We thought the updates to the Map of Semiconductor Fabs would be done in time for this week's update, but unfortunately circumstances conspired against us. The map has been partially updated (a few things have been added and tweaked, and the legend is now properly alphabetized), but there is a great deal more to come.

Nonetheless, it seemed like a good opportunity to launch another new feature we had been planning: Timelines. This week's Timeline of Major Microarchitectures chronicles the various microarchitectures that AMD, Intel, and VIA have used through the years. This was actually a very interesting (and quick) little project, and laying everything out this way really makes it easier to track the (recent) history.

More timelines are on the way. For the next 2-3 months we will probably run a schedule where once a month the update is a timeline, and once a month it is an excerpt from the expanded Big Processor Guide, as The Quick Transmeta Guide was. The remaining updates will be the usual random stuff. We are trying to maintain some balance in the types of content we provide, although that doesn't always work out.

A small footnote: Last week's update inadvertently broke the RSS feed, which has now been fixed.

A really frightening amount of stuff is going on at 10stripe, and I wanted to share a little bit of information here.

Firstly, the Map of Semiconductor Fabs is in the shop for an update, with more fabs. That will be this Tuesday's update if all goes as intended.

In the spirit of the recent wireless technologies comparison, we have a few more visually-oriented updates coming up. More on that later.

But what really drove me to write this post was The Big Processor Guide, which as I've mentioned previously is going through a massive expansion. I also mentioned previously that there was a surprise in store related to that Guide; I'm afraid that will remain a surprise (but not for too much longer, I promise). I have a slightly smaller announcement to make first.

Currently, the Big Processor Guide exists as a series of flat HTML files (with a little PHP thrown in). But as it has grown, and continues to grow, it has become evident that this arrangement needs to change. To that end, we are currently working to transition the Guide to running from a database backend. This will help accomodate its burgeoning size better, and also help the Big Surprise work out better. But you might be more interested in what it will mean in the short term. One of the nice side-effects of a database back-end is that we will be able to provide new tools to help you drill down to just the things you are interested in, and more easily compare different chips. If you've ever used Newegg's Advanced Search and Power Search (try them here if you're not familiar), you'll have a good idea of what we intend to provide.

For the curious, the database system will be powered by the CakePHP framework. After looking at several possible frameworks (because developing everything from the ground up would have been far too much work), we settled on CakePHP because it is a surprisingly easy framework to get started with. In fact, what sealed the deal was an example of creating a simple bookmark manager with CakePHP scaffolding that took about a minute to follow. Nifty stuff.

I want to emphasize again that this is not the Big Surprise, just a small announcement to keep you up to speed on what we are working on.

Another month, another of these posts.

This has been a quiet month, in terms of things going on on the surface. A series of updates dealing with common-but-not-incredibly-exciting issues, and no major upheavals in the way the site looks or works. Standard stuff, right?

In the background, things are much more interesting. Plans for the new, bigger Big Processor Guide are rolling along nicely, and there will be some major surprises in store. The surprises will be in a future post; for now, I can talk about the less surprising things.

First I want to talk about the evolution of the Big Processor Guide, because it is indicative of how things tend to work for 10stripe. In its original form, the guide was solely about AMD's recent (at the time) x86 processors. Then it was expanded to cover their older stuff, and then expanded again to include everything after the 486. Some time later came its largest expansion to date, incorporating Intel's product line over the same period.

Now it is set to be expanded yet again, in two big ways. The first is that it will soon include products from other manufacturers, including Transmeta and Cyrix. The second is that it will, for the first time, include non-x86 processors. POWER is in, SPARC is in, and yes, so is Itanium. This will be a big, big expansion, and so we are moving with some care to ensure that it is not too overwhelming.

There is a good possibility that the net result will be several distinct, interlinked guides. It is too early to say. Stay tuned.