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Workstream: A fast virtual computer you can use for anything

workstream.paperspace.com

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Re: Workstream: A fast virtual computer you can use for anything

#91

Post by microcolonel »

bransonf wrote: post #88

Curious what folks think the outlook on this technology is. Rather, will there be any significant shift towards centralized compute in the next decade? Currently, a large institution/corporation has to manage thousands of individual machines. Say a physical component fails, now a technician must go to the location of the machine and give the user a temporary replacement. Alternatively, in a centralized compute enviro…

> they could just allocate a new machine, and work entirely out of a data center.

Not really, you still have to manage endpoints, and they still have peripherals. One of the big advantages to systems like this is access to high-performance compute, but generally you'll want good displays and peripherals to interface with machines like that.

With a remoting system, you also need to make sure that your network performs well enough not to cause strain for your workers.

All that is not to say that it's exactly the same workload, but it may not be as major of an improvement in administrative complexity as it seems at first blush.

Re: Workstream: A fast virtual computer you can use for anything

#92

Post by atian »

woah wrote: post #78

I've used Paperspace's Gradient product (hosted Jupyter notebooks), and while it is cheaper than most other options, I can't recommend it. The service has a very janky feel. When I first started, there was an issue where my instance was was stuck "shutting down" for half an hour or more and I couldn't access my code. Then there was a weird issue where some kind of geographical split between different types of instanc…

I also can't recommend them. Service is operational when working, but the times it isn't working as expected I don't have the patience to message support. Things just aren't straightforward.

This was 2 years ago when I used them to run a couple of Windows apps for work.

Re: Workstream: A fast virtual computer you can use for anything

#93

Post by Jiger104 »

tone wrote: post #11

Looks quite interesting. I could really use a Windows box that I could use for a few games while I'm isolated not at home with only my Macbook Pro.

Shadow.tech I have had good experiences with. It does take a while to go from sign-up to them actually spinning up a machine for you but the latency is extremely good for cloud gaming.

Re: Workstream: A fast virtual computer you can use for anything

#94

Post by gnade »

nodesocket wrote: post #65

Does it support snapshotting a machine after you configure it and install all your custom software then create a new machine from the snapshot?

Yes! Sorry this isn't more obvious: https://support.paperspace.com/hc/en-us/articles/236402867-T...

Re: Workstream: A fast virtual computer you can use for anything

#95

Post by Jiger104 »

corenting_ wrote: post #42

Another interesting solution for this is : https://shop.shadow.tech/usen/pre-order . They are currently expanding to some countries including the US.

I've had great experience with shadow. I am pretty close to one of their servers (Dallas) so get around 8ms ping, but even up to 40ms ping it works very well.

Re: Workstream: A fast virtual computer you can use for anything

#96

Post by aspenmayer »

capableweb wrote: post #71
rubicks wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The ... host guarantees... This is a really hard problem with "solutions" that usually run counter to privacy and, you know, controlling the machine consuming your electricity. Remote Attestation has come a long way, but (at least on Linux) still in its infancy.

First time I hear about "Remote Attestation", got any trusted sources/resources for someone to read up on it more? (besides Wikipedia and it's sources)

Here's some words Red Hat folks wrote[0] about Keylime[1][2], "open source scalable trust system harnessing TPM Technology,"[3] written in python and rust, originally created within MIT Lincoln Labs.[4] It leverages TMP 1.2 and 2.0[5] and also involves/includes/references code from Intel[6] and Cloudflare[7].

[0] https://next.redhat.com/2019/06/25/keylime-using-tpm-to-secu...

[1] https://keylime.dev/

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qhr_aVBCZPw

[3] https://github.com/keylime/keylime

[4] https://www.ll.mit.edu/news/laboratory-staff-develop-new-cyb...

[5] https://github.com/tpm2-software

[6] https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/architecture-and-tec...

[7] https://github.com/cloudflare/cfssl

Re: Workstream: A fast virtual computer you can use for anything

#97

Post by Legogris »

dkobran wrote: post #8
laurentdc wrote: post #2

I think the pricing section has a few mistakes under Monthly $1343 / hour $1.84 effective hourly price

Nice catch, typo (the values are correct but the text said "/hour" instead of "/month"). Disclosure: I work on Workstream

I really wish that the monthly flat rates were included when hourly prices are quoted on the pricing page and with "only pay for what you use" on the front page. Right now it's very easy to get a first impression of feeling misled.

Re: Workstream: A fast virtual computer you can use for anything

#98

Post by techntoke »

atian wrote: post #92
woah wrote: post #78

I've used Paperspace's Gradient product (hosted Jupyter notebooks), and while it is cheaper than most other options, I can't recommend it. The service has a very janky feel. When I first started, there was an issue where my instance was was stuck "shutting down" for half an hour or more and I couldn't access my code. Then there was a weird issue where some kind of geographical split between different types of instanc…

I also can't recommend them. Service is operational when working, but the times it isn't working as expected I don't have the patience to message support. Things just aren't straightforward. This was 2 years ago when I used them to run a couple of Windows apps for work.

Same here, except I did message support and just as you'd expect they gave me the run around.

Re: Workstream: A fast virtual computer you can use for anything

#99

Post by jedieaston »

kim0 wrote: post #81
t0astbread wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed, something like "Netlify for virtual machines" would be useful. You could probably get close by auto-deploying from GitHub Actions but you wouldn't get the main benefit of a service like that (having ops done in a clean way without having to think much about it). Without having any experience in the field, aren't lambda functions supposed to provide something like that?

Sorry I'm not getting the main value prop from this. I'm mainly an ops person. Can you please explain what that service would look like?

The host would prove that the source available online is the exact same code running on the instance, so you know that it wasn't modified by the developer/bad-guy before it went into production.
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