[HN Gopher] GlobalFoundries joins Google's open source silicon i...
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       GlobalFoundries joins Google's open source silicon initiative
        
       Author : proppy
       Score  : 113 points
       Date   : 2022-08-03 17:19 UTC (5 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (opensource.googleblog.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (opensource.googleblog.com)
        
       | ricksunny wrote:
       | Been a while since I was in the semiconductor industry, but it
       | looks like this open-sourcing is intended to free up the
       | ecosystem from dependence on Cadence EDA. Nice, could open up
       | opportunity for creation of a lot of cottage fabless
       | semiconductor startups. (does anyone known whether Cadence had
       | ever gotten on the freemium offering model?)
        
       | redanddead wrote:
       | I might get some hate for this, but Google seems to be doing some
       | really cool things, like in fintech as well as this silicon
       | project. Google Finance is one of the only players I've seen with
       | an interest of opening things up when so much of the industry is
       | about pushing others out and restricting access. Like for example
       | the CME deal, to open source live, low latency stock market data.
       | Bloomberg might let you rent it for 25k a year if you're lucky.
       | Google? Yeah just hook into the websocket bro, it's free.
       | 
       | Someone's gotta do it
       | 
       | Most of the stock market data the avg person sees is 15 minutes
       | delayed by request of the NYSE, and in a world where trades are
       | reaching the 3 millisecond and below mark, that's a very long
       | time. So Google opening up what could be <20ms data might be able
       | to help some applications. Not saying it's a silver bullet
       | either.
       | 
       | I wish they would take on even more big projects that need to be
       | tackled. Like I want to see a google branded remote controlled
       | barge out in the pacific garbage patch that the public is
       | controlling through a google web app or some other insane, good
       | projects. Idk when you deal with finance companies all day, even
       | google seems moral.
       | 
       | However, it's not looking good this quarter for all tech cos
        
         | beambot wrote:
         | It's "free" until it's sunset with no notice. Google is
         | _notorious_ for doing this. RIP Reader.
        
         | api wrote:
         | Wow, how things have changed. I've been here since back when
         | Google could do no wrong. Now they're a poster child for shady
         | surveillance capitalism.
         | 
         | Same with Elon Musk. I remember him being compared to a comic
         | book hero. Now he's an alt-right racist (if you are a leftist)
         | or an evil globalist technocrat (if you are a rightist).
        
           | kranke155 wrote:
           | If you're Ukrainian he's a National hero.
        
           | mistrial9 wrote:
           | > poster child for shady surveillance capitalism
           | 
           | as well they should be, they carried it forward like Atlas
           | carrying the globe.. in the beginning it was competition,
           | then, we could not stop..
        
           | scarface74 wrote:
           | From day one Google's business plan was ads - except for the
           | brief time where they were selling "Google Search
           | Appliances".
           | 
           | Every company whose business model isn't "I give them money
           | and they give me stuff" is shady.
        
           | mlindner wrote:
           | > Same with Elon Musk. I remember him being compared to a
           | comic book hero. Now he's an alt-right racist (if you are a
           | leftist) or an evil globalist technocrat (if you are a
           | rightist).
           | 
           | He hasn't changed though, and little has changed in what he's
           | actually doing too. If anything, he's more mellow now than he
           | was when he was younger. People's impressions of him have
           | been highly twisted IMO.
        
             | api wrote:
             | Yeah, he's neither a comic book hero nor a monster. He's a
             | rich dude who's pretty smart and decided to risk a bunch of
             | his helping build up companies working in important
             | innovative fields, but unfortunately he also trolls and
             | overshares on Twitter like a 13 year old.
        
         | mszcz wrote:
         | > Like for example the CME deal, to open source live, low
         | latency stock market data. Bloomberg might let you rent it for
         | 25k a year if you're lucky. Google? Yeah just hook into the
         | websocket bro, it's free.
         | 
         | Cursory search turned up nothing for me. Can you point me in
         | the direction where I can find free (or low cost) market data
         | that you mentioned?
        
           | redanddead wrote:
           | https://cloud.google.com/blog/topics/financial-
           | services/buil...
           | 
           | This link has more info
        
             | geph2021 wrote:
             | That seems really cool, thanks for posting. However, I did
             | notice that their demo does not seem to have any live
             | prices right now (the demo is a couple years old, so maybe
             | no longer live): https://showcase.withgoogle.com/marketdata
             | 
             | Also, to the point about Bloomberg's high subscription
             | fees, they provide all imaginable financial data under the
             | sun. This google demo with CME is just CME data, which is a
             | small, albeit important, part of market data, let alone the
             | broader financial data. Furthermore, in many cases the data
             | itself is owned by the exchanges, so Bloomberg's fees
             | reflect passing on the (at times exorbitant) exchange fees.
             | NYSE, NASDAQ, CME, etc.. are historically the ones that are
             | the gatekeepers of the data and putting up financial
             | barriers.
        
               | redanddead wrote:
               | Yeah the bloomberg terminal is still good value if you're
               | going to be using that data, and a relatively good price.
               | Good point about the exchanges
        
             | gregsadetsky wrote:
             | I see that CME is using GCP to offer its data stream, but
             | it doesn't seem free.
             | 
             | "This innovative collaboration with Google Cloud will not
             | only make it easier for _our clients_ to access the data
             | [...] CME Group _customers_ will be able to access all
             | real-time CME Group data [...] " (emphasis mine) [0]
             | 
             | As for [1], it has a Contact Us form and a link to [2]
             | which talks about onboarding and an "On-demand, pay as you
             | go model".
             | 
             | Could you point to the free market data pub/sub and/or
             | specific steps to recreate the demo? Thanks!
             | 
             | [0] https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/cme-group-to-
             | offer-...
             | 
             | [1] https://www.cmegroup.com/market-data/connect-
             | data/cloud-mdp....
             | 
             | [2] https://dataservices.cmegroup.com/Data-Products
        
         | gurjeet wrote:
         | > ... data the avg person sees is 15 minutes delayed ..., that
         | may as well be a light year.
         | 
         | Nit pick: you've got your units mixed up; minute is a unit of
         | time, and light-year is a unit of distance.
        
           | redanddead wrote:
           | fixed, thank you
        
             | Teodolfo wrote:
             | In some unit systems
             | (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geometrized_unit_system)
             | they are both units of length.
        
           | sitkack wrote:
           | I blame George Lucas for this.
        
         | scarface74 wrote:
         | Don't be too impressed. Every company is interested in "opening
         | things up" when it's to their competitive advantage.
         | 
         | You notice that "open" Android is increasingly dependent on
         | closed source "Google Play Services" and Google uses the closed
         | source parts to beat OEMs into submission?
        
         | dogleash wrote:
         | I ain't hating but "commoditizing your complement" is just
         | pushing others out and restricting access with extra steps.
         | 
         | Admittedly, the bones they'll throw us in the process do look
         | like they'll be cool, tho.
        
           | onlyrealcuzzo wrote:
           | As a consumer, you want everything to be a commodity (i.e.
           | and abundance of choice). This means you'll have more options
           | at every price point.
        
             | bee_rider wrote:
             | I would expect a commodity to be produced with pretty low
             | margins (since the competition is pretty fierce), but not
             | for free. If Google is giving away the information for
             | free, is that really a commodity? I mean either they are
             | giving it away for some strategic reason, they are taking
             | their cut in some more byzantine way, or they have decided
             | to act as a charity for at-home traders for some reason.
        
               | Dracophoenix wrote:
               | Information itself is a commodity. An encyclopedia
               | doesn't have value have because it costs money but the
               | vice versa. Wikipedia is free, yet it has done more for
               | the world in 20 years than the _Brittanica_ has in 250.
               | 
               | I'm not suggesting Google gives away information as a
               | purely altruistic endeavor. However, Google's ulterior
               | motives, should they have any, are irrelevant to the
               | value of the information itself so long as it hasn't been
               | edited or tampered with.
        
             | redanddead wrote:
             | That never actually happens though, what ends up happening
             | is that people realize it's better to be a literal cartel
             | and MONOPOLY!
             | 
             | And you get the worst of all deals, see Shrinkflation
             | 
             | My point is we shouldn't trust businesses to be moral, and
             | I don't. I'm just angry at the NYSE
        
             | dogleash wrote:
             | >As a consumer, you want everything to be a commodity
             | 
             | True. But I'm also guessing that in 5 years I'll be more
             | frustrated at the level of control they're exercising with
             | thing they're currently building next to it. More so than I
             | am with the market they're commoditising today.
        
           | konschubert wrote:
           | When things get commoditised, it's good for consumers.
           | 
           | Competition is good.
        
       | colordrops wrote:
       | Hopefully this doesn't eventually go the way of Android where
       | they nerf the open source version and make it very difficult to
       | run without proprietary bits.
        
         | dragonelite wrote:
         | Pretty much this, just run android without GMS and you quickly
         | discover how limited it can be if you don't know what your
         | doing.
        
         | google234123 wrote:
         | This is a shitpost.
        
           | colordrops wrote:
           | What did I say that was inaccurate or untrue?
        
           | scarface74 wrote:
           | https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2018/07/googles-iron-grip-
           | on...
        
           | sorry_outta_gas wrote:
           | The emails leaked a few years ago on twitter say different
        
             | monetus wrote:
             | Have a link? Curious, but seemingly hard to find.
        
       | skywal_l wrote:
       | Can somebody ELI5 this to me? Wbo will that help? And how? 180nm
       | seems big, at least for computer CPUs.
        
       | unity1001 wrote:
       | Good initiative.
        
       | newaccount2021 wrote:
        
       | gchadwick wrote:
       | When the first open SkyWater 130nm PDK came out, with Google
       | paying for free shuttle runs I did wonder how long the money
       | would keep going. I assumed they'd fund a handful of shuttles in
       | the hope that kick starts wider usage.
       | 
       | With this announcement and the other SkyWater 90nm they're
       | bringing out (https://opensource.googleblog.com/2022/07/SkyWater-
       | and-Googl...) it looks like they're keen to fund this for the
       | long haul which is fantastic news.
       | 
       | I think there's great potential in open silicon but precious
       | little of it around right now. Open tooling is still in early
       | development stages in particular for implementation flows (i.e.
       | actually producing a silicon layout from your RTL design).
       | Development here is stifled by how closed this world is. Open
       | PDKs, that can be used for real chips, are a great boon and I
       | hope will really accelerate developments.
        
       | Kukumber wrote:
        
         | [deleted]
        
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       (page generated 2022-08-03 23:00 UTC)