4 ms·

I honestly wonder why did Google cite "SAP HANA" as the _reference_ workload for such setups. I never heard of that product. Noobie asking here, is it the _refe

I honestly wonder why did Google cite "SAP HANA" as the _reference_ workload for such setups. I never heard of that product. Noobie asking here, is it the _reference_ workload for such setups ? And are there more demanding workloads ?

willyyr 9y ago
I guess because SAP HANA is an in memory database which requires, well, a lot of memory. Other providers use HANA as a reference as well.
codeduck 9y ago
AWS do the same: https://aws.amazon.com/ec2/instance-types/x1/ https://aws.amazon.com/ec2/instance-types/x1/ Interestingly, AWS have X1 and X1E-class EC2 offerings, two of which are significantly larger than this new Google offering.
- Jdam 9y ago
  But only Haswell, where GCP offers Skylake
  - p0rkbelly 9y ago
    ...but curious to see the performance gain on SAP (or similar) workloads with a new CPU architecture. RAM is the bottleneck typically.
  - dom0 9y ago
    So -80 % memory for 0-5 % more compute throughput?
  - boulos 9y ago
    I think their latest instances were 4 socket Broadwell. Disclosure: I work on Google Cloud.
Jdam 9y ago
Maybe because SAP HANA requires vertical scaling. For horizontal scaling, I don't see a point in using such big instances.
- manigandham 9y ago
  On Google, the pricing is by cpu/ram so 1x 96 vcpu instance = 12x 8 vcpu instances in cost. Often easier to just run less of more powerful instances.
  - brianwawok 9y ago
    Unless you are single process bound, say mysql or postgres instance.
    - manigandham 9y ago
      Sure, legacy software is still catching up to multiple cores. Postgres is much better now or you can use SQL Server instead. None of them are native multi-master anyway so scale up is still better than scale out unless you only need reads.
      - brianwawok 9y ago
        I am not sure it is correct to call Postgres or MySql "legacy software" To me, legacy software would be something like using Novel PeopleManager 2002 or WordPerfect 7. Postgres 10.0 is < a week old, and is a perfectly fine path to go for a brand new application. You are fooling yourself if you think you should just throw every new application in MongoDB or Cassandra because they are "web scale". If you are using "Legacy Software" to mean "software that has existed for a long time", then I guess sure. But there are many pieces of software that are very new, and could benefit from a single instance with a lot of cores. The most common use of "Legacy Software" is "Old crusty stuff which needs to be replaced", which is NOT at all the case for MySql or Postgres.
        manigandham 9y ago
noelwelsh 9y ago
If you can afford SAP you can afford these instances. I think it's a form of signalling to enterprises that the cloud offerings are suitable for them. HPC people are much technical and less conservative, in general, and can sort themselves out.
totalrobe 9y ago
SAP HANA is an in-memory database. It's probably one of the more recognizable workloads to require significant amounts of ram.
_pmf_ 9y ago
I assume that it's one of very few in-memory databases that are a) in actual production use and b) not already trivially distributed/distributable I.e. just like Azul Systems' system, it's for running bad enterprise applications that you cannot scale with regular means.
bpicolo 9y ago
AWS used it as their reference workload for similarly sized boxes too. SAP HANA is a huge deal in certain sectors. I assume there were plenty of clients they couldn't land without support for it.
dwyerm 9y ago
I would honestly like to hear of another reference workload for machines of this type. I can't find very many uses other than databases for that much memory. I think you can store every single uncompressed frame of a bluray movie in memory of an AWS X1... but even then, so what?

willyyr 9y ago

I guess because SAP HANA is an in memory database which requires, well, a lot of memory. Other providers use HANA as a reference as well.

codeduck 9y ago

AWS do the same: https://aws.amazon.com/ec2/instance-types/x1/ https://aws.amazon.com/ec2/instance-types/x1/ Interestingly, AWS have X1 and X1E-class EC2 offerings, two of which are significantly larger than this new Google offering.

Jdam 9y ago
But only Haswell, where GCP offers Skylake
- p0rkbelly 9y ago
  ...but curious to see the performance gain on SAP (or similar) workloads with a new CPU architecture. RAM is the bottleneck typically.
- dom0 9y ago
  So -80 % memory for 0-5 % more compute throughput?
- boulos 9y ago
  I think their latest instances were 4 socket Broadwell. Disclosure: I work on Google Cloud.

Jdam 9y ago

Maybe because SAP HANA requires vertical scaling. For horizontal scaling, I don't see a point in using such big instances.

manigandham 9y ago
On Google, the pricing is by cpu/ram so 1x 96 vcpu instance = 12x 8 vcpu instances in cost. Often easier to just run less of more powerful instances.
- brianwawok 9y ago
  Unless you are single process bound, say mysql or postgres instance.
  - manigandham 9y ago
    Sure, legacy software is still catching up to multiple cores. Postgres is much better now or you can use SQL Server instead. None of them are native multi-master anyway so scale up is still better than scale out unless you only need reads.
    - brianwawok 9y ago
      I am not sure it is correct to call Postgres or MySql "legacy software" To me, legacy software would be something like using Novel PeopleManager 2002 or WordPerfect 7. Postgres 10.0 is < a week old, and is a perfectly fine path to go for a brand new application. You are fooling yourself if you think you should just throw every new application in MongoDB or Cassandra because they are "web scale". If you are using "Legacy Software" to mean "software that has existed for a long time", then I guess sure. But there are many pieces of software that are very new, and could benefit from a single instance with a lot of cores. The most common use of "Legacy Software" is "Old crusty stuff which needs to be replaced", which is NOT at all the case for MySql or Postgres.
      - manigandham 9y ago

noelwelsh 9y ago

If you can afford SAP you can afford these instances. I think it's a form of signalling to enterprises that the cloud offerings are suitable for them. HPC people are much technical and less conservative, in general, and can sort themselves out.

totalrobe 9y ago

SAP HANA is an in-memory database. It's probably one of the more recognizable workloads to require significant amounts of ram.

_pmf_ 9y ago

I assume that it's one of very few in-memory databases that are a) in actual production use and b) not already trivially distributed/distributable I.e. just like Azul Systems' system, it's for running bad enterprise applications that you cannot scale with regular means.

bpicolo 9y ago

AWS used it as their reference workload for similarly sized boxes too. SAP HANA is a huge deal in certain sectors. I assume there were plenty of clients they couldn't land without support for it.

dwyerm 9y ago

I would honestly like to hear of another reference workload for machines of this type. I can't find very many uses other than databases for that much memory. I think you can store every single uncompressed frame of a bluray movie in memory of an AWS X1... but even then, so what?