measuring software's embodied carbon; was: online meetup Wed. 20 Nov. 18h UTC | Green Coding Solutions: "Eco-CI" and "Powerletrics"

[Joseph P. De Veaugh-Geiss]

Anyone have opinions on this? Good idea? Bad idea?

On 13.11.24 12:33 PM, Joseph P. De Veaugh-Geiss wrote:
> Hi! I'd like to ask the KDE community to give feedback on a possible eco 
> initiative within KDE. The Open Source company Green Coding Solutions 
> has a new tool called Eco-CI to estimate the carbon footprint of the CI/ 
> CD pipeline. Is there support for adopting this tool within the KDE 
> community (e.g., for Okular, as proposed)?
> 
> FYI if you are interested in talking with the developers directly, join 
> the KDE Eco online meetup next week (see below) where Arne and Didi will 
> be presenting.
> 
> As I see it, benefits of integrating Eco-CI into the development 
> pipeline include:
> 
>   - Maximal transparency about the embodied carbon of a software 
> releases in KDE.
>   - Opportunities for data-driven improvement.
>   - Quantifiable differences for any changes made to the development 
> process.
>   - KDE will be a leader in providing data about the carbon footprint of 
> our software development.
> 
> Drawbacks could include:
> 
>   - KDE may be the only organization providing such data and it could 
> give negative impressions abut our environmental impact (to note: I 
> don't think this is necessarily a good argument, but I can see it being 
> one).
>   - Discouraging use of the CI/CD pipeline could negatively impact 
> software quality.
> 
> Other benefits? Drawbacks? Do you support the idea?
> 
> More info can be found about Green Coding Solutions and the Eco-CI tool 
> at this MR in the Okular repository: https://invent.kde.org/graphics/ 
> okular/-/merge_requests/1030
> 
> """
> [Eco-CI] integrates into the GitLab CI/CD pipeline and estimates the 
> energy and CO2 consumption of the pipeline by utilizing a Machine 
> Learning model trained on real server energy data from SPECpower
> 
> The tool creates awareness of the energy cost and carbon emissions of 
> CI/CD pipelines and empowers developers to create action for more 
> sustainability.
> """
> 
> If you want to discuss with the Eco-CI developers directly, join us next 
> Wednesday 20 November 19h CET (see below for details).
> 
> Cheers,
> Joseph
> 
> -------- Forwarded Message --------
> Subject: online meetup Wed. 20 Nov. 18h UTC | Green Coding Solutions: 
> "Eco-CI" and "Powerletrics"
> Date: Tue, 5 Nov 2024 12:40:14 +0100
> From: Joseph P. De Veaugh-Geiss <joseph at kde.org>
> To: kde-eco-discuss at kde.org
> 
> After a short three-month hiatus, the next KDE Eco online meetup will be 
> Wednesday *20 November* 18-19h UTC! I am excited to announce that Green 
> Coding Solutions will present two of their new measurement tools:
> 
>   - "Eco-CI" to measure energy consumption of CI/CD pipeline
>   - "Powerletrics" Linux kernel extension for power usage estimations
> 
> Eco-CI has been suggested for integration into the Okular's CI/CD 
> pipeline. For discussion, see: https://invent.kde.org/graphics/okular/-/ 
> merge_requests/1030
> 
> See below for more details.
> 
> Minutes from past meetups can be found here: https://invent.kde.org/ 
> teams/eco/opt-green/-/tree/master/community-meetups
> 
> _Overview_
> 
> *When*: Wed. 20 November 18-19h UTC
> 
> *Where*: https://meet.kde.org/b/jos-l59-2i1-9yt
> 
> *Topic*: Green Coding Solutions tools "Eco-CI" (CI/CD pipeline) and 
> "Powerletrics" (Linux kernel extension)
> 
> *Pad*: Further ideas are collected at this pad, please add ideas of your 
> own:
> 
>         https://collaborate.kde.org/s/cactBt4frrfTjbW
> 
> *Details*:
> 
> Eco-CI [0] is an open source GitHub / GitLab Plugin that estimates the 
> energy and carbon emissions of a CI/CD workload. It hooks into the 
> pipeline and will print a summary directly in the logs or as a 
> downloadable artifact. Arne, one of the core developers, will present 
> the tool and show some numbers from repos, including their average 
> emissions, to get a feel for the importance of the topic. A discussion 
> of integrating Eco-CI into Okular's GitLab repository will follow the 
> presentation.
> 
> Powerletrics [1] is a kernel extension that brings per process power 
> usage estimations to Linux. It is modelled after the MacOS tool 
> powermetrics which developers can use to gain insights into their 
> environmental impact of their code. With modern ICT infrastructure using 
> more and more resources, it is important that there are easy tools for 
> monitoring and optimisation available so that we don’t waste precious 
> resources.
> 
> [0] https://github.com/green-coding-solutions/eco-ci-energy-estimation
> [1] https://github.com/green-kernel/powerletrics
> 

-- 
Joseph P. De Veaugh-Geiss (he/him)
KDE Eco Project & Community Manager
OpenPGP: 8FC5 4178 DC44 AD55 08E7 DF57 453E 5746 59A6 C06F
Matrix: @joseph:kde.org

Generally available Monday-Thursday from 10-16h CET/CEST. Outside of 
these times it may take a little longer for me to respond.

KDE Eco: Building Energy-Efficient Free Software!
Website: https://eco.kde.org
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