{"id":10837,"date":"2021-04-23T08:00:32","date_gmt":"2021-04-23T15:00:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/?p=10837"},"modified":"2021-04-22T15:49:45","modified_gmt":"2021-04-22T22:49:45","slug":"building-on-specialized-hardware","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/2021\/04\/23\/building-on-specialized-hardware\/","title":{"rendered":"Building on Specialized Hardware"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When Steve Jobs stepped on stage with his iconic black turtleneck and introduced the iPhone, it changed the way we interact and live. Many described it as magical at the time, but now we take it for granted. The mobile industry has never been the same since.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Each iterative refresh of the iPhone brings software, hardware, and middleware updates \u2014 shipped together as a cohesive, polished and (we hope) secure package. Apple\u2019s control over all aspects of that experience have helped it get an edge against its competition by developing software that runs uniquely well on its hardware. It has also enabled new features like face recognition, avatars, fingerprint readers for payments and integration with other Apple devices.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The idea of building on specialized hardware is nothing new to Apple. Alan Kay, who worked at Apple and was influential in <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.fastcompany.com\/40435064\/what-alan-kay-thinks-about-the-iphone-and-technology-now\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">early portable computing concepts<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and a close collaborator with Steve Jobs, famously said, \u201cPeople who are really serious about software should make their own hardware.\u201d This was in 1982.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It\u2019s no wonder that the concept of specialized hardware is so impactful in the mobile space,\u00a0 where everything is miniaturized, and efficiency and battery life are key. Traditional and especially cloud-based software development, on the other hand, have focused on the opposite side of the coin, with hardware abstracted away from the application developer whenever possible.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In a local development environment, everything but the overarching features of your laptop are abstracted away. Developing on any laptop is the same as long as they have the same architecture and operating system. In a cloud environment, PaaS and SaaS offerings can abstract away hardware even further, removing the concept of hardware completely from the end developer. However having such a high level of abstraction comes at a cost both in price and development.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"10838\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/2021\/04\/23\/building-on-specialized-hardware\/marketplace\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Marketplace.png?fit=931%2C620&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"931,620\" data-comments-opened=\"0\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"Marketplace\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Marketplace.png?fit=300%2C200&amp;ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Marketplace.png?fit=931%2C620&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-10838\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Marketplace.png?resize=500%2C333\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"333\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Marketplace.png?resize=300%2C200&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Marketplace.png?resize=768%2C511&amp;ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Marketplace.png?w=931&amp;ssl=1 931w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" \/><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Types of Cloud Services<\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. Source: <\/span><\/i><a href=\"https:\/\/www.aalpha.net\/blog\/the-difference-between-paas-iaas-and-saas\/\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Aalpha<\/span><\/i><\/a><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The idea of software being truly modular and independent from hardware is the core tenet of modern software development. The proliferation of Docker, Kubernetes, and the unlimited scale of public clouds has enforced the idea that you can write software without worrying about the underlying hardware.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">However upon further inspection this statement breaks down. In application development, many modern programming languages have compilers that poll hardware in an attempt to apply architecture-specific, and in many times, cpu-specific optimizations. Virtualization software interacts with specific hardware to provide a standard execution environment and comes with relatively steep performance penalties. Even the hyperscale clouds such as Google and AWS that famously built their server backend on commercial hardware [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.pcworld.com\/article\/112891\/article.html\">Google&#8217;s Secret: &#8216;Cheap and Fast&#8217; Hardware | PCWorld<\/a>] <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> in the early 2000s and gave credence to the golden standard that servers should be built on \u201ccommodity hardware\u201d and are quickly moving to specialized hardware as they chase efficiency gains.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Traditional companies that build homegrown data centers using turnkey server solutions from OEM\u2019s like Dell, HP, and Lenovo have long struggled to match the experience that developers get from public clouds. Private clouds have also struggled to match the efficiency and scale of performance that public clouds provide. While it is true that hyperscalers have talented infrastructure teams and innovative methods to build their data centers, that&#8217;s not enough to explain the vast differences between private and public clouds. Increasingly, it&#8217;s because public clouds are running optimized software on specialized hardware.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">By buying into this idea that software should be truly abstracted from hardware you almost always incur financial cost. In a local development setting, you either have to spend more of your resources executing the code, which could lead to the need to buy a better computer. In a cloud environment, you end up paying the cloud provider to manage interacting with the hardware on your behalf. This leads to a trade-off between utilization, performance, and cost.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Building the hardware to suit your software \u2014 instead of the other way around \u2014 can increase performance and utilization dramatically.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0\u00a0 <img decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"10839\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/2021\/04\/23\/building-on-specialized-hardware\/publiccloud\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/PublicCloud.png?fit=723%2C672&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"723,672\" data-comments-opened=\"0\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"PublicCloud\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/PublicCloud.png?fit=300%2C279&amp;ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/PublicCloud.png?fit=723%2C672&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-10839\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/PublicCloud.png?resize=500%2C465\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"465\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/PublicCloud.png?resize=300%2C279&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/PublicCloud.png?w=723&amp;ssl=1 723w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" \/><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Private vs Public Cloud Cost per Server. <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Source: <\/span><\/i><a href=\"https:\/\/451research.com\/images\/Marketing\/press_releases\/CPI_Graphic.jpg\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">451 Research<\/span><\/i><\/a><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The reality is, optimizing your hardware doesn\u2019t make sense at small scale. However many companies are now coming to the realization that their cloud costs are skyrocketing. If you offer a product that is closely tied to infrastructure like servers and network delivery, it\u2019s clear that these costs not only eat into your revenue, but limit your surface area for innovation. At some point, the advantages of more specialized hardware become apparent.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Companies and the community at large are realizing that building software with the underlying hardware in mind can yield significant advantages. Apple was frustrated with the performance and thermal characteristics they had with Intel CPUs, in part due to the fact that Intel CPUs are not built specifically for Apple&#8217;s use case. As a result, they recently released a lineup of new laptops and desktops that use custom Apple M1 chips, built upon the expertise developing chips for the iPhone. Their performance is often times better than their Intel-based offerings when the software is written to take advantage of the new architecture.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> <img decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"10840\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/2021\/04\/23\/building-on-specialized-hardware\/macworld\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/MacWorld.png?fit=1199%2C609&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"1199,609\" data-comments-opened=\"0\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"MacWorld\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/MacWorld.png?fit=300%2C152&amp;ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/MacWorld.png?fit=1024%2C520&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-10840\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/MacWorld.png?resize=500%2C254\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"254\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/MacWorld.png?resize=300%2C152&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/MacWorld.png?resize=1024%2C520&amp;ssl=1 1024w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/MacWorld.png?resize=768%2C390&amp;ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/MacWorld.png?w=1199&amp;ssl=1 1199w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" \/><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Macbook Pro Geekbench 5 Performance Benchmarks<\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. Source: <\/span><\/i><a href=\"https:\/\/www.macworld.com\/article\/234838\/13-inch-macbook-pro-m1-review-amazing-breakthroughs-in-processing-and-battery-performance.html\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Macworld<\/span><\/i><\/a><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Companies are also trying to build specialized server hardware that will enable private data centers to have the similar speed, scalability, and management advantages that hyperscalers like AWS and Google have developed for their own use. Having seen companies like Nebula<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, a now-defunct company that tried to provide a public cloud-like experience with \u201ccommodity hardware\u201d and failed, new \u201cbare-metal\u201d companies are emerging that try to develop custom hardware for specific applications. Oxide took the same idea as Nebula but is building a specialized open source server that is specifically geared for data center users. By doing so they are looking to bring hyperscale-type benefits to smaller companies with specific needs.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"10841\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/2021\/04\/23\/building-on-specialized-hardware\/oxide\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Oxide.png?fit=1999%2C1999&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"1999,1999\" data-comments-opened=\"0\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"Oxide\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Oxide.png?fit=300%2C300&amp;ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Oxide.png?fit=1024%2C1024&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-10841\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Oxide.png?resize=300%2C300\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Oxide.png?resize=300%2C300&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Oxide.png?resize=1024%2C1024&amp;ssl=1 1024w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Oxide.png?resize=150%2C150&amp;ssl=1 150w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Oxide.png?resize=768%2C768&amp;ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Oxide.png?resize=1536%2C1536&amp;ssl=1 1536w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Oxide.png?resize=174%2C174&amp;ssl=1 174w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Oxide.png?w=1999&amp;ssl=1 1999w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" \/><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Oxide Company Logo. Source: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.crunchbase.com\/organization\/oxide\">Crunchbase\u00a0<\/a><\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As developers start looking to specialized hardware for performance gains, public cloud companies and data centers are beginning to offer access at the hardware level to developers. One such example is Equinix Metal with their \u201cmetal-as-a-service\u201d offering, launched as Packet in 2014<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and acquired by data center giant Equinix in 2020. Built with the end developer in mind, Equinix Metal enables developer-driven companies to build performant software by providing direct access to specialized hardware.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"10842\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/2021\/04\/23\/building-on-specialized-hardware\/equinixmetal\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/EquinixMetal.png?fit=1760%2C420&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"1760,420\" data-comments-opened=\"0\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"EquinixMetal\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/EquinixMetal.png?fit=300%2C72&amp;ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/EquinixMetal.png?fit=1024%2C244&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-10842\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/EquinixMetal.png?resize=499%2C119\" alt=\"\" width=\"499\" height=\"119\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/EquinixMetal.png?resize=300%2C72&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/EquinixMetal.png?resize=1024%2C244&amp;ssl=1 1024w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/EquinixMetal.png?resize=768%2C183&amp;ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/EquinixMetal.png?resize=1536%2C367&amp;ssl=1 1536w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/EquinixMetal.png?w=1760&amp;ssl=1 1760w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 499px) 100vw, 499px\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" \/><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Equinix Metal Logo <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Source: <\/span><\/i><a href=\"https:\/\/dka575ofm4ao0.cloudfront.net\/pages-transactional_logos\/retina\/8704\/Equinix_Metal_Standard_RGB.png\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Equinix<\/span><\/i><\/a><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">At the very beginning of computing, computers and mainframes often had custom programs or basic operating systems that were unique to their individual hardware. Programs were often written in machine code or as system instructions. With the widespread appeal of operating systems and personal computers in the late 1980s, programs finally had both the capability to and the need to be portable and hardware agnostic. As time has progressed, tools and software was developed and adopted to further divide software from hardware. However as we reach the end of Moore&#8217;s Law, we no longer have the ability to increase hardware performance for unoptimized software. In order to build faster and more complex software, we must start optimized first on hardware and eventually build hard for specific software applications. <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When Steve Jobs stepped on stage with his iconic black turtleneck and introduced the iPhone, it changed the way we interact and live. Many described it as magical at the time, but now we take it for granted. The mobile industry has never been the same since. Each iterative refresh of the iPhone brings software,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":60,"featured_media":10717,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Building on Specialized Hardware by Ashvin Nihalani @equinixmetal @equinix","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1363,83,2143],"tags":[4275,4404,4636,3439,4637,4638,4639],"class_list":["post-10837","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-episodes","category-articles","category-exclusive-content","tag-ashvin-nihalani","tag-equinix-metal","tag-metal-as-a-service","tag-packet","tag-private-data-centers","tag-public-cloud-companies","tag-specialized-hardware"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Building on Specialized Hardware - Software Engineering Daily<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/2021\/04\/23\/building-on-specialized-hardware\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Building on Specialized Hardware - Software Engineering Daily\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"When Steve Jobs stepped on stage with his iconic black turtleneck and introduced the iPhone, it changed the way we interact and live. 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