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author of the Inside System Storage series of books. This blog is for the open exchange of ideas relating to storage and storage networking hardware, software and services. You can also follow him on Twitter @az990tony.
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This week was the IBM Pulse 2011 converence in Las Vegas, Nevada, with over 7,000 attendees. I wasn't there, and my on-the-scene correspondent was too busy running the hands-on lab to get out and attend sessions. Fortunately, I was able to watch some of the [IBM Software live stream], and here are my thoughts and observations.
Fellow inventor [Dean Kamen] was the keynote speaker. His inventions help people, making the world a better place. Here are three examples I found interesting during his talk:
Helping third world countries
Dean started out with his favorite quote:
"A problem well defined is a problem half-solved." - John Dewey
Dean mentioned that we are fortunate, having both potable drinking water and a reliable supply of electricity, but 2 to 4 billion people on the planet do not. Sponsored by Coca-Cola, Dean and his team of innovators were able to come up with small units that can be placed in a village or town. One unit takes in wet liquid and produces potable drinking water. The other unit takes combustible materials, like cow dung, and products electricity. Each unit is roughly the size of half a standard server rack. What does Coca-Cola get out of this? New "vending machines"! By combining drinking water with flavored syrups, they can create soft drinks on demand.
Dean's opinion was that if you want something done, you need to work with large corporations, as governments are mired in beauracracy and rules. I agree. When I first joined IBM, I was introduced to [TRIZ] which was a systematic method for solving problems. IBM's best and brightest are working to solve some of the toughest computer science challenges. For more on TRIZ, see this blog post about [TRIZ in BusinessWeek].
Helping injured veterans
Dean Kamen is well known for inventing the two-wheeled [Segway Personal Transporter], but his company, [DEKA], makes all kinds of things, mostly medical equipment. To help wounded soldiers returning from Iraq or Afghanistan without one or both arms, Dean and his team developed a robotic arm that has enough motor dexterity to pick up a raisin or grape off the table without dropping or squashing it. Dean has appeared several times on the Colbert Report, and here is a video of the robotic arm:
I have myself enjoyed riding a Segway. A local place in Tucson uses them to lead tourists through downtown Tucson and the University of Arizona campus.
Helping young students to learn science and technology
Dean wrapped up his talking by talking about his passion about "For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology" or [FIRST]. Modeled after sports competitions, FIRST encourages teams of kids to build robots that perform specific tasks. Every year, companies and universities sponsor teams by purchasing robot kits from FIRST. Teams compete in regional competitions, and then the best of those go on to compete in a stadium in Atlanta, Georgia, hosting 76,000 people cheering for their teams.
Unlike other school sports (Football, Basketball, Baseball, etc.) where a student is more likely to win the lottery than get a successful career as a professional athlete, every student involved in FIRST competitions can "go pro". A study of FIRST success tracked students who participated in competitions, and found a substantial improvement in percentage of those students attending college and working as science and engineering professionals.
I am a big fan of encouraging kids of all ages to learn more about science, technology, engineering and math [STEM]. Back in 2009, I blogged about my involvement with [One Laptop Per Child] and [Junior FIRST Lego League]. I've gotten a great reaction to my latest challenge, to build a Watson Jr. in your own basement, based on my [step-by-step] instructions.
If you attended IBM Pulse this week, please comment on your thoughts and observations!
Wrapping up my week's coverage of the IBM Pulse 2011 conference, I have had several people ask me to explain IBM's latest initiative, Smarter Computing, which IBM launched this week at this conference. Having led the IT industry through the Centralized Computing era and the Distributed Computing era, IBM is now well-positioned to help companies, governments and non-profit organizations to enter the new Smarter Computing era, focused on insight and discovery.
Centralized Computing
Distributed Computing
Smarter Computing
Thousands of IT professionals
Mainframe servers
Effiicent, but only the largest companies and governments had them
Millions of office workers
Personal computers (PC)
Innovative, extending the reach to small and medium-sized businesses, but resulted in server sprawl and increased TCO
Billions of people
Smart phones and other handheld devices
Efficient and Innovative, combining the best of centralized and distributed computing
1952 to 1980
1981 to 2010
2011 and beyond
To help clients with this transition, IBM's Smarter Computing initiative has three main components. This is a corporate-wide strategy, with systems, software and services all working together to realize results.
Big Data
The first component is Big Data. This combines three different sources of data:
Traditional structured data in OLTP databases and OLAP data warehouses, using data management solutions like DB2 and IBM Netezza.
Unstructured data, including text documents, images, audio, and video, processed with massive parallelism using IBM BigInsights and Apache Hadoop.
Real-Time Analytics Processing (RTAP) of incoming data, including video surveillance, social media, RFID chips, smart meters, and traffic control systems, processed with IBM InfoSphere Streams
Of course, Big Data will bring new opportunities on the storage front, which I will save for a future post!
Optimized Systems
Rather than general purpose IT equipment, we have now the scale and scope to specialize with systems optimized for particular workloads, the second component of the Smarter Computing initiative. Of course, IBM has been delivering integrated stacks of systems, software and services for decades now, but it is important to remind people of this, as IBM now has a spate of competitors all trying to follow IBM's lead in this arena.
As with Big Data, the focus on Optimized Systems has impacted IBM's strategy on storage as well. I'll save that discussion for a future post as well!
Cloud
I am glad that nearly all of the storage vendors have standardized to a common definition for Cloud, the third component of Smarter Computing, which shows that this concept has matured:
Cloud computing is a pay-per-use model for enabling network access to a pool of computing resources that can be provisioned and released rapidly with minimal management effort or service provider interaction. -- U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology [nist.gov]
Of course, Cloud is just an evolution of IBM's Service Bureau business of the 1960s and 1970s, renting out time-sharing on mainframe systems, Grid Computing of the 1980s, and Application Service Providers that popped up in the 1990s. While the [butchers, bakers and candlestick makers] that IBM competes against might focus their efforts on just private cloud or just public cloud, IBM recognizes the reality is that different clients will need different solutions. Rather than rip-and-replace, IBM will help clients transition to cloud via inclusive solutions that adopt a hybrid approach:
Traditional enterprise with private cloud deployments, using solutions like IBM CloudBurst, SONAS and Information Archive
Traditional enterprise with public cloud services to handle seasonable peaks, providing offsite resiliency, and solutions for a mobile workforce
Hybrid clouds that blend private and public cloud services, to handle seasonal peak workloads, remote and branch offices
IBM's emphasis on IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL), Tivoli and Maximo products will play well in this space to provide integrated service management across traditional and cloud deployments. This is why IBM decided to launch Smarter Computing initiative at Pulse 2011 conference, the industry's premiere conference on intergrated service management.
The IBM Watson that competed on Jeopardy! is an excellent example of all three components of Smarter Computing at work.
IBM Watson was able to respond to Jeopardy! clues within three seconds, processing a combination of database searches with DB2 and text-mining analytics of unstructured data with IBM BigInsights.
IBM Watson combined servers, software and storage into an integrated supercomputer that was optimized for one particular workload: playing Jeopardy!
IBM Watson used many technologies prevalent in private and public cloud computing systems, storing its data on a modified version of SONAS for storage, using xCat administration tools, networking across 10GbE Ethernet, and massive parallel processing through lots of PowerVM guest images.
This was too good to pass up. For many, there is a perception that cloud computing lacks security. IBM is working on fixing that perception, with this [cute 2-minute video].
Webcast: How to Diagnose and Cure What Ails Your Storage Infrastructure
Wednesday, March 23, 2011 at 11:00 AM PDT / 11:00 AM Arizona MST / 2:00 PM EDT
Storage is the most poorly utilized infrastructure element -- and the most costly part of hardware budgets -- in most IT shops today. And it’s getting worse. Storage management typically involves nightmarish mash-up of tools for capacity management, performance management and data protection management unique to each array deployed in heterogeneous fabrics. Server and desktop virtualization seem to have made management issues worse, and coming on the heels of changing workloads and data proliferation is the requirement to add data management to the set of responsibilities shouldered by fewer and fewer storage professionals. Forecast for Storage in 2012: more pain as long delayed storage infrastructure refresh becomes mandatory.
In this webcast, fellow blogger Jon Toigo, CEO of Toigo Partners International, of [DrunkenData] fame, and I will take turns assessing the challenges and suggesting real-world solutions to the many issues that confound storage efficiency in contemporary IT. Integrating real world case studies and technology insights, our storage experts will deliver a must see webcast that sets down a strategy for fixing storage...before it fixes you.
Don't miss this event, unless you like the stress of knowing that your next disaster may be a data disaster.
IBM and the Austin Chamber of Commerce is inviting registered SXSW Interactive attendees to the networking reception being hosted by the IBM Innovation Center and the IBM Venture Capital Group. Power Systems and Watson will have a significant feature at this SXSW event to be held on March 14, 2011.
While I won't be there personally at the SXSW conference, I strongly recommend you to attend this event.
Innovators and Entrepreneurs Networking Reception
Four Seasons Hotel
March 14, 2011
Hosted by IBM Venture Capital Group, Austin Chamber of Commerce, and the IBM Innovation Center.
This reception will provide a rare opportunity to network and collaborate with your professional community of industry leaders, entrepreneurs, developers, academics, venture capitalists, members of the Austin Chamber of Commerce.
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Tony Pearson is a Master Inventor and Senior Software Engineer for the IBM Storage product line at the
technorati tags: IBM, Pulse, #ibmpulse, keynote, speaker, Dean Kamen, Coca-Cola, robotic, prosthetic, arm, DEKA, Segway, FIRST, Lego, STEM, TRIZ, Watson
