The Googleplex
-
A new data center is being constructed by Google in almost secret fashion. Secret in that we don't know much about the internals of the buildings or what will be housed there.
It's not so secret in that I have a picture and it's been reported in a number of places, not to mention the local residents of the city who know what's happening there.
Still it's cool in a couple ways. First of all it helps to prolong the mystique of Google as this very cool company. If you're working there then you're part of the hip, cool, in crowd. You can also smirk at the local Silicon Valley Starbucks when you drop hints about being inside one of the Googleplex complexes.
It's also very cool to think of all those computers. No one knows how many computers Google uses, but it's estimated at around 450,000.
Four Hundred Fifty Thousand
That's a big number. Heck, I've never seen that many computers. I've been in data centers with around 5,00 computers and those were some big facilities. If they've got 25 locations, then each one is close to 10,000 computers, which means they're some monster facilities.
However I think Google is doing a bit of a disservice with the secrecy. Building scalable infrastructures and tools to manage them is hard. Lost of home grown solutions don't scale and even some of the larger packages you can buy are hard to integrate. It would be good if Google (along with Microsoft, Yahoo, and anyone else with 100,000 nodes) to provide some guidance or even free tools to help people architect and build their own networks.
Steve Jones
-
So how many of us know what the mathematical terms "google" and "googleplex" represent? (yes, they are real mathematical terms)
-
Couldn't this corporate knowledge of how to string together so many computers be considered a trade secret? A valuable trade secret? Yes, it would be good for US to have someone give away their valuable trade secret for free. But why do people think that a Google or other large computing power (OLCP) would or should do so for free?
-
It’s amazing, 450,000 processors!!. As a maximum I’ve worked in a company which had almost 8,000 units (between workstations and servers). All of them distributed along 1000 offices
-
The river behind the buildings would concern me from an operational point of view. I hope their buildings are water tight or all of the computers are on or above the second floor.
Living near to New Orleans has made me aware of many data centers with valid business continuity plans that failed. Mostly due to the generators and HVAC units being on the ground floor instead of the roof.
[font="Arial"]Clifton G. Collins III[/font]
-
Is it not cool to start raising the impact this amount of electricity use for running and cooling al these computers has on the environment?
At what point will it become more important to be able to survive global warming than to run a search in less than 1 second?
Or will it be too late for us to have the choice?
My apologies for not sharing in the techie excitement.
Leo
-
Is it not cool to start raising the impact this amount of electricity use for running and cooling al these computers has on the environment?
Probably a lot less than cooling a shopping mall (or a few).
One has to keep these things in perspective. The efficiency of society improved through information handling has a much larger potential.
...
-- FORTRAN manual for Xerox Computers --
-
...and it certainly uses a LOT less power than the aluminium refining plants which used to occupy the area.
James Luetkehoelter wrote:
"So how many of us know what the mathematical terms "google" and "googleplex" represent? (yes, they are real mathematical terms)"
- those of us familiar with those mathematical terms hopefully also know that the mathematical terms are written as "googol" and "googolplex", respectively...
And in response to Steve's original point, I'm not really sure how many people out there need to hook up a network of over 100 000 computers, and yet don't work for a company with a budget large enough to invest in the design of such a system. And, in all likelihood, the efficiency of such a network would depend heavily on the applications for which it was being used, which would in turn need to influence the design... and in turn would mean that any existing implementation would probably be poorly suited to a new requirement.
-----------------
C8H10N4O2
-
5,00 computers? Do you mean 5 or 500? I would hope the latter.
25 x 10,000 = 250,000, not 450,000. Maybe you meant 18,000 computers?
"Lost of home grown..." ahem, 'Lots'.
-am
-
I didn't know Al Gore read SQL Server Central!
-
A googol (spelled that way, not the way Google spells it) is 10100, or a 1 followed by 100 zeroes.
A googolplex is 10googol, or 1 followed by a googol zeroes.
These are enormously huge numbers:
Since a googolplex is one followed by a googol zeroes, it would not be possible to write down or store a googolplex in decimal notation, even if all the matter in the known universe were converted into paper and ink or disk drives.
The name "googol" was invented in 1938 by the nine-year-old nephew of Edward Kasner, an American mathematician. I wonder, though, given Google's popularity, whether the official spelling will be changed before too long. I hope not, but that is the way things go many times.
See:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Googol
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Googolplex
I really enjoy thinking about these kinds of numbers!
-------------------
A SQL query walks into a bar and sees two tables. He walks up to them and asks, "Can I join you?"
Ref.: http://tkyte.blogspot.com/2009/02/sql-joke.html -
Thanks for correcting my spelling. I feel stupid now, especially since I brought it up
-
Hey, don't be so tough on yourself! I was just pointing out the difference from the way Google spells it, not criticizing your spelling. Sorry if it came across that way. Plus, I was very happy to see that you had brought up the number -- I often see it as the elephant in the room when Google's name comes up.
Ironically, this is the story (short version) of how Google became Google:
The Internet search engine Google was named after this number. The original founders were going for 'Googol', but ended up with 'Google' due to a spelling mistake on a check that investors wrote to the founders.
Smart move. If the the check says "Google," then, guess what, our name is Google! Can you imagine if the guy who got the check went back to the investor and said, pedantically, "Excuse me, it is supposed to be spelled 'Googol'." The investor would've been liable to say, "Well, give me the check back and I'll give it to someone who wants it."
Cheers,
webrunner
-------------------
A SQL query walks into a bar and sees two tables. He walks up to them and asks, "Can I join you?"
Ref.: http://tkyte.blogspot.com/2009/02/sql-joke.html -
Maybe they're working up to googol computers?
On the environmental thing, one of the reasons they're building there is that there's a lot of hydro power on the Columbia river. I know that building the dams there impacts the environment, but they're built, so it's relatively clean electricity.
-
The folks concerned about the new Google complex's location with regard to potential flooding can rest easy, the complex is on the Columbia river about a mile below a large power-generating dam with many other similar dams upstream, so flood problems are unlikely with so many points of control. I'd be surprised if Google didn't cut a deal with the local power companies for low-cost juice, and I'd bet there's more transmission loss in the high-tension lines out of the area each year than the facilty will ever consume. I grew up in that area and still live relatively close by. Their greatest concern will probably be stranded windsurfers wandering onto thier complex.
maddog
Viewing 15 posts - 1 through 15 (of 16 total)
You must be logged in to reply to this topic. Login to reply