SDN, NFV and Skill Development for Network Engineers

I came to Cisco Brussels 14 years ago to take my first CCIE lab. I didn’t pass that time. I went to Tokyo a month later and got my number there. Several years later I kept coming back to Brussels to pass my two other CCIEs.


Many people say there is no value anymore in taking CCIE these days. With SDN and NFV, everything will be done "auto-magically". We don’t even need network engineers anymore! Yeah, right. Last week I went back in Brussels to work on Network Control System, multi-vendor network device management tool from Tail-F that was acquired by Cisco June last year. NCS is the corner store of Cisco Network Service Orchestration framework for Cisco SDN and NFV solution offering. And I’m here to tell you that the world still need lots of network engineers, and CCIEs, or those who have CCIE-level skill set.

But first, let me talk more about NCS, a service orchestration for real-time service provisioning across multivendor networks.

Network devices were, and are still, configured using CLI. Then SNMP was created to help. Soon, we realized SNMP is great to monitor the network but it fails to become configuration management, as stated Continue reading

Unser neuer 31er Datacenter: Düsseldorf

Hallo Düsseldorf. Nestled in the center of the Lower Rhine basin lies the bustling city of Düsseldorf, capital of Germany’s most populous state, Northern Rhine-Westphalia. Provided its status as an international business and telecommunications hub, and serving a population larger than the Netherlands, our data center in Düsseldorf is an important addition to our European network. This means not only better performance in Germany and Northern Europe, but additional redundancy for our 10 other data centers throughout Europe, including our first German data center in Frankfurt.

For the local audience: Liebe Freunde in Düsseldorf, euer Internetanschluss ist schneller geworden und ihr könnt jetzt sicher surfen. Viel Spaß.

Not just any data center

Dusseldorf comes to life.

Our Düsseldorf data center holds a special place in the heart of our legal counsel Ken Carter. When he’s not helping to build a better Internet, he is likely to be found regaling the office with tales of his adventures in the quaint medieval town of Bad Honnef am Rhein, just south of our new data center. Ban Honnef, most famously known as the world-wide headquarters for Birkenstock, can now add one more tale of note. Equidistant between Frankfurt and Dusseldorf, it is Continue reading

Adobe invites help hunting vulnerabilities in its online services

Adobe Systems launched a new program that encourages security researchers to find and report vulnerabilities in the company’s websites and other online services.Unlike companies like Google, Mozilla, Facebook or Twitter that pay monetary rewards for vulnerabilities found in their Web properties, Adobe’s program only promises public recognition for such contributions.“Bug hunters who identify a web application vulnerability in an Adobe online service or web property can now privately disclose the issue to Adobe while boosting their HackerOne reputation score,” said Pieter Ockers, the security program manager at Adobe, in a blog post Wednesday.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

MWC: Israeli startup Waze reveals what life is like under the Google umbrella

Waze, the fast growing urban navigation app, has revealed what life has been like after it was acquired by Google nearly two years ago.The Israeli firm was snapped up by the Silicon Valley internet giant for a reported $1.3 billion (£850 million) in June 2013 in what was one of Google's biggest ever acquisitions.Following the deal, each of Waze's 100 employees at the time received an average of $1.2 million (£780,000) but beyond that the Google acquisition hasn't had much impact on the way Waze operates, according to Di-Ann Eisnor, head of growth at Waze.+ SHOW COVERAGE See all the news out of MWC 2015 +To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

MWC 2015: Microsoft partners with AT&T, Deutsche Telekom for SMB Office

Microsoft announced two Office-related partnerships for small- to medium-size business (SMB), with AT&T and Deutsche Telekom, at the Mobile World Congress event in Barcelona this week.The AT&T Mobile Office Suite deal with the second-largest mobile carrier involves Microsoft's Office 365 apps, along with unified access to voice calls, email, calendars, messaging, HD video conferencing, and file sharing, on almost any mobile device.The Microsoft Office 365 suite includes the usual apps – Word, Excel, and PowerPoint – plus Lync, Exchange, Outlook, and OneDrive, all usable from a desktop, laptop, smartphone or tablet. Lync allows for domestic or international voice calls while in the United States.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

OpenDNS trials system that quickly detects computer crime

A security system undergoing testing by a San-Francisco-based company aims to speed up the detection of websites and domains used for cybercrime.The technology is being developed by OpenDNS, which specializes in performing DNS (Domain Name System) lookups. The DNS translates domain names such as idg.com into an IP address that can be called into a browserOpenDNS offers a secure DNS service for ISPs and organizations that blocks requests from Web browsers to sites that may be associated with cybercrime or spoof a company such as PayPal.The company, which was founded in 2005, has grown so much that its systems respond to some 71 billion DNS requests per day. That’s just 2 percent of global DNS traffic but is enough of a sample to pick up on many cybercrime campaigns.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Android tune-up: How to boost performance while you wait for Lollipop

Android 5.0 Lollipop has been heralded as the operating system’s biggest step forward to date. Improved battery life and performance through changes to Android’s core runtime and power management systems are among the most anticipated enhancements among users, given their promise of a faster, more efficient experience.At least that’s the theory. Unfortunately, for the 98 percent of Android devices eagerly awaiting their Lollipop update, there’s no way of knowing whether Lollipop will breathe new life into their devices. That’s where third-party developers can fill the performance gap, as they have been since Android’s earliest days.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Android for Work pushes Google further into enterprise

Google's push into the enterprise gained steam last week when the company finally launched Android for Work, a containerization platform and standalone app for older Android devices that lets IT administrators create separate corporate and personal workspaces on Android smartphones and tablets.Android for Work is Google's latest attempt to address two of Android's most significant challenges for IT: security and fragmentation. The latest version of Android, v5.0, known as "Lollipop," now supports separate spheres for personal and work. Devices running older versions of the OS can access some of the same features in a separate Android for Work app.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

What’s in my toolbag – Update 2 – SergeantClips

Building on the “What’s in my toolbag” series that I revisited last week with the Fluke LinkSprinter, I wanted to talk about the next new item in my tool bag.  This week we will take a look at a product called SergeantClip.  The SergeantClip is used to help with cable management and switch replacements.  I […]

The post What’s in my toolbag – Update 2 – SergeantClips appeared first on Fryguy's Blog.

Response: Open Web Alliance Lobbies to Intercept Your Traffic

The Open Web Alliance is a lobby group that is opposed to secure and safe HTTPS traffic over the Internet and forms lobby group for the HTTP2 process to ensure that your Internet traffic can be intercepted and logged by service providers. This major purpose of this so-called technology innovation is that your personal information to can […]

The post Response: Open Web Alliance Lobbies to Intercept Your Traffic appeared first on EtherealMind.

The Upload: Your tech news briefing for Thursday, March 5

China defends surveillance plan by pointing to U.S.The Chinese government is calling out U.S. opposition to its new anti-terror law, saying that it’s similar to what other countries are doing as they ask tech companies to hand over information that they need to fight terrorism. On Wednesday, China’s parliamentary spokeswoman tried to play down the impact the proposed legislation might have on foreign tech businesses, who have complained about having to turn over encryption keys and create “back doors” to enable government surveillance.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

The Upload: Your tech news briefing for Thursday, March 5

China defends surveillance plan by pointing to U.S.The Chinese government is calling out U.S. opposition to its new anti-terror law, saying that it’s similar to what other countries are doing as they ask tech companies to hand over information that they need to fight terrorism. On Wednesday, China’s parliamentary spokeswoman tried to play down the impact the proposed legislation might have on foreign tech businesses, who have complained about having to turn over encryption keys and create “back doors” to enable government surveillance.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

China aims to help local Internet firms cross into the global market

China seeks to help the country’s Internet firms gain a bigger foothold in the international market, and is preparing to pour more state funds into its emerging tech sector, according to one of its top leaders.Chinese Premier Li Keqiang made the statement in his opening address to the country’s annual parliamentary session on Thursday. He added that China is establishing an “Internet Plus” plan to promote its mobile Internet, cloud computing, and e-commerce sectors, as part of a push to support the country’s emerging industries.“The country has already established a 40 billion yuan (US$6.5 billion) emerging industry innovation investment fund, and more capital will be brought in and integrated,” he said.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Cisco ACI – a Stretched Fabric That Actually Works

In mid-February a blog post on Cisco’s web site announced stretched ACI fabric (bonus points for not using marketing grammar but talking about a shipping product). Will it work better than other PowerPoint-based fabrics? You bet!

What’s the Big Deal?

Cisco’s ACI fabric uses distributed (per-switch) control plane with APIC controllers providing fabric configuration and management functionality. In that respect, the ACI fabric is no different from any other routed network, and we know that those work well in distributed environments.

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Five things we learned about Etsy from its IPO filing

Etsy, the online marketplace for buying and selling handmade goods and crafts, disclosed some interesting tidbits about the company’s business when it filed to go public Wednesday.Did you know that 86 percent of Etsy’s U.S. sellers at the end of last year were women? Or that three-quarters of its sellers consider their online store a business rather than a hobby?Etsy is hoping to raise US$100 million from the offering to help expand its business. Here are five other things we learned from combing through its S-1 filing.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Hello, I’m 47321

And now the big reveal. The reason I haven't been blogging or doing much of anything for some time now is because I've had a teeny tiny side project going on: And this week I passed the lab exam! I am CCIE 47321 (Routing and Switching).

Cisco might ONIE up

Cisco is preparing to open up its Nexus 9000 switches for further programmability, perhaps even supporting a popular open source tool for booting them up.A Cisco white paper posted on the company’s website and then withdrawn last week stated that the company’s Nexus 9000 switches, in standalone NX-OS mode, can now support the Open Network Install Environment (ONIE). ONIE is a network boot loader to install software, including operating systems from multiple vendors, on bare metal Ethernet network switches.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Facebook wants to get better at detecting fake profiles

Facebook is taking steps to improve how it detects fake profiles, particularly those created by people claiming to be someone else.Fake profiles are a real challenge for Facebook, especially in developing markets. For example, in India there is a significant problem with men creating profiles that impersonate real women, a violation of Facebook’s rules. This makes some women afraid of creating profiles.It’s part of a larger problem in India, where more men are on the Internet than women in comparison to other parts of the world, Facebook chief Mark Zuckerberg said Wednesday.Facebook, Zuckerberg said, is tackling this problem and trying to become faster at flagging fake profiles, in part by getting better feedback from its users.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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