Low Tech Magazine has a solar powered server that sometimes goes offline if there hasn't been enough sun yet. This clearly takes it a step further and gives more redundancy. From an energy usage...
Low Tech Magazine has a solar powered server that sometimes goes offline if there hasn't been enough sun yet. This clearly takes it a step further and gives more redundancy. From an energy usage standpoint though, I wonder how much more energy transmitting a page across the world takes than a local CDN; each router uses some energy to direct the packets, how much energy do they use as compared to the amount needed to generate and send the packets in the first place?
The energy usage of routing packets from A to B I think is largely irrelevant, unless your packets would be the only one traversing those particular pieces of hardware anyway. The advantage to...
The energy usage of routing packets from A to B I think is largely irrelevant, unless your packets would be the only one traversing those particular pieces of hardware anyway.
The advantage to something like this is that a more-advanced version could serve as an energy-efficient CDN as well. If you have a cluster of providers in each timezone (say 5-10), the majority of each cluster goes offline when power generation slows/stops, leaving just 1 to handle the lower night-time traffic.
Solar Protocol is a web platform hosted across a network of solar-powered servers set up in different locations around the world. A solar-powered server is a computer that is powered by a solar panel and a small battery. Each server can only offer intermittent connectivity that is dependent on available sunshine, the length of day and local weather conditions. When connected as a network, the servers coordinate to serve a website from whichever of them is enjoying the most sunshine at the time.
Low Tech Magazine has a solar powered server that sometimes goes offline if there hasn't been enough sun yet. This clearly takes it a step further and gives more redundancy. From an energy usage standpoint though, I wonder how much more energy transmitting a page across the world takes than a local CDN; each router uses some energy to direct the packets, how much energy do they use as compared to the amount needed to generate and send the packets in the first place?
The energy usage of routing packets from A to B I think is largely irrelevant, unless your packets would be the only one traversing those particular pieces of hardware anyway.
The advantage to something like this is that a more-advanced version could serve as an energy-efficient CDN as well. If you have a cluster of providers in each timezone (say 5-10), the majority of each cluster goes offline when power generation slows/stops, leaving just 1 to handle the lower night-time traffic.