If the future of Containers is Carbon Fiber, what could be done in a data center with Carbon Fiber

Economist has an article on the possibility of carbon fiber containers.

One idea Dr Lechner proposed is to make containers out of carbon-fibre composites. Such containers would be easier to use, because they would be lighter and also—if designed appropriately—might be folded flat when empty, saving space. Dr Lechner reckons a carbon-fibre container would need to travel only 120,000km (three times around the Earth) to prove cheaper than its steel equivalent. It would also be more secure, because it would be easier to scan without being opened.

Wonder what kind of data center could be built using a carbon fiber container.  It would be lighter.  Drilling holes in carbon fiber would be much more difficult.

Nothing jumps out as why carbon fiber would make sense in a data center.  Unless you go throughout the whole rack and server components and you could probably shave 30 - 50% of the weight which makes shipping a container worth of gear much easier to do.  Carbon fiber could make sense in military scenarios for planes and other areas where weight is a big issue.

A peak into Amazon's approach to servers comes from LSI

here is a blog post by Silicon Angle with Robert Ober.  In this post Robert discusses some of Amazon’s approached to IT hardware.

“The evolutionary direction we’re going in the data center, you can call it many things – you can call it pooling, you can call it disaggregation – but at a large scale, at a rack or multiple racks or a hyperscale data center, you wanna start pulling apart the parts,” he remarks.

Optimizing infrastructure down to the component level has many benefits, both architectural and operational, but Ober considers the improvements in thermal management to be the most notable. The reason, he details, is that processors, DRAM, flash and mechanical disk all have different temperature thresholds that have to be sub-optimally balanced in traditional configurations.

Here is a video you can watch with Robert discussing some of the ideas.  This interview was done at the OCP Summit V.

Develop Future Communication Systems in AWS, Popular and Disruptive

Network Function Virtualization is a hot topic with Mobile World Congress this week.

Given the move to NFV is about creating a Cloud to service networking needs, one of the things you can do is run an IP Multimedia Subsystem in AWS using the Clearwater project.

The standard Clearwater distribution is designed for fast deployment on Amazon Web Services.  You can stand up a large-scale Clearwater deployment on AWS in a couple of hours using the scripts included in the distribution.  Once you’re comfortable with how Clearwater works on AWS, you can adapt it for your own private cloud environment – or you could offer production services from a Clearwater deployment on AWS.

...

Clearwater is IMS in the Cloud.  IMS (the IP Multimedia Subsystem) is the standards-based architecture that has been adopted by most large telcos as the basis of their IP-based voice, video and messaging services, replacing legacy circuit-switched systems and previous generation VoIP systems based on softswitching.  Clearwater follows IMS architectural principles and supports all of the key standardized interfaces expected of an IMS core network.  But unlike traditional implementations of IMS, Clearwater was designed from the ground up for the Cloud.  By incorporating design patterns and open source software components that have been proven in many global Web applications, Clearwater achieves an unprecedented combination of massive scalability and exceptional cost-effectiveness. Project Clearwater is sponsored by Metaswitch Networks.

There is another Cloud NFV effort here.

And others are ready with their own NFV open frameworks.

Broadcom Announces Open Network Function Virtualization Platform

Helps Accelerate Deployment of Applications and Cost Benefits of NFV

IRVINE, Calif., Feb. 20, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Broadcom Corporation (NASDAQ: BRCM), a global innovation leader in semiconductor solutions for wired and wireless communications, today announced its Open Network Function Virtualization (NFV) platform. This platform is designed to accelerate NFV adoption by allowing implementation of applications across multiple system-on-a-chip (SoC) processor solutions based on diverse Instruction Set Architectures (ISA). Broadcom will showcase its mobile innovations at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, February 24 - 27.  For more news, visitBroadcom's Newsroom. 

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Dell Supports Telecommunications Industry Transformation With Industry Partnerships, Leadership in Network Functions Virtualization, New Data Center Offerings, and Customer Success

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Date : 2/24/2014

Spain

• Dell extends collaboration with Red Hat to co-engineer OpenStack-based Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) and Software-Defined Networking (SDN) solutions specifically for the telecommunications industry and teams with Calsoft Labs to deliver NFV and SDN solutions to telecom operators worldwide
• Dell takes leadership role in CloudNFV consortium to demonstrate and implement an open, cloud-based NFV model

Theory of Information System in Construction Industry, not BIM, BIM, BIM, "The Collective Potential"

When someone talks about an Information System for construction. You many times hear BIM, BIM, BIM, BIM, BIMMITY, BIM as the answers.  Reminds me of the Monty Python skit where everything has SPAM.

Thinking BIM will solve your information problems in a construction project is short sighted.  Why?  If you don’t consider the quality of the data and how you reconcile perception issues of the data, then you can end up with an Information system that is not as trustworthy as you expect.

Rejected information is the result of a conscious determination that the information is not valid based on differences of opinion of perceived untruth.

If this topic has your interest, then you may enjoy reading “The Collective Potential” by Andreas Phelps.  I’ve traded some e-mail with Andreas and have read book quickly, and reading it again.  The fun I am having is testing answers on how to address the issues that Andreas brings up.  So far, I haven’t been stumped yet.  The nice thing of spending 26 years at HP, Apple, and Microsoft, and now 8 years on my own, there are lots of people I know to chat about information systems. I haven’t had the urge to write a book, but this may be a subject that may get me to write a longer paper.

The Collective Potential: A Holistic Approach to Managing Information Flow in Collaborative Design and Construction Environments Paperback

by Andreas Floros Phelps (Author)

Information flow is the foundation of any project. However, the major limiting factor is not the lack of information, but the inability to effectively integrate useful information into a project. By bringing together the fields of organizational science, organizational behavior, and information science, this book explores the interplay of social, technical, and technological factors influencing information flow. By understanding these concepts, managers can strategically leverage the social and technical characteristics of their project team, processes, and tools to enable positive iterations of trust and learning. These serve as the basis for effective information flow and result in significant improvements in information sharing, decision-making, and project outcomes. This unique perspective provides holistic insights regarding the management of team interactions, project planning, and the overarching structure and strategies used within the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry. These findings have significant implications for the: 1) The types of competencies and tools needed in the AEC industry; 2) How the industry approaches management and integration; and 3) The types of organizational structures and innovative strategies that will allow teams to make the best use of their valuable knowledge and realize their greatest collective potential.

Pssst, Aspirin may be good for health beyond heart disease, reduce your cancer risk

I am an old guy, turning 54 this year.  My Dad died from Colon Cancer when he was 64, only 10 years older than I will be shortly.  I have had three colonscopy tests to make sure I am OK.  My cholesterol is managed with a statin.  I don’t smoke, get an annual physical, and work out 4-5 times a week.

What else can I do?  Taking a daily dose of aspirin is recommended with some risks.

Daily aspirin therapy: Understand the benefits and risks

Is an aspirin a day the right thing for you? It's not as easy a decision as it sounds. Know the benefits and risks before considering daily aspirin therapy.

One of the studies that got attention is from my friends at RMS who have a study on the financial risk to pension funds if adults take daily aspirin, creating a $100 billion increased cost to support adults who live longer.

Rise in Aspirin Use Likely to Increase Pensioner Life Expectancy

• NEWARK, Calif. – April 02, 2013 –

• Recent medical reports have confirmed the growing body of evidence that taking a daily low-dose of aspirin reduces cancer mortality, in addition to its known benefits for cardiovascular health. Experts believe around 15% of current cancer deaths could be prevented by daily aspirin use with benefits beginning as early as three years into treatment. Conventional cancer treatments are expensive and new treatments typically require a lengthy approval process. By contrast, aspirin is inexpensive and readily available and has the potential for rapid uptake.

Based on these new findings, RMS modeled several potential scenarios of daily aspirin uptake which revealed that a typical 65 year-old male could see a 12-month increase in life expectancy and a 40% increase in the chance of living to 100, depending on a variety of lifestyle factors.*

Women’s risk of heart disease is significant and there is evidence aspirin helps with cancer’s that impact women.

Previous research has suggested that aspirin may help to reduce the risk of breast cancer and melanoma. Now, new research from the National Institutes of Health suggests that women who take low-dose aspirin every day may reduce their risk of ovarian cancer by 20%.

The findings were recently published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.