
How Google Wants to Rewire the Internet - Katydid
https://www.nextplatform.com/2017/07/17/google-wants-rewire-internet/
======
komali2
I really wanted to understand this article. I tried wikipediaing and googling
some of the things I didn't really get (Jupiter is a thing... ok and
Andromeda.. riiiight). Then I got to the chart "Conceptually, here is how
Espresso plugs into the Google networking stack:", which was totally
unparseable by me. All the green things look the same, but one of them is the
thing this article is about (Espresso, right?), and Google somehow is
represented by a vague dark-grey blob... I just don't get it.

Can anybody help? Am I simply not technically competent enough to consume this
article yet?

~~~
trafficlight
I really hate the naming trend over the past 10-15 years of using common words
for projects.

I can't really search for Espresso, or Jupiter, or Andromeda without
additional qualifiers that I may not know yet.

~~~
komali2
Heh, that for me culminated when windows released a ubuntu subsystem.

The names in order of popularity when it was originally announced (now they
push for WSL)

1\. Bash for Ubuntu on Windows

2\. Windows Bash Shell

3\. Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL)

Trying googling WSL - it's world surf league. Windows Bash Shell is
impossible, so is Bash for Ubuntu on Windows. It's getting better as more and
more articles are being written, but god almighty. I wouldn't be surprised if
google is lending a helping hand with searches for WSL stuff.

~~~
milcron
And the 3rd name is backwards. It ought to be called 'Linux Subsystem for
Windows'.

~~~
SpaceManNabs
THAT IS IT! I was wondering why the name always felt funky. Although the name
they have now is technically correct if you ignore standard noun to adjective
conventions.

~~~
pavement
...or it's missing an apostrophe.

    
    
      a. Windows' Subsystem for Linux
    
      b. Window's Subsystem for Linux
    

Each option has its own sort of context.

~~~
bdowling
If you're making it a possessive using an apostrophe, then it should be
"Windows's Subsystem for Linux" because Windows is singular in that context.

~~~
IncRnd
That's not the entire story, unfortunately. There are other rules. For
example, Windows might be considered a family name, as there are several
Windows Operating Systems. Also, this is a technical name, and technical
writing often follows different rules, specifically in cases such as this.

For the possessive form of Windows I would look at the Microsoft Manual of
Style, which for me is the fourth edition.

Page 184: Possessive Nouns

\--------------

Do not use the possessive form of Microsoft. Do not use the possessive form of
other company names unless you have no other choice. And do not use the
possessive form of a product, service, or feature name. You can use these
names as adjectives, or you can use an of construction instead.

Microsoft style:

    
    
      the Windows interface
    
      Microsoft products, services, and technologies
    
      Word templates
    

\--------------

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emersonrsantos
> But running a fast, efficient, hyperscale network for internal datacenters
> is not sufficient for a good user experience

It will never be sufficient. A good backbone infrastructure doesn't compensate
for the fact that the majority of users don't have ISP choices especially for
fast speed fixed/mobile networks.

~~~
Ajedi32
Hence, Google Fiber and Project Loon.

------
deegles
"one out of four bytes that are delivered to end users across the Internet
originate from Google"

Such a mind blowing statement. Wonder when (if) they'll hit one-in-three
bytes.

~~~
sofaofthedamned
Facebook or Amazon may have a say in that, a lot of those 1 in 4 bytes are
video from Youtube.

That said, those bytes still need to be delivered, Google really don't have
peers in this stuff, apart from maybe Facebook.

~~~
allannienhuis
netflix last year was reported at 37% in NA, so I suspect it will continue to
be a contender as it gets more traction globally.

[http://appleinsider.com/articles/16/01/20/netflix-
boasts-37-...](http://appleinsider.com/articles/16/01/20/netflix-
boasts-37-share-of-internet-traffic-in-north-america-compared-with-3-for-
apples-itunes)

'peak download internet traffic' whatever that means.

~~~
greenshackle2
Traffic during peak hours. Peak demand is what really matters for
infrastructure.

~~~
samstave
Need to be able to store datafiles as youtube videos... e.g. ISO images in
youtube vids... allowing for a view of a youtube vid to stream a download
where, should everything be prioritized for vides/and youtube-google enuring
play... that file transfers can be massive and fast even if neutrality BS
occurs.

~~~
eru
At least for Google Photos, they don't usually give you the exact same bytes
back. (At a very basic level, that protects against some attacks and also
against your scheme.)

Of course, you could add enough coding theory to make it work.

------
eru
Somewhat related: Google's efforts to speed up TCP.

"BBR: Congestion-Based Congestion Control"
[http://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=3022184](http://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=3022184)

------
pavement
I guess this planetary naming convention is part of a tie in with the notable
Pluto Switch:

[https://www.wired.com/2013/03/big-switch-indigo-
switch_light...](https://www.wired.com/2013/03/big-switch-indigo-
switch_light/)

[https://www.wired.com/2012/09/pluto-
switch/](https://www.wired.com/2012/09/pluto-switch/)

------
konpikwastaken
Can someone ELI5 the difference between this and
[https://azure.microsoft.com/en-
us/services/expressroute/](https://azure.microsoft.com/en-
us/services/expressroute/)? Is the technology principle the same?

~~~
manigandham
Azure ExpressRoute = AWS Direct Connect = Google Cloud Interconnect

All 3 are ways to connect your private datacenter or on-premise location
(maybe your corporate office) directly to the cloud provider's network over a
fast private link, like an industrial-sized VPN. This way you can access your
cloud servers/services over this private connection rather than the public
internet. Lots of companies do this if they have sensitive data or have their
own "cloud" system running VMWare or something and want to augment with public
providers.

This article is discussing lower-level infrastructure describing Google's
global network components, from load-balancing, routing, internal datacenter
connections to servers, etc.

~~~
konpikwastaken
Very cool, thank you for explaining. Is VPN the primary purpose or could it in
theory be extended to work as software routers (as opposed to physical
switches your traffic goes through) for all internet traffic once connect?

Let me know if I'm way off base in my understanding.

~~~
manigandham
Well VPN = virtual private network, and that's exactly what it's creating.
What you use it for is up to you.

You can access all Google Cloud services over this link and but you can also
change your routes to point all internet traffic over this link too (you'll
need some cloud VMs with public IPs to be the exit nodes). Not sure what you'd
gain from doing that though.

------
ComodoHacker
>Amin Vahdat: Yup, pretty much traffic directors. Absolutely.

This quote stands out for me and makes me uneasy.

------
zzzcpan
I don't know, feels like a massive waste of resources and if Google is doing
it simply because it can. It's probably much cheaper for everyone else to
handle latency/throughput problems on the client side and application level,
sticking to all the traditional networking, but not relying on it for quality.
Even in the web browser we already can send all kinds of asynchronous requests
to multiple servers in multiple datacenters, choosing the fastest response and
making all kinds of decisions to where to send requests dynamically in real
time.

And while I agree about overcomplicated routers and box-centric thinking in
computer networks, it's pretty much impossible to change things because of the
monopolistic nature of the ISP industry. They are very far from competing on
the levels of quality where SDN could matter.

~~~
mjevans
From the description, it sounds like the routers have been reduced to more
simple muxers, where a small tag added to the packet determines which port it
goes over instead of trying to make a complicated decision all in one focal
point.

This has pushed the decision back from the routers to the servers, where it
scales with the number of hosts handling connections and can additionally be
determined per /session/ instead of per packet. That state is held where
sessions already need to be stored anyway instead of being duplicated in a
router where it's entirely a burden.

~~~
kingosticks
The speedup from traditional MPLS already comes from the simple next-hop only
lookup required by the router. There's no complicated decision making going
on. Something central still manages the labels, that's the complexity but
that's not new either.

Google still buy and use a ton of traditional mega (tera) high bandwidth
networking gear. All of which will support regular label switching. But that
doesn't sound cool and exciting so they always play that down. They can spin
it that way if they like, network hardware vendors don't care because they are
still selling them their boxes.

~~~
johnsmith21006
You really do no understand what Google is doing or how it works. The article
does a poor job explaining. It is more like a virtual circuit switch network.
It enables far less cost in equipment as no need to over provision. But a key
feature is it makes latency far more determinate. This was necessary to make
Spanner work.

