back to article Two different definitions of Edge Computing arrive in one week

The world’s just been given two new definitions of Edge Computing, in the service of making it easier to talk about the topic. But another debate is already considering more definitions for the term! One of the definitions came from the Open Fog Consortium, which this week was pleased to let us all know that its OpenFog …

  1. Sampler

    On the Edge of my seat..

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Yeah, 'Open Fog'...

      Really? You can't make this shit up! I really want to see the expression on these people's faces after after 10 hours of client-fury CloudFog!

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    So edge computing = on-prem computing principles, rebranded?

    You know where you have many sites, and remote DCs/DB servers that sync with the central office so the local staff don't have to wait for a shoddy connection. The same stuff we've all just removed in order to migrate to the cloud.

    IT really has become a buzz-word merry-go-round. Fog computing indeed.

    1. Phil O'Sophical Silver badge

      Fog computing indeed.

      Isn't Fog what happens when a cloud rolls in over you, leaving everything unclear and a bit spooky?

      1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

        "Isn't Fog what happens when a cloud rolls in over you, leaving everything unclear and a bit spooky?"

        And you quickly get lost in it.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Eh?

    So instead of the internet we'll all just use one giant supercomputer with some very long KVM cables? Fucks sake, network latency in the 'last mile' is less of a concern when everyone is using a minimum number of 100Gbps links behind their 'edge' firewalls, the real problem I see is with latency-dependent software stacks with synchronous transactions that are poorly designed and just shift blame to the next device in the chain, instead of just designing the transactions to be asynchronous in the first place.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Eh?

      Fucks sake, network latency in the 'last mile' is less of a concern when everyone is using a minimum number of 100Gbps links

      Latency is unrelated to data rate. It'll be the much same over the last mile at 100GB/s as at 1MB/s.

  4. Teiwaz

    IT with one hand clapping.

    I look forward to the zen interpretation of mainframe, when that fashion comes back in.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Joke

      Re: IT with one hand clapping.

      But I thought the datacenter was the new mainframe. That's what I get for thinking again.

      1. Ken 16 Silver badge
        Trollface

        Re: IT with one hand clapping.

        The network IS the computer, dude!

  5. Milton

    The Mainframe is Dead: Long Live {Enter Rebranded Shyte Here}

    Sometimes you wonder whether the people coming up with this new jargon really are historically illiterate twits who simply can't be bothered to read about computing from the ancient era of, say the 1990s; or are just cynically and knowingly rebranding old ideas in order to exploit the current generation of fadheads. It's even more dispiriting when even engineers, who really ought to think about things with scientific rigour, get sucked into this nonsense.

    I'm beginning to think we need an acronym for Old Concepts Renamed And Polished?

    'Fadhead': n. Person whose unimpressive intelligence, usually accompanied by bonus-seeking behaviour, manifests as gullibility in paying for freshly polished and renamed turds. Collectively known as 'management', sometimes as 'a boardroom of fadheads'.

    'Bonus seeking behaviour': MBA term of art for gaining short-term rewards through 'cost savings' which prove in the longer term to be precisely the opposite.

    1. Paddy
      Pint

      Re: The Mainframe is Dead: Long Live {Enter Rebranded Shyte Here}

      The above lead to a fond remembrance of Terry Pratchett's use of the footnote - Now _there's_ an author....

  6. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

    "The other definition came from a new group of vendors who hope to do business on the edge, but feel it’s hard to have a cogent conversation about edge computing because nobody uses the same definition."

    This has been standard practice with any aspect of computing ever since vendors started to employ PR and marketing.

  7. Mike 16

    Another definition

    Running all your applications in Javascript on The Browser Formerly Known as IE?

  8. Faceless Man

    And I thought Edge Computing...

    ...was when you got to 99% complete, then it stops, rolls back a bit, and gets to 99% again, and sort of keeps it there for as long as possible. You know, to improve the intensity of your outcome.

    IT has long had a problem with unclear definitions. We've had this project to move everything to "the Cloud", only it took 3 years to get a convincing explanation out of them as to what they meant. Partly because they hadn't decided which version of "the Cloud" they wanted to use. I'm still not sure they know, despite having picked one.

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