Tags / Optimisation

 

Like Kubernetes but Sqwished!

- what would it be if I fixed all the things I don't like about Kubernetes?

Last April, as Covid took hold, and as we were locked away in our homes, many took to baking. Instead I decided to re-implement Kubernetes. Those that gave me incredulous looks and suggested i’d gone of the rails - you were probably right. But the thing is, there was so much that frustrated me about it. I know technologies for building distributed, scalable, fault tolerant systems are intrinsically complex. But if there’s one thing i’ve learned in the last decade it’s that it’s important to distinguish between intrinsic and extrinsic complexity.
Published Mar 8, 2021  7 min read   netkernel · architecture · optimisation
 

Generalizing Dynamic Programming

- Using dynamic programming techniques to optimise general compute efficiency

Dynamic programming is an approach to efficiently implementing certain classes of algorithms. As a feeble excuse for not noticing this earlier, the term is a little confusing: it isn’t about programming or about doing it dynamically! It was invented in the 1950s by Richard E. Bellman whilst working for RAND Corporation. Apparently he deliberately named it obtusely to avoid his work being considered research! I discovered this term recently when looking into existing research about algorithm optimisation and specifically why the systemic memoisation in NetKernel can optimise solutions to certain problems particularly well.
Published Apr 10, 2017  8 min read   computer-science · netkernel · caching · optimisation
 

Reducing Power Consumption with ROC

Two weeks ago I spent a couple of days in London attending an Architecture Engineering course at the BCS. Tom Gilb the course creator and teacher along with his son Kai demonstrated the power of an approach to thinking that extends much further than the course title suggests. By seeking to uncover all the variables and risks in any undertaking and then quantifying them, a project can make less subjective decisions through the entire path from conception, requirements gathering, design and implementation of systems.
Published Mar 19, 2014  9 min read   energy efficient computing · resource oriented computing · optimisation
 

Heap Tuning for Large NetKernel Instances Part 2

In the last post I set the stage for a discussion on how to tune large NetKernel instances by providing a discussion of how the Java heap operates and how the NetKernel representation cache interacts with that. Now we are ready to get into the details of how to tune your system. So let’s get stuck in. First we need to capture a of couple metrics: Fixed OldGen - this is composed of the long lived objects that are the modules, spaces, endpoints and kernel data structures.
Published Feb 7, 2013  9 min read   netkernel · caching · optimisation
 

Heap Tuning for Large NetKernel Instances Part 1

I’m writing this post to document information that I learned whilst developing the new NetKernel enterprise L1 representation cache (released today!). Knowledge of how to tune large Java instances is readily available but because NetKernel uses a cache as an integral part of it’s operation and usually this takes up a significant majority of the heap space of a running system this effects the conventional wisdom. So this article summarizes and augments this information with tips and details for tuning large NetKernel instances.
Published Jan 25, 2013  6 min read   netkernel · caching · optimisation
 

NetKernel Protocol Scaling Demonstration

A demo showing how the NetKernel NKP Protocol can scale. It shows a server running in the cloud with a large number of concurrent clients connecting.
Published Dec 22, 2012  1 min read   netkernel protocol · netkernel · optimisation
 

Cut to the Chase

“Cut to the chase” is something you’re only likely to hear me say if I’m enduring some kind of Dickensian wordfest drawn out from the changing of a single bit of information. However in this case I’m not the actor but rather it’s a new architectural endpoint for NetKernel that can keep your web apps on track and up-to-date. Let me explain. Whilst working on the recent representation cache update I noticed that the standard pattern of issuing AJAX requests from the browser was causing a problem.
Published Dec 20, 2012  3 min read   netkernel · architecture · optimisation