Thursday July 03, 2008

- Multi-Core Processors: Intel puts the pressure on the developers - Lionel - 16:44:44

Source : Ars Technica

Manufacturers of processors have arrived at the end of the race concerning frequency; therefore they have decided that the new growth of the power will be done on the number of cores. In order not to disturb the Moore's law, the number of cores must double every 18 months.
But without adapting the software, these cores will not be used for anything other than to consume energy.
The true challenge is thus at the level of software development, and Intel has just given the tone in one of its Blogs, the standard way of communicating delicate information officially.
In this blog, one can read that the developers will not be supposed to learn how to optimize their software for 2,4 8 or 16 cores, but in the near future for tens and then hundreds.
It acts to double the work of the whole. Optimization will take more and more time and will have to start before even writing the first line of code. Before the project starts one needs to know what can be paralleled and how.
The challenge is colossal and will require not only new tools, but also to train the programmers with tasks usually reserved to the people working on work stations. In short, the founders will delegate the technical difficulties they circumvented to other people.
One understands better in this context why Apple decided to make a pause in the esthetics improvement of Mac OS X by announcing Snow Leopard: which will precisely be the start of this new challenge.

[translation by crispin]

- Intel: "CUDA Is Dead, Larrabee Rules" - Eric - 15:20:54

Source : Dailytech

While Intel and NVidia have a common opponent, AMD/ATI, they are also 2 competing chipset and processor manufacturing company. If NVidia is mostly doing the design and outsourcing production, Intel does both. They recently entered into a open fight regarding the future of CPU and GPU. In both case, the predicted increase of core numbers in processors opens the door to huge performance gain. As NVidia is backing the potential of GPU to perform other task than 2D/3D rendering, Intel is predicting that in a near future one would not need GPU anymore, as some cores of a CPU could be dedicated to such function.

NVidia is promoting its CUDA programming language, attacking directly Intel on its data processing arena. CUDA makes it possible to perform intensive and complex physics calculations on the GPU, enabling physics engine like PhysX on the GPU.
the last comment from Intel about CUDA: "NVIDIA’s CUDA programming model would be nothing more than an interesting footnote in the annals of computing history." To backup such statement, Intel’s Pat Gelsinger, co-general manager of Intel’s Digital Enterprise Group, explained that developers will not have time to deeply invest into learning how to program for new architectures like CUDA. At the opposite, Intel’s Larrabee graphics chip will be entirely based on Intel Architecture x86 cores making it easier for developers to program for the graphics processor without requiring learning a new coding language. In addition, Larrabee will have full support for existing APIs like DirectX and OpenGL.

It is now clear that Intel and NVidia will keep fighting about the best future for our computers, should it be fully GPU or fully CPU? and what about AMD, does the company still have to say something, or being able to play a role in this fight?

- Flash Lite on the iPhone - Lionel - 14:16:05

Source : iPhoneatlas

Thomas Joos, a developer has successfully ported Flash Lite on the iPhone. A video is available to demonstrate to illustrate this statement.

Available as an independent application, it could open the doors to many usages. Now, let see how Apple will react, and if Cupertino will accept to offer it on the AppSotre.


[translation by Linathael]

- Windows 7; this will be released by January 2010 - Lionel - 07:30:13

Microsoft fixed a deadline for the next version of Windows, it will be January 2010, if nothing comes along to disturb this agenda.
According to Steve Ballmer, this system will remain closer to Vista than Vista was to XP. However, there should be a radically change in its programming; certainly this is what customers hoped for with the current version.
By that time, Apple should have already released Snow Leopard and should be working with ongoing improvements of its OS; based on the sound foundations of the OS this should bring a batch of innovations on the side of the user interface.
Will these innovations be sufficient for to call it Mac OS XI? It will be certainly the focus of Apple to keep ahead of its eternal competitor as it continues its gradual increase of market share.

[translation by crispin]