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CCIE R&S – By the Numbers

When I started studying in earnest for my CCIE, I started a log of how I was spending my time studying, which books and papers I’d read, videos I’d watched, and so on. I thought it would be a neat exercise to look back afterwards at what it took to achieve this goal. I’m also somewhat self-deprecating and tend to minimize my accomplishments, so having this data is a way for me to remember that this wasn’t a small accomplishment at all.

1,041,248 bytes of digital notes taken

13,916 km traveled (8,711 mi)

1,432 total study hours

652 hours in the lab

321 hours of just reading

223 videos watched

161 hours spent watching those videos

128 PDF documents read

23 books read

5 figures worth of expenses and costs

1 completely trashed USB mouse

Beyond these numbers there’s the intangibles that went into this goal too. No vacations. Giving up free time on evenings and weekends. Not seeing friends as much. Not spending as much time with family. Maintaining focus constantly on the end goal. Constantly staying up late and getting up early.

Looking back at all of this, I realize that becoming CCIE certified isn’t just about Continue reading

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Cisco Live Europe 2015 – and the year ahead

Cisco Live Europe 2015

Commonly known as the biggest networking/’networking’ event in the industry for Europe, Cisco Live has something for everyone. Some great breakout technical sessions, meet the engineer, the World of Solutions and of course this year, the DevNet hall that also had a weekend hackathon which this blogger would have loved to have taken part in.

It was pretty obvious (you would have to be blind and deaf not to notice) that whilst walking around the Milano Congressi venue that houses the event, that Cisco have cottoned on to the idea that a copy and replace of product names to ‘software defined <$PRODUCT>’ is a bit of a unique to them tide turner. There are only so many ways problems like ‘resistance to change’ and the ‘adoption of technology to a risk averse’ industry can be addressed. If everything is based on the same naming schema, then the problem becomes less of a thing. Even if people use the same product they used before with a different name, guess what, it’s now software defined and the maturity cycle is already under way. Clever move. Not that I appreciate new startups calling everything software or hardware defined. Yikes. Continue reading

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Some notes on DRAM (#rowhammer)

My twitter feed is full of comments about the "rowhammer" exploit. I thought I'd write some quick notes about DRAM. The TL;DR version is this: you probably don't need to worry about this, but we (the designers of security and of computer hardware/software) do.

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US Census online by 2020? Not so fast

The US Census Bureau has designs on bringing the 2020 census online but while that might sound like a good idea, there are many challenges that need to be addressed.That’s according to the Government Accountability Office which in a report out today said that to successfully offer the Internet as public response option the Census Bureau needs to, among other things, design and develop an Internet response application, develop and acquire the IT infrastructure to support the large volume of data processing and storage.The idea is a good one. The GAO stated that the Census Bureau has determined an Internet response option offers several benefits for the 2020 census, including the added convenience for households in an increasingly Internet-enabled population to respond to the survey; better quality data, which could reduce the amount of follow-up that is needed for surveys with incomplete or inconsistent data; and less printing, postage, and processing of paper questionnaires.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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Apple’s most important announcements at its Apple Watch event

More than just a smartwatch...Image by REUTERS/Robert GalbraithApple used today's high-profile event to launch its much-anticipated Apple Watch, but also to make announcements about several other products and new partnerships. Here are the most important announcements from Apple's big day.Brand new 12-inch MacBookImage by REUTERS/Robert GalbraithTo read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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Apple Watch to ship April 24 to nine countries

The much-heralded Apple Watch will ship on April 24 with price tags ranging from about $350 for the Sports edition all the way up to $12,000 or more for a limited-edition model in 18kt gold, Apple said Monday. CEO Tim Cook pitched the pricey timepieces at an event in San Francisco, where he aimed to convey that there will be a style of Apple Watch to suit everyone's taste. "Apple Watch is the most personal device we've ever created. It's not just with you, it's on you," he told the crowd. There are three basic editions -- the sports model, in silver or "space-grey" aluminium; a standard model, in silver or black stainless steel; and the high-end gold edition. Each comes in two sizes, with a 38mm or 42mm display.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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13 weird and wonderful sights at PAX East 2015

PAX East 2015! I mean, right?!For a festival set up by a couple guys who have a popular gaming-focused webcomic, PAX (the Penny Arcade Expo) sure has grown fast. Started in 2004 in Seattle, PAX is now a group of four annual festivals of nerd culture, held in Boston (PAX East), Seattle (PAX Prime), San Antonio (PAX South) and Melbourne (PAX Australia.) Here’s a look at the expo floor from PAX East 2015.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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Why spend $10,000 on an Apple Watch that will be obsolete in 2 years?

Rich people regularly spend thousands of dollars—sometimes tens of thousands of dollars, or more—on fancy watches. For their "investment" they get classic timepieces expected to function as well as the day they there were made for generations. In some cases, these luxury devices become family heirlooms and collectors items, worth even more than they were when they were brand new. New versions of these watches come along fairly rarely, and may sport design changes, but are unlikely to perform significantly better than the ones they replace. Watches—the regular kind, anyway—are a very mature market. Smartwatches, not so much. Apple today announced that prices for its new Apple Watch Edition in 18K gold will top out at a whopping $10,000, putting it in a league with legendary timepieces from companies like Tag Heuer, Rolex, and Breitling.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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It’s a road show for the guys behind PAX East’s big, big LAN party

Among the many other exciting diversions for those of a nerdy bent at the PAX East 2015 gaming convention in Boston this past weekend, there was a LAN party. And as you might expect, it wasn’t your average hastily erected LAN, with computers situated around a couple cheap consumer switches nestled between boxes of pizza.No, the LAN party at PAX East featured fully 420 gaming machines, set out in endless rows on long rectangular tables, and stations for more than 300 computers brought in by conference-goers. The setup was provisioned and managed by LANFest, a non-profit organization sponsored by Intel to raise money for charity via sponsorship of big LAN parties.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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Apple’s radical 12-inch MacBook Air is the slimmest, lightest MacBook ever

There’s a reason Apple hasn’t changed the MacBook Air’s core design for years now: It’s basically perfect—the epitome of a thin-and-light laptop, from its luxurious, razor-thin exterior to its majestic glass trackpad. But even perfection can’t coax Apple into sitting on its heels. On Monday, Apple revealed a new 12-inch MacBook Air, a radical revamp that shakes up the winning MBA design by dumping virtually every conventional port—Thunderbolt, the SD card slot, a power connector, everything—in favor of a pair a single USB Type-C connection and an audio jack. That, paired with numerous other advances, helped the 12-inch MacBook Air become the slimmest, lightest MacBook ever—and it's silent, too.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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Striking Gold with Copper in the Data Center

10G Ethernet (10GbE) is a very popular interconnect technology in today’s data center. It’s widely used for servers/storage devices connecting to top-of-rack (leaf) switches, as well as connecting those leaves to the aggregation (spine) switches. According to a Dell’Oro Ethernet Switch Market report published in 2014, 80% of server connections will be 10GbE-based by 2018.

In general, two types of physical media are used in 10GbE interconnects: fiber and copper. For intra-rack (server/storage to leaf switch) connections, most deployments use copper cabling as it is the most cost effective for short distances within the rack.

There are two copper cable types: twinax and twisted pair. Twinax is used in the 10GBASE-CR standard in the DAC (direct attached cable) format, which is a fixed length cable with SFP+ plugs integrated into both ends. Twisted pair, on the other hand, is something that should be very familiar to every IT person. Remember CAT cables and RJ-45? The 10GbE interconnect standard that uses twisted pair is 10GBASE-T, which is officially defined in the IEEE 802.3an standard.

10GBASE-CR with DAC is great and used in many deployments. However 10GBASE-T over twisted pair offers some unique benefits:

Distance & Interoperability

10GBASE-T over twisted pair Continue reading

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Robots to get more processing muscle with Intel’s Xeon D chips

Intel’s Xeon server chips dominate hardware in data centers, and now they could also end up powering robots on factory floors.The new line of Xeon D chips, announced Monday, are designed primarily for servers and network appliances, but as industrial automation grows, Intel believes the chips can all add processing muscle to robots that handle complex manufacturing tasks.Simple robots that do mundane work can run on basic, low-power processors, but faster chips are being plugged into advanced robots for more sophisticated tasks.Xeon D is the first server chip from Intel based on the Broadwell architecture. It’s already being used in PC chips, but it’s graduating to servers, appliances, and now perhaps robots.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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The ‘Why Talented Employees Stay’ Listicle – ORLY?

I’ve seen a list entitled “Why Talented Employees Stay” floating around Twitter. The list has been bothering me, because I don’t think it’s quite…right. The list is interesting, but I don’t believe it tells the whole story. Taken at face value, I think the list could even make it more difficult to retain certain people — not less.

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Cyberespionage arsenal could be tied to French intelligence agencies

A collection of computer Trojans that have been used since 2009 to steal data from government agencies, military contractors, media organizations and other companies is tied to cyberespionage malware possibly created by French intelligence agencies.Researchers from several antivirus companies have found links between the malware programs, which they call Babar, Bunny, Casper, Dino, NBot and Tafacalou. Some share the same command-and-control servers and some use the same implementations for Windows process listing, process blacklisting or export hashing.In January, German news magazine Der Spiegel published several secret documents about the malware activities of the U.S. National Security Agency and its closest partners, the intelligence agencies of the U.K., Canada, Australia and New Zealand—collectively known as the Five Eyes intelligence alliance.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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IDG Contributor Network: Tired of drones? Build a satellite

An amateur-radio satellite called $50SAT/MO-76 marked its 15-month earth-orbiting anniversary last month.Now, you might not think that's a particularly big deal. Satellites stay up longer than that (or don't) all the time.Well, the big deal about $50SAT is that it's a self-built kit. And it's still up there—although possibly only just. Unfortunately, it is now experiencing some premature battery deteriorating caused orbit decay, says Michael Kirkart, a member of the team that built the bird.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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IDG Contributor Network: Tired of drones? Build a satellite

An amateur-radio satellite called $50SAT/MO-76 marked its 15-month earth-orbiting anniversary last month.Now, you might not think that's a particularly big deal. Satellites stay up longer than that (or don't) all the time.Well, the big deal about $50SAT is that it's a self-built kit. And it's still up there—although possibly only just. Unfortunately, it is now experiencing some premature battery deteriorating caused orbit decay, says Michael Kirkart, a member of the team that built the bird.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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Zero rating: The overlooked mobile bandwidth revolution from Mobile World Congress 2015

I didn't attend Mobile World Congress in Barcelona last week, and I don't know what I missed more, the yummy Spanish ham or all the cool new smartphones that were introduced.But the thing that many attendees and press reports, even from those who did attend, also seemed to miss was the increasing importance of a big change in who pays for mobile bandwidth.See also: Five takeaways for CIOs from this year's MWC Whether you call it – "zero rating," "toll-free data," or simply associating it with Facebook's Internet.org initiative – the idea is that carriers make a certain amount of bandwidth available free for specific apps or use cases. The idea, according to Mark Zuckerberg's keynote presentation at MWC, is that by making a baseline amount of mobile net access free, more and more users will be enticed online, see the value of the internet, and over time become inspired to pay real money for additional access to mobile data.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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When Worlds Collide: Digging Deeper

Now that some basic definitions of these new approaches to implement LTE in unlicensed spectrum can be agreed, delving deeper into the colliding worlds of licensed and unlicensed band services, it’s important to understand how these technologies might be deployed...

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Can tech help teachers teach and students learn?

It's spring break, and high school students are eager to put away their books, binders, pencils and... iPads?High school classrooms, teaching techniques and the very way students learn may receive a tech infusion in the near future. Already some schools across the country, most notably the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD), are bringing in tablets and other technology."Technology is becoming pervasive in the classroom and playing a strategic role," says Carolyn April, senior director of industry analysis at CompTIA.CompTIA surveyed teachers, admins and students late last year and found that idea of technology in the classroom is exciting for everyone. All tallied, 58 percent of schools with 1,000 or more students use some education technology, compared to 45 percent of smaller schools.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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Office Word 2011 – An Annoying Little Bug

Today I take a gentle swoop away from networking into the world of documentation. Specifically, I’m looking at a bug in Microsoft Office Word for Mac that drives me bonkers.

Custom Properties

The management of custom properties in Microsoft Word has never been the most elegant part of Word’s interface. The mechanism by which the property values are managed has always been a bit clunky and unfriendly, but at least in the Windows version of Word, it at least functioned as stated.

In Office for Mac however, there’s a bug when you select a property to edit. Since it’s easier to show than tell, here’s a quick video demonstrating the issue.

Now isn’t that a silly bit of coding? Yes, I thought so too! Microsoft just announced availability of the Office 2016 Mac Preview, but sadly Document Properties is not yet available:

If you find out before I do, please let me know!

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