On Sun, Apr 19, 2009 at 6:14 PM, Krishna Sankar (ksankar) <span dir="ltr">&lt;<a href="mailto:ksankar@cisco.com">ksankar@cisco.com</a>&gt;</span> wrote:<br><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
<div id=":674" class="ii gt">But then SaaS is Software over PaaS; PaaS is fabric over IaaS; IaaS is compute, storage and network. Isn&#39;t fabric the P is PaaS ? and in IaaS, we see raw compute/storage/network ?<br>
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If we want to maintain the Software-Platform-Infrastructure terminology hierarchy I am fine with that. Then we should switch the fabric and the Compute-Storage-Network.</div></blockquote></div><br>[Ab]use of the term &quot;<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fabric_computing">fabric</a>&quot; to refer to software platforms like Azure is so far as I can tell a fairly recent trend (and one I&#39;m relatively unconvinced by). Granted the contept (whereby many interconnected nodes, when viewed from a distance, appear to be a single coherent &quot;fabric&quot;) could be applied to both hardware and software, but it is <a href="http://www.webopedia.com/TERM/f/fabric.html">most often applied</a> to low level, interconnected hardware such as SANs and InfiniBand... and <a href="http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/community/features/interviews/blog/fabric-computing/?cs=22018">servers</a>:<br>
<br><blockquote style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;" class="gmail_quote"><span class="bold"></span><b>What is fabric computing and how does it improve upon current server technology?</b><br>
The simplest way to think about it is the next-generation architecture
for enterprise servers. Fabric computing combines powerful server
capabilities and advanced networking features into a single server
structure.<br></blockquote><br>We do need something to refer to the underlying hardware/firmware but I&#39;m even less convinced by proposed alternatives (&quot;unified computing&quot; being the most obvious example). Perhaps &quot;Hardware Fabric&quot; would clarify?<br>
<br>Sam<br><br>