Get on the same page for network asset management

It’s an all-too familiar scene: The start of a new financial quarter signals yet another opportunity for CFOs and CIOs to debate the fate of proposed network equipment purchases, upgrades and support. If these two stakeholders are to come together to maximize the return on every IT dollar spent, it’s crucial they have a clear understanding of the shared IT value equation. For many, this is capex and opex through the lens of deferring or lowering capital expenditures without increasing operational costs.  This approach typically includes a “sweat the assets” strategy for extending the useful life of stable network routers and switches. But first, you need to know exactly what’s deployed and supported under current maintenance contracts. Relying solely on OEMs to provide a full accounting of your network assets is akin to flying blind. Don’t get me wrong: While there’s great value in tools such as Cisco’s Smart Collector for discovering and gathering device-related data from all the Cisco gear in your network, it’s a place to start—not stop. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Get on the same page for network asset management

It’s an all-too familiar scene: The start of a new financial quarter signals yet another opportunity for CFOs and CIOs to debate the fate of proposed network equipment purchases, upgrades and support. If these two stakeholders are to come together to maximize the return on every IT dollar spent, it’s crucial they have a clear understanding of the shared IT value equation. For many, this is capex and opex through the lens of deferring or lowering capital expenditures without increasing operational costs.  This approach typically includes a “sweat the assets” strategy for extending the useful life of stable network routers and switches. But first, you need to know exactly what’s deployed and supported under current maintenance contracts. Relying solely on OEMs to provide a full accounting of your network assets is akin to flying blind. Don’t get me wrong: While there’s great value in tools such as Cisco’s Smart Collector for discovering and gathering device-related data from all the Cisco gear in your network, it’s a place to start—not stop. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Riverbed stabs at Cisco’s heart with next-gen routing

Riverbed, with its highly successful WAN optimization technology, has long competed with Cisco – but in a niche fashion, acknowledges CEO and co-founder Jerry Kennelly. Now, the company is taking its fight to the core of Cisco’s business with new SD-WAN routing technology that could make existing routers obsolete in the world of hybrid clouds and virtual networks.  I want to talk more specifically about how SteelConnect makes hybrid cloud easier?To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

Riverbed stabs at Cisco’s heart with next-gen routing

Riverbed, with its highly successful WAN optimization technology, has long competed with Cisco – but in a niche fashion, acknowledges CEO and co-founder Jerry Kennelly. Now, the company is taking its fight to the core of Cisco’s business with new SD-WAN routing technology that could make existing routers obsolete in the world of hybrid clouds and virtual networks.  I want to talk more specifically about how SteelConnect makes hybrid cloud easier?To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

53% off Apple USB-C to USB Adapter – Deal Alert

This USB 2.0 cable connects your iPhone, iPad, or iPod with Lightning connector to your computer's USB port for syncing and charging, or to the Apple USB Power Adapter for convenient charging from a wall outlet. It's currently discounted 53% on Amazon from Apple, taking its typical list price down to just $9. See the discounted adapter on Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

John McAfee asks court to block Intel’s security spin-out

Intel’s plan to spin out its security business under the McAfee name could run into rough weather with security expert John McAfee asking a court in New York to order an injunction on the deal until a dispute over the use of his personal name for another company is resolved.In a court filing on Tuesday, John McAfee and MGT Capital Investments claimed that there is a high likelihood that Intel intends to sell the rights to the use of his full name to the new venture. “Should the sale go forward any judgment awarded to Plaintiffs will be ineffectual,” it added.John McAfee and MGT informed the court that they will be seeking a preliminary injunction that would prevent Intel from “selling, trading, assigning, leasing or otherwise transferring any alleged rights, in whole or in part, relating to any marks, names, trade names, or entities containing the word ‘McAfee’” until the resolution of the dispute.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

John McAfee asks court to block Intel’s security spin-out

Intel’s plan to spin out its security business under the McAfee name could run into rough weather with security expert John McAfee asking a court in New York to order an injunction on the deal until a dispute over the use of his personal name for another company is resolved.In a court filing on Tuesday, John McAfee and MGT Capital Investments claimed that there is a high likelihood that Intel intends to sell the rights to the use of his full name to the new venture. “Should the sale go forward any judgment awarded to Plaintiffs will be ineffectual,” it added.John McAfee and MGT informed the court that they will be seeking a preliminary injunction that would prevent Intel from “selling, trading, assigning, leasing or otherwise transferring any alleged rights, in whole or in part, relating to any marks, names, trade names, or entities containing the word ‘McAfee’” until the resolution of the dispute.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Q&A: Vendor OpenFlow Limitations

I rarely get OpenFlow questions these days; here’s one I got not so long ago:

I've just spent the last 2 days of my life consuming the ONF 1.3.3 white paper in addition to the $vendor SDN guide to try and reconcile what features it does or does not support and have come away disappointed...

You’re not the only one ;)

Arista Gives Tomahawk 25G Ethernet Some XPliant Competition

Processing for server compute has gotten more general purpose for the past two decades and is seeing resurgence in built-for-purpose chips. Network equipment makers have made their own specialized chips as well as buying merchant chips of varying kinds to meet very specific switching and routing needs.

Of the chip upstarts that are competing against industry juggernaut Cisco Systems, Arista Networks stands out as the company that decided from its founding in 2009 to rely only on merchant silicon for switches and to differentiate on speed to market and software functionality and commonality across many different switch ASICs with its …

Arista Gives Tomahawk 25G Ethernet Some XPliant Competition was written by Timothy Prickett Morgan at The Next Platform.

Google publishes national security letters for the first time

Google is providing for the first time a look into the world of national security letters -- demands from the Federal Bureau of Investigation to hand over details about account holders and keep quiet about it.The letters are a part of business for Google and other major internet companies, but  traditionally they have been barred from acknowledging the letters' existence. That changed in 2013 when, in light of revelations about Internet surveillance by U.S. intelligence agencies, Google and others started fighting to disclose more about the demands.That led to the creation of Google's "transparency report," which revealed the company receives thousands of requests for user data each month from law enforcement agencies around the globe. The national security letters remained secret, but on Tuesday, Google published a handful that are no longer covered by nondisclosure rules.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Google publishes national security letters for the first time

Google is providing for the first time a look into the world of national security letters -- demands from the Federal Bureau of Investigation to hand over details about account holders and keep quiet about it.The letters are a part of business for Google and other major internet companies, but  traditionally they have been barred from acknowledging the letters' existence. That changed in 2013 when, in light of revelations about Internet surveillance by U.S. intelligence agencies, Google and others started fighting to disclose more about the demands.That led to the creation of Google's "transparency report," which revealed the company receives thousands of requests for user data each month from law enforcement agencies around the globe. The national security letters remained secret, but on Tuesday, Google published a handful that are no longer covered by nondisclosure rules.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

The New Tech Economy in Cloud Networking

Installing Ansible 2.2 on Ubuntu 16.04

A few weeks ago I wrote a post about installing Ansible 2.2 on Fedora 25; today, I’d like to tackle what’s involved in installing Ansible 2.2 on Ubuntu 16.04. This post, like its Fedora counterpart, stems from my ongoing evaluation of Linux distributions and desktop environments. While the information here is very similar to the information in the Fedora post, I’m putting it in its own post in the hopes of making the information easier for readers to find.

It’s not really a secret that I like to run Ansible in a Python virtualenv, but I don’t believe that it will make any difference to the procedure described in this post. The errors that result when trying to install Ansible 2.2 without the necessary prerequisite packages should be the same either way (in a virtualenv or not). However, I’m happy to be corrected if someone knows otherwise.

To create a Python virtualenv, you’ll first need virtualenv installed. I prefer to install virtualenv globally for all users using this command:

sudo -H pip install virtualenv

Alternately, you could install it via a package, with apt install virtualenv. As far as I can tell, either approach Continue reading

BrandPost: A Deep and Diverse Menu: VPNs for any needs

There are a variety of virtual private network (VPN) solutions available today.Let’s start off with a quick glance at the menu of options: Software-defined Wide Area Networking (SD-WAN) Multiprotocol Label Switching (MLPS) Broadband Multiservice VPN Ethernet Internet Protocol Security (IPSec) Remote access services Cloud-connected The good news is there are site by site options to best meet the needs of your organization. So here’s a quick guide. SD-WAN: A fast-emerging VPN segment, according to Network World “SD-WANs allow customers to integrate multiple network connection types and let software intelligently route traffic based on application profiles and available network types.” MPLS: Long recognized as a preferred option for dedicated, high performance WAN connectivity, the MPLS VPN is enabled over a high-speed, single-carrier-operated network. It can handle different types of data streams and offers higher security and traffic policy enforcement. It’s idea for connecting data centers and major hubs. Broadband VPNs: Utilizing the public Internet via cable and DSL connections, broadband VPNs can connect two or more locations and provide high-speed connections to workers and small satellite locations, for applications that aren’t latency-sensitive. Multiservice VPNs: A hybrid VPN solution that combines highly secure connectivity for your business voice, video, data, Continue reading

Infoblox Intros Alliance Program to Offer Well-Rounded Security

This alliance integrates cloud, network, and security companies with Infoblox’s software.

Enterprises Relying on SOCs to Fight Security Threats

Security breaches are on the upswing, say 67 percent of enterprises surveyed.

AirPods now available for purchase, but supply is already limited

After a nearly two month delay, Apple today announced that its AirPods headphones are finally available for purchase. Apple initially introduced its AirPods in September and promised that they would be available by late October. However, some engineering challenges resulted in a delay that nearly stretched out until the new year.Indeed, it was widely anticipated that Apple's AirPods wouldn't be released until January 2017 at the earliest. Thankfully, Apple managed to fix whatever technical hurdles it was facing and opened up online orders earlier this morning.Per Apple's Newsroom:To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Cisco’s Intercloud: Stick a Fork in It

Its demise was foreshadowed, but now it’s official.

‘Tis the Season to Decorate Your Playbook

The holidays are upon us. And while we can't automate your gift wrapping, we can make your Playbook more festive.

Introducing Ansible holiday-themed cowsay!

Copy and paste this code:

---
curl "https://gist.githubusercontent.com/jlaska/14bc829af01526add07efcaa83582aaf/raw/5f4918be06ffa69ea848354c5563c6a2d7b59807/happy_holidays.sh" | bash

Decorations are popping up everywhere so why not in your Playbook?

Share your designs with #AnsibleCowsay @ansible

Tweet #AnsibleCowsay

Ascii sources: chris.com and ascii-code.com

Don’t like Russian cyberspies? Tips to stop state-sponsored hackers

Be wary around random, but legitimate-looking emails popping up in your inbox. A foreign government may be using them to try to hack you.That may sound far-fetched, but Russian cyberspies allegedly stole sensitive files from Democratic groups and figures using this very tactic. In some cases, the spoofed emails pretended to be from Google and managed to trick victims into giving up their login details, paving the way for a series of high-profile hacks that rocked this year’s presidential election.But even as the presidential race is over, cybersecurity experts warn that state-sponsored hackers remain a dangerous threat. Political organizations, businesses, and universities all should be on guard -- you’re probably already in their crosshairs.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here