OpenBLAS Deciding Whether To Drop Support For Russia's Elbrus CPUs

[cb88]

You should at least try to have some empathy. There are people for whom this is a very emotive issue, and if they're being asked to review and accept patches from what they consider to be a hostile foreign power, then I can understand why they might refuse.


Okay, so you're clearly not above politics, either.


Not a very compelling argument, IMO. If you care about de-politicizing software projects, then the most winning argument would probably explore the likely downsides of taking this route.

Of course, free software is about a diversity of approaches and viewpoints. So, there will always be some projects on either end of the spectrum. Even so, there's probably a point where most would consider it too contrary to their own existential priorities to remain fully-cooperative with all contributors.


Would you consider taking up arms to fight a hostile, invading force? But you'll still accept they're patches that are intended primarily to benefit their government and military machinery? It's not a theoretical question, for some.

On the other hand they might also be frineds with the university people that develop Elbrus... the military isn't the be all and end all of those CPUs and you can buy them in the normal market in Russia....it just doesn't make sense to sell them anywhere else.

[dimko]

So Russia is allowed to dictate an independent country what to do and what not? Oh, I forgot. Ukraine is ruled by evil Nazis according to Putin. Fun fact: The president of the Ukraine is a Jew.

Also, the mayor difference between what happens in China and in Ukraine is that China is doing these things to their own people - like it or not, it happens inside their borders.

As semi-russian/semi-ukranian/semi-jew I can tell you things. Yes, Ukrain was full of Nazi sympathizers and henchman, who haunted Jews and killed them mercilessly. And a lot of that xenophobic culture is still there. In fact this exact culture has spoiled relationship between Moskali and Khohols after Perestroika. And fact that US paid off a lot of people in all kind of places when last political instability happened.

"Fun fact: The president of the Ukraine is a Jew." - fun fact, dare he say it openly prior to be voted for presidents duty, he would not be a president.
I can say so many things you are not even remotely aware of.
I don't say Putin did a right thing, but I am personally sick and tired of everyone saying that Russia is worse than devil while having blood of Afghanistan, Yugoslavia, and other countries on their hand. You EU and you US. Fun fact, Ukraine wanted to join NATO, hostile to Russia since before it even existed, alliance. What is your excuse for invading Iraq or Yugoslavia? In immortal words of South Park [OH NO, THEY ARE COMING RIGHT AT US]!

[blacknova]

It is quite possible that the situation might last for several years. To exclude this possibility from the list of predictions/strategies would be naive.

That is true, but that would be mostly guerrilla fighting. As much as some people wish it is impossible for Ukraine to win on their own, and there would be no direct military help from others. So it is pretty safe to assume that unless Russia decide otherwise to end invasion they would completely occupy Ukraine.

[dimko]

How do you define 'a fair war '?

Not shooting prisoners of war, not killing on purpose civilian population(a few tens, even hundred or two when 100Mil and 40Mil countries fight is not even drop in the bucket). Not torturing prisoners of war or humiliating them.

[piotrj3]

That's a twisting of the definition used by the kernel, which you seem to be referencing. Even the kernel doesn't have a standard that supported hardware must be broadly commercially-available.


It's a question each software project must come to terms with. I think it generally comes down to a hope that expanding the user community & hardware support will result in more fixes & features being upstreamed. There's probably some sort of self-interest angle, or else they would eventually burn out and go unmaintained.

I kind of was referring it yes, but from perspective of maintainers project, having openblas support russian cpu benefits :
- no normal users,
- no open source projects,
- no morally right stuff (like medical equipment, science progress etc.)

Instead it is supporting extremly rare platform that only russian military use.

[caligula]

I don't say Putin did a right thing, but I am personally sick and tired of everyone saying that Russia is worse than devil while having blood of Afghanistan, Yugoslavia, and other countries on their hand. You EU and you US. Fun fact, Ukraine wanted to join NATO, hostile to Russia since before it even existed, alliance. What is your excuse for invading Iraq or Yugoslavia? In immortal words of South Park [OH NO, THEY ARE COMING RIGHT AT US]!

Russia threatens civilized western countries, their neighbors. Consider Nord Stream 2. Ukraine is also a potential EU member some day. Those shit hole countries are doomed to incite wars for the rest of their lives.

[dimko]

Yeah but you're better off running stuff on cheap snapdragons ...

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/ru...t-unacceptable

And it's not that you can't have timing attacks on Elbrus processors ... more like, nobody will ever care. BTW, timing attacks like Spectre are incredibly difficult to pull off to begin with even on Intel, which was the hardest hit.

Oh yeah, they are probably shit, like any Russian electronics. And no doubt snapdragons are superior technology, but its not the point. Snapdragons made in Taiwan. While Russia and China are good business partners - they are still rivals. In case of shit hitting the fan, snapdragons are gonna go kaput for Russia. Plus same thing, security with chips you don't do yourself is all but impossibility. consider that Intel put some identifiers into their chips around 15 years ago, Putin being paranoid did decision to create this crap known as Elbrus. Its like Russian cars. "15 minutes of shame on the road and you are at work"

[blacknova]

Oh yeah, they are probably shit, like any Russian electronics. And no doubt snapdragons are superior technology, but its not the point. Snapdragons made in Taiwan. While Russia and China are good business partners - they are still rivals. In case of shit hitting the fan, snapdragons are gonna go kaput for Russia. Plus same thing, security with chips you don't do yourself is all but impossibility. consider that Intel put some identifiers into their chips around 15 years ago, Putin being paranoid did decision to create this crap known as Elbrus. Its like Russian cars. "15 minutes of shame on the road and you are at work"

Elbrus is not produced in Russia. It is produced in Taiwan as well. Zelenograd's factories could probably produce it. AFAIK in Russia factories can produce chips at 16nm.

[coder]

Yeah but you're better off running stuff on cheap snapdragons ...

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/ru...t-unacceptable

As that article says, those CPUs had already been superseded by newer models, even at the time the tests had been run. Also, snapdragons don't have enough memory capacity, no ECC memory or other RAS features, no multi-CPU support, extremely limited I/O, and being ARM/Qualcomm makes them subject to US sanctions.

I know you were using Snapdragons as a joke, but there are legit reasons Russia wants its own CPUs. And if you're not going to make a separate CPU + GPU, then VLIW at least has the potential to give you good GPU-style number-crunching horsepower.

[coder]

You want to tell me, that Russia surrounded by hostile NATO alliance,

NATO never attacked Russia, nor did they ever threaten to. Russia has attacked several of its neighbors. So, which one is really hostile, here?

who warned Ukraine for many years not to join NATO(and Ukraine did not listen)

Sorry, but exactly when did Ukraine join NATO? Oh, right. They didn't.