7 Reasons your cloud will fail

Although vendor-written, this contributed piece does not advocate a position that is particular to the author’s employer and has been edited and approved by Network World editors.According to Gartner, a company with a corporate “no-cloud” policy in 2020 would be as rare as a company today operating without Internet. IDG estimates that 70% of enterprises are running at least one application in the cloud today and that number is projected to reach 90% in the next 12 months. In other words, in a couple of years a company not in the cloud will be unfathomable.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

7 Reasons your cloud will fail

Worth Reading: The CCDE “aha” moment

The problem with my mindset was this need to ‘jump to conclusions’, and the core of my issues with being successful with the CCDE practical exam. Hello, I’m Zig the preconceived notion guy! I will forever be known in our CCDE Study group as the preconceived notion guy! Leave your preconceived notions at the door! I cannot emphasize enough how important this is. Bring all of your technical experience and understanding, but leave every other attribute that’s not related to the technology at the door. The scenario will be feeding you all of the information you need to make a valid decision. Your personal experience and opinion about a technology that isn’t technical will only get in your way, as it was in my way. —Cisco Learning

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How Brocade’s Virtual Traffic Manager is Supporting China Mobile’s Data Centers

By deploying Brocade’s virtual traffic manager in its data centers, China Mobile will be able to deliver agile cloud services.

Big Switch Amasses Help for Containers and vSAN

Big Cloud Fabric 4.0 is available as of today.

RSA Conference Topic: Endpoint Security

As the calendar shifts from January to February, cybersecurity professionals are gearing up for the RSA Security Conference in a few short weeks.  Remarkably, the management team is expecting more than 50,000 attendees this year! So, what can we expect from RSA 2017?  Well, cybersecurity is being driven by dangerous threats, digital transformation, and the need for massive scalability.  This means innovation and change in just about every aspect of cybersecurity technology so I plan of writing a few blogs about my expectations for the RSA Conference.  I’ll start with this one about endpoint security.To be clear, endpoint security should no longer be defined as antivirus software.  No disrespect to tried-and-true AV, but endpoint security now spans a continuum that includes advanced prevention technologies, endpoint security controls, and advanced detection/response tools.  My colleague Doug Cahill and I are currently tracking more than 50 endpoint security vendors, demonstrating just how much activity there is today.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

RSA Conference 2017: Endpoint security in the spotlight

As the calendar shifts from January to February, cybersecurity professionals are gearing up for the RSA Security Conference in a few short weeks. Remarkably, the management team is expecting more than 50,000 attendees this year. So, what can we expect from RSA 2017? Well, cybersecurity is being driven by dangerous threats, digital transformation and the need for massive scalability. This means innovation and change in just about every aspect of cybersecurity technology, so I plan to write a few posts about my expectations for the RSA Conference. I’ll start with this one about endpoint security.To be clear, endpoint security should no longer be defined as antivirus software. No disrespect to tried-and-true AV, but endpoint security now spans a continuum that includes advanced prevention technologies, endpoint security controls and advanced detection/response tools. My colleague Doug Cahill and I are currently tracking more than 50 endpoint security vendors, demonstrating just how much activity there is today.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

RSA Conference 2017: Endpoint security in the spotlight

As the calendar shifts from January to February, cybersecurity professionals are gearing up for the RSA Security Conference in a few short weeks. Remarkably, the management team is expecting more than 50,000 attendees this year. So, what can we expect from RSA 2017? Well, cybersecurity is being driven by dangerous threats, digital transformation and the need for massive scalability. This means innovation and change in just about every aspect of cybersecurity technology, so I plan to write a few posts about my expectations for the RSA Conference. I’ll start with this one about endpoint security.To be clear, endpoint security should no longer be defined as antivirus software. No disrespect to tried-and-true AV, but endpoint security now spans a continuum that includes advanced prevention technologies, endpoint security controls and advanced detection/response tools. My colleague Doug Cahill and I are currently tracking more than 50 endpoint security vendors, demonstrating just how much activity there is today.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

More evidence of a resurrected Windows RT in new Windows builds

Speculation about a new edition of the Windows operating system, called Windows Cloud, got a shot in the arm with references to new versions of the OS found in recent builds. A Twitter sleuth known as "The Walking Cat" posted a screenshot of in Windows 10 for PCs build 15003, showing references to "Cloud" and "CloudN," the latter of which is believed to be a version without Media Player pre-installed, according to on Petri.com. ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley claims that Windows 10 Cloud is pretty much a newer version of Windows RT, the mobile OS based on Windows 8 designed to be more locked down and controlled and using only authorized apps. RT was a dismal failure on early Surface tablets, and a Windows 10 version never emerged. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Musing: Conferences and Travel Bans

The IETF posted that travel bans may impact its decisions on where to hold conferences. This has got me thinking.

1. A substantial number of people travel internationally to conferences that are hosted in the USA, in part because these conferences have the best content
2. Large vendor conferences that I have attend HPE Discover, Cisco Live, VMworld have been well attended by numbers of overseas attendees. I don’t have exact numbers, can’t find any ?
3. Big deals are often done at these conferences where executives from customer and vendor will fly in to finalise a deal.
4. Confereneces are critical to sales cycles of big US companies who will 1) reward customers with free trips 2) accompany customers to see what interests them 3) forge/strengthen relationships with customers who may be moving away from them.

From a personal perspective, I’m in the final stages of content planning for the Packet Pushers two day workshop at the Interop ITX conference on May 15-16. Last year, we had a large contingent of overseas folks attend Interop in large part to hear us and for some this was their first trip to the USA.

Many conferences3 are already struggling to maintain attendees, vendors and revenue. The Continue reading

Busted: Federal Reserve employee mined bitcoin using government server

At least one employee of the U.S. Federal Reserve sees the value of bitcoin and mining for it if you get your computing power for free. Nicholas Berthaume, who is now a former employee, was sentenced to 12 months’ probation and fined $5,000 for installing unauthorized bitcoin software on a Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System server.According to a news release by the Office of Inspector General, Berthaume pleaded guilty to one count of unlawful conversion of government property.Working as a Communications Analyst, Berthaume had access to some Board computer servers. He put the computing power of a federal server to work for him. Mining is costly after all, as nowadays it tends to use more electricity than a miner earns. Unless a person has excess power from a solar farm for mining, then stealing electricity for mining is an option some people choose. You may have heard about the three men and one woman recently arrested in Venezuela for electricity theft and internet fraud.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Busted: Federal Reserve employee mined bitcoin using government server

At least one employee of the U.S. Federal Reserve sees the value of bitcoin and mining for it if you get your computing power for free. Nicholas Berthaume, who is now a former employee, was sentenced to 12 months’ probation and fined $5,000 for installing unauthorized bitcoin software on a Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System server.According to a news release by the Office of Inspector General, Berthaume pleaded guilty to one count of unlawful conversion of government property.Working as a Communications Analyst, Berthaume had access to some Board computer servers. He put the computing power of a federal server to work for him. Mining is costly after all, as nowadays it tends to use more electricity than a miner earns. Unless a person has excess power from a solar farm for mining, then stealing electricity for mining is an option some people choose. You may have heard about the three men and one woman recently arrested in Venezuela for electricity theft and internet fraud.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Aerohive looks to disrupt enterprise Wi-Fi with a low price point

Wi-Fi has become a critical component of digital enterprises. The wireless network connects workers, customers, Internet of Things (Iot) endpoints and virtually everything else to the company network. In addition to connectivity, the data that is generated by wireless traffic can be analyzed and used to provide the business with new insights on customer or user behavior. Choosing the right vendor for Wi-Fi infrastructure can be a conundrum for businesses. The choices available are either a low price point that carries a basic feature set or one with an enterprise-class set of functions with a much higher cost, meaning a compromise is always required. With most solutions, if a customer chooses the low-cost option, there’s no upgrade path to a more feature-rich solution other than ripping out the old stuff and putting in a whole new set of infrastructure. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Save 14% Plus Another $20 on ASUS Dual-Fan Radeon Rx 480 4GB OC Edition Gaming Graphics Card – Deal Alert

Deploy into the VR rebellion with the Dual-fan Radeon RX 480 with 1-click overclocking. Auto-Extreme manufacturing technology with Super Alloy Power II components ensures premium quality and reliability while dual fans provide a quieter and cooler gaming environment. GPU Tweak II with XSplit Gamecaster delivers ultimate monitoring and streaming control. Patented Wing-Blade Fans for max air flow with 105% more air pressure. ASUS Dual-fan RX480 graphics cards have two HDMI ports for connecting a VR device and display at the same time, so you can enjoy immersive virtual reality experiences anytime without having to swap cables. Its list price of $220 has been reduced 14% to $189.99, but an additional post-purchase rebate offer drops the price further to $169.99. See this deal now on Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Privacy worries are on the rise, new poll of U.S. consumers shows

A recent IDC survey found 84% of U.S. consumers are concerned about the privacy of their personal information, with 70% saying their concern is greater today than it was a few years ago.These concerns of consumers should also alarm businesses: Consumers are willing to switch to another bank, medical center or retailer if they feel their personal information is threatened, the survey found."Consumers can exact punishment for data breaches or mishandled data by changing buyer behavior or shifting loyalty," said Sean Pike, an analyst at IDC, in a statement. The survey, released last week, polled 2,500 U.S. consumers about their privacy concerns across four verticals: Financial services, healthcare, retail and government.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Privacy worries are on the rise, new poll of U.S. consumers shows

A recent IDC survey found 84% of U.S. consumers are concerned about the privacy of their personal information, with 70% saying their concern is greater today than it was a few years ago.These concerns of consumers should also alarm businesses: Consumers are willing to switch to another bank, medical center or retailer if they feel their personal information is threatened, the survey found."Consumers can exact punishment for data breaches or mishandled data by changing buyer behavior or shifting loyalty," said Sean Pike, an analyst at IDC, in a statement. The survey, released last week, polled 2,500 U.S. consumers about their privacy concerns across four verticals: Financial services, healthcare, retail and government.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Maximizing use of existing cabling saves time, money and headaches

Maximizing use of existing cabling saves time, money and headaches

This vendor-written tech primer has been edited by Network World to eliminate product promotion, but readers should note it will likely favor the submitter’s approach.Network advances often require cable upgrades, but rewiring takes time and money.  Often the existing cable can be leveraged, or the extent of the upgrade minimized, using ]media converters, one of the least glamorous yet most common and perhaps most versatile tools in a network manager’s toolbox.New media converters and extenders are available that support Power-over-Ethernet (PoE and PoE+) and legacy cabling types such as coax and 2-wire. These devices enable increased utilization of existing network cabling while upgrading network performance.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Maximizing use of existing cabling saves time, money and headaches

This vendor-written tech primer has been edited by Network World to eliminate product promotion, but readers should note it will likely favor the submitter’s approach.Network advances often require cable upgrades, but rewiring takes time and money.  Often the existing cable can be leveraged, or the extent of the upgrade minimized, using ]media converters, one of the least glamorous yet most common and perhaps most versatile tools in a network manager’s toolbox.New media converters and extenders are available that support Power-over-Ethernet (PoE and PoE+) and legacy cabling types such as coax and 2-wire. These devices enable increased utilization of existing network cabling while upgrading network performance.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Uber, Amazon, Tesla ramped up US lobbying in 2016

Many major tech companies spent less money lobbying in Washington in 2016, but a handful, including Uber and Amazon, invested significantly more in attempting to influence politicians and the regulatory process.The money, which totals tens of millions of dollars, is spent on workers and companies that monitor bills and schmooze with politicians and their staffs in the hopes of shaping laws in favor of their clients.Uber, which is regularly in conflict with regulators, spent $1.4 million on issues as varied as autonomous cars, access to military bases for its cars and transportation regulations. That's almost three times the $470,000 it spent in 2015, according to regulatory filings.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here