Aruba flexes some IoT muscle

The Internet of Things (IoT) is heating up and will be a hot trend in 2017. And Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise Company, plans to be a part of it. The company has been active in the IoT industry by providing Wi-Fi connectivity to IoT endpoints and security through its ClearPass product. However, it has never put together a comprehensive IoT story that spans its portfolio.Last week at the HPE Discover Conference, though, Aruba announced several new products to position itself as a strong IoT enabler. The new solutions include security tools, wired switches and new partnerships.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Debugging war story: the mystery of NXDOMAIN

The following blog post describes a debugging adventure on Cloudflare's Mesos-based cluster. This internal cluster is primarily used to process log file information so that Cloudflare customers have analytics, and for our systems that detect and respond to attacks.

The problem encountered didn't have any effect on our customers, but did have engineers scratching their heads...

The Problem

At some point in one of our cluster we started seeing errors like this (an NXDOMAIN for an existing domain on our internal DNS):

lookup some.existing.internal.host on 10.36.0.9:53: no such host  

This seemed very weird, since the domain did indeed exist. It was one of our internal domains! Engineers had mentioned that they'd seen this behaviour, so we decided to investigate deeper. Queries triggering this error were varied and ranged from dynamic SRV records managed by mesos-dns to external domains looked up from inside the cluster.

Our first naive attempt was to run the following in a loop:

while true; do dig some.existing.internal.host > /tmp/dig.txt || break; done  

Running this for a while on one server did not reproduce the problem: all the lookups were successful. Then we took our service Continue reading

Trump’s plan for protecting IT jobs raises hopes, fears

President-elect Donald Trump is showing a willingness to wage an economic battle with firms that move jobs offshore. He's threatening tariffs and promising H-1B visa reform, but may be offering carrots as well, namely tax incentives.These actions may be raising hopes among some IT employees who have lost jobs, or are losing them, that the incoming Trump administration is serious about keeping IT jobs in the U.S. But Trump's proposals -- particularly the tariff -- are also raising much uncertainty.Trump, in a series of tweets this weekend, reaffirmed plans to impose a 35% import tariff on "cars, A.C. units etc," on goods made by offshore U.S. firms but sold in the U.S.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

EU approves LinkedIn deal after Microsoft makes concessions

The European Union's regulators on Tuersday approved Microsoft's acquisition of social network LinkedIn on the condition that the U.S. company abide by several minor concessions it made to secure the deal.The conditions were reminiscent of those forced on Microsoft in past antitrust actions, including the settlement between the firm and the U.S. Justice Department early in the century, and a later judgment against Microsoft in the European Union (EU).Microsoft promised it would not require PC makers to install a LinkedIn app or Windows 10 tile on machines sold in the European Economic Area (EEA), the region consisting of EU member states as well as Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway. Users will be able to remove any LinkedIn app or tile in Windows, Microsoft said, and pledged that it would not use Windows to nag customers to install a LinkedIn app.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

8 free virtual appliances you’ll love

Despite the fact there’s no such thing as a free lunch, you can download the eight virtual appliances discussed in this article for free. That doesn’t mean you can use any of these in a high-end production environment, but it doesn’t mean you can’t either. Some even have paid and supported versions should you choose to go that route.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

8 free virtual appliances you’ll love

Despite the fact there’s no such thing as a free lunch, you can download the eight virtual appliances discussed in this article for free. That doesn’t mean you can use any of these in a high-end production environment, but it doesn’t mean you can’t either. Some even have paid and supported versions should you choose to go that route.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

10 best sites and services to sell used tech

At the end of each year, many of us attempt to turn the technology we no longer need into cash. You could be cleaning out the drawers or closets to which you banished old gadgets. Perhaps you treated yourself to a Surface Studio or MacBook Pro and need some extra money to pay for that pricey new computer.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

10 hottest tech skills for 2017

Scott Zulpo is facing stiff competition.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

How to get creative with your digital transformation strategy

Digital transformation can mean many things and encompass many areas of technology, it will look entirely different from one company to the next. However, there is one common theme -- it requires that creativity and innovation be tailored specifically around your business' needs.But many companies suffer from, what Chakib Bouhdary, digital transformation officer at SAP calls, "corporate cholesterol." In other words, businesses are often entrenched in "rigid processes, risk avoidance and a mindset of 'it's working, why change?'," which can limit an organization's ability to quickly adapt.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Playing cyber defense is not enough to win

While the San Francisco 49ers are leading the NFL in defense, the New Orleans Saints currently hold the number one slot for total offense. In the overall league rankings, though, neither of those two teams rank in the top 10. What's the takeaway? Winning isn't strictly about strong offense or impenetrable defense. NFL league leaders advance to the top because they know how to balance the two; they know how to play the game.To address the growing number of attacks on the US government and private sector systems, President-elect Donald Trump's cybersecurity plan aims to, "Develop the offensive cyber capabilities we need to deter attacks by both state and non-state actors and, if necessary, to respond appropriately."To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Playing cyber defense is not enough to win

While the San Francisco 49ers are leading the NFL in defense, the New Orleans Saints currently hold the number one slot for total offense. In the overall league rankings, though, neither of those two teams rank in the top 10. What's the takeaway? Winning isn't strictly about strong offense or impenetrable defense. NFL league leaders advance to the top because they know how to balance the two; they know how to play the game.To address the growing number of attacks on the US government and private sector systems, President-elect Donald Trump's cybersecurity plan aims to, "Develop the offensive cyber capabilities we need to deter attacks by both state and non-state actors and, if necessary, to respond appropriately."To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Coworking tips to increase your productivity and privacy

The coworking and open-workspace revolutions are upon us.Many modern offices have already switched to open-plan concepts, and dedicated coworking spaces continue to become more and more popular. The general idea is to move office workers from their fixed cubicles to more open environments, to encourage interaction and collaboration. And coworking spaces let employees work from their locations of choice.Today, the sight of workers moving around throughout the day with their laptops is common, and they often huddle with different groups. But how can employees remain both productive and secure in such environments? Here are some basics for anyone who's new to an open office or cowork space.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

How Lean IT impacts business outcomes

In the years since Lean first revolutionized the manufacturing sector, the basic principles have also shown benefits in other industries and other departments, most notably within technology. But new research emphasizes the major impact Lean can have not just in your IT departments, but across your entire organization.The ultimate goal and guiding principle of Lean is creating perfect value for customers through a perfect value creation process with zero waste. In the day-to-day implementations of Lean, that translates to creating more value with fewer resources and inefficiencies.Perfect value Organizations that have implemented Lean are seeing this principle become a reality, according to the Lean Business Report 2016 research from visual product delivery solutions company LeanKit, which surveyed 3,000 executives, consultants and team members between September and November 2015.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

7 Ways Flash Storage Is Gaining Momentum

35% off Fitbit Alta Fitness Tracker – Deal Alert

Motivation is your best accessory with Fitbit Alta-a customizable fitness tracker designed to fit your personal style . Stay motivated by tracking all-day activity like steps, distance, calories burned and active minutes, and get credit for your workouts with Smart Track automatic exercise recognition. At night, track your sleep and set a silent alarm to wake better and get your best rest. No matter where you're headed, the easy-to-read OLED screen keeps your goals in focus with stats, time, and call or text notifications on display. And with accessory wristbands in metal, leather and sport, help you find the right style for every occasion. Wear fitness your way with Fitbit Alta.  To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Kenna Security Raises $15M in Series B

Some of its customers include TransUnion, Starbucks, Hanes, and Hilton.

L3 fabric DC -The underlay Network -Part1

In the previous posts we have discussed the classic DC designs and the M-LAG solution. In this post we will cover the basic L3 fabric DC, you might never heard of it or you think that’s a solution for massive scale DC, yes the massive DC in the world would be running L3 fabric but nowadays more and more customers are moving …

The post L3 fabric DC -The underlay Network -Part1 appeared first on Networkers-online.com.

Q&A: Building a Layer-2 Data Center Fabric in 2016

One of my readers designing a new data center fabric that has to provide L2 transport across the data center sent me this observation:

While we don’t have plans to seek an open solution in our DC we are considering ACI or VXLAN with EVPN. Our systems integrator partner expressed a view that VXLAN is still very new. Would you share that view?

Assuming he wants to stay with Cisco, what are the other options?

US Supreme Court leaves gap in Samsung-Apple patent ruling

The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled in favor of Samsung Electronics and its backers in the industry in a design patent dispute with Apple, when in a 8-0 decision it said that “the term 'article of manufacture' is broad enough to embrace both a product sold to a consumer and a component of that product, whether sold separately or not.”But the top court has left a lot unsaid, including by not providing guidance to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on how the damages Samsung has to pay Apple for the infringement of smartphone design patents will have to be calculated. That could also delay for a long time the resolution of the patent dispute between Apple and Samsung, which has already dragged on for a number of years.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Facebook, Google, World Wide Technology near top of Glassdoor’s Best Places to Work 2017 list

Depending up on how loosely I define "enterprise technology vendor," I'd say about a third of the 2017 Glassdoor Best Places to Work in the U.S. list consists of companies that supply IT professionals and those they support.Facebook (hey, they sell Workplace collaboration tools) is all the way up to #2, rising from #5 last year, and Google (#4), system integrator World Wide Technology (#5) and Adobe (#9) are all among the top 10. Consulting firm Bain & Co., is #1 for the third time since 2012, and replaces Airbnb as top dog this time around in the 9th annual rankings.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here