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Category Archives for "Networking"

Microsoft launches undersea, free-cooling data center

A free supply of already-cooled deep-sea water is among the benefits to locating pre-packaged data centers underwater, believes Microsoft, which recently announced the successful launch of a submarine-like data center off the coast of the Orkney Islands in Scotland.The shipping-container-sized, self-contained server room, called Project Natick, submerged earlier this month on a rock shelf 117 feet below the water’s surface also has the benefit of potentially taking advantage of bargain-basement real estate near population centers — there’s no rent in open sea.“Project Natick is an out-of-the-box idea to accommodate exponential growth in demand for cloud computing infrastructure near population centers,” John Roach writes on Microsoft’s website.To read this article in full, please click here

Microsoft launches undersea, free-cooling data center

A free supply of already-cooled deep-sea water is among the benefits to locating pre-packaged data centers underwater, believes Microsoft, which recently announced the successful launch of a submarine-like data center off the coast of the Orkney Islands in Scotland.The shipping-container-sized, self-contained server room, called Project Natick, submerged earlier this month on a rock shelf 117 feet below the water’s surface also has the benefit of potentially taking advantage of bargain-basement real estate near population centers — there’s no rent in open sea.“Project Natick is an out-of-the-box idea to accommodate exponential growth in demand for cloud computing infrastructure near population centers,” John Roach writes on Microsoft’s website.To read this article in full, please click here

Microsoft launches undersea, free-cooling data center

A free supply of already-cooled deep-sea water is among the benefits to locating pre-packaged data centers underwater, believes Microsoft, which recently announced the successful launch of a submarine-like data center off the coast of the Orkney Islands in Scotland.The shipping-container-sized, self-contained server room, called Project Natick, submerged earlier this month on a rock shelf 117 feet below the water’s surface also has the benefit of potentially taking advantage of bargain-basement real estate near population centers — there’s no rent in open sea.“Project Natick is an out-of-the-box idea to accommodate exponential growth in demand for cloud computing infrastructure near population centers,” John Roach writes on Microsoft’s website.To read this article in full, please click here

More signs the Qualcomm Centriq is in trouble

Last month there were rumors that Qualcomm was looking to exit the data center business and abandon the Centriq processor, an ARM-based 48-core chip designed to take on Intel in the enterprise server market. The news seemed surprising, given Qualcomm had put years of work into the chip and had only just launched it a few months earlier.Now Bloomberg adds further fuel to the fire with a report that the company is preparing to lay off almost 280 employees, and most of them are in the data center group. Bloomberg got wind of the layoffs due to filings with the state governments in North Carolina and California, which require advanced notice of significant layoffs.To read this article in full, please click here

More signs the Qualcomm Centriq is in trouble

Last month there were rumors that Qualcomm was looking to exit the data center business and abandon the Centriq processor, an ARM-based 48-core chip designed to take on Intel in the enterprise server market. The news seemed surprising, given Qualcomm had put years of work into the chip and had only just launched it a few months earlier.Now Bloomberg adds further fuel to the fire with a report that the company is preparing to lay off almost 280 employees, and most of them are in the data center group. Bloomberg got wind of the layoffs due to filings with the state governments in North Carolina and California, which require advanced notice of significant layoffs.To read this article in full, please click here

DroneDeploy and Cloudflare Workers

DroneDeploy and Cloudflare Workers

DroneDeploy and Cloudflare WorkersImages courtesty of DroneDeploy

When we launched Workers a few months ago, much of the focus was on use cases surrounding websites running on origins that needed extra oomph. With Workers you can easily take a site, introduce a raft of personalization capabilities, A/B test changes or even aggregate a set of API responses around a range of services. In short by layering in Cloudflare Workers we can take origin websites and do transformational things.

One of the joys of a platform, is that you never know where you are going to see the next use case. Enter DroneDeploy

DroneDeploy and Cloudflare Workers
DroneDeploy is a cloud platform that makes it easy to collect and analyze drone imagery and data. Simply install DroneDeploy on your mobile device and connect to a DJI drone. DroneDeploy flies the drone, collects the imagery, then stitches the photos into maps.

The maps can show things like crop conditions & stress, construction project progress, or even thermal temperature ranges across vast solar farms or for search and rescue situations.

DroneDeploy and Cloudflare Workers
Using plant health algorithms applied to drone-generated maps, growers can pinpoint crop stress in their fields and stomp out pests, disease, or irrigation issues.

DroneDeploy and Cloudflare WorkersWith Thermal Live Map, it’s possible Continue reading

We’re Going to Visit All 203 Nations

In November 2017, the Internet Society hosted the inaugural Indigenous Connectivity Summit in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The event brought together community network operators, Internet service providers, community members, researchers, policy makers, and Indigenous leadership. One of the participants shared her story.

Denise Williams,Coast Salish from Cowichan Tribes on Vancouver Island, began her career as an ESL teacher, with the idea that she would travel the world teaching English. A chance encounter on a bus – “I’m from a small town so I talk to whoever is in my vicinity,” says Williams – served as an entry point to work as a policy analyst for Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada, which led to Education Technology work at the First Nations Education Steering Committee. “I learned the way that digital technologies either advance or detract from a community’s ability to nurture curiosity in their youth,” says Williams. “I came from no understanding of networks to it becoming my life’s work. I don’t know if i found it or it found me.”

In 2015, Williams took the reigns of the totally defunded First Nations Technology Council, and through strategic planning and vision, has grown the organization’s programs in talent development, Continue reading

Network professionals should think SD-Branch, not just SD-WAN

Earlier this year, fellow industry analyst Lee Doyle wrote a blog post on the software-defined branch (SD-Branch) market hitting $3 billion by 2022. Doyle defines the SD-Branch as having SD-WAN, routing, network security, and LAN/Wi-Fi functions all in one platform with integrated, centralized management. An SD-Branch can be thought of as the next step after SD-WAN, as the latter transforms the transport and the former focuses on things in the branch, such as optimizing user experience and improving security.I don’t often critique other analysts work, as their opinion is theirs and not everyone agrees. However, in this case, I don't think “all in one platform” should be a requirement. The integrated and centralized management hits the nail on the head, but the software should act as a management overlay, so even though the infrastructure isn’t a “single box,” it’s managed like it.To read this article in full, please click here

Network professionals should think SD-Branch, not just SD-WAN

Earlier this year, fellow industry analyst Lee Doyle wrote a blog post on the software-defined branch (SD-Branch) market hitting $3 billion by 2022. Doyle defines the SD-Branch as having SD-WAN, routing, network security, and LAN/Wi-Fi functions all in one platform with integrated, centralized management. An SD-Branch can be thought of as the next step after SD-WAN, as the latter transforms the transport and the former focuses on things in the branch, such as optimizing user experience and improving security.I don’t often critique other analysts work, as their opinion is theirs and not everyone agrees. However, in this case, I don't think “all in one platform” should be a requirement. The integrated and centralized management hits the nail on the head, but the software should act as a management overlay, so even though the infrastructure isn’t a “single box,” it’s managed like it.To read this article in full, please click here

IDG Contributor Network: A first-hand account of Cisco Live 2018 in Orlando

I have had many people ask me about what Cisco Live is like, from my perspective as a long-time attendee and a member of the Hall of Fame Elite for speakers.  While my perspective may be a bit different than your average attendee, I thought I’d give it a shot and write it up.Cisco Live is an amazing event.  Some years, I may present at Cisco Live up to 4 times per year, and this was one of those years.  Cancun, Mexico – December 2017 Barcelona, Spain – February 2018 Melbourne, Australia – March 2018 Orlando, Florida, USA – June 2018 When I was a young buck and started attending Cisco Live they were actually called “Networkers” and to me, that still describes the best part of Cisco Live.  Not networking in the technology sense, but the human networking that goes on.  It’s like a reunion with the people that I get to see year after year; and I get to meet new people every single time.To read this article in full, please click here