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>KVM is free. ZFS is free. Linux & BSD are free. Your time, hopefully, isn't. >The margins on server kit are tiny. And man, does it ever show. >Oxide gets p

>KVM is free. ZFS is free. Linux & BSD are free. Your time, hopefully, isn't. >The margins on server kit are tiny. And man, does it ever show. >Oxide gets plugged here non-stop, but the audience here still struggles to see what the point is. I'd like someone to appreciate music with; but alas, my cat doesn't like Debussy, she likes tuna, and I must love my cat for what she is. That the HN audience struggles to see the point of a properly-integrated systems offering isn't an indictment of that offering. They (and good for them!) may never have had the professional experience of having to manage a large enterprise IT resource on questionable hardware with indifferent software support from multiple vendors. >Sounds like a vanity project to keep some of the old Solaris talent in-pocket. Then that would be a vanity project for Oracle; but I believe that ship has sailed. >the current growth-area is GPU/ML processing, where Oxide has bupkis. Nobody but nvidia has anything hw-wise in that area (for the moment...).

hello_computer 3y ago
> Your time, hopefully, isn't. Even on low-end hardware, the cost of competent deployment amortizes to zero. Like most industrial pursuits, the deployment cost of the first box is high; the cost for each additional box is orders-of-magnitude less. Add the end of Moore's Law into the mix--getting many years of economic service out of boxes that would have been obsolete within the year--the cost is lower still. There are people out there who've been running aisles of rock-bottom supermicro gear, for almost decade, without incident. Gabriel's Law: "worse is better". FAANG rode Gabriel's law to the bank. > Then that would be a vanity project for Oracle As for "in-pocket", I did not mean Frankenstein's Solaris. I meant Operation Paperclip. Knowledge was acquired on someone else's dime, and it would be imprudent to leave this talent disengaged--to be retrieved and used by one's competitors. > Nobody but nvidia has anything hw-wise in that area Exactly. That is the castle that needs to be stormed. That is where the treasure is. 0xide is running a war against an already-dying kingdom. They might as well be playing minecraft.
- panick21_ 3y ago
  > There are people out there who've been running aisles of rock-bottom supermicro gear, for almost decade, without incident. Have there? But not you I take it? Bryan worked at joyant and ran a public cloud on dell and supermicro gear. And it seems they had plenty of problems. I have heard the same sentiment im other places. Additional evidence comes from the cloud providers themselves. Why did all of them develop their own stuff if operations with that stuff is so problem free? Google tried it and rejected it quickly.
  - hello_computer 3y ago
    > Have there? But not you I take it? I have a variety of customers running a variety of different x86_64 gear. From an up-time perspective, there has been low correlation between price and reliability. If we're talking non-x86_64 systems--like zSeries or industrial control systems--then the price and the reliability are correlated, but that is not an x86_64 market, and probably never will be. > Bryan worked at joyant and ran a public cloud on dell and supermicro gear. And it seems they had plenty of problems. Never called it perfect. I wrote "worse is better"--the "best" losing out to the "good enough". The supermicros I mentioned were "good enough". Of course Cantrill et. al. had problems with them, since they were running Solaris/Indiana on x86_64 gear, expecting Sun-tier SLAs. They'd need Sun-tier hardware to accomplish that, but the Sun that made that kind of gear is dead, just like Joyent. They are both dead for a reason: worse is better. Google also used bare-bones discount servers in their early days (not wasting money on brands, SLAs, and fancy cases[0]). > Additional evidence comes from the cloud providers themselves. Why did all of them develop their own stuff if operations with that stuff is so problem free? Let's say there are three tiers of users 1) small-fries who spin up a few AWS images, 2) businesses who've grown to the point where public cloud is no longer economical, but not invested enough in computing to justify developing their own hardware, and 3) FAANG, who have so much money and so much need that it would be absolutely stupid for them not to develop their own hardware. At FAANG-scale it's no longer just about cost or quality; it's about being in control of your own business. #2 would seem to be 0xide's target market, but as someone who inhabits that space, I am unimpressed. [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Google%E2%80%99s_First_Production_Server.jpg https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Google%E2%80%99s_First_...
mlindner 3y ago
> That the HN audience struggles to see the point of a properly-integrated systems offering isn't an indictment of that offering. It definitely shows who it's actually an indictment of though.

hello_computer 3y ago

> Your time, hopefully, isn't. Even on low-end hardware, the cost of competent deployment amortizes to zero. Like most industrial pursuits, the deployment cost of the first box is high; the cost for each additional box is orders-of-magnitude less. Add the end of Moore's Law into the mix--getting many years of economic service out of boxes that would have been obsolete within the year--the cost is lower still. There are people out there who've been running aisles of rock-bottom supermicro gear, for almost decade, without incident. Gabriel's Law: "worse is better". FAANG rode Gabriel's law to the bank. > Then that would be a vanity project for Oracle As for "in-pocket", I did not mean Frankenstein's Solaris. I meant Operation Paperclip. Knowledge was acquired on someone else's dime, and it would be imprudent to leave this talent disengaged--to be retrieved and used by one's competitors. > Nobody but nvidia has anything hw-wise in that area Exactly. That is the castle that needs to be stormed. That is where the treasure is. 0xide is running a war against an already-dying kingdom. They might as well be playing minecraft.

panick21_ 3y ago
> There are people out there who've been running aisles of rock-bottom supermicro gear, for almost decade, without incident. Have there? But not you I take it? Bryan worked at joyant and ran a public cloud on dell and supermicro gear. And it seems they had plenty of problems. I have heard the same sentiment im other places. Additional evidence comes from the cloud providers themselves. Why did all of them develop their own stuff if operations with that stuff is so problem free? Google tried it and rejected it quickly.
- hello_computer 3y ago
  > Have there? But not you I take it? I have a variety of customers running a variety of different x86_64 gear. From an up-time perspective, there has been low correlation between price and reliability. If we're talking non-x86_64 systems--like zSeries or industrial control systems--then the price and the reliability are correlated, but that is not an x86_64 market, and probably never will be. > Bryan worked at joyant and ran a public cloud on dell and supermicro gear. And it seems they had plenty of problems. Never called it perfect. I wrote "worse is better"--the "best" losing out to the "good enough". The supermicros I mentioned were "good enough". Of course Cantrill et. al. had problems with them, since they were running Solaris/Indiana on x86_64 gear, expecting Sun-tier SLAs. They'd need Sun-tier hardware to accomplish that, but the Sun that made that kind of gear is dead, just like Joyent. They are both dead for a reason: worse is better. Google also used bare-bones discount servers in their early days (not wasting money on brands, SLAs, and fancy cases[0]). > Additional evidence comes from the cloud providers themselves. Why did all of them develop their own stuff if operations with that stuff is so problem free? Let's say there are three tiers of users 1) small-fries who spin up a few AWS images, 2) businesses who've grown to the point where public cloud is no longer economical, but not invested enough in computing to justify developing their own hardware, and 3) FAANG, who have so much money and so much need that it would be absolutely stupid for them not to develop their own hardware. At FAANG-scale it's no longer just about cost or quality; it's about being in control of your own business. #2 would seem to be 0xide's target market, but as someone who inhabits that space, I am unimpressed. [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Google%E2%80%99s_First_Production_Server.jpg https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Google%E2%80%99s_First_...

mlindner 3y ago

> That the HN audience struggles to see the point of a properly-integrated systems offering isn't an indictment of that offering. It definitely shows who it's actually an indictment of though.