Silicon Choices

Cumulus Networks has always strived to provide our customers with choice. And now, Cumulus Linux 3.0 has been refactored to make the user experience fun and easy … and at the same time bring you, even more choice:

  • In hardware platforms, from a variety of manufacturers.
  • In CPU architectures — x86 and ARM.
  • In Broadcom networking chips for a variety of use cases — 1G, 10G, 10GBase-T, 40G and 100G switches with Helix4, Hurricane2, Trident-II, Trident-II+ or Tomahawk chips inside.
  • And now, for the first time, choice in silicon vendors with the introduction of Cumulus Linux-powered 40G and 100G switches with Mellanox Spectrum chips inside.

Shrijeet Mukherjee (our fearless engineering leader) kicked off the Cumulus Linux 3.0 development cycle with this as our main goal — to offer even more choice to our customers. And then this happened…

three-dragons

 

So we took on the challenge of unifying the user experience across this sweeping range of hardware platforms and switch silicon without muting the unique prowess and feature richness of any of them.

How did we do this? By deploying the three dragons in our arsenal: ONIE, switchd and the Linux kernel itself (which is now better fed by Continue reading

EP07: Interview with Jacob Hess – CoFounder of NexGenT

Jacob Hess is an entrepreneur and systems engineer who has over 15 years experience in Information Technology. Working in both the customer and systems integrator environments he has designed and deployed many complex IT projects spanning the full stack of networking technologies. Jacob is also a United States Air Force veteran who served as a technical instructor and trained hundreds of network engineers to be job ready for the Department of Defense. He is the Co-founder & COO of Nexgent and is passionate about inspiring, creating, and empowering the next generation of IT engineers.

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Lenovo wants consumers to take Google Tango for granted, so does Google

Gamers and R&D labs creating new applications for augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) have been the source of enthusiasm for this new category. But most people have only a superficial opinion—or no opinion—about these exciting emergent technologies because they haven’t become relevant in their lives. The two early use cases, games and immersive 360-degree video, represent large future businesses that few people have experienced.Yesterday, Lenovo introduced the Phab2 Pro, which is both an AR device and has all the features of an Android smartphone. It’s a more approachable form of AR because the consumer looks through the Phab2 Pro like a looking glass and doesn’t feel awkward donning a strange-looking headset or visor. It feels normal—like taking a picture or video.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

3 ways to improve security as you embrace containers

This vendor-written tech primer has been edited by Network World to eliminate product promotion, but readers should note it will likely favor the submitter’s approach.

In enterprise IT, disruptive technologies become commercially viable faster than you can say “Moore’s Law.”  However, if corporate culture and processes don’t evolve in conjunction with the pace of technology, it can inhibit the benefits of even the most awesome of enterprise apps. One area of IT where corporate culture has stymied progress is cyber security, but the rise of software containers — arguably one of the most disruptive enterprise technologies on the horizon - provides an opportunity to get application security right, or at least make it a whole lot better.

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

3 ways to improve security as you embrace containers

This vendor-written tech primer has been edited by Network World to eliminate product promotion, but readers should note it will likely favor the submitter’s approach.In enterprise IT, disruptive technologies become commercially viable faster than you can say “Moore’s Law.”  However, if corporate culture and processes don’t evolve in conjunction with the pace of technology, it can inhibit the benefits of even the most awesome of enterprise apps. One area of IT where corporate culture has stymied progress is cyber security, but the rise of software containers — arguably one of the most disruptive enterprise technologies on the horizon - provides an opportunity to get application security right, or at least make it a whole lot better.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Intralinks adds security layers for high value content collaboration using SharePoint and other systems  

This column is available in a weekly newsletter called IT Best Practices.  Click here to subscribe.   Recently I was engaged by a large corporation for a writing project to support a product launch. This project had a small team of people who needed to collaborate on developing some promotional materials using content that had to remain confidential until launch day.The company was so protective of the content's secrecy that it provided me with a company-issued laptop computer, VPN access to their network, and a login ID for their network. In particular, I was given behind-the-firewall access to the SharePoint repository where the in-progress documents were kept. This way I was fully integrated into the internal team for the duration of the project, and the confidential documents would never have to leave the safety of the company's network.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

IDG Contributor Network: The IoT market is unlikely to create a gorilla

In his book The Gorilla Game, management consultant Geoffrey Moore identifies a tendency for some technology sectors to develop winner-take-all outcomes. The Internet of Things (IoT) market looks like a textbook example, as many industrial customers (original equipment manufacturers) are looking to consolidate around a single platform, a slice of enabling technology. It is surprising, therefore, that no IoT gorilla has yet emerged from the mist.+ More on Network World: Most powerful Internet of Things companies +To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Cracked spoofs wireless carriers’ ads

It's open season on wireless carriers' silly and confusing commercials.Sure, Verizon, AT&T, Sprint & T-Mobile have been the butt of jokes for some time now, and justifiably so, for the flimflam they spew about their amazing speeds and bargain pricing. SNL, for example, skewered Verizon a few years back in a skit that depicted all the jargon spewed by Verizon as "an old person's nightmare."Comedy Central's Amy Schumer more recently sent up those mobile phone ads that feature perky young women interacting with customers.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Cracked spoofs wireless carriers’ ads

It's open season on wireless carriers' silly and confusing commercials.Sure, Verizon, AT&T, Sprint & T-Mobile have been the butt of jokes for some time now, and justifiably so, for the flimflam they spew about their amazing speeds and bargain pricing. SNL, for example, skewered Verizon a few years back in a skit that depicted all the jargon spewed by Verizon as "an old person's nightmare."Comedy Central's Amy Schumer more recently sent up those mobile phone ads that feature perky young women interacting with customers.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Tools: Conn-check

conn-check – A deployment utility to check connectivity between services conn-check is a small utility, written in Python using the Twisted network library, that verifies outgoing connections from your application servers to services it depends on, e.g. databases, caches, web service APIs, etc.conn-check is used not only to verify network dependency changes at deploy time, […]

The post Tools: Conn-check appeared first on EtherealMind.

Optimizing TLS over TCP to reduce latency

The layered nature of the Internet (HTTP on top of some reliable transport (e.g. TCP), TCP on top of some datagram layer (e.g. IP), IP on top of some link (e.g. Ethernet)) has been very important in its development. Different link layers have come and gone over time (any readers still using 802.5?) and this flexibility also means that a connection from your web browser might traverse your home network over WiFi, then down a DSL line, across fiber and finally be delivered over Ethernet to the web server. Each layer is blissfully unaware of the implementation of the layer below it.

But there are some disadvantages to this model. In the case of TLS (the most common standard used for sending encrypted data across in the Internet and the protocol your browser uses with visiting an https:// web site) the layering of TLS on top of TCP can cause delays to the delivery of a web page.

That’s because TLS divides the data being transmitted into records of a fixed (maximum) size and then hands those records to TCP for transmission. TCP promptly divides those records up into segments which are then transmitted. Ultimately, Continue reading

Establishing a confidential Service Boundary with Avaya’s SDN Fx

Cover

 

Security is a global requirement. It is also global in the fashion in which it needs to be addressed. But the truth is, regardless of the vertical, the basic components of a security infrastructure do not change. There are firewalls, intrusion detection systems, encryption, networking policies and session border controllers for real time communications. These components also plug together in rather standard fashions or service chains that look largely the same regardless of the vertical or vendor in question. Yes, there are some differences but by and large these modifications are minor.

So the questions begs, why is security so difficult? As it turns out, it is not really the complexities of the technology components themselves, although they certainly have that. It turns out that the real challenge is deciding exactly what to protect and here each vertical will be drastically different. Fortunately, the methods for identifying confidential data or critical control systems are also rather consistent even though the data and applications being protected may vary greatly.

In order for micro-segmentation as a security strategy to succeed, you have to know where the data you need to protect resides. You also need to know how it flows through Continue reading

Gain Deep Insight Into Your NSX Network While Simplifying Management and Operations

We’re excited to announce that VMware NSX, version 6.2.3, is now available for all customers with active support. As we evolve the NSX platform, we continue to place a high degree of emphasis on helping customers operationalize NSX, speed-up deployment, and integrate with more systems from our NSX ecosystem partners. This latest release introduces enhanced network monitoring and troubleshooting tools with expanded hardware partner integration.

Some of the top highlights include:

Native Visibility and Reporting

Resolve problems faster, visualize event trends, trigger alerts, and more, all in real-time with VMware vRealize Log Insight for NSX, now included with NSX Standard, Advanced and Enterprise licenses. This new capability introduces:

  • Centralized big data log management built for NSX
  • Monitoring and dashboards for network virtualization and security

To learn more about vRealize Log Insight for NSX refer to the FAQ or visit the Log Insight product page here.

Improvements to NSX Management and Operations

Reduce Mean Time to Recovery with improved troubleshooting and operational capabilities.  Key enhancements include:

  • Dashboards for health status of components and built-in monitoring of all critical systems communication channels
  • Simplified filtering of firewall rules
  • Enhancements to central CLI
  • New partner services to enable packet capture and Continue reading

IDG Contributor Network: Ecommerce needs to up its game, says UPS

Retailers have to invest in digital tools such as inventory transparency if they want to retain customers, says shipper UPS in its new report on online shopping.If they don’t, fickle “shoppers will likely go elsewhere to more efficiently meet their needs,” the company says.UPS found that most online shoppers (58 percent) want to see a retailer’s inventory online while they are shopping, and 20 percent will check inventory status at alternate locations or on a retailer’s website when in the store.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

DevOps: The Real Impact On IT Pros

In this episode of Network Matters with Ethan Banks, learn why the topic of DevOps has become so pervasive in IT media. Ethan explains what DevOps really means for most IT organizations, and how Infrastructure professionals can use concepts from DevOps to improve their own efficiency.

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