Erik Funkenbusch <erik@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> And that is the real point. In unix, every "thread" is considered a
> process, whereas in Windows, there would be many hundreds of "processes" if
> they were counted the way Linux counts them. For example, on my Windows
> system right now it has 792 threads running and 61 processes, and that's
> not really doing much. Just because Linux has to count as processes what
> would be threads on Windows doesn't mean Linux is doing more work.
True, Linux processes are very lightweight and are roughly equivalent
to Windows threads. That is an advantage really.
> xclock? xmeter? You've got to be kidding me. Those, on windows, would be
> called "applets" and would likely run as threads within a process like
> Explorer some parent monitor system. You choose the most simplistic and
> tiny apps for your "example".
>
> Hey, I can run 200 copies of notepad and get similar results. BFD. Why
> are you afraid to run real apps?
Leaving aside the whole argument of what qualifies as a 'real app'
for the moment, that was never the purpose of this test. We were
challenging the assumption that Linux could not do the following:
"I sometimes have over 50 windows open, I have 16 dual-head virtual
desktops, and I usually have about 100-150 tasks running, with just
512 MB of RAM."
A few people expressed doubt that it was possible. The test proved
otherwise. There was never any requirement that each of those 'tasks'
run by Roy needed to be as heavyweight as Firefox or OpenOffice.
Indeed, it is very common to use Unix or Linux to do many lightweight
tasks in separate programs and combine the input via scripting and
pipes and so forth. Certainly in the Windows world it is more common
to use monolithic vertically integrated apps that spin off threads
and try to do it all under one big app umbrella. None of that is
pertinent to what this test addressed.
> No, you've only shown that you can choose a number of trivial apps that
> wouldn't even count as processes on Windows to pad your numbers. If that's
> what you're counting as apps, you're really not even using your computer.
I'll grant you that multiple copies xclock or xmeter is pointless,
but even with that removed we still blow past the 50 window / 100-150
task numbers given by Roy. And yes, believe it or not, some of do
use our computers to ssh into a lot of servers, run a lot of command
line processes, view a lot of lightweight status monitors, and many
other small tasks at the same time, and yes we call that work. We
are used to that sort of intense multitasking in the Unix/Linux
world... which is probably why Unix/Linux geeks often see a big
advantage in multi-workspace window managers while many Windows
users do not. Perhaps it all comes down to philosophical
differences in how work get done and where the boundaries on
'tasks' are drawn.
Thad
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