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Cake day: July 16th, 2023

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  • Xen is running full virtual machines. You run full operating systems on simulated hardware. The real “host” operating system is the hypervisor (Xen). Inside a VM, you have the concept of one or more CPUs but you do not know which actual CPU cores that maps to. The load can be distributed to any of them by the real host.

    In something like Docker, you only run a single host kernel. On top of that you run sandbox environments that run on the kernel that “think” they have an environment to themselves but are actually sharing a single host kernel. The single host kernel directly manages the real hardware. Processes can run on any of the CPUs managed by the single host kernel.

    In both of the above, updating the host means shutting the system down.

    With this new approach, you have multiple kernels, all running natively on real hardware. Any given CPU is being managed by only one of the kernels. No hypervisor.





  • I do not consider a stand-alone kernel that does not ship to end users to be a product. But we do not have to argue definitions or semantics if you disagree.

    Linux distros are certainly products though (paid or otherwise).

    Russia can create a Linux distro, and even modify the kernel, regardless of the rules controlling US companies and foundations. They can certainly vet and remove anything they do not like as well. They just cannot distribute their code via linux.org.

    The willingness of Linus to reject Russian participation in the kernel may have more to do with his being Finnish than his being American. There are many American sanctions and restrictions against Huawei (China) and yet they remain one of the largest contributors to the Linux kernel. They use their company email. And the US does not seem very anti-Russian to me (as a third-party to both).

    Huawei is a Platinum sponsor of the Linux Foundation. Half of the Platinum Sponsors are from outside the US. Those foreign sponsors could easily establish a non-US based Linux Foundation if needed.

    Thank your for saying “usually” regarding the the typical Red Hat/GNU platform (same software). I use Chimera Linux (based out of Spain) which skips a lot of that. It also adds some atypical Microsoft tech, a lot of Google tech, and a typical Linux kernel.


  • AV1 has issues with film grain. There are things you can do. Let me admit however that one movie that I have not encoded as AV1 is a restored version of the original Star Wars. And film grain is a contributor to that.

    Another thing about film grain though is that it is often artificially added after as you say. With AV1, you can often get amazing compression that removes the grain as a side-effect and then just add it back yourself. To each their own how they feel about this approach.

    I also agree that H.264 can be more transparent. However, that is at massive file sizes. Others may have the space for that but I do not… Perhaps I do mot have the eyes for it either. I am not extracting and comparing single frames. To me, the AV1 files that I have look better at the size that I am archiving than they would using any other codec.

    I use the fact that massive bit rate H.264 looks great to my advantage as that is what my AV1 is being transcoded into when I watch it most of the time.

    Some content compresses better than others. Sometimes I get massive size reductions with AV1 at what looks like great quality to me. Other times, it struggles to beat H.265 or even H.264 at similar quality. It is pretty rare that I do not choose AV1 though.

    I often use Netflix VMAF to get an idea of target compression. It is not perfect though. You have to verify visually. Saves time trialing different parameters though.

    I should say that the audio codec is another big factor. I typically pair AV1 with Opus audio and the size reductions there are amazing even at quality levels that are transparent to me.

    If AV2 offers better quality at the same size, or similar quality at smaller sizes, I will likely switch to it long before having hardware that can play it natively.





  • I assume you mean The Linux Foundation.

    While the LF is US based, the real “product” is the distro and you can choose a non-US distro. My distro of choice is based in Spain.

    And, if needed, the kernel could be forked to anywhere in the world without disruption.

    Many core programs are built primarily by US firms, like Red Hat, but even OpenBSD relies on many of those. Same story with the forking. OpenBSD maintains some of this themselves (like X11).



  • The main thing I want is small file size for the quality. Netflix, YouTube, and me agree on that.

    Most of my stuff is AV1 today even though the two TVs I typically watch it on do not support it. Most of the time, what I am watching is high-bitrate H.264 that was transcoded from the low-bitrate AV1.

    I will probably move to AV2 shortly after it is available. At least, I will be an early adopter. The smaller the files the better. And, in the future when quality has gone up everywhere, my originals will play native and look great.




  • What parts of Wayland do you not like?

    There is a good chance that it was also designed this way on purpose. Almost everything I have heard people complain about on Wayland boils down to “it does not do that on purpose for security reasons”. In order to get around the purposeful constraints, you need to design extension protocols to create desired functionality and not all of those have been built. It is still on purpose though.

    You may simply disagree with the priorities. Which is what enshitification for profit is as well of course.