2.3k Patch Would Improve Linux Build Times 50~80% & Fix “Dependency Hell”

Post by hffft » Mon, Jan 03, 2022, 4:06 AM UTC

mkl wrote: post #21

hffft wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The OP missed out the key word "series" from the actual blog. Probably didn't miss it... probably hit the very strict/short HN post title limit.

No, the limit is 80 characters, and the current title is 73, so "Series " would fit. Also, "2.3k", besides being confusing, is not actually an abbreviation of 2297. len('2297 Patch Series Would Improve Linux Build Times 50~80% & Fix "Dependency Hell"') == 80. Better would be to replace "Patch" with "Commit", since that's how Molnar describes it, but that would take rewording (or removal of quotes) to fit on HN. "Time…

Post by cyberpunk » Tue, Jan 04, 2022, 1:14 PM UTC

gjm11 wrote: post #13

cyberpunk wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the difference then? Build time, I would assume would be a number like "it takes 4 minutes to build a kernel package".. Build rate also assuming, is more like "We can build 50 of these in an hour on two servers"... The two are related, but you can scale the rate with more hardware, whereas the time is limited to how fast your hardware is or how optimised the job is, no? So Improving the _time_ increases your r…

I think the point isn't subtleties about scaling with more hardware, but about the fact that the percentages mean very different things depending on whether they're describing times or rates. A 50% improvement in build time means becoming 2x as fast. A 50% improvement in build rate means becoming 1.5x as fast. An 80% improvement in build time means becoming 5x as fast. An 80% improvement in build rate means becoming…