Datacenter Overview

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Data Centers
 Data center (DC) is a physical facility that enterprises use to house computing and storage
infrastructure in a variety of networked formats.

 Main function is to deliver utilities needed

by the equipment and personnel:
- Power
- Cooling
- Shelter
- Security

 Size of typical data centers:

- 500 – 5000 sqm buildings
- 1 MW to 10-20 MW power (avg 5 MW)

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Example data centers

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Datacenters around the globe

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/learn/modules/explore-azure-infrastructure/2-azure-datacenter-locations
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Modern DC for the Cloud architecture
 Geography:
- Two or more regions
- Meets data residency requirements
- Fault-tolerant from complete region failures

 Region:
- Set of datacenters within a metropolitan area
- Network latency perimeter < 2ms

 Availability Zones:
- Unique physical locations within a region
- Each zone made up of one or more DCs
- Independent power, cooling, networking
- Inter-AZ network latency < 2ms
- Fault tolerance from DC failure
Src: Inside Azure Datacenter Architecture with Mark Russinovich 5
Data Centers
 Traditional data centers
- Host a large number of relatively small- or medium-sized applications, each running on a dedicated
hardware infrastructure that is decoupled and protected from other systems in the same facility
- Usually for multiple organizational units or companies

 Modern data centers (a.k.a., Warehouse-scale computers)

- Usually belong to a single company to run a small number of large-scale applications
- Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Amazon, Alibaba, etc.
- Use a relatively homogeneous hardware and system software
- Share a common systems management layer
- Sizes can vary depending on needs

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Datacenter Architecture

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Scale-up vs. scale-out
 Scale-up: high cost powerful CPUs, more cores, more memory
 Scale-out: adding more low cost, commodity servers

 Supercomputer vs. data center

 Scale
- Blue waters = 40K 8-core “servers”
- Microsoft Chicago Data centers = 50 containers = 100K 8-core servers
 Network architecture
- Supercomputers: InfiniBand, low-latency, high bandwidth protocols
- Data Centers: (mostly) Ethernet based networks
 Storage
- Supercomputers: separate data farm
- Data Centers: use disk on node + memory cache
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 Main components of a datacenter

src: The Datacenter as a Computer – Barroso, Clidaras, Holzle 9

Traditional Data Center Architecture
Servers mounted on 19’’
rack cabinets

Racks are placed in single rows forming

corridors between them.

Src: the datacenter as a computer – an introduction to the design of warehouse-scale machines 10

 A Row of Servers in a Google Data Center

Src: the datacenter as a computer – an introduction to the design

of warehouse-scale machines
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Inside a modern data center
 Today’s DC use shipping containers packed with
1000s servers each.

 For repairs, whole containers are replaced.

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Costs for operating a data center
 DCs consume 3% of global electricity supply
(416.2 TWh > UK’s 300 TWh)
Monthly cost = $3’530’920

 DCs produce 2% of total greenhouse gas 1 Servers

emissions 3 4%
% Networking
Equipment
 DCs produce as much CO2 as The Netherlands 1
Power Distribution &
or Argenti 8 57% Cooling
% Power
31% power 8 Other Infrastructure
%
45,978 servers, 3yr server & 10 yr infrastructure amortization
45,978 servers, 3yr server & 10 yr infrastructure amortization

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Cloud and Cloud computing
Datacenter hardware and software that the vendors use to offer the computing resources and services.

 The cloud has a large pool of easily usable

virtualized computing resources, development
platforms, and various services and
applications.

 Cloud computing is the delivery of

computing as a service.

 The shared resources, software,

and data are provided by a provider
as a metered service over a network.

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Cloud Computing
 Datacenters are vendors that rent servers or other computing resources (e.g., storage)
- Anyone (or company) with a “credit card” can rent
- Cloud resources owned and operated by a third-party (cloud provider).

 Fine-grained pricing model

- Rent resources by the hour or by I/O
- Pay as you go (pay for only what you use)

 Can vary capacity as needed

- No need to build you own IT infrastructure for peak loads

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Types of Cloud Computing
Public vs. Private
 Public: resources owned and operated by the one organization aka the cloud vendor
 Private: Resources used exclusively by a single business or organization

On-premise vs. Hosted:

 On-premise (on-prem): resources located locally (at a datacenter that the organization operates)
 Hosted: resources hosted and managed by a third-party provider

Private cloud can be both on-prem and hosted (virtual private cloud)

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Types of Cloud Computing (cont)
Hybrid cloud
 Combines public and private clouds, allows data and applications to be shared between them.
 Better control over sensitive data and functionalities
 Cost effective, scales well and is more flexible
Multi-Cloud
 Use multiple clouds for an application / service
 Avoids data lock-in
 Avoids single point of failure
 But, need to deal with API differences and handle migration across clouds

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Cloud service models (XaaS)
more Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)
 Rent IT infrastructure – servers and virtual machines (VMs),
storage, network, firewall, and security

Platform as a Service (PaaS)

 Get on-demand environment for development, testing and management of
software applications: servers, storage, network, OS, databases, etc.
control

Serverless, Function as a Service (FaaS)

 Overlapping with PaaS, serverless focuses on building app functionality without
managing the servers and infrastructure required to do so.
 Cloud vendors provides set-up, capacity planning, and server management.
Software as a Service (SaaS)
 Deliver software applications over the Internet, on demand.
less  Cloud vendor handles software application and underlying infrastructure
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Infrastructure as a Service
 Immediately available computing infrastructure,
provisioned and managed by a cloud provider.

Managed by user
 Computing resources pooled together to
server multiple users / tenants.

 Computing resources include:

storage, processing, memory, network bandwidth, etc.

cloud provider
src image from Microsoft Azure
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Platform as a Service
 Complete development and deployment environment.

 Includes system’s software (OS, middleware),

user
platforms, DBMSs, BI services, and libraries to
assist in development and deployment of
cloud-based applications.

 Examples:

Managed by cloud provider

src image from Microsoft Azure 20
Software as a Service

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Cloud pros and cons
User’s benefits: User’s concerns:
 Elimination of up-front commitment  Dependability on network and internet
 Speed – services are provided on demand connectivity
 Global scale and elasticity  Security and privacy
 Productivity  Cost of migration
 Performance and security  Cost and risk of vendor lock-in
 Customizability
 Ability to pay for use of computing resources
on a short-term basis (as needed)

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