Julia EvansJun 5, 2023

32 bits is small

permalink: https://wizardzines.com/comics/32-bit-small/

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Show threadJulia EvansJun 6, 2023
definitely going to take out the "it's not the 90s, use 64 bits” line out of this one. I was already unsure about it (because it's obviously not true, you should use whatever size is appropriate for your use case) and from the responses I don't think it's adding much
Show threadStuart Marks
@b0rk I think there's still something useful to say here though. In the 1990s I worked on a system that used 32-bit unsigned as a millisecond timestamp. It would roll over after about 50 days. Our attitude was, "The system will never stay up that long." No longer! Maybe the line should be, "It's not the 90s, make sure you account for 32-bit overflow."
Jun 7, 2023 at 12:17amWeb
Show threadAdrian CockcroftJun 7, 2023
@stuartmarks @b0rk 10ms signed 32bit is about 250 days or about 9months. I know because one of the old SunOS 4 versions would hang up when the clock tick went negative.
Show threadStuart MarksJun 7, 2023
@adrianco @b0rk Yeah I was talking about the X Window server. In the early days that thing wouldn't even stay up for a day, so talk of it staying up 50 days was "Inconceivable!" (to quote Vizzini).
Show threadHeiko RuppJun 7, 2023

@stuartmarks @b0rk

That sounds a lot like the Boeing 787 which needs (needed?) a reboot every 51 days :)

https://www.theregister.com/2020/04/02/boeing_787_power_cycle_51_days_stale_data/

Boeing 787s must be turned off and on every 51 days to prevent 'misleading data' being shown to pilots

: US air safety bods call it 'potentially catastrophic' if reboot directive not implemented

The Register
Show threadStuart MarksJun 8, 2023
@pilhuhn @b0rk Yeah a disturbing number of things need to be rebooted regularly. I have to reboot my desktop and even my phone every couple weeks otherwise things start behaving wonky. I was once on a plane waiting for pushback from the gate and the pilot announced a brief delay while they worked out some issue. They eventually rebooted the plane! It got really quiet for about 30 seconds. But that fixed it. We were all looking at each other thinking, "I hope we don't need to do that in the air."