nice graphics and gobbling the cpu

[Dick Dunn]

(Whew!  I was beginning to think we'd not see anyone defending fat software.)

root at NEXTSERVER.CS.STTHOMAS.EDU (Max Tardiveau) writes:

> This is obviously a matter of opinion. While I agree with you that
> windowing systems take a large amount of power, I would argue that
> it is not too much...

We only agreed that X sucks up a lot of compute power; we didn't agree that
a window system running on UNIX needed a lot of compute power (CPU or
memory).  I see no reason to believe that it does.  Nothing I've ever read
or heard of the work at Bell Labs suggests that window systems need a lot
of power.

>...I like having nice graphics on my workstation,
> and I like to have responsive windows...

Fine...but what does this (particularly the latter half) have to do with
X???  There are other ways to get nice graphics, and X doesn't give you
responsive windows.  (See Doug Gwyn's earlier note.)

>...And, like most people, I use
> only a small portion of the processing power of my workstations
> (show me a Sparcstation that's 100% busy 100% of the time. There
> are probably a few, but not a whole lot).

Show me a car that's driven at top speed (or even maximum legal speed) 100%
of the time.  The maximum compute power exists to serve your maximum needs;
it's a peak (not-to-exceed:-) figure.  Sure, most of the time the CPU is
sitting idle...but when you get something that's heavy on computing going,
you want the CPU available.  If that compute-intensive task also does any
significant amount of display, the cost of a fat window system drags you
down.

If you're saying that you've generally got more compute power than you
need, that's still not a vindication of X; it just reinforces what other
folks have said here: that software bloat serves hardware manufacturers
by creating an artificial demand for faster CPUs and more memory.
-- 
Dick Dunn     rcd at ico.isc.com -or- ico!rcd       Boulder, CO   (303)449-2870
   ...While you were reading this, Motif grew by another kilobyte.