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The concept of open source is seeping into every nook and cranny of the technology industry. Now it’s reached the data center.
Last week, GreenM3 announced a partnership with the University of Missouri to form an open source data center design initiative.
Industry veteran Mike Manos said that this effort is “focused around putting together an open and free engineering framework upon which data center designs, technologies, and the like can be quickly put together” and to “standardize the approaches that both end-users and engineering firms approach the data center industry.”
In his blog post, Manos said that too many data center design firms rely on black box designs to bilk their customers and stifle innovation. The former Microsoft guru said that open source is necessary to reduce risk and improve quality in the the data center.
With an open source mentality, he said, “we will be able to start driving true visibility of costs both upfront and operating and associate those costs with the set designs with differences and trending from regions around the world.”
Manos acknowledged that not everyone in the industry will be happy about this new open approach to data center design.
“We certainly expect there to be some resistance to this approach out there and in fact some outright negativity from those firms that make the most of the black box complexity components,” Manos said.
