You Don’t Want To Be A Rock Star

When I say “rock star”, you probably have all kinds of images that pop up in your head. Private planes, penthouse suites, grand stages, and wheelbarrows full of money are probably on that list somewhere. Maybe you’re a purist and you think of someone dedicated to the craft of entertaining the masses and trying to claw their way to fame one note at a time. But I’m also sure in both of those cases you also think about the negative aspects of being a rock star. Like ego. And lack of humility. I want to touch on some of that as it pertains to our jobs and our involvement in the community.

Great Like Elvis. Without The Tassels.

The rock star mentality at work is easy to come by. Perhaps you’re very good at what you do. You may even be the best at your company or even at the collection of companies that are your competitors. You’re the best senior architect there is. You know the products and the protocols and you can implement a complex project with your eyes closed. That’s how people start looking at you. Larger than life. The best. One of a kind.

And that Continue reading

Heavy Networking 450: Getting To Know The Open-Source VyOS Network OS

Today's Heavy Networking digs into VyOS, an open-source, Linux-based network OS for routing. Forked from the Vyatta Core, VyOS includes a full routing stack and features including firewalling, VPN, and more. Guest Yuriy Andamasov, the project coordinator, gives us a guided tour.

The post Heavy Networking 450: Getting To Know The Open-Source VyOS Network OS appeared first on Packet Pushers.

Faster script loading with BinaryAST?

Faster script loading with BinaryAST?

JavaScript Cold starts

Faster script loading with BinaryAST?

The performance of applications on the web platform is becoming increasingly bottlenecked by the startup (load) time. Large amounts of JavaScript code are required to create rich web experiences that we’ve become used to. When we look at the total size of JavaScript requested on mobile devices from HTTPArchive, we see that an average page loads 350KB of JavaScript, while 10% of pages go over the 1MB threshold. The rise of more complex applications can push these numbers even higher.

While caching helps, popular websites regularly release new code, which makes cold start (first load) times particularly important. With browsers moving to separate caches for different domains to prevent cross-site leaks, the importance of cold starts is growing even for popular subresources served from CDNs, as they can no longer be safely shared.

Usually, when talking about the cold start performance, the primary factor considered is a raw download speed. However, on modern interactive pages one of the other big contributors to cold starts is JavaScript parsing time. This might seem surprising at first, but makes sense - before starting to execute the code, the engine has to first parse the fetched JavaScript, make sure Continue reading

Technology Short Take 114

Welcome to Technology Short Take #114! There will be a longer gap than usual before the next Tech Short Take (more details to come on Monday), but in the meantime here’s some articles and links to feed your technical appetite. Enjoy!

Networking

Servers/Hardware

Security

Cloud Computing/Cloud Management

IDG Contributor Network: The modern data center and the rise in open-source IP routing suites

As the cloud service providers and search engines started with the structuring process of their business, they quickly ran into the problems of managing the networking equipment. Ultimately, after a few rounds of getting the network vendors to understand their problems, these hyperscale network operators revolted.Primarily, what the operators were looking for was a level of control in managing their network which the network vendors couldn’t offer. The revolution burned the path that introduced open networking, and network disaggregation to the work of networking. Let us first learn about disaggregation followed by open networking.Disaggregation The concept of network disaggregation involves breaking-up of the vertical networking landscape into individual pieces, where each piece can be used in the best way possible. The hardware can be separated from the software, along with open or closed IP routing suites. This enables the network operators to use the best of breed for the hardware, software and the applications.To read this article in full, please click here

Programmable Packet Forwarding Pipelines Using P4 on Software Gone Wild

Every time a new simple programming language is invented, we go through the same predictable cycle:

  • Tons of hype;
  • Unbounded enthusiasm when people who never worked in target environment realize they could get something simple done in a short time;
  • Ever-worsening headaches as the enthusiasts try to get a real job done with the shiny new tool;
  • Disappointment;
  • A more powerful language is invented to replace the old one.

A few years ago we experienced the same cycle when OpenFlow was the-one-tool-to-bind-them all.

Read more ...

Understanding real-world concurrency bugs in Go

Understanding real-world concurrency bugs in Go Tu, Liu et al., ASPLOS’19

The design of a programming (or data) model not only makes certain problems easier (or harder) to solve, but also makes certain classes of bugs easier (or harder) to create, detect, and subsequently fix. Today’s paper choice studies concurrency mechanisms in Go. Before we dive in, it might be interesting to pause for a moment and consider your own beliefs about Go, which may well include some of the following:

  • Go was explicitly designed to make concurrent programming easier and less error-prone
  • Go makes concurrent programming easier and less error-prone
  • Go programs make heavy use of message passing via channels, which is less error prone than shared memory synchronisation
  • Go programs have less concurrency bugs
  • Go’s built-in deadlock and data race detectors will catch any (most?)
    bugs you do let slip into your code

The first of those statements is true. For the remaining statements, you can use the data from this research to re-evaluate how strongly you want to hold those opinions…

We perform the first systematic study on concurrency bugs in real Go programs. We studied six popular Go software [projects] including Docker, Kubernetes, and Continue reading

BrandPost: Cloud-managed Networking Unites Global Manufacturing Operations

Manufacturers know better than most businesses the expense of replacing legacy equipment. With high costs for the industrial machines, programmable logic controllers, IT gear, and other systems needed to build everything from consumer packaged goods to cars and electronics, many manufacturers choose to milk their capital expenditures as long as possible. That can mean waiting years before replacing old equipment.One manufacturer, however, has found a way to replace legacy IT equipment while saving time and money, thanks to cloud-managed network appliances from Cisco Meraki.A legacy of innovationJapanese scale maker Teraoka Seiko has been in business for more than 85 years. While the company still makes scales, it has since expanded its business to include self-checkout cashiers, point-of-sale (POS) systems, and many other related devices and appliances. Although the technology has changed over the decades, the company’s commitment to innovation and its international focus has remained constant.To read this article in full, please click here

BrandPost: High-End Networking Improves Customer Satisfaction at Audi

In the era of e-commerce, top consumer brands depend on superior customer service to win sales in the store and showroom. In few industries is this more important than automotive, where technology is changing the relationship between consumers and the cars they drive or ride in, offering an expanding array of options for mobility beyond simple ownership.One carmaker has risen to the challenge with a mix of smart tech and stellar customer service that created one of the most satisfied groups of automotive customers.To read this article in full, please click here

BrandPost: Connecting in a Wi-Fi-Challenged Environment at MIT

It started as a Ph.D. thesis project at one of the world’s premier institutions of technology research and higher education. Now it’s back to benefit a new generation of students and researchers.An advanced yet easy-to-use wireless network from Cisco Meraki – with origins in research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) – has solved one of the university’s most intractable problems: providing robust Wi-Fi access in a challenging radio frequency environment.From research to productThe Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) at MIT is home to cutting-edge research in the areas of robotics, artificial intelligence (AI), machine vision, networking, and more. In 2006, researchers developed a novel plug-and-play Wi-Fi networking system that they spun out into a company called Meraki.To read this article in full, please click here

Installing Cumulus packages on air-gapped equipment

From time to time I run into situations where someone would like to install the Cumulus Linux operating system as well as additional packages that aren’t part of the default binary install package. This short excerpt is meant to assist in helping get those additional packages into an air-gapped environment for the install where you don’t have a repo or mirror available to pull from.

For instance, let’s say we want to install TACACS+ on an air-gapped switch and we don’t have access to a mirrored repo. There is a very tedious method which I’ll outline first, then there is the more Linux admin like option which is much more streamlined.

One thing that could be done is to run through the install on a switch with outside connectivity, gather the package and dependency info… manually pull the deb’s off of the repo on whatever media you are using to transfer files to the new switch. Then copy all of the packages over and install them. It’s the hard way, but sometimes that’s the road we have to take.

The long way

Pull the package list from a switch connected to the repo:

All of the packages should be in Continue reading

Envisioning the Future in the Middle East

How can the brightest minds help transform the Middle East for the better? The MIT SciTech Conference hoped to find answers. The annual three-day conference, which took place 19-21 April in Boston, Massachusetts, brought together students and professionals from across North America and the MENA Region. This year’s theme was “Envisioning the Future: Cities of MENA,” and included an IDEAthon on Energy, Innovation, and Infrastructure.

Many people from all over the globe attended the conference, mainly Arabs who were also successful tech entrepreneurs, leveraging the Internet to reach communities across the world. They also spoke about their innovations and inspired the young participants, who included MIT students, through panels, keynotes, ideation processes, and SciTech talks.

The first day started with a tour of MIT Labs and the launch of the IDEAthon. After initial sessions and introductions, participants were left for the night to work on their ideas. Those ended up being presented at the end of the third day to judges, with cash prizes awarded to winners so that they could turn them into reality by implementing them throughout the Arab world.

Infrastructure is a challenge in the MENA region, especially with a rapidly growing population, and the conference Continue reading

Becoming an AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate

Architecting for the cloud is becoming a highly desired skill set. Working as a consultant, I’m often in situations where clients are overwhelmed with questions about the cloud. How do I migrate my applications? How do I secure everything? How does it integrate with LDAP and DNS? What’s the best way to connect to the […]

The post Becoming an AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate appeared first on Overlaid.

On the ‘net: EVPN Use Cases

In the final session of this video series, we talk to industry experts and RFC authors about additional challenges for which EVPN-VXLAN is a strong answer: Connecting domains (DCI, Campus to DC connections, Multi-vendor networks), multicasting for use cases like live TV streaming, public cloud connection, and other super powers. Join us to find out why these expanded use cases make your lives easier and why your CTO will want to hear more about it to equip your business for rapid responses to new application needs.

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