Linux.conf.au 2017 – Wednesday – Session 1

Servo Architecture: Safety and Performance – Jack Moffitt

  • History
    • 1994 Netscape Navigator
    • 2002 Mozilla Release
    • 2008 multi-core CPU stuff not making firefox faster
    • 2016 CPUs now have on-chip GPUs
    • Very hard to write multi-threaded C++ to allow mozilla to take advantage of many cores
  • How to make Servo Faster?
  • Constellation
    • In the past – Monolithic browser engines
      • Single browser engine handling multiple tabs
      • Two processes – Pool Content processes vs Chrome process
        • If one process dies on a page doesn’t take out whole browser
      • Sanboxing lets webpage copies have less privs
    • Threads
      • Less overhead than whole processes
      • Thread per page
      • More responsive
      • Sandboxing
      • More robust to failure
    • Is this the best we can do?
      • Run Javascript and layout simultaniously
      • Pipeline splitting them up
      • Child pipelines for inner iframes (eg ads)
  • Constellation
    • Rust can fail better
    • Most failures stop at thread boundaries
    • Still do sandbox and privledges
    • Option to still have some tabs in multiple processes
  • Webrender
    • Using the GPU
      • Frees up main CPU
      • Are VERY fast at some stuff
      • Easiest place to start is rendering
    • Don’t browsers already use the GPU?
      • Only in a limited way for compositing
    • Key ideas
      • Retain mode not immediate mode (put things in optimal order first)
      • Designed to render CSS content (CSS is actually pretty simple)
      • Draw the whole frame every frame (things are fast enough, simpler to not try to optimise)
    • Pipeline
      • Chop screen into 256×256 tiles
      • Tile assignment
      • Create a big tree
      • merge and assign render targets
      • create and execute batches
    • Text
      • Rasterize on CPU and upload glyth to GPU
      • Paste and shadow usign the GPU
  • Project Quantum
    •  Taking technology we made in servo and put it in gecko
  • Research in progress
    • Pathfinder – GPU font rasterizer – Now faster than everything else
    • Magic DOM
      • Wins in JS/DOM intergration
      • Fusing reflectors and DOM objects
      • Self hosted JS
    • External colaborations: ML, Power Mngt, WebBluetooth, etc
  • Get involved
    • Test nightlies
    • Curated bugs for new contributors
    • servo.org

In Case of Emergency: Break Glass – BCP, DRP, & Digital Legacy – David Bell

  • Definitions
    • BCP = Business continuity Plan
    • A process to prevent and recover from business continuity plans
    • BIP = Business interuptions plan
    • BRP = Recovery plan
    • RPO = Recovery point objective, targetted recovery point (when you last backed up)
    • RTO = Recovery time objective
  • Why?
    • Because things will go wrong
    • Because things should not go even more wrong
  • Create your BCP
    • Brainstorm
    • Identify events that may interrupt, loss access to physical site, loss of staff
    • Backups
      • 3 copies
      • 2 different media/formats
      • 1 offsite and online
      • Check how long it will take to download or fetch
    • Test
    • Who has the Authority
    • Communication chains, phone trees, contact details
    • Practice Early, Practice often
      • Real-world scenarios
      • Measure, measure, measure
      • Record your results
      • Convert your into an action item
      • Have different people on the tests
    • Each Biz Unit or team should have their own BCP
    • Recovery can be expensive, make sure you know what your insurance will cover
  • Breaking the Glass
    • Documentation is the Key
    • Secure credentials super important
    • Shamir secret sharing, need number of people to re-create the share
  • Digital Legacy
    • Do the same for your personal data
    • Document
      • Credentials
      • Services
        • What uses them
        • billing arrangments
        • Credentials
      • What are your wishes for the above.
    • Talk to your family and friends
    • Backups
    • Document backups and backup your documentation
    • Secret sharing, offer to do the same for your friends
  • Other / Questions
    • Think about 2-Facter devices
    • Google and some others companies can setup “Next of Kin” contacts

 

 

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