Ever since Bitcoin was introduced back in 2009, this cryptocurrency has had the distinction of being something you could mine with your computer—putting your hardware to use helping the blockchain technology Bitcoin is based on record and verify transactions by solving complex math problems.As a reward, you’d get Bitcoins. But it was a very slow process for a single PC, and the necessary component for success was a high-end GPU. One GPU brought to bear on Bitcoin could take years to find one coin, so miners started building massive farms akin to data centers but without enclosures. The result was that Bitcoin farms bought up all the GPUs, causing severe shortages and infuriating gamers.To read this article in full, please click here
Cisco made enhancements to its security offerings that will expand and change the way customers buy its Secure Access Service Edge products as well as bolster network-access authentication.Cisco's SASE plan will focus on enhancing networking and security functions while building them into an integrated service that can help simplify access to enterprise cloud resources securely, said Gee Rittenhouse senior vice president and general manager of Cisco’s Security Business Group during this week's Cisco Live! event.MORE CISCO LIVE! NEWS: Cisco takes its first steps toward network-as-a-service; Cisco brings net intelligence to Catalyst switches, app-performance managementTo read this article in full, please click here
Cisco says upgrades to its Catalyst switch and AppDynamics application-monitoring package will let enterprises more easily see and fix network and applciation problems.The company has added network intelligence-monitoring capabilities it bought from ThousandEyes in May 2020 to its Catalyst 9300 and 9400 Series boxes and its AppDynamics Dash Studio application-management dashboard.More Cisco Live! News: Cisco takes its first steps toward network-as-a-serviceTo read this article in full, please click here
No one ever said Pat Gelsinger was timid. A month into his stint as Intel’s CEO, he has announced an ambitious plan to drive ahead with Intel’s chip-manufacturing efforts rather than give up on it.Naysayers and pundits had been saying Intel should dump its fabrication business, similar to what AMD did more than a decade ago when it spun out its fabs into what became GlobalFoundries. Intel’s fabs had fallen behind the bleeding edge, and while the TSMC foundry was making 7nm chips for AMD, Intel was struggling to get to 10nm.Well bleep that, said Gelsinger (OK, maybe not). Rather than spin off the foundry business, Intel is setting it up as a separate unit within the company called Intel Foundry Services with its own profit and loss statements like the other Intel divisions. So in addition to making Intel chips, Intel Foundry Services will make chips for other semiconductor companies.To read this article in full, please click here
Cisco has taken a big step forward with its first network-as-a-service offering that ultimately will let customers buy enterprise-network hardware and software components on an as-needed basis.The company announced the service, called Cisco Plus, at its virtual Cisco Live 2021! conference, telling customers its NaaS will offer best-in-class networking, security, compute, storage, and applications with unified subscriptions that promise to be simple to use.Now see: Who’s selling SASE, and what do you get?“Network-as-a-service delivery is a great option for businesses wanting to shift to a cloud operating model that makes its easy and simple to buy and consume the necessary components to improve and grow their businesses,” said James Mobley, senior vice president and general manager of Cisco’s Network Services Business Unit.To read this article in full, please click here
I know what you’re thinking. “6G? He wants to blather on about 6G, when we barely have 5G?”
5G resources
What is 5G? Fast wireless technology for enterprises and phones
How 5G frequency affects range and speed
Private 5G can solve some problems that Wi-Fi can’t
Private 5G keeps Whirlpool driverless vehicles rolling
5G can make for cost-effective private backhaul
CBRS can bring private 5G to enterprises
Point taken. But 5G’s seemingly interminable rollout should not preclude wildly premature and breathless anticipation over its successor. Let’s face it, the time will come when we’ll all be complaining about the limitations of puny little 5G. Plus, isn’t wildly premature and breathless anticipation the essence of technology publishing?To read this article in full, please click here
As-a-service offerings have been around for more than 10 years with roots that are decades older than that, and now this ever-expanding category of service offerings includes enterprise network-as-a-service.NaaS enables enterprises to outsource network functionality at network Layers 4-7—such as software-defined WAN (SD-WAN) and application delivery controller (ADC)—as well as Layers 1-3, which includes switches and routers.[Get regularly scheduled insights by signing up for Network World newsletters.]
Full adoption of NaaS is still in its early days because most enterprise network functions require physical hardware to transport data to and from endpoints and the data center or internet. That is a challenge to deliver as a service. The Layer 4-7 functions are already available in a cloud-delivery model.To read this article in full, please click here
We all know the old saw about pushing a strand of spaghetti uphill, and I’ve got to wonder whether that’s what we’re now doing with 5G.
5G resources
What is 5G? Fast wireless technology for enterprises and phones
How 5G frequency affects range and speed
Private 5G can solve some problems that Wi-Fi can’t
Private 5G keeps Whirlpool driverless vehicles rolling
5G can make for cost-effective private backhaul
CBRS can bring private 5G to enterprises
First, 5G is going to happen because of the orderly process of modernizing wireless networks. It doesn’t need “justifying”. The problem is that vendors want 5G to be revolutionary and transformational, rather than orderly. Second, that need to seem revolutionary has pushed 5G stories to the boundaries of sensibility.To read this article in full, please click here
IDC has released a new study, the first of its kind, that predicts that cloud computing could help to prevent more than one billion metric ton of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in the next three years.The forecast uses IDC data on server distribution and cloud and on-premises software use along with third-party information on data center power usage, carbon dioxide emissions per kilowatt-hour, and emission comparisons of cloud and non-cloud data centers.[Get regularly scheduled insights by signing up for Network World newsletters.]
IDC's forecast includes upper and lower bounds for the estimated reduction in emissions. If the percentage of green cloud data centers today stays where it is, just the migration to cloud itself could save 693 million metric tons over the four-year time period.To read this article in full, please click here
Networks of the not-to-distant future could feature many more open-source software components, advanced programmability, and be delivered as-a-service, according to experts speaking at the Future:Net 2021 symposium.Attendees of the virtual event heard predictions from vendors such as Cisco, Google, and Microsoft as well as academics and analyst firms such as Gartner and 451 Research. Who's selling SASE, and what do you get?
A key theme from many of the speakers was that networks and networking technology of the future will feature way more software controls and programmability than most enterprise customers see in their environments today. To read this article in full, please click here
The Tableau CEO and Salesforce executive is returning to Amazon Web Services after six years away to take over the cloud division when Andy Jassy moves on to the top Amazon job later this year.
Google and Cisco have extended their technology development relationship to make it easier to marry cloud-based resources with SD-WAN command and control.The expanded technology agreement is centered around a cloud-based network-management system Google rolled out this week that promises to let customers configure and manage multiple on-prem- and public-cloud networks. The new service, called Network Connectivity Center, offers a central console for connecting and watching over multiple networking aspects, including traffic flows, performance metrics, and VPN connectivity.To read this article in full, please click here
If you’d like to know what systems and devices are attached to your local network—whether out of security concerns or simple curiosity, Linux has some really great commands for providing answers. In this post, we’ll probe a small network and see how devices can be identified.nmap
The first tool we’ll use is nmap, which stands for Network Mapper, an open source tool for exploring networks and doing some serious security auditing. It was designed to work quickly even on large networks and provide information using raw packets to identify hosts, services, and sometimes even operating systems.The simple scan shown below is detecting systems and devices on the local network. The “/24” portion of the target address indicates that all hosts in the 192.168.0.x IP address range are to be included.To read this article in full, please click here
Data is the ultimate asset of modern business and the foundation of digital transformation. It is the currency that funds innovation and growth. Data must be protected with the utmost rigor, but it must also flow effortlessly to where it can deliver the greatest benefits.In an era where the cloud rules infrastructure, traditional network security is no longer useful. The current construct for data protection is outmoded and in urgent need of an update. The biggest fundamental shift in the world of digital transformation is that data is no longer on a CPU that the enterprise owns. Security teams must invest in the right technology to achieve more complete data protection, and we all need to ensure Zeron Trust principles are applied everywhere data needs protection.To read this article in full, please click here
With a goal of making distributed applications more secure, VMware has announced plans to buy security vendor Mesh7 for an undisclosed amount.Combining the acquisition with its other security wares, VMware aims to address modern applications that require reliable connectivity, dynamic service discovery, and the ability to automate changes quickly without disruption as they extend across multi-cloud environments, said Tom Gillis, senior vice president and general manger with VMware's networking and security business unit, in a blog about the Mesh7 acquisition.To read this article in full, please click here
The Federal Communications Commission plans yet another auction of radio-frequency spectrum suitable for delivering 5G services and continues to scrutinize the security of 5G infrastructure made in China, both of which will affect how quickly 5G services are deployed.
5G resources
What is 5G? Fast wireless technology for enterprises and phones
How 5G frequency affects range and speed
Private 5G can solve some problems that Wi-Fi can’t
Private 5G keeps Whirlpool driverless vehicles rolling
5G can make for cost-effective private backhaul
CBRS can bring private 5G to enterprises
The commission says it will seek bids on licensing another 100MHz swath of RF spectrum in the 3.4GHz mid-band range, which lies close to the C-band frequencies that were auctioned off late last year, and will impose stiff build-out requirements on winning bidders in order to get 5G infrastructure up and running quickly.To read this article in full, please click here
AMD has taken the wraps off the third generation of Epyc server processors, codenamed Milan, just 18 months after launching the Rome generation. Formally named Epyc 7003, the new generation sports a new Zen 3 core with a number of performance bumps.The Zen 3 core has been on the market for a while in desktop form as AMD’s Ryzen 5000 series, a line that has proven very hard to find due to a supply shortage and high demand. Because of its performance, the 5000 series is insanely popular with gamers.Cisco uses new AMD Milan processor to grow its UCS server family
Like the Zen 2/Rome/Epyc 7002 line, the new Milan is built on a 7nm manufacturing process and is socket-compatible with the prior two generations of servers, so you can give your servers a processor upgrade without having to replace the whole thing. All you need is a BIOS upgrade from the motherboard maker.To read this article in full, please click here
The /etc/fstab file is a very important file on Linux systems. It contains information that allows the system to connect to disk partitions and determine where they should be mounted in the file system. While this file has played an important role over the years, its format has changed with the introduction of UUIDs and, on some systems, a more reliable file-system type.Here's an example of an /etc/fstab file on a Fedora system:$ cat /etc/fstab
#
# /etc/fstab
# Created by anaconda on Fri Mar 12 12:26:55 2021
#
# Accessible filesystems, by reference, are maintained under '/dev/disk/'.
# See man pages fstab(5), findfs(8), mount(8) and/or blkid(8) for more info.
#
# After editing this file, run 'systemctl daemon-reload' to update systemd
# units generated from this file.
#
UUID=a9e33237-9114-44ae-afd5-8ddb231d301f / btrfs subvol=root 0 0
UUID=15f42905-5897-4804-9c51-e6d5e169e6c2 /boot ext4 defaults 1 2
#UUID=a9e33237-9114-44ae-afd5-8ddb231d301f /home btrfs subvol=home 0 0
UUID=d867ced1-8d81-47c6-b299-3365ba8a02de /home ext4 defaults
How to loop forever in bash on Linux
Each line in the file (other than the comments) represents a file system and has six fields.To read this article in full, please click here
NetApp, one of many players in the hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) hardware business, plans to end production of its NetApp HCI hardware and focus instead on its Project Astra Kubernetes platform.HCI is split into two categories, software and hardware. On the software side, it's roughly an even split in marketshare between Nutanix and VMware. On the hardware side, IDC and Gartner both list HCI leaders as HP Enterprise, Dell Technology, Cisco Systems, and "the rest of the market." You can guess what category NetApp falls into.
Read more:To read this article in full, please click here