Technology in Edge

The age of technological ubiquity

In our daily lives we use our laptop, mobile phone or smartwatch and we already consider them essential devices without doubting that connectivity and their functionalities are always available.

In the domestic environment phrases such as: "Alexa! Put the washing machine on" or "Google! Make me a coffee" are becoming more and more common and more devices are becoming part of this area (entertainment systems, lighting devices, air conditioning, automatic doors, household appliances...)

But this does not end at home, it continues to spread throughout our daily social environment, on product labels, in the environmental sensors of our city, in the monitoring devices of our grandparents or even in the emergency beacon of our car.

Everything tends to connect, and therefore not everything remains the same, the limits we have seen in the use of technology are being completely erased because:

• We no longer work in the office and we connect from anywhere and with multiple devices.

• Connectivity and bandwidth have increased exponentially, with access to a large amount of data.

• The majority of the digital systems that surround us are a PC in themselves with capabilities far superior to those of a few years ago.

• The cloud (the famous Cloud) has become popular for the storage and execution of processes and applications.

We need something else, Edge

This ubiquity of technology and connected equipment cannot be managed in the same way as centralised systems, we cannot expect the scope of operation to be infinite and controlled from a single central point. Decentralisation of connectivity and devices needs to go hand in hand with decentralisation of control and enforcement. The perimeter (Edge) must have a processing capability, so that its boundaries can be erased.

Therefore, Edge could be defined as the post-perimeter. In the past, any operation requiring data processing relied on physical data centres, with a very limited perimeter of operation. Edge distributes processing capacity around us, taking advantage of the devices around us, the high data transport capabilities and the processing power of any current device.

As we said, the popularisation of smart devices, the rise of the IoT that allows us to collect and make data available ubiquitously, which has been supported by the increase in transfer speeds, low latency and high bandwidths. These devices, in turn, have increasingly greater processing capabilities, and therefore open the door to what we call Edge Computing, the ability to process beyond the perimeter, beyond data centers.

Gadgets

Like everything in life, nothing is as easy as it seems. This new paradigm also leads to new situations where processing power and execution autonomy on Edge is key.

Taking advantage of the technological advances that science brings us, sometimes leads us to the absurd, and therefore we must not only look for functionality but t we need reliability and robustness in a non-negotiable way.

Edge Requirements

Edge must therefore take advantage of the current advantages that technology offers:

• The low latency of communications and the business opportunities it provides.

• Improved bandwidths to take advantage of both communications with the cloud and with other devices.

• The expansion of connectivity to almost every corner of the territory.

But in turn, we must also be aware of the risks and limitations and take them very seriously in order to create reliable and robust environments:

• Bandwidth can be an advantage, but in some cases it can be a constraint and therefore we must adapt the operation to its availability.

• Business continuity, equipment and systems must maintain their functionality at all times. Customer dissatisfaction will put any extra functionality on the back burner, as well as the obligation to guarantee the operation of systems that may be critical or cause risk.

• Data exposure, now distributed across the Edge and more exposed than ever, must be protected and encrypted against intrusion to maintain privacy.

• Identity management must draw the line between what is ours and what belongs to others. The perimeter is fluid and we must manage our identity efficiently.

We cannot let Edge and "cool" functionalities dominate the possibilities of the digital, we must use and integrate robustness, reliability, security and usability into product and solution development flows if we want technology and Edge to be a help and not a problem.