Opening up at OCP Summit

Lots of networking activity at this week’s Open Compute Project Summit as vendors develop specifications designed to further abstract the dependencies of hardware and software.Dell submitted to OCP a Switch Abstraction Interface (SAI) designed to enable a common language between vendor network operating systems and switch silicon. The submission is currently under review and Dell expects acceptance.SAI is an API to express switch abstractions. With it, third-party developers can build applications to help customers tailor their network equipment to meet certain infrastructure requirements, Dell says.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Facebook’s ‘Wedge’ network switch will soon be on sale to all

A network switch that Facebook designed for its own data centers will soon be on sale from Taiwanese manufacturer Accton Technologies, the latest sign of progress from the community hardware effort known as the Open Compute Project.Facebook set up the OCP about four years ago as a way for data center operators to collaborate on new hardware designs that they can then ask low-cost manufacturers to produce. Part of the goal is to get cheaper, more standardized hardware than what’s normally supplied by top-tier vendors like Cisco, Hewlett-Packard, and Dell.Facebook is already using the top-of-rack switch, known as Wedge, in its own data centers, and it will be available to others in the first half from Accton and its OEM partners, said Jay Parikh, head of Facebook’s infrastructure division. Cumulus Networks and Big Switch Networks will provide software for it, and Facebook has put some of its own network software on Github for companies that want to “roll their own.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

No, the CIA isn’t stealing Apple’s secrets

The Intercept news site by Glenn Greenwald is activism rather than journalism. Their stories don't reference experts knowledgeable about subjects, but only activists who are concerned about the subjects. This was demonstrated yet against in their piece claiming "The CIA Campaign to Steal Apple's Secrets". Yes, the Snowden documents are real, but pretty much everything else is made up.

Here's the deal. Terrorist leaders use iPhones. They are a status symbol, and status symbols are important to leaders. Moreover, since Apple's security is actually pretty good, terrorists use the phones for good reason (most Android devices suck at security, even the Blackphone).

When CIA drones bomb a terrorist compound, iPhones will be found among the bodies. Or, when there is a terrorist suspect coming out of a dance club in Karachi, a CIA agent may punch them in the face and run away with their phone. However, it happens, the CIA gets phones and wants to decrypt them.

Back in 2011 when this conference happened, the process of decrypting retrieved iPhones was time consuming (months), destructive, and didn't always work. The context of the presentation wasn't that they wanted to secretly spy on everyone's phones. The context was Continue reading

IPv4 QoS Markings Calculator

This is a quick calculator I came up that I could use in the CCIE lab to translate between various IPv4 header QoS markings. As long as I could remember how to draw out the calculator, all I had to do was some basic math and I could translate between markings quite easily.

Google CFO Patrick Pichette to retire

Patrick Pichette, Google’s chief financial officer, is retiring, the company said Tuesday.The exact date of his retirement is not yet known nor is his replacement, though Google expects to have a new CFO within the next six months, the company said in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.Pichette, who has worked as Google’s finance chief for nearly seven years, informed the company of his decision last week, the filing said.He cited a desire to spend more time with his family as the reason behind his decision, in a Google+ post on Tuesday. Specifically, leaving Google will give him more time to travel with his wife, he said.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Senators again push for online sales tax

A group of U.S. senators has revived an effort to require major online retailers to collect sales tax from shoppers.The nine senators on Tuesday reintroduced legislation that would allow states to collect sales taxes—more than 9 percent in a handful of states—from large Internet sellers with no operations in the states collecting the taxes.The Marketplace Fairness Act is similar to legislation that was introduced but failed to pass in the past two sessions of Congress. A version of the bill passed the Senate by a vote of 69-27 in May 2013, but the House of Representatives failed to act on it.Lawmakers have tried for more than a decade to pass an Internet sales tax. Supporters of an online sales tax say local businesses are at a disadvantage because they have to collect sales taxes, while online retailers, in many cases, do not.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Six things to know about the USB 3.1 port in the new MacBook

Apple is challenging laptop users to adapt to fewer ports with the bold design of its new 12-inch MacBook, which has just one USB 3.1 port and a headphone jack. Apple laid out a similar challenge with its first MacBook Air in early 2008, which had just one USB 2.0 port to connect peripherals and a micro-DVI port to connect monitors.But the faster USB 3.1 port is significant because it will also be used to recharge the MacBook, as well as to connect to a wider variety of peripherals such as monitors, external storage drives, printers and cameras. The MacBook is one of just a few devices to carry the new USB port.USB 3.1 can technically transfer data between the host computers and peripherals at maximum speeds of up to 10Gbps (bits per second), which is two times faster than the current USB 3.0. The USB 3.1 port in the new MacBook will initially transfer data at 5Gbps, but expect that number to go up as the technology develops. There’s also excitement around the MacBook’s USB Type-C cable, which is the same on both ends so users can flip cables and not Continue reading

Snowden docs show CIA’s attempts to defeat Apple device security

Researchers sponsored by the U.S. government have reportedly tried to defeat the encryption and security of Apple devices for years.Several presentations given between 2010 and 2012 at a conference sponsored by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency described attempts to decrypt the firmware in Apple mobile devices or to backdoor Mac OS X and iOS applications by poisoning developer tools.Abstracts of the secret presentations were among the documents leaked by former U.S. National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden to journalists and were published Tuesday by The Intercept.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Technology Short Take #49

Welcome to Technology Short Take #49 (also known as Distraction-as-a-Service)! I have here for your reading pleasure an eclectic collection of links and articles from around the web, focusing on data center-related technologies. Here’s hoping you find something useful. Bring on the content!

Networking

  • I love this post from Matt Oswalt on five next-gen skills for networking pros. I highly recommend you read the entire post, but in short the five skills Matt recommends are software skills (which includes configuration management and software development tools like Git), Linux, deep protocol knowledge, hypervisor and container networking, and IPv6. What’s really interesting to me is the (completely uncoordinated) alignment between Matt’s list of skills for networking pros and the list I provided to virtualization pros in a series of recent VMUG presentations (refer to slide 15, but the list is software development basics, Linux, automation/orchestration, and public cloud services). What does this mean? It tells me that some skills—specifically, Linux, automation/configuration management, software development concepts—are going to be essential for all new IT pros in the near future. If you want to stay relevant, regardless of your current “silo,” it’s time to evolve.
  • Carl Niger has a write-up on the introduction Continue reading

Are We The Problem With Wearables?

applewatchface
Something, Something, Apple Watch.

Oh, yeah. There needs to be substance in a wearable blog post. Not just product names.

Wearables are the next big product category that is driving innovation. The advances being made in screen clarity, battery life, and component miniaturization are being felt across the rest of the device market. I doubt Apple would have been able to make the new Macbook logic board as small as it is without a few things learned from trying to cram transistors into a watch case. But, are we the people sending the wrong messages about wearable technology?

The Little Computer That Could

If you look at the biggest driving factor behind technology today, it comes down to size. Technology companies are making things smaller and lighter with every iteration. If the words thinnest and lightest don’t appear in your presentation at least twice then you aren’t on the cutting edge. But is this drive because tech companies want to make things tiny? Or is it more that consumers are driving them that way?

Yes, people the world over are now complaining that technology should have other attributes besides size and weight. A large contingent says that battery life is Continue reading

Response: Open Compute Project (OCP) Formally Accepts Open Network Linux (ONL) | Big Switch Networks, Inc.

This is good news. Big Switch has contributed Open Network Linux to Open Compute Project and been accepted as the standard operating system for whitebox Ethernet. Analysis Customers now have a number of choices for operating system for theirwhitebox switches. I know of the following: Open Network Linux Cumulus Linux PicOS from Pica8 This is base […]


The post Response: Open Compute Project (OCP) Formally Accepts Open Network Linux (ONL) | Big Switch Networks, Inc. appeared first on EtherealMind.

Show 227 – OpenStack Neutron Overview with Kyle Mestery

Today's Packet Pushers adventure is piloted by hosts Ethan Banks and Greg Ferro. They are joined by guide Kyle Mestery on a tour of OpenStack Neutron.

Author information

Ethan Banks

Co-host at Packet Pushers

Ethan Banks, CCIE #20655, has been managing networks for higher ed, government, financials and high tech since 1995. Ethan co-hosts the Packet Pushers Podcast, which has seen over 3M downloads and reaches over 10K listeners. With whatever time is left, Ethan writes for fun & profit, studies for certifications, and enjoys science fiction. @ecbanks
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The post Show 227 – OpenStack Neutron Overview with Kyle Mestery appeared first on Packet Pushers Podcast and was written by Ethan Banks.

Apple Watch: Function Over Form Otherwise It’s Just a Fad

Apple Watch: Function Over Form Otherwise It's Just a Fad

by Kris Olander, Sr. Technical Marketing Engineer - March 10, 2015

So yet another technology company wants to put some jewelry on my wrist.  Good luck.  You know it’s not that I don’t want the Apple Watch to succeed.  It’s just that I’ve been down this path already.

This past weekend I was reading a piece in the San Francisco Chronicle by Thomas Lee, “Why we need Apple to fail.”  While I’m not really buying Mr. Lee’s line of thinking - my ego is not going to be bruised one way or the other should Apple fail or succeed with this product - it did start me thinking.

My father was an employee at Hewlett Packard back in the good old days.  One of the latest and greatest products of those days was the desktop calculator.  It was a time when each successive year found significantly more computational power in much smaller footprints.  Eventually someone said, “Hey, we could make a calculator as small as a watch now.”  So they did.  

I don’t know how many watches HP produced over the lifetime of the product Continue reading

Cup of Joe with Jon and James

Cup of Joe with Jon and James

Two of Ansible’s very own Solutions architects, James Martin and Jonathan Davilla, will be hanging out at various coffee shops in the Washington, DC metro region in the upcoming weeks.   Stop by during your lunch hour and ask them about automation, DevOps culture, Ansible, and the difference between a latte and a machiatto.  Follow them on twitter for last minute updates @grepless and @defionscode.

3/13 , 11am-2pm   -  Swing’s Coffee 1702 G Street NW

3/27, 11am-2pm  - Chinatown Coffee 475 H St. NW

Open Hardware that Just Runs

When you buy a server, you don’t worry whether or not Windows will run on the server.  You know it will. That’s because the server industry has a comprehensive solution to a hard problem: rapid, standard integration between the OS and underlying open hardware.  They’ve made it ubiquitous and totally transparent to you.

This is not the case for embedded systems, where you have to check whether an OS works on a particular hardware platform, and oftentimes you find out that it’s not supported yet. Bare metal switches are a good example of this.

It’s time to change that.  We need the same transparent model on switches that we have on servers.  

To make open networking ubiquitous — and to give customers choice among a wide variety of designs, port configurations and manufacturers — the integration between the networking OS and bare metal networking hardware must be standardized, fast, and easy to validate. We need open hardware.

The Starting Point

Today, a bare-metal networking hardware vendor supplies their hardware spec to the NOS (network OS) provider. The NOS team reads the spec, interprets it and writes drivers/scripts to manage the device components (sensors, LEDs, fans and so forth). Then Continue reading

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