Welcome to the fourth issue of High Performance Infrastructure. To receive future issues via email you can sign up below.
According to Arpit Joshipura, The Linux Foundation’s general manager of networking, edge computing will overtake cloud computing by 2025, reported a recent article by ZDNet.
When Arpit mentions “edge computing” he’s talking about compute and storage resources that are 5 to 20 milliseconds away from the end user. These resources can be as close as down the hall or at the Internet’s edge (what we’re developing at StackPath).
In order for edge computing to “overtake” cloud computing by 2025, Joshipura believes that a having an interoperable framework for edge computing is absolutely necessary. This framework would be independent of hardware, silicon, cloud, or operating system—and it’s already being built by LF Edge.
LF Edge is part of The Linux Foundation and its mission is to build an open source framework for the edge. It currently has seven active projects and, for this issue, we thought it would be worthwhile to give you an overview of each.
LF Edge Projects
- Akraino Edge Stack: Includes 10 blueprints that support a variety of edge use cases and are validated on real hardware.
- Baetyl (GitHub): Provides temporary offline, low-latency computing services and includes device connect, message routing, remote synchronization, and more.
- EdgeX Foundry: A loosely-coupled microservices framework with a focus on the IoT edge.
- Fledge: A framework and community for the industrial edge focused on critical operations, predictive maintenance, situational awareness and safety.
- Home Edge: Concentrates on enabling a framework for home devices that require edge computing resources.
- Edge Virtualization Engine (GitHub): An architecture that unifies the development of cloud-native applications across the enterprise’s on-premise edge.
- Open Glossary of Edge Computing (GitHub): A collection of concise definitions for terms related to edge computing.
Learn Edge Speak
Here are a few terms and definitions from LF Edge’s Open Glossary of Edge Computing that will benefit those who are just starting to explore the Edge…
- Infrastructure Edge (what StackPath is building): Edge computing capability, typically in the form of one or more edge data centers, which is deployed on the operator side of the last mile network. Compute, data storage and network resources positioned at the infrastructure edge allow for cloud-like capabilities similar to those found in centralized data centers such as the elastic allocation of resources, but with lower latency and lower data transport costs due to a higher degree of locality to user than with a centralized or regional data center.
- Access Edge Layer: The sub-layer of infrastructure edge closest to the end user or device, zero or one hops from the last mile network. For example, an edge data center deployed at a cellular network site. The Access Edge Layer functions as the front line of the infrastructure edge and may connect to an aggregation edge layer higher in the hierarchy.
- Device Edge: Edge computing capabilities on the device or user side of the last mile network. Often depends on a gateway or similar device in the field to collect and process data from devices. May also use limited spare compute and data storage capability from user devices such as smartphones, laptops and sensors to process edge computing workloads. Distinct from infrastructure edge as it uses device resources.
You can view more terms and definitions here. There was also a paper published by Cornell University this month that directs the similarities and differences between cloud computing, fog computing, and edge computing.