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Will the network centers of the world someday look like this?
No word on how company plans to deal with pirates

While Sun may have pioneered the "Datacenter in a shipping container" concept some time ago with "Project Blackbox," and alternative uses for shipping containers discovered before that by enterprising architects, a San Francisco area startup company is planning on taking the concept of portable servers one step further -- by floating the loaded containers on the cargo ships from whence they came.

International Data Security (IDS) plans to open its first portion of available space at the beginning of April 2008 on a container ship docked at San Francisco Bay's Pier 50, according to Kenneth Jamaca of Silverback Migration Solutions. Standard connections for power and network will be run to the ships.

According to the company sales brochure and further information from IDS, IDS will be deploying 50 "server ships" worldwide, with 22 docked in North America. Each ship will have facilities similar to landed data centers, with additional ship-specific features such as overnight accomodations and a galley instead of a cafeteria -- and over 200,000 square feet of available server space per ship.

Power demands will be supplemented by on-ship generators running on the ship's fuel supply, allowing sustained power outages of up to one month. To help reduce the demands on the cooling system for the generators and data containers, sea water will be used to cool the AC towers for a claimed power reduction of 30-40%. In a circular fashion, the excess heat from the same equipment will be used to supplement ambient heat on the ship.

While the jokes about purchasing an entire cargo ship and setting sail for international waters have already been told, there are no plans for the ships to leave port -- the massive bandwidth requirements and use of refurbished ships no doubt play large roles in this decision.

Still, the dream of a certain Swedish peer-to-peer site to purchase a "floating data haven" seems to be inching closer and closer by the day.

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Ummm...
By FITCamaro on 1/9/2008 3:16:15 PM , Rating: 2
Why exactly are we building data centers on ships? Land isn't that sparse here in the states.




RE: Ummm...
By Talcite on 1/9/2008 3:25:34 PM , Rating: 2
It makes sense technologically.

The sea water acts as free air conditioning, backup power is provided by engines which are already onboard, and connecting some fiberoptic to a ship is no different from connecting it to a land datacenter. The ships are refurbished, so they've already been built. I'm sure these guys are saving a lot of costs. It just sounds crazy, that's all.


RE: Ummm...
By rippleyaliens on 1/9/2008 3:31:02 PM , Rating: 1
An advantage to this, especially in california, Natural Disasters, fires, earthquakes, etc... Now granted now your DC is floating, there is still risks envolved. Now what i see with this, we have a DC at wherever.. now i can have a CO-LO, that is on a boat. IN the SF area, that is a novel idea in which to have data spread out through-out.. IF a raging storm was comming, the ship could leave port. Much more secure, from the typical exploits.. Unlocked doors, too much walk through traffic.. As security on even a cargo ship is tight, as it is very easy to see if someones commind. Now if navy seals are comming,welllllll too bad, too sad..

I rather have my HOT DC on somehting affordable, and portable, versus 1000 miles away, in a mountain, lol


RE: Ummm...
By TomZ on 1/9/2008 3:40:59 PM , Rating: 2
I'm not sure that the ship leaving port, thereby severing the DC/CO-LO network connections, is a situation that any customer would want because a bad storm rolled in.

I perceive that a ship-based DC would be less reliable than the land-based equivalent.


RE: Ummm...
By retrospooty on 1/9/2008 5:14:20 PM , Rating: 2
"In the SF area, that is a novel idea in which to have data spread out through-out.. IF a raging storm was comming, the ship could leave port."

Storms that are severe enough that ships need to leave port don't hit California ever, so that wont even need to happen.


RE: Ummm...
By SiliconAddict on 1/9/2008 6:09:02 PM , Rating: 2
One word.....tsunami
And if, on the off chance, you think such a thing can't hit the West cost you are delusional.
Three additional words...ring of fire.


RE: Ummm...
By retrospooty on 1/9/2008 6:16:12 PM , Rating: 2
OK, thats possible, but none have hit CA since at least prior to the 1700's, so its pretty good odds.


RE: Ummm...
By rcc on 1/9/2008 7:09:16 PM , Rating: 2
Wrong answer, several have hit this century. Most with minimal damage. But you might look up Crescent City Tsunami some time.

Granted that is "just barely" CA.


RE: Ummm...
By Samus on 1/10/2008 2:23:37 AM , Rating: 2
h4ck d4 g1b$0n!!!


RE: Ummm...
By retrospooty on 1/10/2008 9:33:50 AM , Rating: 2
OK, there has not been a significant tsunami on record. Significant meaning larger utility ships would be damaged.


RE: Ummm...
By masher2 (blog) on 1/10/2008 10:09:27 AM , Rating: 2
See the article thumbnail photo above? That's what happens when a "larger utility ship" encounters 7 meter waves...the size of those in the Crescent City tsunami.

Would it sink the ship? No, but I'd lay odds it'd shut down an onboard datacenter, and server any landline connection.


RE: Ummm...
By rcc on 1/10/2008 5:20:15 PM , Rating: 2
Did you look up the Crescent City tsunami? A significant portion of the downtown area was flooded, and lives lost. They still have city wide (town wide) tsunami drills.


RE: Ummm...
By Mojo the Monkey on 1/11/2008 7:16:33 PM , Rating: 2
Have you been to the SF Bay area? most of the docking areas where this kind of project would take place are on the INSIDE of the bay, where there is virtually no wave presence. Even during a "mighty storm", i think you'd be hard pressed to find a sunken row boat.


RE: Ummm...
By rcc on 1/18/2008 5:17:44 PM , Rating: 2
The comment was that CA didn't have any damaging storms or tsunamis. Not so.


RE: Ummm...
By wushuktl on 1/10/2008 6:56:46 AM , Rating: 2
this is silly. you think a giant cargo ship could outrun a tsunami?


RE: Ummm...
By Mojo the Monkey on 1/11/2008 7:18:01 PM , Rating: 2
While I am not commenting on the feasibilty of disconnecting servers just to outrun a storm; there is a big difference between leaving port ahead of a storm and "outrunning" a storm.


RE: Ummm...
By masher2 (blog) on 1/9/2008 5:48:25 PM , Rating: 4
> "It makes sense technologically"

I disagree. Anything and everything maritime-related is 2-10X more expensive than normal. Maintaining a large ship is enormously costly. Even something as simple as a flush toilet is ridiculously expensive. There are dozens of systems needed on a ship which aren't even neccesary on land...and the constant exposure to moist salt air erodes everything far faster than normal.

Sure, sea water is "free air conditioning", but you can easily pipe sea water to a land-based coastal site...or use river or lake water, which isn't filled with highly-corrosive salt.

The sole advantage I see is it allows you to still site in the Bay area (home to the most expensive real estate market in the nation) and tap into the labor market there.
But personally, I still think it makes more economic sense to build somewhere where both land and labor are cheap,


RE: Ummm...
By Clauzii on 1/9/2008 7:32:52 PM , Rating: 2
Yes. I also don't like the idea of a floating datacenter getting pirated by a bunch of tug boats.

With a great danger of BIG-time data loss.

"Damn, they took our ocean of data!"


RE: Ummm...
By Clauzii on 1/9/2008 7:36:14 PM , Rating: 1
Which btw. brings me back to a Dolphin, a Metalmonster and some large amount of data in my head!

;))