[openbeos] Re: Add-ons/Module problems/ideas??
- From: "Michael Phipps" <mphipps1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: openbeos@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 01 Aug 2002 21:18:45 -0400
>Isaac Yonemoto wrote:
>
>> Is it possible to have a kernel that can reboot itself?
>> I think I posted this on the suggestions list, but I
>> didn't get much of a response.
>
>> On bootup (if say, spacebar is pressed), then it boots up normally,
>> clearing out all of the previously recorded information.
>
>On a remotely related note, in GEOS you could shut down the
>system at any time. It would then reboot the next with WITH
>your applications open AND the documents you were working on!
>And as the GEOS "auto-save" default is set to 1min, even in
>case of a complete system crash you would lose less than
>1min's work. This is something I'd like to see on BeOS too,
>because if it's aimed at the desktop, it has to be
>newbie-proof, so even if they just shut down the system the
>hard way, it should restart just where they left/shut-it off.
The first thing that comes to my mind is that this is something of an apples to
oranges comparison. :-) Memory was a lot smaller back then (64k on the
C64 where Geos came from). And while, yes, disks were smaller and slower,
memory usage has risen by many orders of magnitude, while disk speed only by
1 or a few (depends on if you compare floppies to hard drives or hd<-->hd).
Writing out every page in use every minute could hurt a lot. Because they have
to be
synchronized. You can't write out pages in parts, or your work will be
fragmented and
probably crash. Assuming an average disk speed of 20 megabytes/second, no
seeking,
basically best possible results, that is still 6.4 seconds to write out 128mb
of ram.
Oh, and btw, because of the paging issue, either the whole OS would have to
pause, or
the VM would have to become *VASTLY* more complex (i.e. pausing write requests
to
pages until the previous version was written to disk). I don't know how many
people would be
willing to have their machine "paused" 1/10 of the time. And yes, I know that
you might not
have to write out 128mb - some users will have less. But some users will have
more. I chose
an average.
Now. Having said that, I think that a special shutdown that says "on reboot, I
want to start
up *RIGHT* where I am" is a cool thing. Maybe not the average thing. But great
for some users.
I remember the Amiga days, where if something was hosed, you just flipped the
machine
off, then on for a clean slate. OTOH, I can't shut my home machine down without
losing the
30 windows that I have open. It would be nice if everything just came back. So
I could
see this as a shutdown option.
But, since this is an R2+ thing, this really belongs on GE. ;-)
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