Lots of news this week!
Chuck Talks About Scheduled Fabric
If you listened to Cisco's earnings announcement yesterday (May 17), Chuck Robbins talked about Cisco being in a good position for AI networks because of its implementation of scheduled fabric. While I've been following AI and machine learning (ML) topics for a while, I wasn't familiar with the term "scheduled fabric".
What is Scheduled Fabric?
As described by Cisco, a network fabric is "the mesh of connections between network devices that transports data to its destination". As more physical and virtual elements are added to a network, greater demands are put on both the data and control path resources. Fabric scheduling optimizes the utilization of resources to better handle this ever-growing appetite.
Why is it important to AI?
AI models use a ton of resources. Concerns about AI growth pushing the capacity of existing networks are building. AI workloads can reach many high-speed endpoints running the same application in a synchronized manner. IEEE found that using a distributed synchronized fabric with parallel workloads improved both the scalability and performance of AI models.
Developer AI Tools Wars Heat Up...
Google jumped into the developer AI fray by launching their new version of Studio Bot. This follows the general release of GitHub's Copilot for Business a few months ago and the more recent habit of using ChatGPT to do some coding. In a recent test, the reviewer found that ChatGPT and Copilot had different strengths and weaknesses when it comes to coding. I believe that this competition will only grow in coming years as AI becomes more ingrained across many facets of technology. Do you have a prediction?
...As the Casualties Start Mounting
Stack Overflow reported this week that visits and usage have been dropping steadily since AI tools have become more available. Usage has been dropping by an average of 6% a month since January 2022. In response, Stack Overflow had a reduction in workforce and is now working to launch its own AI offering. Christopher Detzel of LinkedIn talks about how AI can help communities with answering questions more quickly, improved language support, and better data. I definitely see those benefits, but I am concerned about people losing interest in connecting with others.
Communities are crucial gatherings of people, but will AI impact these and isolate people even further, or will people continue to connect around their interests? Share your thoughts!
Live TONIGHT! An Algorave...
... But Don't Get Too Wild
A study from University of Michigan and George Mason University that was released this month looked at how drugs affected work performance for software developers. They found that stimulants were the most commonly used substances, which had a positive impact on focus and productivity, but didn't help creativity. Others weren't as helpful... cannabis seemed to help brainstorming, but was neutral for coding and negative for debugging. Interestingly, they found that alcohol was not helpful overall, but actually helped in debugging. While I'm not condoning any substance use or abuse, maybe it's best to plan your party by your task!
Cisco and AI, community and AI, coding and music, developer proclivities... what do you think? Please share your ideas!
