Readit NewsNB: I am on the rapid storage team.
Rapid Storage: A new Cloud Storage zonal bucket that enables you to colocate your primary storage with your TPUs or GPUs for optimal utilization. It provides up to 20x faster random-read data loading than a Cloud Storage regional bucket.
(Normally we wouldn't allow a post like this which cherry-picks one bit of a larger article, but judging by the community response it's clear that you've put your finger on something important, so thanks! We're always game to suspend the rules when doing so is interesting.)
I don't know of a single GCP product that's been shut down, although I could be missing something. But their track record for GCP is, I think, what you would want a cloud provider's record to be.
(I should mention that I work for GCP. But this is just based on my own memory.)
It seems like there are a lot of options for large scale analytics, but I don't know a lot for high throughout geo-redundant transaction processing.
Alternatives? LOL
Basically just looking for geo-redundant, high read & write throughput. Our intention was to leverage Azure Event Grid/Kafka Connect to have event streaming used to coordinate writes between Redis (cache), Cosmos (transactional DB), and our systems of record (legacy). Majority of read/writes would occur via our API, but some would occur via the systems of record, hence the use of a log-based architecture.
Do you have any specific requirements for which cloud provider you use, or any particular interface you really need?
For me, the problem with video-calling isn't the image-quality. It's all the much more mundane technological problems - high latency, lag-spikes caused by bad ISPs, failed noise-cancellation for people who don't use headsets for audio, bad wifi routers cutting out, etc.
First thing I did when I realized we were going to be WFH long-term was buy myself a $100 gaming headset. Next thing I did was get all my home computer stations wired with Cat 6.
That stuff is far more fundamental and far less interesting than 3D telepresence, but it's the real unsexy problem that so many people are suffering through this pandemic.
Even simple things like latency make simple, natural reactions agonizing. Talkcover and crosstalk is incessent and I've developed a filthy habit of just talking over people because otherwise it's a solid 20 seconds of "you go no you go" caused by awful latency. I've had to defuse angry reactions by co-workers who feel they're being interrupted by other co-workers and explain to them that the latency makes interruptions feel worse than they are.
I've tried to push friends to join me on my private Mumble server where the latency is near-nil and the call-quality is excellent, but there's always one person who doesn't have a working headset and wants to just use a laptop or tablet mic with no feedback-cancelling that destroys the conversation through echos (plus Mumble's auth system is needlessly bewildering).
Then with video, problems are similar but less impactful - cheap cameras, poor lighting, compression artifacts, poor sync with the audio, etc. And it's infuriating because every person has a wonderfully powerful camera in their pocket right now - and there's software to connect them but it's just too tricky for most people.
Good on Google for taking an interest in the subject, but I feel like they're decorating the apex of the technological pyramid while most people are pushing stones around at the bottom.
(NB: I work at Google, but this comment has nothing to do with my work.)
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Here's a recent post: https://devblogs.microsoft.com/devops/introducing-scalar/
It looks like every other clustered file system. What's special about Google's Colossus?