Google as OS?

The power of Google...

[eboda]

Greetings...

I could not pass up posting this on W W - I still have to digest this article. Good stuff :D
[eweek.com...]

[mil2k]

The article uses Metaphor. Still reminds us the dominance of Google.

[GoogleGuy]

I've seen this rhetorical device (Google = Operating System) used once before, and I really have to say that I don't buy it. Google can answer queries--that what a search engine boils down to. Operating systems like Windows, OS X, and Linux are just completely different animals. An OS lets you do so many things (abstract access to hardware, provide file storage, graphical applications). As a result, an OS takes time to adjust to, and it's not trivial to switch to a new operating system. In contrast, there's no lock-in whatsoever to a search engine--you can switch at any time--and the skills that work on one search engine apply directly to a different search engine, for example.

So the OS metaphor really just doesn't hold in my opinion. I can understand that people mention web services, but that really just allows people to access Google programmatically. It still doesn't let you do all the cool things that Windows or another operating system can do. And Amazon does web services very well, but people don't talk about an Amazon operating system. :)

Anyway, that's just my personal take. I'll believe that Google is an operating system when I can use it to play Doom III or mix sound files. ;)

[eaden]

I'm sure behind the scenes Google is an OS.
Don't tell me Google uses a stock standard Debian or Red Hat, no, it would be a custom linux based OS.

GG: what do you call it?

But of course Google as a webservice or webpage isn't an OS.

[jk3210]

That article is an excellent example of what happens when a journalist is facing an impending deadline with no viable topic to write about.

[GoogleGuy]

eaden, Google runs on an operating system, sure, but that's very different from claiming that Google *is* an operating system. ;) That's the part of the article that just didn't sit right with me. :)

best,
GoogleGuy

[TheDave]

when I can use it to play Doom III

Do you really play Doom games GG? :D

[edit] I've just figured out why the googleplex needs so many networked computers ;P [/edit]

[eaden]

GG I understand that the Google search engine isn't an OS.
But what I was getting at was that the OS that Google *does* run on must be unlike any other OS, with all sorts of clustering-fu etc, and was wondering what you call it.

[drewls]

Oracle? :D

[Chris_D]

"powered by the world's largest commercial Linux cluster (more than 10,000 servers)"
[google.com...]

So I guess if its been hand crafted in house, then you could call the operating system used in the Datacentres 'Goog-lux' or 'Googlin'

: )

[ciml]

Google won't take over from operating systems IMO, but for a lot of people it has taken over from DNS and browser bookmarks as a user friendly method of reaching Web pages, even when those pages have been visited often before.

I don't tend to remember things unless I have to, so there are one or two WebmasterWorld pages I visit on an almost daily basis. It would probably make sense to add them to my browser "favorites", but Google searching is just more natural now.

[Critter]

Ok now folks, let's not forget the *best* operating system out there if we're enumerating.

FreeBSD

Peter

[Yidaki]

>I'll believe that Google is an operating system when I can use it to play Doom III

Har, har, sorry for the bump but i missed this phrase. Bad boy, you - come get some ... >:)

Critter, no talks about the best os, but OS X is ...

[ciml]

We can make an exception for "Google as an OS", but discussion of the merits of any other is politics [webmasterworld.com]. Anyway, we all know that <snip> is the best OS seeing as Google use it themselves. :-)

[Yidaki]

>we all know that <snip> is the best OS seeing as Google use it themselves

Hey, they're using <snip>? Wow! ;)

[Critter]

Yidaki...

Of course OS X is! Darwin (the unix kernel of OS X) is based on FreeBSD!

Lol

[Yidaki]

critter,

yah, that's right but did you ever see and feel the difference between a XServe and a rack mounted compac? Puhh ... however, better to stop here, we're going too much ot, i fear. ;)

[Critter]

Sorry Yidaki...

I haven't seen a GUI in 6 years :)

j/k, but I like command-line, I'm not into pretty pictures. :P~ hehe

Just to confirm though...I've used OS X and I think the whole thing is (to quote Dame Edna) Beeee-uuutiful.

Peter

[GoogleGuy]

<snip> rules, but I like <snick> and <snack> too. In fact, I'm typing on a <dropped> machine right now! :)

[Critter]

Hey GG:

I think you're dropping packets with all the data transfer going on over there...

Peter

[BigDave]

In the late 2.3.x development kernels and early 2.4.x, as I recall, both Yahoo and Google had issues with the new kernels. On LKML there was a lot of discussion and work put in to making things work right for the companies with the monster clusters.

I'm assuming that Beowolf had the same attitude about getting clustering to work well enough in the ultimate testing grounds.

I know that we took network booting for the google and yshoo datacenters very seriously when I was working on that.

Google does not need to run standard distributions. They will run stripped down custom kernels with as little overhead as possible. They will even build different kernels for different jobs. They will tweak the values to get the best performance.

[Critter]

Yahoo is a freebsd shop.

Peter

[BigDave]

I knew that but it just didn't register in my mind as I was trying to recall the facts. The grey matter gets a bit rusty after a few years.

[mack]

Google as an operating system doesn't wash with me. I think of the operating system as the software that runs the hardware.

You would be surprised. Ask some not very tech savi computer users what OS they are using.

I have done this and had some pretty strange replies.

Explorer, outlook, yahoo ...

Most users know windows runs their machine but do not refer to it as an operating system, windows is simply their computer.

Mack.

[Fiver_321]

GG - Doom III?

Have you tried Unreal Tournament 2003?

I'll do a death match with you and blow your head off (unless of course you put my site at number 1 then I may just let you win!)

:)

Fiver

AKA - Head_Hunter - UT2003 - well weve got to do something when the dance is on.