I’m still watching the development of the Open Rack specification as part of the Open Compute Project with a lot of hope and excitement. The development os a power bus and changed back to 600mm wide rack is good news. I like the “hardware API” concept because certain “cloud experts” might actually listen:
The Open Rack is more than just a server cabinet; it’s also an abstraction layer between the server and the rack, like a hardware API. The rack’s modular equipment bay — which contains the compute, storage, and other related hardware — provides a large degree of flexibility when it comes to configuration. The Open Rack design guide provides specifications and guidelines to show suppliers of IT equipment how they can build systems compatible with the Open Rack.
It’s probably too early to consider this today, but in the future, this looks like an exciting change in our data centre physical plant.
via Open Rack 1.0 Specification Available Now – Open Compute Project.