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Edge Computing at Chick-fil-A

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Re: Edge Computing at Chick-fil-A

#141

Post by reaperducer »

coffeesn0b wrote: post #132
reaperducer wrote: post #125

We think of our Edge Computing environment as a “micro private cloud” We call local clouds "fogs."

Interesting - why? (this is Caleb, one of the authors and lead SRE for the project)

Interesting - why?

Because more than one person on the team has a background in meteorology, and to them a localized cloud event is "fog." I think it started as a joke, but it just kind of stuck.

It helps that our events that require localized cloud infrastructure are sporadic, just the way real fog is. And just like real fog, we don't always know where it will be. Once or twice a year we have to deploy about 150 devices to a different location in the desert. Then as quickly as we arrived, we pack up and move on.

Re: Edge Computing at Chick-fil-A

#143

Post by swampthinker »

coffeesn0b wrote: post #130
djhworld wrote: post #64

I enjoyed reading this post, but came away with more questions. They talk about providing a service for developers to deploy stuff easily, but I'm wondering how that works in practise. I've very little experience with Kubernetes, the author mentions they run 'mini' kubernetes clusters at each restaurant. Does that mean they have to deploy software/container updates to each restaurant one by one? Or is it abstracted a…

Hey! Caleb here... I'm the lead SRE building the clusters on the restaurants. Each individual restaurant gets it's own cluster (we aren't fully deployed yet). There are too many network latency challenges and too much immaturity around federated clusters to take the route (unfortunately). We currently use gitops, which houses all the configs per cluster in a single repo per restaurant (CRAZY amount of corgis!)... we…

What were the main issues you faced with Helm?

Re: Edge Computing at Chick-fil-A

#144

Post by ereyes01 »

bradleyankrom wrote: post #6
dpeck wrote: post #4

with articles like this and Mac'd from this YC cohort it seems like an increasingly interesting time in the restaurant/technology space.

the domain is interesting, but I worry about the long-term effects of maximizing efficiencies (read: automation) forpeople who rely on jobs in that industry.

There are certainly negative consequences of automation, and many existing jobs will disappear.

A key feature of the times we live in is that knowledge is ubiquitous. If an idea becomes known and understood to be feasible, and it serves a useful purpose, you can't hide it from existence. If your restaurant doesn't capitalize on these tools to improve efficiency, another one likely will. This might mean that your restaurant gets be out-competed by a better product elsewhere AND your workers will be out of a job.

Trying to freeze a system that works at a given time is becoming more and more difficult as we advance our knowledge and technology. This paradigm of rapid evolution has been playing out since the industrial revolution, and seems to be accelerating with time.

Maybe it ends badly for us in the macro sense, we'll see. I feel for the folks that can't evolve and get left behind, but I'm not sure how to help them. Resisting the change probably won't work.

Re: Edge Computing at Chick-fil-A

#145

Post by Fellshard »

pvg wrote: post #124
chipotle_coyote wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The quoted definition of bigotry as "intolerance toward those who hold different opinions from oneself" is from the New Oxford American Dictionary, from Oxford University Press (the OED people). If that's what Google is using, I don't think I can rely on your definition of "crappy."

Yep, it's a crappy definition that does not reflect current usage. It doesn't even reflect the definition in the OED, if you want to check there. 'Bigotry' is not limited to difference of opinion. Nobody uses it like that, you can take a look at the quoted usage examples here, which are from current publications. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/bigotry

Ahh, yes. Always useful to continuously cherry-pick or alter definitions to tailor words that have an objectively negative moral implication to apply to exactly the standards you want.

Just because some publications use the word in that way does not mean the definition of the word should be shifted.

Re: Edge Computing at Chick-fil-A

#146

Post by legohead »

ballenf wrote: post #75
joezydeco wrote: post #30

Having worked with some of CFA's competition and comparing their IoT architectures, I'd say these guys have their heads on straight. Kudos to them.

I've never been to a retail establishment with anything close to the credit card speed of CFA. The cashier can swipe and grab receipt in one smooth and quick motion. It's so fast you feel like it's broken or slight of hand. I wonder how they do it or why other companies can't or don't do it. CFA stores are so much busier than even an average McDonald's, maybe the efficiency gains are just worth more. No idea how they…

Costco is the fastest I've come across. Haven't tried CFA as I usually do drive-thru.

Most places have convoluted the whole card process. It's slower than cash now...

Re: Edge Computing at Chick-fil-A

#147

Post by caconym_ »

factsaresacred wrote: post #126
caconym_ wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love seeing this argument. It's like you people think you can raise any arbitrary instance of hate/intolerance/ bigotry onto a criticism-proof pedestal simply by brandishing a dictionary. Like, who are the real bigots: Nazis, or the nasty people who have the gall to disagree with their racist, antisemitic, etc. views? Is the answer not obvious? Does the question send you scuttling back under your dictionary? I'm fi…

You're missing the point. I'm not concerned about the word. I'm concerned about the definition - those quickest to cry bigot are often guilty of acting like one themselves. Case-in-point: Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey being forced to apologise for eating at Chick-fil-A during LGBT Month. What kind of bizarre intolerant nonsense is that? Another case-in-point: Boston and Chicago mayors claim "Chick-fil-A values are not [our…

> I'm not concerned about the word. I'm concerned about the definition

Come again?

It seems like you're the one who's missing the point, anyway. You didn't address anything I wrote in my comment. Par for the course, I guess. Just imagine I wrote the exact same comment again, and reply to that if you feel like it.

Re: Edge Computing at Chick-fil-A

#148

Post by saalweachter »

GFischer wrote: post #50
theossuary wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was surprised too, when I saw their name in the Devops Handbook; apparently they were one of the pioneers of Devops. Talking with a previous employee, it sounds like they really reinvented themselves from an IT department to a little tech oasis within the company.

You can find some pretty awesome work on "traditional" companies. There are some pretty cutting-edge projects where I work too :) (but way more legacy migrations and boring financial CRUD apps).

I think one thing that doesn't always occur to programmers who haven't experienced is that really boring problems can be really interesting to work on.

(And really interesting problems can be really boring to work on, and really interesting companies can have a lot of cruft and technical debt under the hood.)

Re: Edge Computing at Chick-fil-A

#149

Post by zzzeek »

timdorr wrote: post #3

If you want to see the actual hardware used at the restaurant, check out the previous blog post: https://medium.com/@cfatechblog/bare-metal-k8s-clustering-at... Spoiler: It's a stack of Intel NUCs.

I'm just trying to understand, I see three of those machines, inside a pretty nice rack, with the switches, routers, a keyboard, I would assume some fairly high quality hard drive / RAID type of thing etc. then the blog post claims "We run our Edge infrastructure on commodity hardware that costs us, ballpark, $1000/restaurant. ". Just the intel nuc I can find on newegg alone costs $349 each, with no memory or harddrive installed, retail. I know they are likely getting amazing volume discounts but it still seems amazing that whole stack could possibly be only $1000 each.

Re: Edge Computing at Chick-fil-A

#150

Post by starshadowx2 »

factsaresacred wrote: post #126
caconym_ wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love seeing this argument. It's like you people think you can raise any arbitrary instance of hate/intolerance/ bigotry onto a criticism-proof pedestal simply by brandishing a dictionary. Like, who are the real bigots: Nazis, or the nasty people who have the gall to disagree with their racist, antisemitic, etc. views? Is the answer not obvious? Does the question send you scuttling back under your dictionary? I'm fi…

You're missing the point. I'm not concerned about the word. I'm concerned about the definition - those quickest to cry bigot are often guilty of acting like one themselves. Case-in-point: Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey being forced to apologise for eating at Chick-fil-A during LGBT Month. What kind of bizarre intolerant nonsense is that? Another case-in-point: Boston and Chicago mayors claim "Chick-fil-A values are not [our…

The paradox of intolerance[1]: being tolerant of those who are intolerant leads to less tolerance. It is completely right to call out intolerant views and actions and work towards eliminating them.

[1] https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Paradox_of_tolerance

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