The Power of Scala

Great little story ;) Though I don't think you have to be concerned about tripping circuit breakers: that's what they're there for! The one that cut you off was probably only the first level, I'm sure there's at least one other level (or the vital electric system for the plane is entirely separate from what powers the seat power sockets). Did you try changing the power settings to low power (if you had not yet upgraded to 10.5.6, which removed that)?
Robert

On Thu, Dec 18, 2008 at 2:41 PM, Bill Venners <bill@artima.com> wrote:

Hi All,

I thought you might be interested in hearing this story.

I gave two Scala talks at Devoxx in Belgium last week, and on the way
back my flight out of Copenhagen was cancelled. Given I had an event
to get to the next day, I ended up getting rerouted on three airlines
with two stopovers. With all the hassles I ended up draining all of
one of my laptop batteries and maybe a third of my spare battery by
the time I got on the third flight. It was a United "Premium Service"
flight. I didn't know what that meant, but as I was awake I was
wanting to work on ScalaTest, and bumming that I wouldn't have much
time to work on it given I only had 2/3 of one battery left.

But the flight attendant noticed I was using my laptop and mentioned
that one thing "Premium Service" meant was that even coach seats have
power sockets under the seat. This made me happy because it meant I
could work on ScalaTest for several more hours. Unfortunately, though,
shortly after I started plugging in the power stopped working. The
flight attendant noticed the light had gone out and asked me about it,
and I said I don't know what happened it just stopped working. So we
tried the other socket and it worked for a while then failed. But by
this time, the first one had somehow fixed itself, so I plugged back
into that. It worked for a while then stopped working.

This back and forth went on for about 45 minutes until I had an idea
for an experiment. I plugged into a good socket, and watched the light
on the power cord, where it plugs into my Mac. Sure enough, it was a
bright orange, indicating my battery was being charged. Then I fired
up the Scala compiler. The light gradually dimmed, then flickered,
then went out. Running the Scala compiler was causing my Mac laptop to
draw enough extra current that it was throwing a circuit breaker! I
think it was just the circuit breaker for my row of seats, but it was
a bit concerning given I was on a airplane. After I figured out the
compiler was the culprit, I simply added an extra step to do a build.
First I'd unplug the power cord from my Mac, then build ScalaTest on
batter power, then plug the power cord back in again. Problem solved,
and the plane landed safely in San Francisco in plenty of time for me
to get to my event.

Bill

Bill... for future reference: nice scalac ....

'nice' tends not to cause the processors kick into full power consumption mode and thus you won't pull the full 85W of power that the Mac power supplies draw.

On Thu, Dec 18, 2008 at 11:41 AM, Bill Venners <bill@artima.com> wrote:

Hi All,

I thought you might be interested in hearing this story.

I gave two Scala talks at Devoxx in Belgium last week, and on the way
back my flight out of Copenhagen was cancelled. Given I had an event
to get to the next day, I ended up getting rerouted on three airlines
with two stopovers. With all the hassles I ended up draining all of
one of my laptop batteries and maybe a third of my spare battery by
the time I got on the third flight. It was a United "Premium Service"
flight. I didn't know what that meant, but as I was awake I was
wanting to work on ScalaTest, and bumming that I wouldn't have much
time to work on it given I only had 2/3 of one battery left.

But the flight attendant noticed I was using my laptop and mentioned
that one thing "Premium Service" meant was that even coach seats have
power sockets under the seat. This made me happy because it meant I
could work on ScalaTest for several more hours. Unfortunately, though,
shortly after I started plugging in the power stopped working. The
flight attendant noticed the light had gone out and asked me about it,
and I said I don't know what happened it just stopped working. So we
tried the other socket and it worked for a while then failed. But by
this time, the first one had somehow fixed itself, so I plugged back
into that. It worked for a while then stopped working.

This back and forth went on for about 45 minutes until I had an idea
for an experiment. I plugged into a good socket, and watched the light
on the power cord, where it plugs into my Mac. Sure enough, it was a
bright orange, indicating my battery was being charged. Then I fired
up the Scala compiler. The light gradually dimmed, then flickered,
then went out. Running the Scala compiler was causing my Mac laptop to
draw enough extra current that it was throwing a circuit breaker! I
think it was just the circuit breaker for my row of seats, but it was
a bit concerning given I was on a airplane. After I figured out the
compiler was the culprit, I simply added an extra step to do a build.
First I'd unplug the power cord from my Mac, then build ScalaTest on
batter power, then plug the power cord back in again. Problem solved,
and the plane landed safely in San Francisco in plenty of time for me
to get to my event.

Bill

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Follow me: http://twitter.com/dpp
Git some: http://github.com/dpp

Hi Robert, David,

On Thu, Dec 18, 2008 at 11:50 AM, Robert Kosara wrote:
> Great little story ;) Though I don't think you have to be concerned about
> tripping circuit breakers: that's what they're there for! The one that cut
> you off was probably only the first level, I'm sure there's at least one
> other level (or the vital electric system for the plane is entirely separate
> from what powers the seat power sockets). Did you try changing the power
> settings to low power (if you had not yet upgraded to 10.5.6, which removed
> that)?
>
I'm on 10.5.5, but I don't see an explicit low power setting. I was
most likely on my "Better Energy Settings" selection, to try and get
as much time out of the remaining battery as I could get.

Next time I'm in a plane and feeling lucky, I'll try the "nice scalac" option.

Bill

> Robert
>
> On Thu, Dec 18, 2008 at 2:41 PM, Bill Venners wrote:
>>
>> Hi All,
>>
>> I thought you might be interested in hearing this story.
>>
>> I gave two Scala talks at Devoxx in Belgium last week, and on the way
>> back my flight out of Copenhagen was cancelled. Given I had an event
>> to get to the next day, I ended up getting rerouted on three airlines
>> with two stopovers. With all the hassles I ended up draining all of
>> one of my laptop batteries and maybe a third of my spare battery by
>> the time I got on the third flight. It was a United "Premium Service"
>> flight. I didn't know what that meant, but as I was awake I was
>> wanting to work on ScalaTest, and bumming that I wouldn't have much
>> time to work on it given I only had 2/3 of one battery left.
>>
>> But the flight attendant noticed I was using my laptop and mentioned
>> that one thing "Premium Service" meant was that even coach seats have
>> power sockets under the seat. This made me happy because it meant I
>> could work on ScalaTest for several more hours. Unfortunately, though,
>> shortly after I started plugging in the power stopped working. The
>> flight attendant noticed the light had gone out and asked me about it,
>> and I said I don't know what happened it just stopped working. So we
>> tried the other socket and it worked for a while then failed. But by
>> this time, the first one had somehow fixed itself, so I plugged back
>> into that. It worked for a while then stopped working.
>>
>> This back and forth went on for about 45 minutes until I had an idea
>> for an experiment. I plugged into a good socket, and watched the light
>> on the power cord, where it plugs into my Mac. Sure enough, it was a
>> bright orange, indicating my battery was being charged. Then I fired
>> up the Scala compiler. The light gradually dimmed, then flickered,
>> then went out. Running the Scala compiler was causing my Mac laptop to
>> draw enough extra current that it was throwing a circuit breaker! I
>> think it was just the circuit breaker for my row of seats, but it was
>> a bit concerning given I was on a airplane. After I figured out the
>> compiler was the culprit, I simply added an extra step to do a build.
>> First I'd unplug the power cord from my Mac, then build ScalaTest on
>> batter power, then plug the power cord back in again. Problem solved,
>> and the plane landed safely in San Francisco in plenty of time for me
>> to get to my event.
>>
>> Bill
>
>

> Running the Scala compiler was causing my Mac laptop to
> draw enough extra current that it was throwing a circuit breaker!

Now I understand all those extra laptop security checks at the airports.
We might go as far as throwing a circuit breaker in the cockpit!

Expect that, in the future,
the security people are going to ask you if you have a Scala compiler installed!

--
  __~O
 -\ <,
(*)/ (*)

reality goes far beyond imagination

Luc,

Yes, i can see the lines now:

• Fast track
• Normal
• Scala developers
  

Best wishes,

--greg




--
L.G. Meredith
Managing Partner
Biosimilarity LLC
806 55th St NE
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