Stephen Lawson
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Google’s data centers grow too fast for normal networks, so it builds its own
Google has been building its own software-defined data-center networks for 10 years because traditional gear can’t handle the scale of what are essentially warehouse-sized computers.The company hasn’t said much before about that homegrown infrastructure, but one of its networking chiefs provided some details on Wednesday at Open Network Summit and in a blog post.The current network design, which powers all of Google’s data centers, has a maximum capacity of 1.13 petabits per second. That’s more than 100 times as much as the first data-center network Google developed 10 years ago. The network is a hierarchical design with three tiers of switches, but they all use the same commodity chips. And it’s not controlled by standard protocols but by software that treats all the switches as one.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Wi-Fi and LTE join up for gigabit mobile service in Korea
What happens if you combine the best of Wi-Fi and cellular networks? In South Korea, consumers get gigabit-speed service to their phones.Samsung Electronics and mobile operator KT have developed a hybrid technology called GiGA LTE that can bring LTE and Wi-Fi signals together for download speeds as high as 1.17Gbps (bits per second), according to The Korea Herald. GiGA LTE is available now with a firmware upgrade to Samsung Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge handsets.Wi-Fi and LTE are becoming wary neighbors as cellular operators look for more spectrum and all types of wireless networks face growing user demands. Carriers are looking into LTE-Unlicensed, which can transmit LTE signals in the same band with Wi-Fi, and Qualcomm is now exploring a technology that would let more types of operators set up those networks. Some Wi-Fi backers say LTE-Unlicensed could squeeze out wireless LAN users.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Qualcomm may adapt LTE into a network anyone can deploy
As if the all the controversy over LTE networks crowding out Wi-Fi isn’t enough, a new technology in the works at Qualcomm Research might allow a lot more people to set them up.LTE was designed to run on frequencies licensed by mobile operators for their exclusive use. But an emerging technology called LTE-Unlicensed allows the cellular system to supplement those frequencies with unlicensed spectrum that’s shared with systems like Bluetooth and Wi-Fi. This gives the carriers additional spectrum that they don’t have to pay for in an auction.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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CTIA sues over another cellphone radiation law
The mobile industry is trying to shoot down another law requiring cellphone radiation warnings.CTIA sued the city of Berkeley, California, on Monday, taking aim at a law passed in May that would force cellphone retailers to post a notice about safety from radiofrequency radiation emitted by handsets. CTIA, the main trade group for U.S. mobile operators, says the law will force its members to pass on an inaccurate message that they don’t agree with.Just a few years ago, CTIA successfully fought a similar law in nearby San Francisco. That law required phone sellers to disclose the emissions produced by each model. The disputes are part of a smoldering debate over whether phones and other wireless devices give off radiation that may be harmful to humans. CTIA, and the Federal Communications Commission, say there is no evidence of a health risk from approved devices.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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CTIA sues over another cellphone radiation law
The mobile industry is trying to shoot down another law requiring cellphone radiation warnings.CTIA sued the city of Berkeley, California, on Monday, taking aim at a law passed in May that would force cellphone retailers to post a notice about safety from radiofrequency radiation emitted by handsets. CTIA, the main trade group for U.S. mobile operators, says the law will force its members to pass on an inaccurate message that they don’t agree with.Just a few years ago, CTIA successfully fought a similar law in nearby San Francisco. That law required phone sellers to disclose the emissions produced by each model. The disputes are part of a smoldering debate over whether phones and other wireless devices give off radiation that may be harmful to humans. CTIA, and the Federal Communications Commission, say there is no evidence of a health risk from approved devices.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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For its next feat, Google will try to make you eat your vegetables
If your image of the Google cafeteria is a bunch of portly coders tucking into steak and lobster every night, think again: Silicon Valley’s cream of the crop is going on a diet.To the list of perks you’re missing out on at the famous workers’ paradise, you can now add healthier food. But don’t worry, the planet wins, too. For the last year and a half, Google’s food department has been on a mission to cut down on meat.“A more balanced, plant-centric diet is good for the environment and is good for your health,” said Michiel Bakker, director of the Global Food Program at Google. “So if we can move more people to eat less meat and to enjoy more vegetables, the rest will follow.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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For its next feat, Google will try to make you eat your vegetables
If your image of the Google cafeteria is a bunch of portly coders tucking into steak and lobster every night, think again: Silicon Valley’s cream of the crop is going on a diet.To the list of perks you’re missing out on at the famous workers’ paradise, you can now add healthier food. But don’t worry, the planet wins, too. For the last year and a half, Google’s food department has been on a mission to cut down on meat.“A more balanced, plant-centric diet is good for the environment and is good for your health,” said Michiel Bakker, director of the Global Food Program at Google. “So if we can move more people to eat less meat and to enjoy more vegetables, the rest will follow.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Shopping for 802.11ac Wave 2 Wi-Fi? Don’t rush into it
Cisco's new Aironet 1850 Access Point supports 802.11ac Wave 2 WiFi technology The new world of Wi-Fi is a bit like the proverbial airplane being built in mid-air: Unless you really need to enter the new world of LANs right now, it might make sense to hold off. A case in point is the first 802.11ac Wave 2 access point from Cisco Systems, introduced on Tuesday in advance of the Cisco Live conference next week.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Pure says users can upgrade the same all-flash array for a decade
Enterprise storage is a long-term bet. Pure Storage, a growing maker of all-flash arrays, is reshuffling the deck on that gamble in a way that might save IT departments time and money.Pure’s plan is to let customers keep the same system for a decade, upgrading various components as improved versions come out but never having to migrate the data from an older array to a new one. For some organizations, this could eliminate an expensive and time-consuming effort every few years.The elements of the new approach have been coming together for a while. But the company formally introduced the strategy and gave it a name—Evergreen Storage—as it unveiled its fourth-generation product on Monday. Evergreen Storage applies to all generations of Pure hardware already shipped as well as versions yet to come.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Apple acquires Metaio with a view to augmented reality
Apple has taken a big step into augmented reality by acquiring Metaio, a German company whose technology has been used by Macy’s, BMW and furniture retailer Ikea.Augmented reality systems add information to a user’s view of the world to help them do things like work, shop or drive. Whereas virtual reality makes it look like you’re in a different place, AR allows you to be more informed about your actual surroundings.BMW has demonstrated glasses that display navigation data and other travel information, and link up with cameras on the outside of a car, to let a driver see “through” the vehicle for tasks like parking. A startup called Augment offers software for iOS and Android that lets users visualize 3D renderings within the space in front of them, for jobs like designing store displays.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Chip maker Avago may be close to buying Broadcom
Avago Technologies is in advanced talks to acquire Broadcom in a potential deal that could mark the latest consolidation in the global semiconductor industry, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal.The terms being discussed aren’t clear and the deal could still fall through, according to the report, which did not name its sources.Broadcom makes chips for a wide range of communications products, including wired and wireless networks, connected home and car equipment and the Internet of Things. Avago’s silicon goes into industrial and enterprise storage gear as well as wireline and wireless networks. Avago, founded in 1961, is based in San Jose, California, and Singapore. Broadcom is in Irvine, California, and started in 1991.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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ICANN chief to leave office early, may miss key transition
The ICANN leader who kicked off the Internet organization’s move away from U.S. government control will leave his post early, possibly before the transition is finished.Fadi Chehadé, who became president and CEO of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers in September 2012, will step down in March 2016, ICANN announced on Thursday. He is leaving for a new career in the private sector, outside of the domain name industry, the group said. Chehadé’s term was to have lasted until June 2017.Chehadé’s biggest job at the helm of ICANN, which coordinates the Internet’s DNS (Domain Name System) and Internet Protocol addresses, has been to shepherd its transition away from U.S. control. ICANN operates under a contract from the U.S. National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), which is scheduled to expire in September.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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IBM cloud will reach back into tape for low-cost storage
In the new world of cloud storage, there’s still room for old standbys like tape. IBM says combining them can save enterprises money.At its Edge conference in Las Vegas this week, the company will preview an archiving architecture that can span all tiers of storage from server-based flash cache to tape, moving data to the best and most cost-effective tier at any time based on enterprise policies.Enterprises are accumulating growing volumes of data, including new types such as surveillance video that may never be used on a regular basis but need to be stored for a long time. At the same time, new big-data analytics tools are making old and little-used data useful for gleaning new insights into business and government. IBM is going after customers in health care, social media, oil and gas, government and other sectors that want to get to all of their data no matter where it’s stored.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Facebook’s software smarts put cold storage on a power diet
When it comes to storage, Facebook is learning to do more with less.For backup copies of older content, the social network is building “cold storage” facilities that are designed to keep data available without some of the expensive, power-sucking features found in a traditional data center. Facebook says it’s built in strong protection against data loss while reducing the overhead of additional storage.These are data centers designed to hold more than an exabyte of data—1,000 petabytes—with no redundant electrical systems, while consuming less than one-sixth as much power as a conventional facility. And they store all that data on cheap, consumer-grade media.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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EMC hopes to extend ViPR Controller’s reach with open-source release
EMC will release its ViPR Controller storage automation and control software as an open-source project, letting third parties develop their own services and applications on top of it and possibly make ViPR work with more parts of enterprise storage environments.The open-source release, called Project CoprHD, is set to go up on GitHub next month. It will be licensed under the Mozilla Public License 2.0 so vendors, developers and others can contribute to the code. Project CoprHD will have essentially all the capabilities of ViPR Controller, which EMC will continue to sell in a commercial version that includes service and support.ViPR Controller is intended to turn multiple storage systems from EMC and other vendors into a single virtual pool and automate the provisioning of data capacity to applications based on policies. Among other things, it can work with most storage platforms from EMC, plus major hardware and software products from several other vendors, including HP, NetApp, HDS (Hitachi Data Systems) and Microsoft, according to EMC.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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VCE’s VxRack systems want to be Vblocks for the next generation
EMC’s VCE division wants to take the engineered systems approach it’s honed with its Vblocks into next-generation mobile and cloud applications.On Monday, it introduced the VCE VxRack System, a hyperconverged platform designed to scale out to thousands of racks of computing and storage capacity. Where Vblocks are designed to run traditional business applications like ERP (enterprise resource planning), VxRack is built for a new era.The Vblock coverged architecture has been a success among customers looking to run traditional mission-critical enterprise applications. It was the founding product of VCE, which was formed in 2009 as a joint venture among VMware, Cisco Systems and EMC, and it remains VCE’s flagship, the company;s CEO Praveen Akkiraju said on Monday at EMC World, where the VxRack System was announced.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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EMC’s XtremIO gets bigger, packs in more flash
EMC says enterprises like its XtremIO all-flash storage array, so in version 4.0, the company is offering more of it.The latest software for the product it introduced in 2013 will let customers tie together more systems in a cluster and also include new features for replication, copy management and other capabilities. It’s due out by the end of June.XtremIO 4.0 is a free software upgrade that will automatically boost scaling ability for clusters already in the field. Users who want to invest in new hardware will have another way to increase capacity, by using a new, higher capacity version of the X-Brick, the basic building block of an XtremIO system. Customers will be able to order that product by the end of June, though EMC hasn’t said how much it will cost.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Salesforce said to be fielding buyout offers
Salesforce is working with financial advisors to field bids after being approached by an unnamed party about a possible buyout, according to a Bloomberg report.The cloud-based CRM (customer relationship managment) company has a market value of more than $40 billion. It could be the largest software acquisition ever, according to Bloomberg.The report cited unnamed sources and did not name any potential bidders. There is no guarantee a deal will come together, the sources told Bloomberg.Salesforce stock was up almost 9 percent on the New York Stock Exchange less than an hour before the end of trading Wednesday.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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HDS big-data tools should help IT, mobile health workers
Hitachi Data Systems is aiming its big-data expertise at health care and enterprise IT departments with specialized products for combining types of information.The company has been expanding beyond its traditional storage business through development and acquisitions in big data in recent years. It bought Avrio and Pantascene last year for public safety video and sensor systems, and this year it has announced acquisitions of SAP services specialist Oxya and business analytics vendor Pentaho.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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US trade judge rules against Microsoft in phone patents case
Microsoft has lost the latest round in a patent-infringement case that could lead to an import ban on its phones.Administrative Law Judge Theodore Essex of the U.S. International Trade Commission ruled on Monday that Nokia and Microsoft Mobile products infringed two patents held by R&D company InterDigital. Essex’s decision is preliminary and will be reviewed by the full commission, which is expected to announce its final ruling on Aug. 28. The final ruling could lead to a ban on importing the phones into the U.S.The ruling covers most of Microsoft’s mobile phones, according to InterDigital spokesman Patrick Van de Wille. Microsoft acquired Nokia’s devices business last year. The patents in the case cover technologies involved in powering up a phone and having it connect to 3G wireless networks. Even though most current cellphones use 4G LTE, they still have 3G capability for use where 4G isn’t available.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here