DISA

Professor Mauro Caporuscio will give a seminar on September 22nd 14-15 about Green Software by Design. It is possible to attend the seminar either onsite or online. If you are interested in joining please send an email to diana.unander@lnu.se.

Abstract
Despite the media interest in sustainability, the public is still unaware that software, including digital assistants, cryptocurrencies, audio/video streaming services, finances, and games, are predicted to account for as much as 14% of the total worldwide carbon footprint in the next decade. Indeed, all software consumes electricity. In general, people think electricity is clean. Still, since most electricity is produced through burning fossil fuels (e.g., coal, oil, and natural gas), in practice, electricity is the single most significant cause of carbon emissions worldwide. Further, all the devices we use for running software (from our smartphones/computers to network appliances, and to cloud infrastructures) produce carbon when manufactured and disposed of (once they reach the end of life). The two most effective ways to reduce the carbon emissions of software are through Energy efficiency, and Hardware longevity. Unfortunately, current software development projects usually treat these concerns as an afterthought: a desirable quality to be considered if and only if other stakeholder- and economy-centered requirements (e.g., performance, business needs) have been successfully addressed. To face this unsustainable trend, we need a paradigm shift in the way we engineer and operate software systems. Indeed, the software shall be designed from the foundation to be green.

The aim of this talk is to bring these aspects to your attention and to hint at future research directions toward the reconciliation of three different and typically conflicting aspects: (1) efficiency: the ability to limit energy consumption, (2) longevity: the ability to live long and prevent hardware obsolescence, and (3) efficacy: the ability to meet the users’ expectations.