Gartner drops Green Data Center as top 10 strategy for 2011

ZDNet reports on Gartner's Top 10 Strategic Technology areas for 2011.

10 things: Handicapping Gartner's top technologies for 2011

By Larry Dignan | October 19, 2010, 6:26am PDT

Summary

Gartner outlined its top 10 technologies for 2011 that will give technology execs the most bang for their budgets. How many of these technologies will be a true hit?

Gartner on Tuesday outlined its top 10 technologies for 2011 that will give technology execs the most bang for their budgets. How many of these technologies will be a true hit?

Here is the 2010 vs 2011 list.

Note #4 and #5 - IT for Green and Reshaping the Data Center.

Does this mean there is a slowing in the interest in Green Data Centers?

I don't think so. 

What this means is Gartner's revenue stream from sponsored research in this areas has dropped the topic out of the top 10.

The green data center hype should die down a bit which is good as much of the presentations were not worth people's time.

Greening the data center is a long term commitment, not a product category.

Greenpeace will help keep people focused on the environmental impact of data centers.

I would trade Greenpeace's environmental focus on 100% renewables data center energy vs. Gartner's sponsored research in Green IT to drive change in the industry.

The smart people/companies are figuring out how to work with environmental organizations.  Could you imagine hiring Gartner to talk to Greenpeace?  Now that would be a funny meeting to sit in.

Maybe Greenpeace should start protesting Gartner for not making 100% renewable energy a a corporate IT requirement in addition to going after Facebook.  Let's see when Gartner changes its tune when government regulations mandate carbon reduction in IT.

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Religion in the Data Center

There are many views in the data center world, and sometimes the way people think it reminds me of religious discussions that are all over the technology industry.

I joked about Google destroying a church.

Google Demolishes Presbyterian Church, do no evil?

InformationWeek has a picture gallery of Google's data center construction in Council Bluffs, Iowa.  One interesting picture for company with the motto of do no evil is below where a Presbyterian Church will be demolished as part of the construction.  A funny point made by one blogger is do no evil  is an anagram for o no devil seems to be appropriate.

Nearby Presbyterian Church will be demolished.

And, Steve Manos discusses his religious moment.

Losing My Religion

Posted on Thu, Sep 30, 2010

By Steven Manos

Four years ago I made a significant change in my life.  Four years ago I became a member of the Church of the Critical Facility.  I can remember the euphoria that came over me as I was immersed and baptized in the chilled water along the banks of the River Crah as the high cleric quoted verse from the Book of Tiers.  In the first several months as a member of the congregation I learned that though our flock had its share of zealots who constantly challenged one another on issues like DC vs. AC distribution, Rotary vs. Battery or whether or not to use raised floor, that ultimately we all had the same underlying belief system.  Our religion, my friends,  is rooted in the bedrock of ideas that we must build grand monuments whose complexity and design at times seem as though we are channeling a more superior technological being.  We build such monuments to honor those of us who reside in the clouds, those who welcome us in as their hosts and others we build to those around us who provide our world with all that we need to live.

The Religion of Data Centers

Gazing upon these monuments one can’t help but feel a sense of tremendous pride, the jubilation of such a feat and at the same time feel humble in the shadows that they cast.  It is at this point that our toils really just begin.  By the nature of their design, these facilities require skilled and diligent shepherds to ensure that that they are maintained in a way that is fitting for such a grandiose accomplishment.  The exhaustion of our energy, labor, efforts and around the clock vigilance is only matched by the exhaustion of our worldly goods through our immense contribution not only to build such an edifice,  but through our constant tithes required to keep them running.

To this church I have been a loyal member.  That is, until now.

I'll see Steve in Las Vegas at Data Center World, and I brought my Canon 7D to capture the moments.

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Data Center Problem Solving or Process, where do you spend your time?

In 1991 after 7 years at Apple I took a sabbatical and vacation for 15 weeks re-living a  childhood summer vacation experience taking off from Memorial Day to Labor day.  It took me 6 weeks to decompress, and I was thankful I took so much time off.  One of my realizations I had is I really enjoyed solving complex product development problems.  Passionate and refreshed I returned to Apple in Sept 1991 told my manager my realization and she said, "well it's nice you like to solve problems, but we are about process here."  By April 1992, I took the leap leaving Apple to go to Microsoft to work on Windows until 2006.

I was having a great philosophical conversation last night with Kevin Francis at Silent Partner.

Kevin Francis

Kevin Francis

Growing up in Austin, Texas Kevin developed an affinity for live music, tacos and a story well-told. That background somehow resulted in an ability to put complex telecom problems into plain language that non-technical executives can understand and profit from. Previously, Kevin learned the ins and outs of his field at leading companies such as MCI, GST and CRG West. It was at XO, however, where he first met Mike and developed a friendship which would lead to the origins of Silent Partner. When he’s not in his super secret laboratory cooking up strategy for his clients, he’s most likely enjoying a cold beer and watching live music or the Texas Longhorns. Hook ’em.

We first met a couple of months ago at a data center social, and had fun talking about Texas Longhorn football as I plan on taking my 9 year-old daughter next month to her first Texas Longhorn game and to see her Uncle who was an all-American swimmer for Texas.  And, while I am in Austin I'll see the guys at Smooth-Stone and Dell. 

image

Last night Kevin and I got into an interesting discussion of how so many decisions are made by people who don't really understand the problem they are trying to solve.  And, this morning that's when it hit me.  Most people are going through a process, not a problem solving exercise.  And, this same issue of so many being about process, is causing the data center industry to be slow in changing.

What problem do you want to solve?  Many data center people want to build a data center to reduce their costs vs. collocation facilities.  So, this is a process of cost reduction. 

Silent Partner's engages with many clients who have network performance issues, scalability of their information services, and cost reduction.  The entrepreneurial start-ups are running into these type issues as they grow.

AREAS OF EXPERTISE

Pie Chart

We strive to stay at the center of our industry. At this point, we’ve experienced it all. We know what products, services, and vendors work best. We see how deals are struck and what dynamics are at play. We know exactly how much you can get for your money. We hear about new facilities before our competitors and we know which new technologies are being offered. We are essentially stockpiling information to give our clients every advantage.

If you try to take a process approach you'll many times go down a path of "covering your ass" do all the things in a way so you and your peers can't get fired which many times happen in IT as there is low tolerance for risk.  Risk-less development can be costly and ineffective, but it saves people's jobs.  Look who builds some of the most inefficient data centers and they are usually the most bureaucratic process oriented organizations.

To get out of this dilemma you can hire a good set of outside experts like Silent Partner to address the problems and not be focused on process.

Services

We never start with a price list. We get in a room with our clients and listen. Out of that comes all kinds of ideas, big and small. Sometimes we need to get them up and running, yesterday. Sometimes we need to sit back and take a more strategic view of the problem. Every solution is different.

The telecom landscape is constantly being populated and re-populated with new technologies, protocols, services, and vendors. We stay connected and close to the action—it’s the only way to ensure our customer’s success

BAR CHART ILLUSTRATING
SUCCESS RATES:
Bar Chart

Their client list is solid.

SP_logos

Where do you spend the majority of your day in process or problem solving?

I try spend the majority of my time talking to guys like Kevin Francis.

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How Green is Green enough in a Data Center?

A green data center is not exactly defined.  Being energy efficient, a low PUE, and renewable energy are all good, but even if you had no carbon footprint for operations, there are others areas of environmental impact that environmentalist could point out.

Data Center Journal has an editorial post on being green.

How Green is Green Enough?

Design Editorial

THURSDAY, 16 SEPTEMBER 2010 16:41

WRITTEN BY JEFFREY CLARK

The recent (and ongoing) dispute between the social-networking giant Facebook and environmental advocacy group Greenpeace (“Greenpeace Versus Facebook”) illustrates the growing strain between the data center industry and some groups and individuals seeking to protect the environment. Ignoring the extremes of “man can do no right” and “man can do no wrong” with regard to the environment, the question in the data center context becomes how far must companies go to earn the title of “environmentally friendly.

And being the voice of reason.

The quest for environmental friendliness is, in some sense, a quest for perfection: a data center, or any system that uses energy, can always become more efficient (perfect efficiency is impossible, courtesy of the second law of thermodynamics) and can always make better use of its available resources. Even if a data center reached 100% efficiency, someone, somewhere, would likely still fault it for using too much energy. As the above-mentioned blog article states, “In short, can we ever be green enough? The short answer is no.”
Thus, data center managers must decide what their own goals for environmental friendliness are and in what time table these goals are achievable. With energy prices rising and public concern about the environment growing, companies have little choice but to take action in this regard, but what actions they take may well be limited by available resources. Some new efficiency technologies may well reduce a data center’s power consumption, but the cost of these technologies may well be out of reach for some companies. But to be responsible and to avoid being hectored by environmental groups, some action is required.

Jeffrey closes with this advice.

Perhaps the best approach for companies attempting to “green” their data centers is moderation. Reduce energy waste, yes; reduce inefficiency, yes; be responsible, yes; but don’t break the bank attempting to achieve perfection when perfection is not even needed.

But, be careful this last advice is what Facebook did.  What data center managers need to be aware of is if you work for a big brand company which almost all the big data center companies are, then you could be a target identified by Greenpeace.

So, when you green your data center, you need to think about how others view your efforts as their view of green may not be the same as yours.

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What is the future of a Data Center Glasnost?

DataCenterKnowledge’s Rich Miller wrote a good post on Google’s Chris Malone presentation at Uptime Institute in Apr 2009, and Daniel Costello’s calling for a Data Center Glasnost.

Microsoft, Google and Data Center Glasnost

April 16th, 2009 : Rich Miller

Chris Malone of Google speaks Tuesday at the Uptim Institute Symposium 2009 in New York, while Uptime founder Ken Brill listens.

Chris Malone of Google speaks Tuesday at the Uptime Institute Symposium 2009 in New York. Listening at right is Uptime Institute founder Ken Brill.

One of the best-attended Tuesday sessions at The Uptime Institute’s Symposium 2009 in New York was a presentation by Google’s Chris Malone. As has been notedelsewhere, Malone’s talk summarized much of the information that Google disclosed April 1 at its Data Center Efficiency Summit. But there was a noteworthy moment during the question and answer period when Daniel Costello approached the mike.

Daniel went on to present the idea of a Glasnost.

“Microsoft applauds Google’s openness in presenting this information,” Costello said. “It’s moving us forward to a data center glasnost of sorts.” Glasnost, for those with short memories, was the policy of openness and transparency that Mikhail Gorbachev introduced in the Soviet Union in the 1980s.

Google’s Chris Malone responds.

Over the past year Microsoft has been actively discussing some of its data center innovations and best practices at industry events. Responding to Costello, Malone said Google intends to pursue a similar path, reversing years of secrecy about its data center operations. “One of the reasons we’re here is to share in the industry discussions,” said Malone, who added that Google has now joined The Green Grid, one of the industry consortiums on energy efficiency.

Rich Miller makes an excellent point though in differences in what Microsoft and Google are presenting.

There are differences in the two companies’ approaches. Microsoft is talking publicly about its future data center design plans, like the “Generation 4 ” plan for roofless container farms. Google’s disclosures thus far have focused on older facilities that likely don’t represent the 2008 model year for its data centers. And as happened at Uptime, there will be continuing debates in the industry about how much of the innovation seen at Google and Microsoft is relevant to smaller data centers.

But, with Daniel Costello moving to Google will Glasnost and the spirit of openness change into a Cold War?  Rich Miller closed his post making the point of a cold war.

But when it comes to expert information on best practices, more is better. Like the end users, the data center industry has its share of information siloes, and its good to see that starting to change. Much hard work remains. But Glasnost is far better than a data center Cold War.

If you follow with the Cold War analogy who is the Soviet Union and who is the US?

Google has been building data centers longer than Microsoft and they are proud of their move to containers before Microsoft.

Both Google and Microsoft have a bunch of money and a lot to win and lose in the data center wars.

Is Daniel Costello’s move to Google a tipping point?

From Publishers Weekly

The premise of this facile piece of pop sociology has built-in appeal: little changes can have big effects; when small numbers of people start behaving differently, that behavior can ripple outward until a critical mass or "tipping point" is reached, changing the world. Gladwell's thesis that ideas, products, messages and behaviors "spread just like viruses do" remains a metaphor as he follows the growth of "word-of-mouth epidemics" triggered with the help of three pivotal types. These are Connectors, sociable personalities who bring people together; Mavens, who like to pass along knowledge; and Salesmen, adept at persuading the unenlightened. (Paul Revere, for example, was a Maven and a Connector). Gladwell's applications of his "tipping point" concept to current phenomena--such as the drop in violent crime in New York, the rebirth of Hush Puppies suede shoes as a suburban mall favorite, teenage suicide patterns and the efficiency of small work units--may arouse controversy.

How ironic that Daniel calls for Glasnost in Apr 2009 as Microsoft data center executive and in Sept 2010 will be a Google Data Center executive.

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