The OCP’s third regional summit took place on the 26^th and 27^th of September in Amsterdam. I was in attendance as EPS Global’s representative for the second time (I was on my best behaviour, honest). Over the next 2 blogs I will share some of the new technologies that were on show from the biggest names in the hardware world. In part 1 though, I will give an overview of the OCP, where, when and why they began, the ethos within and where it is heading. Part 2 will be dedicated to the new technologies that aim to solve the ever-increasing challenges within cloud computing and more. With members including Facebook, Google, IBM, Rackspace, Nokia, Microsoft, Alibaba Group and Cisco to name but a few, all working in collaboration, the Open Compute Project looks capable of rising to these challenges.

The OCP’s third regional summit took place on the 26^th and 27^th of September in Amsterdam. I was in attendance as EPS Global’s representative for the second time (I was on my best behaviour, honest). Over the next 2 blogs I will share some of the new technologies that were on show from the biggest names in the hardware world. In part 1 though, I will give an overview of the OCP, where, when and why they began, the ethos within and where it is heading. Part 2 will be dedicated to the new technologies that aim to solve the ever-increasing challenges within cloud computing and more. With members including Facebook, Google, IBM, Rackspace, Nokia, Microsoft, Alibaba Group and Cisco to name but a few, all working in collaboration, the Open Compute Project looks capable of rising to these challenges.

Billy Connolly, the Scottish comedian, laughing at his father for losing his glasses again jokingly told him about an article he had read for a prescription car windscreen. His father thought this would be the greatest thing since sliced bread and wanted one immediately. Now, imagine the vision as this vehicle approaches and a man with a head the size of a small asteroid is looking at you. Or the confusion of a new owner as he drove off into a lamppost!! My point is we have to careful when looking at things we are told will change our lives for the better. We have all heard the buzz around 5G so let’s have a look and see if it’s a prescription windscreen or our generation’s sliced bread. 

Billy Connolly, the Scottish comedian, laughing at his father for losing his glasses again jokingly told him about an article he had read for a prescription car windscreen. His father thought this would be the greatest thing since sliced bread and wanted one immediately. Now, imagine the vision as this vehicle approaches and a man with a head the size of a small asteroid is looking at you. Or the confusion of a new owner as he drove off into a lamppost!! My point is we have to careful when looking at things we are told will change our lives for the better. We have all heard the buzz around 5G so let’s have a look and see if it’s a prescription windscreen or our generation’s sliced bread. 

Container platforms and Cloud Native are the talk of the town, with Kubernetes, or k8s as it is stylized, recently being crowned the victor in the bloody but aptly named ‘Container Wars’. The white flag of surrender for management and orchestration was raised by Docker which now supports Kubernetes natively. Docker is still the container engine of choice though. This means that most Cloud Native systems are going to contain both platforms in a complementary fashion.

Container platforms and Cloud Native are the talk of the town, with Kubernetes, or k8s as it is stylized, recently being crowned the victor in the bloody but aptly named ‘Container Wars’. The white flag of surrender for management and orchestration was raised by Docker which now supports Kubernetes natively. Docker is still the container engine of choice though. This means that most Cloud Native systems are going to contain both platforms in a complementary fashion.