edge computing

term

cloudISP & telecom

Running computation near where data is produced or consumed, instead of sending it to a central location first.

The motive is usually latency and sometimes law: physics puts a floor under a round trip to a distant region, and data residency rules can forbid the trip entirely. The cost is operational multiplication - the same workload now runs in many places you do not physically control, with the update, monitoring and key management problems that follow. It is a distribution decision before it is a technology.

Also known as: edge

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