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Edge Computing has been around for a while and as technology evolved and connectivity improved dramatically , we ’ ve seen use cases and applications in almost every aspect of human life . Distributed Edge Computing is one of the areas where we are seeing accelerated development . Distributed Edge Computing , which is essentially a computing paradigm that brings computation and data storage closer to the location where it is needed to improve response times and save bandwidth , has many guises – the Internet of Things ( IoT ), IT / OT convergence etc . – but in its purest form , it ’ s about how technology can be automated to improve human life .
Sensors in the fields that help farmers keep track of the health of their crops , self-driving machines that work 24 / 7 on mining sites , automated factories that operate round the clock with minimal human supervision , little drones that surgeons can send into your body . The applications are limited only by our imagination .
The Gartner Hype Cycle in 2020 is of the opinion that Edge Computing is approaching the peak of inflated expectation , but I would argue that this is the next important step for technology development and with accelerated rollouts of 5G all around the world , we ’ re going to see Edge Computing really coming of age this year .
All transformational technologies take place in waves and what we ’ re seeing this year is the convergence of some really big waves coming together . Arguably , the biggest catalyst is the global pandemic .
From a technology perspective , it has led to the biggest shift towards digitalisation that the world has ever seen . Whole industries have been disrupted as businesses race to implement technology that will enable them to survive . We will look back on 2020 as a milestone in humanity ’ s Digital Transformation .
What this means for infrastructure
Edge Computing will cause a serious rethink about how we architect our data centers . Data centers will need to be physically closer to users and support processing , and decision support applications closer to where the data is generated . Furthermore , these data centers need to be designed to accommodate huge amounts of unstructured data at high speed and will need to be built on cloud-native technologies such as containers and to support a much wider variety of application needs .
The data gravity challenges that Edge applications create mean that data must be processed at the Edge and across Edge sites – it is simply too costly and prohibitive to move data to a central location . The applications and infrastructure needed to support this must become more distributed in nature – harkening a
shift from all application processing in a core cloud , to a core cloud working hand-in-hand with a distributed cloud at the Edge .
James Petter , International VP , Pure Storage
Edge Computing will cause a serious rethink about how we architect our data centers .
What does the CIO or CTO need to think about in order to build IT for their enterprises that can take advantage of distributed Edge Computing . For one , this will create a deluge of data unseen in human history . Where will we store this data ? How will we move it ? How do we figure out what ’ s important ?
This proliferation of smaller yet more agile data centers highlights the need for speed , flexibility and operational simplicity in each location . However , two challenges present themselves . First , these Edge sites are small and there are often thousands of them – so all the data can ’ t exist in every site .
IDC projects that IoT devices alone will generate almost 80ZB of data by 2025 , yes Zettabytes . I believe this is only the tip of the iceberg .
New architectures are being built where Edge applications generate , store and interact with data at the Edge , but these Edge sites are tightly-coupled
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