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How we decreased GitLab repo backup times from 48 hours to 41 minutes

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Re: How we decreased GitLab repo backup times from 48 hours to 41 minutes

#111

Post by sneak »

cvoss wrote: post #47
School-Cotton wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not the precise mathematical definition of exponential, but rather the colloquial one, where it just means "a lot".

You shouldn't use a word that can carry a precise mathematical meaning in a sentence that literally uses mathematical notation in order to speak precisely and then expect readers not to interpret the word in the precise mathematical way.

“Words mean things.”

If you can’t agree with this, then you shouldn’t be speaking or writing, IMO.

Those who argue that words that mean different things are actually equivalent have no business dealing with language.

Re: How we decreased GitLab repo backup times from 48 hours to 41 minutes

#112

Post by jjmarr »

blharr wrote: post #68
cvoss wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You shouldn't use a word that can carry a precise mathematical meaning in a sentence that literally uses mathematical notation in order to speak precisely and then expect readers not to interpret the word in the precise mathematical way.

I somewhat agree, but for lack of a better word, what would you use? Quadratically doesn't have the same punch

"by a factor of `n`" also sounds impressive.

Re: How we decreased GitLab repo backup times from 48 hours to 41 minutes

#114

Post by Dylan16807 »

IshKebab wrote: post #70
cvoss wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You shouldn't use a word that can carry a precise mathematical meaning in a sentence that literally uses mathematical notation in order to speak precisely and then expect readers not to interpret the word in the precise mathematical way.

You should if you expect your readers to be normal humans who understand obvious context, and not pedantic HN readers who understand obvious context but delight in nit-picking it anyway.

You can, but it's not should.

Re: How we decreased GitLab repo backup times from 48 hours to 41 minutes

#115

Post by sneak »

msgodel wrote: post #28
marcellus23 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Meaningless and non-constructive pedantry.

I disagree. Misuse of the word "exponential" is a major pet peeve of mine. It's a particular case of the much more common "use mathematically precise phrasing to sound careful/precise" that you often find in less than honest writing. Here they are actually using it to refer to growth functions (which is rare for this error) and being honest (which is also rare IMO) but it's still wrong. They should have written about…

My personal pet peeve is when the term “exponentially” is used to refer to a change between precisely two data points.

It’s a very specific subset of the one you’re describing.

“Tell me you don’t know what you’re talking about without telling me you don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Re: How we decreased GitLab repo backup times from 48 hours to 41 minutes

#116

Post by rubit_xxx22____ »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #105
rubit_xxx22___ wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> I don’t want something gathering all my thoughts historically together and tying it to something else; nothing good comes from that; I’m not writing a serial novel. Yeah but you should want your thoughts on a single post to tie together. > Many years ago I had a user with thousands of karma points. I used to get really annoyed with other users downvoting my valid and thoughtful comments because it affected my karma…

[flagged]

Re: How we decreased GitLab repo backup times from 48 hours to 41 minutes

#117

Post by 1oooqooq »

SoftTalker wrote: post #48

Cool discovery but the article could have been about 1/10 as long and still communicated effectively. At least they didn't post it as a video, so it was easy to skim to the important details.

it could have been longer. I still don't know why they were doing backup bundles with two refs :)

Re: How we decreased GitLab repo backup times from 48 hours to 41 minutes

#119

Post by dieortin »

hinkley wrote: post #101
EdwardCoffin wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bruce Dawson says: I like to call this Dawson’s first law of computing: O(n^2) is the sweet spot of badly scaling algorithms: fast enough to make it into production, but slow enough to make things fall down once it gets there. https://bsky.app/profile/randomascii.bsky.social/post/3lk4c6...

I made the “mistake” in an interview of equating two super-quadratic solutions in an interview. What I meant was what Dawson meant. It doesn’t matter because they’re both too ridiculous to even discuss.

They’re too ridiculous… unless a more optimal solution does not exist
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