{"id":269427,"date":"2020-12-07T07:13:09","date_gmt":"2020-12-07T12:13:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.webscale.com\/?p=269288"},"modified":"2023-12-29T08:05:52","modified_gmt":"2023-12-29T13:05:52","slug":"the-challenges-of-distributed-databases-at-the-edge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.webscale.com\/blog\/the-challenges-of-distributed-databases-at-the-edge\/","title":{"rendered":"The Challenges of Distributed Databases at the Edge"},"content":{"rendered":"

Global Internet traffic in 2021 will be equivalent to 135x the volume of the entire Global Internet in 2005,\u00a0according to Cisco<\/a>. Globally, Internet traffic will reach 30 gigabytes per capita in 2021, up from 10 gigabytes per capita in 2016. Drivers of the huge increase in data volume include networked smart devices, emerging technologies \u2013 like IoT, 5G and AI \u2013 seeing rapid uptake, and manufacturing IIoT. Remote working has also contributed to the trend toward distributed data across 2020 and this looks set to largely continue through 2021. In parallel to this, end users have ever growing expectations for reliable connectivity, superior performance, and fast speed of service.<\/p>\n

Demand is growing for edge computing, which\u00a0offers many advantages<\/a>\u00a0in meeting these needs. By bringing data processing and storage as close as possible to the end user, edge computing offers benefits in speed, reliability and scalability, not to mention efficiency savings. Edge computing is a fast-growing market,\u00a0with Statista forecasting<\/a>\u00a0global revenue to reach $9 billion by 2024. Meanwhile,\u00a0Gartner predicts<\/a>\u00a0that by 2025, three-quarters of enterprise-generated data will be created and processed at the edge (compared to just 10% in 2018).<\/p>\n

Before edge computing can truly deliver on its promise, however, the challenge of distributed databases at the edge needs to be solved. To date, edge computing workloads have been mostly stateless, but changing edge workloads are driving the need for persistent data at the edge. Using cloud and on-premise databases is not the ideal solution. We need to figure out the most efficient way to process the tsunami of data at the edge.<\/p>\n

Why Conventional Distributed Databases Don\u2019t Work at the Edge<\/h3>\n

Conventional distributed databases<\/a>\u00a0depend on the centralized coordination of stateful data, scaling out within a centralized datacenter. They rely on a specific set of design assumptions, including:<\/p>\n