Software Defined Networking standard bearer the Open Networking Foundation (ONF) and ON.Lab have merged with designs on further pushing SDN benchmarks and open source software development of the technology.+More on Network World: Gartner Top 10 technology trends you should know for 2017+According to the groups, the merger will create a single organization under the ONF name. Joint operations will begin immediately, and will be led by ON.Lab founder and executive director, Guru Parulkar. Dan Pitt, an SDN, OpenFlow protocol proponent, left the ONF executive director position recently and ONF technical director Rick Bauer is currently listed as interim executive director but will now serve as ONF’s head of standards. ONF will be governed by an interim board of directors through the end of 2017.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
The SURFboard SB6190 is the first Gigabit+ cable modem available in retail, and is compatible with major US Cable Internet Providers like Xfinity by Comcast, Time Warner, Cox, Brighthouse and many others, so you can ditch their cable modem (along with their rental fee) and regain control. It harnesses the power of DOCSIS 3.0 technology to bond up to thirty two downstream channels and eight upstream channels--providing you advanced multimedia services with data rates up to 1.4 Gbps download and 131 Mbps upload depending on your Cable Internet provider service. That makes streaming HD Video, gaming, shopping, downloading, working, high-quality voice and video conferencing, and peer-to-peer networking applications far more realistic, faster, and efficient than ever before. It averages 4.5 out of 5 stars on Amazon from over 4,100 people (read reviews). Its typical list price of $149.99 has been reduced 25% to $111.99. See it now on Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Data is piling up, and storage keeps getting faster thanks to flash, so the networks that link it all together need to keep up, too.Both traditional Fibre Channel and more general-use protocols used in storage keep steadily ratcheting up performance. On Wednesday, Cisco Systems is boosting the speed of long-distance storage links for disaster recovery and business continuity. It’s also introducing higher speeds for IP (Internet Protocol) storage networks in data centers and enhancing its software to simplify storage management.Fibre Channel hangs on as the glue that binds together SANs (storage area networks) because it’s dependable and secure, said 451 Research analyst Steven Hill. A majority of large enterprise installations use it even though typically cheaper IP-based systems like iSCSI have been around for years, he said.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Facebook’s bid to open up networking is moving up into nosebleed territory for data centers. The company’s 100-gigabit switch design has been accepted by the Open Compute Project, a step that should help to foster an open ecosystem of hardware and software on high-speed networking gear.The 32-port Wedge 100 is the follow-on to Facebook’s Wedge 40, introduced about two years ago and now in use in practically all of the company’s data centers, said Omar Baldonado, director of software engineering on Facebook’s networking team. Mostly, it’s a faster version of that switch, upping the port speed to 100Gbps (bits per second) from 40Gbps. But Facebook also added some features to make service easier, like a cover that can be removed without tools and LED status lights to check the condition of a the cooling fans from a distance.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
You may find many uses for this versatile and powerful file hub from RAVPower, currently discounted 58% on Amazon from $75.99 down to just $32.49. Let's run down the features:
Let up to 5 devices wirelessly connect to the FileHub wireless network, to access its SD card and/or USB storage to share files
Media server capabilities, allowing wirelessly connected devices to stream audio and video from any attached storage device
Move files freely between all connected methods of storage and devices, including tablets and phones
Bridge an existing wireless network, create a new secure network and share with family or friends, or bridge to connect to devices such as Chromecast in hotels
Built-in power bank charges your device when you can't access a power source
RAVPower's FileHub currently averages 4 out of 5 stars from over 1,800 customers (read reviews). For more information or to explore buying options, see the discounted FileHub now on Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
In his book The Seventh Sense, Joshua Cooper Ramo makes the thought-provoking statement that networks compress time. Nowhere is this more visible than with Amazon. Amazon reportedly releases more than 20,000 new features, capabilities and services to their customers a day, making changes to production every 11 seconds. Facebook does multiple releases a day, and Google does a large package of releases every week or two.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Visible Light Communications (VLC), or Li-Fi, is a new optical wireless communications technology that promises spectacular amounts of new bandwidth for data transmissions. It uses visible light spectrum. Common lights could, indeed, be used to create the networked communications.However, there’s a drawback to this optimistically regarded tech, say scientists. The receivers need to see the light bulbs. That means the space in which this technology is used can’t be dark, and that's a problem if someone wants to sleep in the room. A solution is to dim LEDs or switch them on and off at high speeds, so the eye can’t see it.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Cisco today said it bought Heroik Labs which does business as Worklife and sells collaborative software that helps companies more effectively run and manage online meetings.“With the Worklife team onboard, we see an opportunity to build on the virtual meeting experience that the Cisco Spark platform currently provides, and enhance meeting productivity across the board. For example, we can start offering additional tools, tightly integrated into Cisco Spark, to help users track calendars, create agenda templates, and collaborate on note-taking in real-time during a meeting,” wrote Rob Salvagno vice president of Cisco’s Corporate Business Development in a blog announcing the buy. “Worklife’s technology and talent builds on the success of Cisco’s previous collaboration software acquisitions such as Collaborate.com, Assemblage, Tropo, Acano and Synata.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Do you remember when we used multi-protocol routing for IPX, AppleTalk, and TCP/IP running on the same network? In the 1980s and early 1990s many enterprises had multiple protocols running on the physical network infrastructure as “ships in the night”. Cisco routers became highly adept at multi-protocol routing and the company grew in prominence as a result. Then in the early 1990s, TCP/IP won out and the internet took shape as the global network we enjoy today.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
New products of the weekOur roundup of intriguing new products. Read how to submit an entry to Network World's products of the week slideshow.ScreenBeam 960Key features: ScreenBeam 960 is an enterprise-grade wireless display receiver for business professionals, medical practitioners and educators who need wireless display connectivity to collaborate, create and communicate. More info.§ For medium-to-large scale deployments§ Designed specifically for commercial applications and dense wireless environments§ No Wi-Fi network required§ Supports Windows 7/8, 8.1 and 10To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
From a global leader in flash memory technology, the SanDisk Ultra Fit USB 3.0 Flash Drive is an ultra-small, low-profile drive with a storage capacity of 128GB, and enough speed to transfer a full-length movie in less than 30 seconds. It's a #1 Amazon Best Seller in its category with 4 out of 5 stars from over 2,500 people (read reviews). Its typical list price of $40 has been reduced 31% to just $28. See the discounted Flash Drive from SanDisk now on Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Sprint today said it would get into the managed SD-WAN arena in early 2017 with an offering using VeloCloud’s technology.+More on Network World: Branch office links, big bandwidth needs drive SD-WAN evolution+Sprint said it is currently teaming with VeloCloud to support customer trials for its SD-WAN service during the fourth quarter of 2016, with a global launch planned for early 2017.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
While the internet itself was first envisioned as a way of enabling robust, fault-tolerant communication, the global routing infrastructure that underlies it is relatively fragile. A simple error like the misconfiguration of routing information in one of the 7,000 to 10,000 networks central to global routing can lead to a widespread outage, and deliberate actions, like preventing traffic with spoofed source IP addresses, can lead to distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks.The Internet Society (ISOC), a cause-driven nonprofit organization that seeks to promote the open development, evolution and use of the Internet and the parent organization of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) standards body, is moving to change that. In 2014, ISOC introduced its Mutually Agreed Norms for Routing Security (MANRS) initiative. Today ISOC announced that the initiative membership has more than quadrupled in its first two years, growing from its initial nine network operators to 42 network operators today.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Cisco Systems has patched a critical vulnerability that could allow hackers to gain access to Cisco Meeting and Acano servers that are used in enterprise environments for video and audio conferencing.The flaw allows an unauthenticated attacker to masquerade as a legitimate user because the Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP) service incorrectly processes a deprecated authentication scheme, Cisco said in an advisory.The flaw affects Cisco Meeting Server versions prior to 2.0.6 with XMPP enabled, as well as versions of the Acano Server prior to 1.8.18 and prior to 1.9.6. If upgrading to the latest releases is not immediately possible, administrators are advised to disable XMPP on their servers and keep using the other available protocols.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
The SanDisk Connect wireless stick is a flash drive with a unique twist -- you can access it wirelessly. Whether it's in your pants pocket, in your bag, or on the picnic table at your campsite, the Connect wireless stick lets you stream media or move files wirelessly with up to three computers, phones or tablets simultaneously. Connections are made via built-in wifi (think "hotspot"), so no external wireless or internet services are needed. A USB connection is also available, if desired. Storage on this model is a generous 200GB. Reviewers on Amazon report at least 8-10 hours of battery life on one charge. This model is currently discounted 27%, from $119.99 down to $87.56. See it now on Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
We live in a network-centric world, and network laws are beginning to govern business models and even global economics. When you understand these laws, you begin to understand why we live in a world where new network-centric business models (think Google, Facebook, Amazon, Airbnb, etc.) become de facto monopolies that result in incredible wealth creation.More important, you might be able to figure out how to put these same network effects to work for your business to spur growth and increase customer and shareholder value.Metcalfe’s Law and network effects
The first law to understand is Metcalfe’s Law. As you probably know, Bob Metcalfe is the co-inventor of Ethernet. I’ve met Bob a few times in my career. He’s smart, kind and very intuitive. Back in the dawn of networking, he made an observation about how networks work, and he put an equation behind it. That equation has come to be known as Metcalfe’s Law. Here’s how it goes and why it’s critical for modern business models, not just for the networks that underpin them.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
The long fight over LTE networks sharing frequencies with Wi-Fi may be just the first of many battles as device makers and service providers try to make the most of the limited available spectrum.Around the world, regulators and industry are working on how to let different kinds of networks use the same spectrum. The new techniques and policies they use should lead to better mobile performance in some areas, but it’s also likely that wireless performance will fluctuate more as you move around.LTE-U has grabbed headlines because it involves licensed carriers using some of the channels that consumers depend on for Wi-Fi service, which often is free or runs on users' own routers. Wi-Fi supporters cried foul last year after Qualcomm and some U.S. carriers proposed the technology, and it took until last month for the two sides to reach an apparent peace agreement.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Even as we increase data rates and network capacity in Wi-Fi with 802.11ac, 11ad and then 11ax, it’s worth keeping an eye on other communication technologies that may become useful in the enterprise.
Visible light communication (VLC) is making progress in the background, and while it is barely out of the lab, it may take off in a few years. The startups working with enterprise VLC are adopting the term “LiFi” (although it has—today—no connection with Wi-Fi).
Like all new technologies, there are many possibilities—and the number of potential uses is impressive. Applications include vehicle-to-vehicle, underwater communications, streetlamps, aircraft cabins, and industrial uses where Wi-Fi cannot be used due to RF interference.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Network monitoring systems typically look for slow, overloaded, failing or crashed servers, routers, switches and network connections – and alert network administrators to the problem. According to the IT Central Station user community, the most important criteria to consider when choosing network monitoring software are scalability, flexibility and multi-tenancy.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
Comcast said bandwidth caps would be back before 2019, and now the company's living up to its promise.The cable provider recently announced that its 1 terabyte bandwidth cap for Xfinity Internet subscribers would start rolling out more broadly. Comcast’s data caps are currently in effect in 16 regions with another 18 regions getting the bandwidth cap on November 1. You'll find the complete list of current and upcoming bandwidth cap regions at the bottom of this post.The company settled on the 1TB cap limit after experimenting with various caps for several years in select areas. During that time, Comcast appeared to be favoring a 300GB cap, but never rolled it out nationwide. Then in April, Comcast bumped up the cap in its test markets to 1 terabyte.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here