When most non-technical people hear the term “seven layers”, they either think of the popular Super Bowl bean dip or they mistakenly think about the seven layers of Hell, courtesy of Dante’s Inferno (there are nine). For IT professionals, the seven layers refer to the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) model, a conceptual framework that describes the functions of a networking or telecommunication system.The model uses layers to help give a visual description of what is going on with a particular networking system. This can help network managers narrow down problems (Is it a physical issue or something with the application?), as well as computer programmers (when developing an application, which other layers does it need to work with?). Tech vendors selling new products will often refer to the OSI model to help customers understand which layer their products work with or whether it works “across the stack”.To read this article in full, please click here
Historically, there’s always been tension between enterprises and carriers over equipment and servicing issues. But network functions virtualization (NFV) is providing more visibility into the network, giving enterprises greater confidence in what they’re paying for.Back in 2009, a survey by consulting firm EY found deep skepticism among enterprise users regarding telecom service providers. More than half of those surveyed at that time would not consider telcos for IT help desk, business consulting or cloud services.To read this article in full, please click here
What's going to shake things up in 2018? IT pros will have their hands full with technologies that have been hyped for some time and are now ripe for adoption, including software-defined WAN, hybrid cloud computing, hyperconvergence, and Internet of Things. See below for our collection of enterprise picks, predictions and prognostications.Why 2018 will be the year of the WAN
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Software-defined WAN technology is sweeping across the industry, growing from an emerging technology in 2017 to become mainstream in 2018. As SD-WAN deployments become ubiquitous for organizations with remote offices, more big changes will come. Check it out.To read this article in full, please click here
The reality of a self-managing data center is getting closer with HPE’s announcement last week of what it claims to be the first artificial intelligence (AI) predictive engine for trouble in the data center.HPE says next year it will offer an AI recommendation engine add-on that’s designed to predict and stop storage- and general-infrastructure trouble before it starts. It’s one of a number of autonomous data center components that we should expect to see soon from players. Other AI and machine learning systems geared towards data centers will be available from companies such as Litbit (which I wrote about in the summer) and Oracle, among others.To read this article in full, please click here
Computer vision is fundamental for a broad set of Internet of Things (IoT) applications. Household monitoring systems use cameras to provide family members with a view of what’s going on at home. Robots and drones use vision processing to map their environment and avoid obstacles in flight. Augmented reality glasses use computer vision to overlay important information on the user’s view, and cars stitch images from multiple cameras mounted in the vehicle to provide drivers with a surround or “bird’s eye” view which helps prevent collisions. The list goes on.Over the years, exponential improvements in device capabilities including computing power, memory capacity, power consumption, image sensor resolution, and optics have improved the performance and cost-effectiveness of computer vision in IoT applications. This has been accompanied by the development and refinement of sophisticated software algorithms for tasks such as face detection and recognition, object detection and classification, and simultaneous localization and mapping.To read this article in full, please click here
IDG
Software-defined WAN (SD-WAN) technology is sweeping across the industry, growing from an emerging technology in 2017 to become mainstream in 2018.Research firm IDC predicts SD-WAN revenues will hit $2.3 billion in 2018, growing 69% on a compound annual growth rate to reach more than $8 billion by 2021. “2017 saw a lot of early adopters of SD-WAN that were limited to maybe two or three sites,” says IDC networking analyst Brad Casemore. “Now, rollouts are getting a lot bigger; we’re starting to see hockey-stick inflection point.”To read this article in full, please click here
IDG
The world of enterprise Wi-Fi moves fast, but 2018 is going to see gear based on 802.11ac Wave 2 remain the state of the art – its successor, 802.11ax, is still one for the future.Wave 2 is the latest Wi-Fi standard to be certified by the IEEE. Its main technological innovation is MU-MIMO, or multi-user multiple-input, multiple-output. In practice, this means that manufacturers can create access points that talk to multiple devices at the same instant. Earlier APs had to handle multiple streams sequentially.To read this article in full, please click here
IDG
Instrumentation is coming – 2018 promises the IoT-ification of a lot of existing technology, plus edge computing, improved analytics and even some security improvements, if we’re reading these tea-leaves correctly.IoT has been one of the biggest phenomena in technology for years, but 2018 is the year that it begins to really shake up the rank-and-file of enterprise users, according to Christian Renaud, director of 451 Research’s IoT practice. To read this article in full, please click here
IDG
Despite the public cloud seemingly grabbing the lion’s share of attention in the cloud market, private and hybrid cloud computing markets have been growing robustly as well and experts predict they will only gain importance in 2018 and beyond.“Few companies have enjoyed the expected benefits of private infrastructure-focused clouds, but a renewed focus on developer empowerment, stepping into cloud on-premises first, and a raft of new tech stack (will) spark new private cloud interest and experimentation,” Forrester research analyst Dave Bartoletti and colleagues predict in their 2018 look-ahead for the cloud market. To read this article in full, please click here
IDG
IoT is going to expand on its current strengths in the coming year, broadening its presence in the industrial, energy and transportation sectors and continuing to see growing usage in fields like healthcare and retail.Rohit Mehra, IDC vice president for network infrastructure research, said that those up-and-coming IoT sectors are getting new applications that make their deployment more attractive to end-users.To read this article in full, please click here
IDG
Mini data centers are sprouting up on the edges of networks – in factories, on container ships, and piggybacked on cellular base stations – as enterprises and service providers look to embed compute and storage capacity closer to where data is being generated.So-called micro-modular data centers (MMDC) aren’t new, and they’re not the only distributed edge computing solution. But they’re growing in popularity with a compound annual growth rate of 42% over the last three years, according to 451 Research. Sales of MMDCs are forecast to reach nearly $30 million in 2018 from $18 million in 2017. While the market appears small, MMDC sales in 2018 will represent about 2,000 new installations and be a part of projects that cost many times greater than that, according to the research firm.To read this article in full, please click here
IDG
As the preeminent networking company shapes its plans for 2018, analysts and users say Cisco is at somewhat of an inflection point, transitioning from a hardware-based company to an integrated hardware and software-focused one.In doing so, Cisco has plotted the next generation of its network management products in the form of intent-based networking. Meanwhile, as hardware sales growth slows due to workloads shifting to the public cloud, the company eyes the Internet of Things and edge computing as new frontiers for revenue growth.To read this article in full, please click here
Earlier this year, Pure Storage announced Charlie Giancarlo as CEO. Prior to leading Pure Storage, Giancarlo was a managing director and senior advisor at Silver Lake Partners.If Giancarlo's name is familiar to you, it should because he held a number of executive positions at Cisco, including chief technology officer and chief development officer, which is where I got to know him. Many people, myself included, consider Giancarlo one of the masterminds behind Cisco’s meteoric rise, as he was one of the architects that moved the company into new markets, such as ethernet switching, VoIP, Wi-Fi and TelePresence.Also on Network World: Get ready for new storage technologies and media
The one thing I always found impressive about Giancarlo is that we could be discussing the latest business and stock market trends and then a few minutes later transition into how the silicon inside a router was designed and the technical differentiation it creates. To read this article in full, please click here
Tesla’s “Maximum Plaid” speed mode rockets its new Roadster from 0-60 in 1.9 seconds. If you think that’s fast, go ahead and Google “5G.”5G is Plaid for cellular networking – a next-generation mobile network that promises not only ten-times the available spectrum, for ten-times the download speeds, but across ten-times the devices and with a fraction of the latency.The move from 1Gbps to 10Gbps speeds will support bandwidth-intensive applications like high-definition video and virtual reality, and near real-time connections will enable ultra-low latency applications like autonomous cars, remote surgery and specialized applications within the Internet of Things (IoT).To read this article in full, please click here
Among the many clouds in the storage sky, Amazon Web Services is the dominant leader by far. The annual AWS re:Invent trade show is taking place in Las Vegas this week, and given how many enterprises have some data in the AWS cloud, the event is expected to sell out.It’s no secret that the cloud is one of today’s top storage industry disruptors, significantly reshaping enterprise IT architectures and investments. Cloud object storage has a well-earned reputation for cutting costs since enterprises can avoid both upfront capital and costly operational expenditures by storing data off-premises. However, the challenges of getting data to the cloud means many enterprises are only getting started on adoption. There is much more growth ahead, as the cloud’s elastic scaling can also deliver agility, but so far, most enterprises are relegating cloud storage for archival.To read this article in full, please click here
Resilient application architectures have evolved dramatically over the years. In the age of monolithic applications, with static application deployments in large datacenter setups, resiliency required depth and redundancy in individual deployments. It needed always-on scale to meet the maximum expected workload, along with redundant connectivity and power.Within a monolithic application environment, individual components – like servers – were expected to fail, and organizations built deployments with component-level redundancy as a result. For example, they created multiple database servers in a primary/secondary config or multiple application servers in an active/active config.To read this article in full, please click here
Recently we’ve watched netops and devops teams struggle to navigate complex networks, regulate change management, meet competitive deadlines, and break through the barriers posed by siloed IT structures. They are plagued with challenges that make the thought of five-nine SLAs a farfetched dream. The top priority in these tough times is implementing a system that helps them achieve their goals faster, without compromising quality. That’s we’re seeing automation come in.Automation is no longer a new concept. It is an essential part of every application lifecycle, from the development stage to the final deployment. Gone are the days when users, to copy a file, would open the command prompt, navigate to the directory, then manually identify the file’s final location and specify the command with the right syntax. This process was not only incredibly tedious – it was extremely error-prone. Now, users can simply drag and drop files to copy them. The functionality remains the same, but automation does the heavy lifting instead of the user.To read this article in full, please click here
With the billions of Internet of Things (IoT) devices projected to come on-stream over the next few years, questions are arising as to just where the bandwidth and radio channels are going to come from to make it all work.The sensors need to send their likely increasingly voluminous data back to networks wirelessly to be processed.RELATED: 8 tips for building a cost-effective IoT sensor network
But there’s a finite amount of radio spectrum available, and much of it is already allocated to incumbent primary users, such as public safety agencies. Other spectrum is dedicated to mobile network operators who have licensed chunks of it. Some is leftover in the millimeter frequencies, which is thus far pretty much untested in the real world — it’s going to be used for 5G in the future.To read this article in full, please click here
SD-WAN is the hottest topic in networking today. On the one hand, analyst reports state that this industry is in its infancy with less than 5% adoption through 2017. On the other hand, the same analysts project over 50% customer adoption in the next 36 months. Why has adoption been modest to-date, and why is 10X acceleration expected now? The answer lies in understanding the differences between the first generation of SD-WAN (Gen1) and the second generation of SD-WAN (Gen2).In the old days, WAN routers were focused on providing connectivity using MPLS. The goal of Gen1 SD-WAN was to enable usage of broadband for connectivity. So Gen1 SD-WAN provided better VPN manageability and improved the delivery of voice traffic over broadband connections. However, like many first-generation products, Gen1 SD-WAN has serious limitations, three of which I examine below.To read this article in full, please click here
When managing your /etc/sudoers files, it’s a good idea to organize user privileges in ways that make them easier to manage over the long haul and to assign permissions based on the roles that users play in your organization. One very useful way is to group related commands together – such as all commands related to running backups or managing web sites – and assign them to the individuals or groups that require these privileges.Setting up command groups
To create a command group, you would use what is called a Cmnd_Alias in your /etc/sudoers file and give the new command group a meaningful name. Here are some examples. Note that full pathnames should be specified for all of the commands included in a group. Otherwise, you are likely to see an error like this when you try to exit visudo. And remember to only edit /etc/sudoers with the visudo command to allow it to warn you in ways like this and prevent errors.To read this article in full, please click here