hdante

The most powerful, fully open, fully programmable desktop computer today is the Raptor Computing Systems Talos II workstation. It uses IBM OpenPOWER CPUs and the OpenBMC board firmware.

https://www.raptorcs.com/content/TL2DS1/intro.html

Openess might be impacted by add-on hardware. For servers, more powerful OpenPOWER systems are available from IBM.

It makes no sense to use the x86 ABI today. 32-bit processors are not produced anymore (since post Pentium 4/~10 years ago). 64 bit mode is much better and even provides a better 32-bit ABI. The improvement in GCC 5 should be seen as an improvement for legacy software.

As an analogy, seeing it as a "refresh" for the old x86 ABI is like a patient that goes to the doctor and says he cuts his wrists every week and the doctor solution is to give him iron supplements.

I'm afraid that trying to squeeze the text on the analogy made me distort the message. What I meant is in this paragraph:

"The point is to cut the link between feelings and actions, and do it anyway. You get to feel good and buzzed and energetic and eager afterwards."

So, discipline will kick things off and later you'll have the feelings that should have been generated by motivation.

The author argues that discipline is what gets you started and motivation is what keeps you going.