Taking the CCIE Lab in RTP

Cisco's campus in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, is one of only two places in the United States where candidates can complete a CCIE lab exam (the other being in San Jose, California). People fly in from all over the eastern US and beyond to spend a day taking the exam. Lots of folks who've taken the exam have written up their experiences, but I haven't seen many talk at length about their time in RTP outside of Cisco's building 3.

I've lived just a few minutes away from the testing site for the past few years, and it occurred to me recently that visitors might benefit from some local knowledge.

Getting Here

Most people fly in via Raleigh-Durham International Airport (RDU). RDU is a medium-sized airport with two terminals. Most flights operate out of Terminal 2, except for Southwest Airlines, which is based in the newly-renovated Terminal 1.

rdu.jpg

As airports go, I'm a big fan of RDU. It's a very modern, clean, and well-organized facility. The interior of Terminal 2 is beautifully designed to resemble an early airplane wing and is flooded with natural light during the day. (It's also one of very few places where you can Continue reading

Taking the CCIE Lab in RTP

Cisco's campus in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, is one of only two places in the United States where candidates can complete a CCIE lab exam (the other being in San Jose, California). People fly in from all over the eastern US and beyond to spend a day taking the exam. Lots of folks who've taken the exam have written up their experiences, but I haven't seen many talk at length about their time in RTP outside of Cisco's building 3.

I've lived just a few minutes away from the testing site for the past few years, and it occurred to me recently that visitors might benefit from some local knowledge.

Getting Here

Most people fly in via Raleigh-Durham International Airport (RDU). RDU is a medium-sized airport with two terminals. Most flights operate out of Terminal 2, except for Southwest Airlines, which is based in the newly-renovated Terminal 1.

rdu.jpg

As airports go, I'm a big fan of RDU. It's a very modern, clean, and well-organized facility. The interior of Terminal 2 is beautifully designed to resemble an early airplane wing and is flooded with natural light during the day. (It's also one of very few places where you can Continue reading

Taking the CCIE Lab in RTP

Cisco's campus in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, is one of only two places in the United States where candidates can complete a CCIE lab exam (the other being in San Jose, California). People fly in from all over the eastern US and beyond to spend a day taking the exam. Lots of folks who've taken the exam have written up their experiences, but I haven't seen many talk at length about their time in RTP outside of Cisco's building 3.

I've lived just a few minutes away from the testing site for the past few years, and it occurred to me recently that visitors might benefit from some local knowledge.

Getting Here

Most people fly in via Raleigh-Durham International Airport (RDU). RDU is a medium-sized airport with two terminals. Most flights operate out of Terminal 2, except for Southwest Airlines, which is based in the newly-renovated Terminal 1.

rdu.jpg

As airports go, I'm a big fan of RDU. It's a very modern, clean, and well-organized facility. The interior of Terminal 2 is beautifully designed to resemble an early airplane wing and is flooded with natural light during the day. (It's also one of very few places where you can Continue reading

FBI said to investigate possible hack of another Democratic Party organization

The FBI is said to be investigating yet another suspected hack of a Democratic Party organization, this time of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee that raises funds for Democrats running for the House of Representatives.The previously unreported hack of the DCCC is likely to have been aimed at gathering information on donors rather than steal funds, four sources told Reuters.The intrusion is likely to raise fresh concerns about Russia trying to meddle in the U.S. elections. Another hack of the Democratic National Committee, suspected by security investigators to have been perpetrated by Russians, led to an embarrassing dump on Friday of leaked emails that showed that the Democratic Party's national strategy and fund-raising committee had favored Hillary Clinton over Senator Bernie Sanders, her rival in the presidential nomination campaign.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

FBI said to investigate possible hack of another Democratic Party organization

The FBI is said to be investigating yet another suspected hack of a Democratic Party organization, this time of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee that raises funds for Democrats running for the House of Representatives.The previously unreported hack of the DCCC is likely to have been aimed at gathering information on donors rather than steal funds, four sources told Reuters.The intrusion is likely to raise fresh concerns about Russia trying to meddle in the U.S. elections. Another hack of the Democratic National Committee, suspected by security investigators to have been perpetrated by Russians, led to an embarrassing dump on Friday of leaked emails that showed that the Democratic Party's national strategy and fund-raising committee had favored Hillary Clinton over Senator Bernie Sanders, her rival in the presidential nomination campaign.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Docker Built-in Orchestration Ready for Production: Docker 1.12 Goes GA

We wanted to thank everyone in the community for helping us achieve this great milestone of making Docker 1.12 generally available for production environments. Docker 1.12 adds the largest and most sophisticated set of features into a single release since the beginning of the Docker project. Dozens of engineers, both Docker employees and external contributors, have made substantial contributions to every aspect of 1.12 orchestration including core algorithms, integration into the Docker Engine, documentation and testing.

We’re very grateful to the community, which has helped us with feedback, bug reports and new ideas. We couldn’t have done it without the help in particular of the tens of thousands of Docker for Mac and Windows beta users who have been testing our 1.12 features since DockerCon in June. We’ve seen contributions ranging from bash tab completion to UX up-and-down votes that helped us understand what users want most. Compared to what we unveiled at DockerCon, we’ve ended up with significant improvements in the swarm node join workflow (it’s simpler), error reporting (easier to view), UX improvements (more logical), networking (fixed reliability issues) etc.

The core team also wanted to give a Continue reading

Spousetivities at VMworld 2016

Many of you have asked, and here’s the answer: Yes, there will be Spousetivities at VMworld 2016 in Las Vegas, NV! For those of you who may be new to the VMworld scene, Spousetivities started in 2008 when my wife got together with a small group of spouses and partners traveling with the conference attendees. From there, it’s become a staple of the VMworld community events. Read on for more details on what’s planned this year at VMworld 2016!

  • First up is the famous “Getting to Know You” breakfast, but with a slightly different approach. This year you’ll be cooking breakfast with Chef Phillip Dell, winner of season 9 of “Chopped”. How cool is that?
  • There will be a walking tour of the Las Vegas Strip, in case there are folks that are new to Vegas.
  • A trip to the Grand Canyon is available. If you haven’t yet been to the Grand Canyon, this is a great way to go—private bus, meals along the way, etc. Much easier than planning such a trip yourself!
  • Of course, you’ll have the opportunity to see the Hoover Dam and Lake Mead.
  • Here’s a new one: a 2-4 mile easy hike up Mount Continue reading

Trump’s hacking comment rattles the cybersecurity industry

Donald Trump’s muddled stance on hacking has disturbed security experts at time when the tech industry is looking for clarity on the U.S.'s cyber policy.On Wednesday, the outspoken presidential candidate seemed to call on Russia to break into rival Hillary Clinton’s email system.“Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” Trump said, referring to emails Clinton had deleted from a private email server. On Thursday, he walked back his comment and said he was being sarcastic.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Trump’s hacking comment rattles the cybersecurity industry

Donald Trump’s muddled stance on hacking has disturbed security experts at time when the tech industry is looking for clarity on the U.S.'s cyber policy.On Wednesday, the outspoken presidential candidate seemed to call on Russia to break into rival Hillary Clinton’s email system.“Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” Trump said, referring to emails Clinton had deleted from a private email server. On Thursday, he walked back his comment and said he was being sarcastic.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Black Hat: 9 free security tools for defense & attacking

When Black Hat convenes next week in Las Vegas, it will be a rich environment for gathering tools that can be used to tighten security but also - in the wrong hands - to carry out exploits.Researchers presenting generally point out the value these releases hold for researchers like themselves who operate in experimental environments as well as for enterprise security pros who want to build better defenses against such attack tools.Presenters will detail a broad range of exploits they’ve carried out against devices, protocols and technologies from HTTP to internet of things gear to the techniques penetration testers use to test the networks of their clients.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Black Hat: 9 free security tools for defense & attacking

When Black Hat convenes next week in Las Vegas, it will be a rich environment for gathering tools that can be used to tighten security but also - in the wrong hands - to carry out exploits.Researchers presenting generally point out the value these releases hold for researchers like themselves who operate in experimental environments as well as for enterprise security pros who want to build better defenses against such attack tools.Presenters will detail a broad range of exploits they’ve carried out against devices, protocols and technologies from HTTP to internet of things gear to the techniques penetration testers use to test the networks of their clients.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

A look at Oracle’s 10 biggest acquisitions

Oracle is back at it again today, announcing one of the largest acquisitions in company history with the purchase of enterprise resource planning (ERP) company NetSuite for $9.3 billion.+MORE AT NETWORK WORLD: Details of Oracle’s NetSuite takeover | Can Oracle buy its way into the cloud? +Larry Ellison and crew are no strangers to acquisitions. The company has made many over the past few decades. For Ellison though, cloud acquisitions are particularly noteworthy, given that not too long ago he derided the market as a fad.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Amazon’s cloud business continues upward march

Amazon reported another surge in revenue for its cloud business last quarter, though the growth is slowing as the division gets bigger.Amazon Web Services revenue for the second quarter was $2.87 billion, up 58 percent from the same period in 2015, Amazon announced Thursday. Operating profit was $863 million, up from $391 million a year earlier.It's another positive sign for AWS, which is still the leader in public cloud services, even as IBM, Microsoft and Google step up their efforts to complete.The growth at AWS is slowing, however, which is typical for a company as its business gets bigger. The gain was 64 percent in the first quarter, and 69 percent the quarter before that.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Is the next big thing VR, AI and Robotics? Or is it already here. Recap of AT&T Shape 2016

Attend any technology conference today (2016) and I bet you there is going to be a track for IoT (Internet of Things), VR (Virtual Reality), AI (Artificial Intelligence) and other buzz words like deep learning, machine learning, big data, robotics et all. Almost all industries across the board either already have something or in the process of inventing something that inches us closer to SkyNet and science fiction. Academia which is always a few years ahead of the industries also heavily invests in these topics.  VR, AI, Robotics and Machine Learning are few of the top research topics of 2016 listed by IEEE.

© Arun Sriraman
I was lucky to attend one such conference - AT&T Shape this year (2016) held at AT&T Park in SF on the 15th-16th of July. AT&T Shape is about showcasing future technology - a preview into what's possible & what's coming in the next few years. This year most of the exhibits & demos were VR, Robotics and AI themed. And speaking of machine learning/AI - look at the video above. It's a video generated by Google using the photos & videos I captured during the event. Google automatically has figured out the Continue reading

22% off iHealth Oxygen level, Pulse rate, and Perfusion Index Monitor – Deal Alert

This handy meter gives fast and reliable readings of your oxygen level, pulse rate, and perfusion index, wirelessly on your smartphone or tablet. Using the iHealth app, easily record and save your data to the secure, HIPPA compliant iHealth cloud for meaningful results you can track over time for yourself or a caregiver. This iHealth monitor typically lists for $69.95, but is currently discounted 22% to $54.33. See the discounted item now on Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Bugs & Bugs: National Moth Week, PHP, Black Hat & more

National Moth Week, Black Hat exploit presentations, edible insects, Pornhub's bug bounty, Flash vulnerabilities and Zica prevention at the Rio Olympics all came up on this week's Bugs & Bugs Facebook Live event, the program on which we discuss the latest in computer bugs and real insects (view saved version of video below).As my colleague Tim Greene, our resident IT security editor discusses, next week's Black Hat event in Las Vegas will be filled with intriguing presentations by white hat hackers sharing their latest exploits, including one involving Bluetooth Low Energy that could impact internet of things devices. Tim also hits on researchers taking Pornhub up on its $20K bug bounty challenge, which turns out to benefit PHP developers everywhere, and dives into the latest on Flash exploits, which Cisco warns can lead to ransomeware attacks.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Bugs & Bugs: National Moth Week, PHP, Black Hat & more

National Moth Week, Black Hat exploit presentations, edible insects, Pornhub's bug bounty, Flash vulnerabilities and Zica prevention at the Rio Olympics all came up on this week's Bugs & Bugs Facebook Live event, the program on which we discuss the latest in computer bugs and real insects (view saved version of video below).As my colleague Tim Greene, our resident IT security editor discusses, next week's Black Hat event in Las Vegas will be filled with intriguing presentations by white hat hackers sharing their latest exploits, including one involving Bluetooth Low Energy that could impact internet of things devices. Tim also hits on researchers taking Pornhub up on its $20K bug bounty challenge, which turns out to benefit PHP developers everywhere, and dives into the latest on Flash exploits, which Cisco warns can lead to ransomeware attacks.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here