Why Speculative Execution Needs Branch Prediction to Succeed
A deep dive into how branch prediction enables effective speculative execution, boosting performance while introducing new security challenges.
Performance
Why Short-Lived Objects Die Young in Modern GCs
Modern GCs favor short-lived objects, reclaiming them within milliseconds. This post explains the underlying algorithms, runtime optimizations, and practical coding tips.
How jemalloc Balances Arenas Against Thread Caches
A deep dive into jemalloc’s arena‑vs‑thread‑cache design, its runtime balancing algorithm, and practical tuning tips for developers.
When Reader-Writer Locks Leave Your Writers Starving
Reader‑writer locks promise high concurrency for reads but can silently starve writers. This post explains why, how to spot it, and practical fixes.
Why Query Planners Fail at Cardinality Estimation
A deep dive into the reasons query planners stumble on cardinality estimation, from outdated statistics to optimizer assumptions, and how to mitigate the impact.