process, the CPU was independently designed by Huawei based on ARMv8 architecture license. It significantly improves processor performance by optimizing branch prediction algorithms, increasing the number of execution units, and improving the memory subsystem architecture and so on. At typical frequency, the Huawei Kunpeng 920 CPU scores more than an estimated 930 on SPECint®_rate_base2006. At the same time, power efficiency is 30% better than that offered by industry counterparts. Huawei Kunpeng 920 provides much higher computing performance for data centers while slashing power consumption. TaiShan will enable computing platforms with high performance and low power consumption for enterprises. Main Specification Architecture: ARM v8.2 Core: up to 64 Typical Frequency：2.6GHz Memory：8 DDR4 Channels Coherent Interconnect: 2S&4S I/O: PCIe 4.0, CCIX, 100G, SAS/SATA 3.0 Max Power: 180W Process：7nm Highlights Huawei Kunpeng 920 will enable computing platforms with high performance and low power consumption for scenarios including Big Data, Distributed Storage, Database, ARM-Native, Edge Computing and so on. It brings unique value in the coming diversified computing era. Huawei Kunpeng 920 SPECint_rate_base2006 estimate based on internal testing. The SPEC CPU® 2006 benchmark has been retired and SPEC is no longer reviewing or publishing results with this benchmark. SPEC, SPEC CPU, and SPECint are registered trademarks of the Standard Performance Evaluation Corporation. See www.spec.org for more information.

Interesting how the Kunpeng development will proceed as Huawei faces serious sanctions from USA.

ARM, Intel, Linux, Ryzen

MacBooks to become much more affordable by ditching Intel components

This MacBook could be the cheapest Apple laptop ever, according to a new report. According to newly leaked data, the new Macbook with Apple Silicon will be the most inexpensive Apple laptop to date. The MacBook will cost approximately $799 and the MacBook Pro 13-inch approximately $1,099. The leaked price points are $200 less than the 2020 versions of both the MacBook Air and the MacBook Pro 13-inch. Apple is expected to officially announce these new laptops as well as their official pricing in the fall. (Source: LaptopMag) Why this is important for your business: We’re all trying to conserve cash in these very difficult times, so if you’re thinking of replacing MacBooks in your office you may want to hold off for a few months.

Unlike many people claim, already today Apple notebooks can compete with other premium notebooks in terms of price. Cutting out Intel components, will make Apple notebooks even more affordable and even far cheaper, if one considers the total ROI of a daily companion that is expected to work flawlessly which you will never experience with a Windows notebook.

ARM, Intel, macOS, BigSur

Apple's switches to their own CPU derivate of ARM boosting their competition edge

Not only is Apple disrupting the MacBook and Mac market with its move to ARM-based processors, it’s also going to have an impact on the wider marketplace. Microsoft will be forced to accelerate its Windows 10 on ARM project to allow its partners to stay in touch with Apple. And Google will have to consider the danger to its Chromebook project . I’ve previously talked about the impact of Apple’s move to ARM-based processors on the Windows 10 ecosystem. In summary it’s going to force Microsoft’s Windows 10 on ARM into the spotlight; rival laptop manufacturers will no doubt offer at least one ARM-powered line-up in the portfolio rather than let Apple take all the glory; and there will be an increased focus on fixing legacy app compatibility (something that Windows 10 and MacOS will have to deal with quickly and smoothly).

Because of Microsoft Windows' inability to evolve, ARM CPUs are not really widespread in the PC market. Linux would massively benefit of ARM compared to Windows, as Linux incl. most of its software already supports ARM for years.

ARM, Intel, MIPS

Nvidia to acquire ARM

Nvidia Corp. is in advanced talks to acquire Arm Ltd., the chip designer that SoftBank Group Corp. bought for $32 billion four years ago, according to people familiar with the matter. The two parties aim to reach a deal in the next few weeks, the people said, asking not to be identified because the information is private. Nvidia is the only suitor in concrete discussions with SoftBank, according to the people. A deal for Arm could be the largest ever in the semiconductor industry, which has been consolidating in recent years as companies seek to diversify and add scale. But any deal with Nvidia, which is a customer of Arm, would likely trigger regulatory scrutiny as well as a wave of opposition from other users.

Far too speculative to judge if this would be a good step for tech advancement.

ARM, Intel, MIPS

Confidential Computing brings silicon-protected trust to cloud computing

Google Cloud encrypts data at-rest and in-transit, but customer data must be decrypted for processing. Confidential Computing is a breakthrough technology which encrypts data in-use—while it is being processed. Confidential Computing environments keep data encrypted in memory and elsewhere outside the central processing unit (CPU). Confidential VMs, now in beta, is the first product in Google Cloud’s Confidential Computing portfolio. We already employ a variety of isolation and sandboxing techniques as part of our cloud infrastructure to help make our multi-tenant architecture secure. Confidential VMs take this to the next level by offering memory encryption so that you can further isolate your workloads in the cloud. Confidential VMs can help all our customers protect sensitive data, but we think it will be especially interesting to those in regulated industries.

This is truly a revolution for cloud computing and cannot be overestimated. It opens up a whole class of use cases that were not possible for legal & compliance reasons.

VMware, AWS, Azure, Disruption

Java 16 to enable C++14 language features

Through JDK 15, the language features used by C++ code in the JDK have been limited to the C++98/03 language standards. With JDK 11, the code was been updated to support building with newer versions of the C++ standard, although it does not yet use any new features. This includes being able to build with recent versions of various compilers that support C++11/14 language features. The purpose of this JEP is to formally allow C++ source code changes within the JDK to take advantage of C++14 language features, and to give specific guidance about which of those features may be used in HotSpot code.

This might make Java apps perform even faster.

Java16, Kotlin, Rust

Gorilla Glass gets even tougher

Gorilla Glass Victus is the latest in glass innovation from the people at Corning, who have been working on delivering better glass for smartphones since the original iPhone. While Gorilla Glass is up to number 6 in its line, Corning has announced new glass and new branding, calling it Victus. Sure, fine. But what’s interesting here is that Corning is saying the new Gorilla Glass Victus now brings two-meter drop protection (over six feet), and onto hard/rough surfaces, while doubling the scratch resistance over Gorilla Glass 6. That’s quite something, because Corning has only ever announced better scratch resistance or drop protection – the twin pillars of mobile glass – but never both together. Glass strength is a battle. Just like diamonds are very hard but brittle, and Sapphire glass as well, Corning tries to increase hardness against scratches, while making glass less brittle. So, this is an event. And the hints are the Galaxy Note 20 will be the first to have it equipped when Samsung announces that phone in just under two weeks time. You can watch Corning test out the new glass here. There is some joy in this, although most people will be looking for the certain YouTuber’s regular durability testing which usually tracks “scratches at level 6 with deeper grooves at level 7.” Will that change with Victus?

I remember, Apple wanted to play around with sapphire which was slightly harder than Gorilla glass three years ago but more costly to manufacture. Good for Apple not having invested even more money into sapphire.

iPhone, Android

iPhones made in India, Apple dumps China manufacturing

Apple’s contract manufacturing partner Foxconn has started to assemble the current generation of iPhone units — the iPhone 11 lineup — in its plant near Chennai, India, a source familiar with the matter told TechCrunch. A small batch of locally manufactured iPhone 11 units has already shipped to retail stores, but the production yield is currently limited, the person said, requesting anonymity as matters are private. Apple, in general, has ambitions to scale up its local production efforts in India, the person said. The local production of current iPhone 11 models illustrates Apple’s further commitment to India, the world’s second largest smartphone market, as it explores ways to cut its reliance on China, which produces the vast majority of iPhone models today.

I do not comment on that one! Dirty political games are going on here.

Politics, Apple, iPhone

Chrome with Upload Streaming, Human Interface Devices, and Custom Properties with Inheritance

Fetch Upload Streaming Fetch upload streaming lets web developers make a fetch with a ReadableStream body. Starting in Chrome 85, it's available for an origin trial. Previously, you could only start a request once you had the whole body ready to go. But now, you can start sending data while you're still generating the content, improving performance and memory usage. For example, an online form could initiate a fetch as soon as a user focuses a text input field. By the time the user clicks enter, fetch() headers would already have been sent. This feature also allows you to send content as it's generated on the client, such as audio and video. For more information, see Streaming requests with the fetch API. See the Origin Trials section for information on signing up and for a list of other origin trials starting in this release. This origin trial is expected to run through Chrome 87 in January 2021. WebHID API There is a long tail of human interface devices (HIDs) that are too new, too old, or too uncommon to be accessible by systems' device drivers. The WebHID API solves this by providing a way to implement device-specific logic in JavaScript. In Chrome 85, it's available for an origin trial.

Chromium and hence many other browsers that are build upon Chromium continue advancing. Good for the web, not necessary good for proprietary app stores, like Apple's App Store and Google's PlayStore.

Firefox, Chrome, Safari

Integrated Ryzen-based Linux notebooks from a vendor in Germany

Augsburg (Germany), 20th of July 2020. Our brand new TUXEDO Pulse 15 redefines the class of super thin and lightweight laptops and raises the bar to a completely new performance level: Instead of using a common power-saving ULV (Ultra Low Voltage) - processor, the 16.8 mm thin chassis made of magnesium alloy houses a high performance AMD Ryzen 7 4800H octa core cpu with a thermal design power of up to 54 W. In order to give users besides this great performance also excellent battery runtimes while unplugged from the power socket, a huge 91 Wh Lithium-Polymer battery provides the AMD-only ultrabook with energy for more than 20 hours.

Great to see another store providing an integrated pre-installed Linux notebook without asking you to pay Microsoft license fees, for are license Linux users do not use.

Linux, macOS, Apple

Coinbase is not using Kubernetes to run their container workloads

Coinbase built and maintains their own platform that's working for them. Coinbase provided an analysis worth studying. The major takeaway for me: asking people to manage their own Kubernetes cluster is like asking people to manage their own hypervisors when they just want VMs.

In the end there are more than a single solution to a problem. In many cases people tend to over-engineer a solution to their problem. The anticipated for a highly speculative future is usually a false advisor.

K8s, Cloud, AWS

macOS Big Sur is Apple's next-gen OS

macOS Big Sur is a major update that advances the legendary combination of the power of UNIX with the ease of use of the Mac, and delivers our biggest update to design in more than a decade,” said Craig Federighi, Apple’s senior vice president of Software Engineering. “With its modern and clean look, huge improvements to key apps including Safari, Messages, and Maps, and new privacy features, we think everyone is going to love the breakthrough experience that macOS Big Sur offers.

Apple offers a generous update policy that enables it even older notebooks to receive the new OS.

macOS, Apple, Windows, Linux, Fedora

ECMAScript 2020 spec for JavaScript released

Specific features introduced by ECMAScript 2020 include: A “function-like” import() module loading syntax to asynchronously import modules with a dynamic specifier. The proposal adds an import(specifier) syntactic form, acting in many ways like a function. It returns a promise for the module namespace object of the requested module, created after fetching, instantiating, and evaluating a module’s dependencies, along with the module itself. The specifier will be interpreted the same way as in an import declaration. While specifier is a string, it is not necessarily a string literal; thus, code like import(`./language-packs/${navigator.language}.js`) will work. This was not possible with the usual import declarations. With the plan, import() is proposed to work in both modules and scripts, giving script code an easy asynchronous entry point into the module world and allowing it to start running module code. BigInt, a new number primitive for working with arbitrary precision integers. BigInt can represent numbers larger than two to the 53rd power, the largest number JavaScript can represent reliably with the Number primitive. A BigInt is created by appending n to the end of the integer or by calling the constructor. The matchAll method for strings, to produce an iterator for all matched objects generated by a global regular expression. The rationale behind this proposal is that if a developer has a string and either a sticky or a global regular expression with multiple capturing groups, the developer might want to iterate through all the matches, for which there are currently several options but with limitations. String#matchAll addresses issues by providing access to all capturing groups and not visibly mutating the regular expression object in question. Promise.allSettled, a new Promise combinator that does not short-circuit. This returns a promise that is fulfilled with an array of promise state snapshots, but only after the original promises have settled, i.e. have been either fulfilled or rejected. globalThis, providing a universal way to access the global this value. A dedicated export * as ns from ‘module’ syntax to use within modules. Increased standardization of for-in enumeration order, partially specifying enumeration order in JavaScript. import.meta, a host-populated object in Modules that can contain contextual information. This serves as a JavaScript metaproperty, holding host-specific metadata about the current module. Nullish coalescing, a value selection operator for better handling of cases involving property accesses. It is a syntax feature to improve working with “nullish” values (null or undefined). Optional chaining, a property access and function invocation operator that will short-circuit if the value to access/invoke is nullish.

Fortunately the improvements are not only about ECMAScript, the language but also about underlying VM standard that executes the code and can be targeted by every other high-level language that can be transpilled to JavaScript and already have corresponding language primitives.

Kotlin, VM, JavaScript, Chromium

Windows 10 May 2020 update's WSL2 is maturing and gaining performance vs WSL1

When taking the geometric mean of those 69 benchmarks, using WSL2 on Windows 10 May 2020 Update meant around 21% better performance over the original WSL implementation. Ubuntu 20.04 running bare metal on the same system was faster by just 8%. With WSL2 offering much faster I/O as what was the main bottleneck with the original WSL, the WSL2 performance is now incredibly close to that of Ubuntu itself running on the system. All 69 benchmarks can be viewed via OpenBenchmarking.org.

Still I am very sceptical in how far one can actually use WSL in product and in workaround that go beyond "Hello, World". For example can you run Windows' and Linux' Gradle compilation workloads without getting into deadlocks because Linux Gradle want to delete a file that Linux Gradle keeps open? This would not be an issue on Linux but on Windows it is as Windows has the peculiarity that it does not allow to delete file that are open which is possible on Unix systems.

Ubuntu, Debian, Fedora, WSL, RedHat