Google's Secret Plans For All That Dark Fiber? 534
beat.net writes "Robert X. Cringely details the plan for all the dark fiber Google has been buying up: "The probable answer lies in one of Google's underground parking garages in Mountain View. There, in a secret area off-limits even to regular GoogleFolk, is a shipping container. But it isn't just any shipping container. This shipping container is a prototype data center. Google hired a pair of very bright industrial designers to figure out how to cram the greatest number of CPUs, the most storage, memory and power support into a 20- or 40-foot box. We're talking about 5000 Opteron processors and 3.5 petabytes of disk storage that can be dropped-off overnight by a tractor-trailer rig. The idea is to plant one of these puppies anywhere Google owns access to fiber, basically turning the entire Internet into a giant processing and storage grid. While Google could put these containers anywhere, it makes the most sense to place them at Internet peering points, of which there are about 300 worldwide.""
5,000 opterons? That'd make a fine... (Score:1, Funny)
Imagine (Score:5, Funny)
a Beowulf cluster of these puppies...
...Oh, we don't really need to Google seem to be building one.
When will sinister phase two begin? (Score:5, Funny)
HEY! (Score:5, Funny)
Mommy Mommy... (Score:4, Funny)
aren't they all? (Score:5, Funny)
I haven't yet met one that didn't think they were very bright. Industrial Designers invent stuff that takes 'ordinary' engineers years to throw away and build something else that will fly. No danger of anything happening here folks
You've got their plan all wrong - Occam's Razor (Score:1, Funny)
Nothing to worry about folks... (Score:5, Funny)
They're just getting ready to run Windows Vista when it comes out.
Re:Stealing (Score:5, Funny)
Knowing Google, I would think that these shipping container computer things would be covered with sensing devices. It's probably scanning the face, gait, apparent weight, and shoe size of anyone that gets near it, and googling for their name, their address, their family and children, employer, and all other relations. As it prepares to activate the lightning sprocket, it's probably composing emails, editing video footage, and notifying the newspapers of an impending obituary.
I'd sooner touch the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord your God, than touch one of these here Google Skynet Singularity Machines.
Re:Google is Skynet? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Google is Skynet? (Score:2, Funny)
The same with proggies, OSes or InterNetworks, because each one are based on another.
If I find a metropolitan gateway falling because of a software error that the main developer is unable to spot, i think "erm... ok", but if there are 5000 Opterons to trace registers and code-machine into, I would say: BECAUSE HE WANTS or he DOESNT.
See?
It's already sentient!
Re:HEY! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Cooling 5000 Opterons? (Score:5, Funny)
1 cup of coffee: 0.2 litres (200g) heated from 10 to 100 degrees celsius (90 degrees) = 18 KJ.
250 KW: 14 cups of coffee per second.
The answer to "where do we put these puppies"?
Next to Starbucks.
Re:Google is Skynet? (Score:5, Funny)
I hadn't heard of Crzmblski's Limit, so naturally I went to Google to find out what it was
Re:Stealing (Score:2, Funny)
So when does this become self-aware? (Score:5, Funny)
Now all we have to do is wait for some Google employee to play a Sony CD on this and these will become spam relays.
Perfect.
Re:Google is Skynet? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Um, what? (Score:3, Funny)
You mean it isn't already a giant game?
Re:Missing something here... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:When will sinister phase two begin? (Score:3, Funny)
As it turns out, the same news source has recently revealed Google's "phase two" plans [theonion.com].
Cheers,
IT
Re:Nice work of fiction (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Obviously... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Google is Skynet? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Google is Skynet? (Score:4, Funny)
How about a nice game of chess?
Re:HEY! (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Lots of heat, lots of power (Score:1, Funny)
You don't need to worry about liquid cooling. You get that automatically once you turn it on, and the whole thing melts into a pool of glowing silicon.
The limit's definition is posted on everything2 (Score:5, Funny)
For some reason... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Google is Skynet? (Score:1, Funny)
Re:The limit's definition is posted on everything2 (Score:2, Funny)
Definition of patiented
http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node=Patiente
Re:Your numbers are off(need surface area,not Vol) (Score:1, Funny)
Re:The Alternative Re:Google is Skynet? (Score:3, Funny)
Went to an Oracle "development shop" (or so they said), where they called me in because they thought they had an Oracle tuning issue. Turns out that their entire office of 65 people were plugged into a series of daisy-chained LinkSys 10MB hubs, and they were all accessing this Oracle DB with some rather high traffic requests.
I went in and did some investigation, and it was the first time I've EVER seen the actual network connection time out like that.
I raised this to their attention, and mentioned that they should probably go get some mid-range 100MB switches to replace that stuff, and they wouldn't accept my findings. They dismissed them as being wrong, and sent me packing.
I talked to another friend of mine a few weeks later, and it seems that he was also called in as an outside contractor to figure it out... and he came up with the same findings. And they did the same thing... dismissed the findings and sent him on his way.
They just couldn't or wouldn't believe that it was a network issue. I never really figured out why it was so hard for them to even entertain the thought.
What a gong show.
Re:The limit's definition is posted on everything2 (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Google is Skynet? (Score:1, Funny)
Re:Google is Skynet? (Score:3, Funny)
More importantly, who on Slashdot will be the first to welcome it as their new overlord?
Re:Google is Skynet? (Score:3, Funny)
Does the name Pavlov ring a bell?