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Category Archives for "Networking"

IPv6 Host Networking and Insomnia

I’ve been running IPv6 on my home network for a while. The solution in place has evolved over time, from terminating tunnels to a linux VM using gogo6 all the way to front-ending with a Cisco ISR using Hurricane Electric, the goal has always been the same - to practice what I preach. Running IPv6 at home and REFUSING to turn it off when problems arise is one of the best ways to learn the protocol.

IPv6 Host Networking and Insomnia

I’ve been running IPv6 on my home network for a while. The solution in place has evolved over time, from terminating tunnels to a linux VM using gogo6 all the way to front-ending with a Cisco ISR using Hurricane Electric, the goal has always been the same - to practice what I preach. Running IPv6 at home and REFUSING to turn it off when problems arise is one of the best ways to learn the protocol.

Juniper PTX3000 – thin is in…

Juniper just launched the PTX3000, which has some nice features – such as being small enough to be installed by one technician, and pushing 0.5Gbps per cubic inch.  The thing is, we still can’t work out who is going to buy these things…

Anywhoo, here’s the info on the Juniper website, with a nice side-view so you can marvel at its 10 inches:

http://www.juniper.net/us/en/dm/ptx-3000/?utm_source=promo&utm_medium=home_page&utm_content=carousel&utm_campaign=ptx3000


Six Things About F5 BIGIP v11 iApps

F5 Networks’ Local Traffic Manager (LTM) is my load balancer – okay, Application Delivery Controller, if you insist – of choice. The LTM platform is as feature-rich and well-supported as they come, with all sorts of customizability as well as the iRule scripting language (a superset of TCL) that lets you do fancy transaction manipulation. […]

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Ethan Banks

Ethan Banks, CCIE #20655, has been managing networks for higher ed, government, financials and high tech since 1995. Ethan co-hosts the Packet Pushers Podcast, which has seen over 3M downloads and reaches over 10K listeners. With whatever time is left, Ethan writes for fun & profit, studies for certifications, and enjoys science fiction. @ecbanks

The post Six Things About F5 BIGIP v11 iApps appeared first on Packet Pushers Podcast and was written by Ethan Banks.

Packet Design Acquired by Private Equity Firm; Appoints New CEO

Leader in IP Network Route Analytics Receives Cash Infusion to Accelerate Growth

SANTA CLARA, CA — March 19, 2013 — Packet Design, the leading provider of IP network route analytics software announced today that it has been acquired by Lone Rock Technology Group, an Austin-based private equity firm specializing in enterprise software. S3 Ventures, an early stage venture firm with a focus on information technology and also based in Austin, joins Lone Rock as a major investor in the company. With the deal, Packet Design announced it has appointed Scott Sherwood, a network and systems management industry veteran, as its new CEO. 

Since it was founded in 2003, Packet Design has pioneered the complex science of route analytics. Its patented technology provides unique visibility into routing and traffic behavior across the entire cloud. Network managers at hundreds of the largest service providers, mobile operators, cable and broadband providers, enterprises and government agencies spanning five continents rely on the intelligence Packet Design provides to optimize the performance and control of their networks. 

“We believe Packet Design’s technology, world-class talent, and marquee customers position it extremely well in a market growing over 12% CAGR, and we are excited by the Continue reading

My Tools for Studying

Anyway, I thought it would be neat to document the tools I'm using today. It'll be interesting to read this in a couple of years to see how things have changed again and maybe it'll give a fellow cert-chaser some ideas for today.

A Contest of Protocols: EIGRP or OSPF?

Ah, the age old question that nearly every CCNA and CCNP candidate asks of themselves and others at some point. We see a minimum of 4 routing protocols in our networking studies, more if you decide to take on the Service Provider track. What makes one routing protocol better than another? I think it’s clear why (at least mostly) these particular two protocols are different, keeping in mind that one is distance vector (yes, distance vector, not hybrid distance vector) and the other is link state.

A Contest of Protocols: EIGRP or OSPF?

Ah, the age old question that nearly every CCNA and CCNP candidate asks of themselves and others at some point. We see a minimum of 4 routing protocols in our networking studies, more if you decide to take on the Service Provider track. What makes one routing protocol better than another? I think it’s clear why (at least mostly) these particular two protocols are different, keeping in mind that one is distance vector (yes, distance vector, not hybrid distance vector) and the other is link state.

Broadview Networks Deploys Packet Design’s VPN Explorer to Manage Converged Services Network

IP Routing and MPLS VPN Visibility Increases Network Operations Efficiency, Reduces Mean-Time-to-Repair

SANTA CLARA, Calif., December 20, 2010 – Broadview Networks, a business communications service provider, has deployed VPN Explorer, an IP/MPLS VPN routing analysis solution from Packet Design, Inc. Broadview will use VPN Explorer to manage their IP network, which provides business customers with VoIP, Internet, VPN and MPLS-enabled data communications.

Broadview Networks installed VPN Explorer earlier this year to monitor its large router network, which runs the Open Shortest Path First (OSPF), Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) and Multi-Protocol BGP (MP-BGP) MPLS VPN routing protocols. VPN Explorer uses a technology known as ‘route analytics’ that lets the company's network engineering staff look at otherwise hidden aspects of routing behavior – undetectable by conventional SNMP-based management tools – and understand its impact on network reliability, redundancy, and customer service delivery.

George Carey, managing director of ISP Operations for Broadview Networks, said the need for more visibility into IP and MPLS VPN routing has increased with the growth of Broadview’s service portfolio and the expansion of the network. “Our IP backbone network has grown to support many diverse services, including more than 50,000 OfficeSuite™ hosted IP phone stations, SIP trunking, Continue reading

Packet Design’s Route Explorer Integrated with Juniper Networks Junosphere Lab

SANTA CLARA, Calif., October 4, 2011 – Packet Design has integrated its Route Explorer route analytics solution with the Juniper Networks® Junosphere™ Lab cloud-based service, giving Juniper customers a way to visualize and analyze complex Layer 3 routed networks created in the Junosphere virtual environment.

Route Explorer provides real-time, network-wide Layer 3 visibility across an enterprise or service provider's IP/MPLS/VPN network, delivering an intuitive graphical view of control plane operation, including IP forwarding paths, RSVP-TE tunnels and Layer 3 VPN services. Integration with Junosphere will allow users to see a real-time topology map of their virtual network, monitor routing changes, perform in-depth analyses, including the ability to rewind network event history, and graphically depict what-if scenarios for failure analysis or to understand the impact of changes before they are deployed. Route Explorer functionality is provided free of charge to Junosphere Lab users.

Judy Beningson, vice president and general manager, Virtual Junos Business Unit at Juniper Networks , said, “We are excited to expand our partnership with Packet Design, and to bring Route Explorer’s powerful network visualization and analysis capabilities to Junosphere Lab users. Route Explorer will give users of our ground-breaking cloud-based service additional flexibility, allowing our customers to Continue reading

Quiz #10 &#8211 OSPF on CE-PE links

Company ABC has multiple offices interconnected via an MPLS provider and each office runs OSPF with a separate Area number.
In one of the offices, there is an internal router that uses VRFs. You notice that some routes are not learned. Why ?

Show 140 – Introduction OpenStack and Quantum Projects

OpenStack is progressively developing into a product that networking needs to be a part of. One way to describe OpenStack is to say it’s an API for infrastructure. OpenStack is a combination of open source plus a significant number of hardware vendors who see contributions to OpenStack as a way of growing or maintaining their own markets and customers.

Customers want OpenStack as an alternative to VMware or other commercial software - not all applications and service need to have expensive software licenses and maintenance. We need to be able to build a core of functional services that can deliver services.

In the future, it seems likely that OpenStack Quantum API will be important. We discuss Open Vswitch and how it’s changing from being a “switch” to including routing, firewall and load balancing features. If you don’t like that, you could consider using Quantum API as a way to consume load balancers from your preferred vendor - the API exists to simplify the consumption of network resources.

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Greg Ferro

Greg Ferro is a Network Engineer/Architect, mostly focussed on Data Centre, Security Infrastructure, and recently Virtualization. He has over 20 years in IT, in wide range of employers working Continue reading

Nexus 5000 QoS – Keeping It Classless Labs

I’m pleased to revive the KIC LABS series with a video on Cisco MQC-style QoS on the Nexus 5000. PLEASE read these two articles first, as they do a lot better job at explaining the structure that we’re going to be putting together in the video. Unfortunately I was not able to provide this during the video, as I was pressed for time. https://keepingitclassless.net/2012/11/cisco-quality-of-service-part-1-types-of-qos-policies/ https://keepingitclassless.net/2012/11/qos-part-2-qos-and-jumbo-frames-on-nexus-ucs-and-vmware/ Download the configuration used in this video here.

Nexus 5000 QoS – Keeping It Classless Labs

I’m pleased to revive the KIC LABS series with a video on Cisco MQC-style QoS on the Nexus 5000. PLEASE read these two articles first, as they do a lot better job at explaining the structure that we’re going to be putting together in the video. Unfortunately I was not able to provide this during the video, as I was pressed for time. https://keepingitclassless.net/2012/11/cisco-quality-of-service-part-1-types-of-qos-policies/ https://keepingitclassless.net/2012/11/qos-part-2-qos-and-jumbo-frames-on-nexus-ucs-and-vmware/ Download the configuration used in this video here.

Nexus 5000 QoS – Keeping It Classless Labs

I’m pleased to revive the KIC LABS series with a video on Cisco MQC-style QoS on the Nexus 5000. PLEASE read these two articles first, as they do a lot better job at explaining the structure that we’re going to be putting together in the video. Unfortunately I was not able to provide this during the video, as I was pressed for time. https://keepingitclassless.net/2012/11/cisco-quality-of-service-part-1-types-of-qos-policies/ https://keepingitclassless.net/2012/11/qos-part-2-qos-and-jumbo-frames-on-nexus-ucs-and-vmware/ Download the configuration used in this video here.

What’s Next for OpenFlow and Open Source?

One year ago, the Open Networking Foundation was setting a blistering pace of standards development. Though their process is closed to outsiders, word had leaked out that not only were they on track to produce version 1.3 of the OpenFlow standard, but 1.4 would follow before the end of 2012. At some point that plan […]

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Bill Owens

Bill Owens

Bill has had his hands in networks since 2400 baud was fast, but lately he thinks that things like DNS, IPv6 and OpenFlow are more fun. During the day he helps take care of a statewide optical/IP network. You can find him on Twitter as @owens_bill and lurking around lots of different network-related mailing lists.

The post What’s Next for OpenFlow and Open Source? appeared first on Packet Pushers Podcast and was written by Bill Owens.

What’s that % sign after ipconfig IPv6 address?

How does the internet work - We know what is networking

I see a % ## in my IPv6 address… what is it?? Because all Link-Local Addresses share the same network identifier (fe80::), you cannot determine which interface an LLA is bound to merely by looking at the address. Therefore, if a computer running Windows has multiple network adapters connected to different network segments, it distinguishes the networks by using a numeric zone ID following a percent sign after the IP address.

What’s that % sign after ipconfig IPv6 address?