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Microsoft Research Introduces Record-Beating MinuteSort Tech
mikejuk writes "A team from Microsoft Research has taken the lead in the MinuteSort data sorting test using a specially-devised technology: Flat DataCenter Storage. The figures are impressive — 1401 gigabytes in 60 seconds, using 1033 disks across 250 machines. Not only is this three times as much as the previous record, but also, it uses only one sixth of the hardware resources, according to a blog post about the test from Microsoft. One thing that's interesting about the success is the technology used. While solutions such as Hadoop and MapReduce are traditionally used for working with large data sets, Microsoft Research created its own technology called the 'Flat Datacenter Storage,' or FDS for short. This isn't just academic research, of course. The team from Microsoft Research has already been working with the Bing team to help Bing accelerate its search results, and there are plans to use it in other Microsoft technologies."
Sorted by Microsoft
"They are pretty much the only one of the large companies that fund this kind of research"
Bullshit alert.
"Their work does lots of good for the world."
For the world? Or for Microsoft?
Citations needed.
Typically Microsoft develops something impressive-sounding that is good for a news story, but that never gets out of the research labs -- i.e. vapourware as far as the rest of the world is concerned. Typically we hear about Google research projects when there is a chance to try them out. Intel innovations make it into the next chip generation. As a result, Microsoft 'innovation' stories fail to arouse any interest for me at all.
Not sure if troll. Yes, they fund "this kind of research", but to say they are "pretty much the only one of the large companies that [do so]" is absurd. Please see Hadoop's origins (Google). Oh and also IBM who eats this shit for breakfast.
AccountKiller
...yet MinuteSort still takes a minute!
My God can beat up your God. Just kidding...don't take offense. I know there's no God.
Google doesn't really innovate or do any research. The closest you get is the 20% time they give to engineers (note that not for other personnel). In fact, the only real products Google has made in-house are their search engine and gmail. Everything else (YouTube, Google Earth, Maps, Android) have been buy-outs of startups or copied, like Google+.
What about their self-driving cars? What about their glasses and stuff? They have a lot of secret research projects that they are allegedly spending billions on. Are you trolling, or am I misunderstanding you?
Exactly right. Functional self-driving cars aren't really innovations like a fancy coffee table is!
People don't really need silly things like augmented reality glasses or street-level pictures of their mapped destinations - they need internally-inconsistent UIs that change at every major OS version! Thank God we have Microsoft to innovate for us!
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
http://www.research.ibm.com/
They used to have one of the most amazing IT geek magazines.
Not only is this three times as much as the previous record, but also, it uses only one sixth of the hardware resources, according to a blog post about the test from Microsoft.
The important part is not that this is a new approach, but that they beat the previous record using less hardware.
The team from Microsoft Research has already been working with the Bing team to help Bing accelerate its search results, and there are plans to use it in other Microsoft technologies.
So Bing is going to scrape their search results from Google *and* other search engines? :-)
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
From the Wiki (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Research#Laboratories), all of the following have come from MS Research
C#
Comic Chat (IRC Client)
F#
Sideshow (Became Desktop Gadgets)
Surface (TouchLight)
SenseCam
ClearType
Group Shot
Allegiance (Game)
Songsmith
I'd say C#, F#, and ClearType are pretty big contributions
personally i wouldn;t knock any research, funded for "humanity" or profit. If it advances technology eventually it becomes accessible... plus its kinda cool
"Their work does lots of good for the world."
For the world? Or for Microsoft?
Dude, seriously! You do realise this algorithm has been developed to help Microsoft sort through all of the outstanding 'serious security flaw found in IE6' tickets? Why else do you think they'd need 1033 hard drives, and 250 machines?
What about their self-driving cars?
They bought the talent: aka Sebastian Thrun, who worked on many successful self driving cars before being hired by Google.
First of all tons of companies fund research. Lots of papers come out of them of all kinds and plenty more that is never published.
Second of all Microsoft is actually known for being a black hole of research. Researchers go in and almost nothing comes out. They hire people just so their competitors can't hire them. They may do a few demos but nothing commercial comes from them.
I don't doubt that Microsoft Research has made important contributions (even though from the list you posted only C# is something I can put my finger on). Obviously, it's the "They are pretty much the only one" part that is complete nonsense.
Did they actually do anything or just build a machine using todays hardware and lots of funding. A team from yahoo got the record in 2009 hardware has changed alot in the 3 years and when money is not a object couldnt anyone do about the same?
Citations needed.
Here you go. About 14,000 peer reviewed publications for the computer science community, about 10,000 of which were published completely in house by Microsoft Research, and about 4,000 of which were done in collaboration with Universities.
For one moment there, I read "Comic Sans" instead of "Comic Chat".
ClearType invented nothing apart from the name itself.
Sub-pixel rendering was used two decades ago by Apple.
"Back in 1976, my design of the Apple II's high resolution graphics system utilized a characteristic of the NTSC color video signal (called the 'color subcarrier') that creates a left to right horizontal distribution of available colors. By coincidence, this is exactly analogous to the R-G-B distribution of colored sub-pixels used by modern LCD display panels. So more than twenty years ago, Apple II graphics programmers were using this 'sub-pixel' technology to effectively increase the horizontal resolution of their Apple II displays." - Steve Wozniak
More irrational Microsoft hatred from the peanut gallery. Interesting accomplishment from Microsoft Research (a group which has produced all kinds of useful advances in computing and software development, and which has very little to do with shipped products like Outlook, IE6, etc.); Average /. luser interpretation? LOL SHILL ARTICLE FROM TEH MICRO$OFT FAGGORTZ YOU SUCK LOL.
Good to see that a nerd site is inundated with droves of empty-headed group-think religious fanatics!
When you're done masturbating to your imaginary universe, maybe you'd like to sit down with the likes of Simon Peyton-Jones and discuss some of the finer points of the terrible work he and his peers have been doing.
Baa-hahahaha. Right.
Don't all research houses always 'buy' talent by recruiting qualified candidates? Isn't a university the place where people develop skills and then 'sell' themselves to employers?
The big difference is that Microsoft Research is one of the last large corporate research labs focused on pure research. That is, research done for the sake of the research, not to drive product development. Research done at MSR doesn't have to be product driven (it has to be in the general space of software and computers, but that's about the only requirement). MSR is well funded by Microsoft and an integral part of the company's culture.
Sure, IBM, HP, and Intel all have research labs, but their charters have been re-written over the last ten years to focus more on product-centric research. Most research projects at these companies must start with a business plan that shows how the work will be commercialized within 5 years before being approved. This is not the pure research these labs were once known for.
Google, Facebook, Yahoo, and many other internet companies have some interesting projects (self driving cars, for instance), but these tend to be one-off projects and aren't part of a larger, long lived research organization.
Another interesting aspect of MSR is that they encourage all MS developers to take a stint in the organization, not just specially recruited Ph.D.s. It's not uncommon for someone to go from working on a product for a few years, take some time in MSR, then go back to product work.
I've worked directly with many of the research groups mentioned in this post over the last 20 years. Based on my experiences, MSR is truly the last real corporate research group (in the spirit of 20th century PARC/Watson/et al). The others are just part of the product funnels or whims of the founders.
-Chris
The dispute has nothing to do with Microsoft Research. It is the claim that they are the only big company that researches. You even refute this yourself with your mention of IBM. Almost everything Google does is in the name of R&D (hence the high risk/reward business model). Then you extend that outside of the tech industry and look at pharmaceutical research. Look at Monsanto R&D. Look at Boeing R&D.
The GGP was complete troll material.
it just means royalties and licenses go to ms instead of others. this contributed to microsoft, not the world. your citation is invalid, try again. :)
.NET, C#, VB.NET, and F# are all free... Download the .NET framework, fire up a text editor, and use the command-line compiler.
Visual Studio Express versions are free... Wrap a GUI around your development.
Parts of ASP.NET are even open source now... And they're accepting contributions from the public.
What exactly hasn't been contributed?
You immediately lose credibility by citing Steve Gibson.
The type of subpixel rendering done on old Apple IIs essentially treats the color display as a monochrome display of triple the resolution. This is clever and useful, but causes color fringing.
ClearType takes the concept substantially further by applying perceptual modelling to determine how the subpixels can be used. It's similar to MP3 audio, in that the process adds artifacts, but some artifacts will be invisible (or inaudible in MP3's case) to a human. The trick is minimizing the visible artifacts.
For example, if you have a one pixel wide line, it is always safe to shift it one third of a pixel to the left. RGB becomes BRG, which still appears the same.
However, if you have a one third pixel width line, you cannot just use one third of the subpixels. A "white" vertical line would be all red, all green, or all blue, depending on which subpixel it fell on. ClearType would render it using all three subpixels but in the correct color.
There's quite a bit more to it - sometimes you can use a single subpixel depending on what neighbors it, and/or you can adjust adjascent subpixels to mask fringing artifacts.
So yes, sub-pixel rendering isn't a wholly new concept, but saying ClearType isn't novel is willfully ignorant.