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Category Archives for "Networking"

5G is over-hyped and expectations need reigning in

5G is nearly here. The next generation of wireless connectivity promises superfast speeds, ultra-low latency and more network capacity than ever. 5G auctions have or are due to take place in the US, UK, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, Germany, Australia and host of other countries.To read this article in full, please click here(Insider Story)

5G is overhyped and expectations need reining in

5G is nearly here. The next generation of wireless connectivity promises superfast speeds, ultra-low latency and more network capacity than ever. 5G auctions have or are due to take place in the US, UK, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, Germany, Australia and host of other countries.To read this article in full, please click here(Insider Story)

5G is overhyped and expectations need reining in

5G is nearly here. The next generation of wireless connectivity promises superfast speeds, ultra-low latency and more network capacity than ever. 5G auctions have or are due to take place in the US, UK, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, Germany, Australia and host of other countries.To read this article in full, please click here(Insider Story)

Celebrating ECMP in Linux — part one

ECMP in Linux: A brief history

Equal Cost Multi-Path (ECMP) routes are a big component of all the super-trendy data center network designs that are en vogue right now. Clos networks and the ECMP that underpins those designs are the best tools we have today to deliver high bandwidth, highly fault-tolerant networks. Clos networks are rich with multiple equal cost paths to get from Server A to Server B.

Linux kernel ECMP

2 Paths from Host to ToR * 8 Paths from ToR to Leaf * 16 Paths from Leaf to Spine * 8 Paths from Spine to Leaf * 2 Paths from Leaf to ToR
= 4096 Possible Unique Paths between Server A and Server B

FYI: The above is an actual customer network. Names have been changed to protect the innocent and colors have been added because a rainbow of links is more fun!

Cumulus has been working to improve the behavior of ECMP routes in the Linux kernel over the last several kernel releases. Now, with kernel v4.17, we have achieved the milestone we set out to attain. As of Linux kernel v4.17, Linux hosts can now leverage the “5-Tuple” style hashing used inside traditional network devices for Continue reading

Interested in Virtualization? Check Out Our Newest Addition to the INE Library: Virtualization – Introduction to Hypervisor (KVM)

Virtualization is a key skillset for any Linux Administrator or Engineer. Not all workloads are useful in the cloud, and companies are quickly realizing this in terms of increasing cloud bills. You can bring those workloads in house, but what about licensing? KVM is a favorite of home labs because of the low cost of entry (free). KVM is also a favorite of shops that know how powerful open source is. Gain a greater understanding of how any virtualization platform works by utilizing common linux tools to manage and orchestrate your virtual machines. KVM forms the basis for upstream virtualization projects like oVirt and RHEV as well. Learn how to setup a virtualized environment only armed with an install usb from your favorite linux distribution.

 

Any workload can be run on a KVM virtual machine platform. Docker/Kubernetes? No problem. Databases, front end web services, workloads requiring dedicated hardware such as GPU’s or HBA’s, KVM can run any of these workloads with near bare metal performance.


What You’ll Learn:

  • Setting up the hypervisor machine
  • Installing your first virtual machine
  • managing network storage memory and cpu resources
  • Virtual machine snapshots
    Virtual machine cloning


You can watch this course on our streaming Continue reading

BrandPost: What We Can Learn from IT in Education

Among the vertical industries most impacted by technological change in the past three to five years is K-12 education. This is often overlooked, but the move to becoming digital is truly changing the game for school districts. Changes wrought by extensive device use, distance learning, and emerging technologies such as virtual reality and augmented reality require that K-12 schools dramatically overhaul their approach to IT. In many ways, the IT need at schools has similar or greater demands for availability, reliability, and scalability to support new applications than what is seen in other industries. However, the rapid rate of change that has occurred in K-12 is exceptional. There are some important lessons that we can learn from the “high speed” that IT professionals and administrators are responding to.To read this article in full, please click here

IDG Contributor Network: Cisco Digital Network Architecture: a prison of promises or the next big thing?

Cisco’s Digital Network Architecture (DNA) promises to help companies in their digital transformation journey where new technologies can be used to accelerate business activities and processes to make them more competitive. It's also a big validation that network analytics is no longer a nice to have but a must have. Cisco DNA aims to provide a platform that companies can use as the foundation for digital transformation projects. The architecture's key tenants are virtualization, automation, analytics, a cloud-based service management layer, and open application programming interfaces (APIs). It’s a system that’s “designed for automation.” In other words, Cisco wants to make its products easier to deploy and manage. At the heart of that message is a move away from CLI. Sounds good so far.To read this article in full, please click here

IDG Contributor Network: Cisco Digital Network Architecture: a prison of promises or the next big thing?

Cisco’s Digital Network Architecture (DNA) promises to help companies in their digital transformation journey where new technologies can be used to accelerate business activities and processes to make them more competitive. It's also a big validation that network analytics is no longer a nice to have but a must have. Cisco DNA aims to provide a platform that companies can use as the foundation for digital transformation projects. The architecture's key tenants are virtualization, automation, analytics, a cloud-based service management layer, and open application programming interfaces (APIs). It’s a system that’s “designed for automation.” In other words, Cisco wants to make its products easier to deploy and manage. At the heart of that message is a move away from CLI. Sounds good so far.To read this article in full, please click here

IDG Contributor Network: Improving supply chains with the IoT and blockchain

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently advised "consumers to throw away any store-bought romaine lettuce and warned restaurants not to serve it amid an E. coli outbreak that has sickened more than 50 people in several states."This problem highlights the dangers of modern supply chains. They help lower costs and improve business efficiency, but they’re complex and a single failure can sicken people thousands of miles away. The food we eat and the medicines we use come from remote suppliers, transported in refrigerated trucks, and stored in different warehouses. How can perishable commodities be tracked from suppliers to customers? How can the temperature conditions during shipment be monitored to avoid contamination? How can spoilt products be quickly recalled even if they’re in transit or stored in a warehouse?To read this article in full, please click here

Deconstructing the Encryption Debate: The Internet Society-Chatham House Roundtable on Encryption and Lawful Access Report

Encryption is an important technical building block for Internet trust. It secures our infrastructure, enables e-commerce, ensures the confidentiality of our data and communications, and much more. Yet, because bad actors can also use encryption to hide their activities, it can present challenges for law enforcement.

How, or even if, law enforcement should gain access to encrypted content has remained a divisive issue for the last twenty years. Yet, even as encryption tools have grown in variety and use, the public debate has become over-simplified into a battle between those for and against encryption. That public debate often fails to address the nuances of the digital-communications and data-storage landscape, or how it has evolved. With both sides largely talking at each other, rather than listening to one another, there has been little headway towards a solution, or set of solutions, that is acceptable to all.

In October of 2017, the Internet Society and Chatham House convened an experts roundtable under the Chatham House Rule to deconstruct the encryption debate. They explored ways to bridge two important societal objectives: the security of infrastructure, devices, data, and communications; and the needs of law enforcement. The roundtable brought together a diverse set of Continue reading