Good book, me, book is read, even though some are not as good as I thought they were.
Tubes – The Physical World of the Internet (ugly translation of the book in English Tubes: A Journey to the Center of the Internet), the Andrew Blum, is a book written for curious people who do not have any technical knowledge about the functioning of a computer network. If you've never heard of words like “hub”, “switch”, “optical fiber”, but have heard that your files are in e-mail “cloud”, then you are a strong candidate to start reading Tubes.
Andrew Blum, plus author, is also a journalist who was born and lives in New York and writes about architecture, design, technology, art and travel to various channels like Wired, The New York Times, The New Yorker, Bloomberg Business Week, Metropolis, Popular Science, Gizmodo etc.
What motivated the author to write this book was the curiosity to find out what really makes the Internet work. The vague explanation that our files are in the cloud, that the Internet has no owner, that your files can go through to get to Tokyo in Argentina were not detailed enough to quench the thirst of curiosity Andrew Blum.
This thirst begins when the light goes off your modem and worldwide Internet simply disappears from your computer screen. Investigating with the coach company that provides Internet to their residence, discovers that a simple squirrel chewed the cord “da Internet” and that was enough to let him out of the world's largest network of computers.
Not particularly enjoyed the narrative of the book, because the author tries to describe all the technical behind the Internet with popular terms that facilitate the understanding of lay readers. As my background is technical, have knowledge to understand what is behind the Internet, with their topologies, servers, optical fiber connections, centers interconnects, but the author chose to describe each of these themes humanizing the “techno-babble”.
Start the Journey Pipe
Tubes journey begins explaining about the Internet Map, citing some buildings that serve as major centers of connection across the Internet, called Internet Exchange Points. These buildings are responsible for connecting the networks of various companies with other partners. These local networks of Facebook connect with Google, or with the Microsoft Intel, or your Internet provider with the rest of the world.
These locations receive different connections by optical fibers, of thousands of different sites, and connect to powerful switches that determine the fate of every piece of information that travels on the Web.
Tubes continues the journey and explains a bit more detailed as the network of all networks is alive and why it does not belong to a single controlling body. Since its conception, the Internet was built to be a network that works “on their own”, where nobody can restrict operation.
Internet Feit de luz
Andrew discovers that the Internet and its great speed is closely related to the light, more precisely with the ability of light travel a plastic handle, slightly thicker than a hair, a speed as fast, capable of carrying 40Gbps of data per second!
Even more interesting is to discover that fiber optic cables are played in the oceans to connect continents! Many think that the connections between countries and continents are made exclusively via satellite, but they are ugly mostly through fiber optic cables.
It seems inconceivable that a physical cable crossing across the Atlantic Ocean to connect, eg, the United States to Europe, but that is as it happens and Andrew tells of her experience to accompany the arrival one end of a transatlantic cable on a beach, brought by an ordinary ship.
More surprising to know that the cable is “amended” to one that already exists on the coast and buried in the beach sand. Soon, simple.
Where data sleep
Of course the book also had to rely on data centers, locations on the size of a building, responsible for storing the data of the Internet and also by consuming the same amount of energy from small towns!
Data centers are responsible for creating the feeling that your files are in the clouds, because you do not know exactly where they are and, much less, if you stand in one place at one time.
Your emails Gmail can be stored in five data centers physically scattered in different countries and you, perhaps even Google engineers, know exactly what are these five Data Centers.
Andrew Blum tried to visit a Google Data Center, but, despite the largest Internet company have data of almost all people in the world, few are allowed to enter their Data Centers. Andrew was not one of those lucky, but got permission to visit one of Facebook.
Conclusion
I read this book in the English version. Maybe so, not have a level of English as determined as you like, enjoyed much of the narrative of the author.
I finished the book with the same feeling I get when I read a magazine View or Season: if they took the pages advertising, decrease the weight of the magazine in 70%. No case of Tubes, if the author failed to mention that rented a car to walk along the coast, or the external architecture of the building shows no signs that there was born the main access point to the Internet in that city, certainly save many pages the book.
I understand that the book was written for people who are not technical. My question is whether people who are not technical one days will be interested in reading this book.
This was the recommendation of friend Andre Mello. Overall I liked the book, for I have learned in more detail the physical Internet.
For those who are curious like me, also I recommend reading.
Learn a little more about the author in this video:
Very cool, friend!