Facebook shares design details

Facebook has become ‘vanity-free.’ Firstly, it is openly sharing the design details of its new green datacentre with competitors. Secondly, by leaving servers free from paint, logos, stickers and a front panel more than 120 tonnes of material does not have to be manufactured – saving time and cost.

Through the “Open Compute Project,” Facebook, apparently, wants to encourage others in the industry to collaborate for best practices on datacentre and server technology.

“Facebook and our development partners have invested tens of millions of dollars over the past two years to build upon industry specifications to create the most efficient computing infrastructure possible," said Jonathan Heiliger, vice president of technical operations at Facebook.

By publishing technical specifications and mechanical CAD files for the centre’s servers, power supplies, server racks and building design the social networking site are showing the industry, openly, what can be achieved and how.

Heiliger added. “These advancements are good for Facebook, but we think they could benefit all companies. We think it's time to demystify the biggest capital expenses of an online business – the infrastructure."

The datacentre supposedly uses 38 per cent less energy, doing the same work, than the company’s present facilities – and at 24 per cent less cost. With all the information presented on a platter, rivals of the networking site would be foolish not to look further.