Networks are a fundamental part of the Google infrastructure. Ask yourself a couple of questions and then you can answer the questions about Googles motivations.
1) Is there any switch that does only what you want? Have any of the features you didn't need interfered with your uptime?
2) In a 48 port high performance switch which is more expensive? The switch or the cables? Why?
So if you 'do the math' the obvious answer sort of pops out.
Disclaimer: I worked there and agreed not to discuss any platform technologies until such time as either Google talked about them publicly or they were disclosed by other means not related to me.
To be honest I don't know. I do know that Google has a tendency to brag about things after they remove them from service so from a practical standpoint its not 'forever' but when I get home I'll check the language.
Hasn't google already talked a bit about this ? They build (and possibly buy some) switches that's OpenFlow enabled, so they can among other things control the forwarding of many switches from a central control plane. e.g. http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2012/04/going-with-the-...
Yes they have talked about things from a software perspective but very little from a hardware/systems perspective. I keep hoping the Open Compute project comes out with a switch design.
1) Is there any switch that does only what you want? Have any of the features you didn't need interfered with your uptime?
2) In a 48 port high performance switch which is more expensive? The switch or the cables? Why?
So if you 'do the math' the obvious answer sort of pops out.
Disclaimer: I worked there and agreed not to discuss any platform technologies until such time as either Google talked about them publicly or they were disclosed by other means not related to me.