Last week at the Cloud Connect 2012 conference in Santa Clara, I was sharing a panel with industry colleagues representing the most prominent vendors in the application optimization, cloud infrastructure and network acceleration space . The topic was “hitching your wagon to the cloud”, discussing the importance of the network, particularly WAN, to make your cloud deployments successful. Folks talked about interesting concepts like “stateless branch office”, and “nirvana of Internet as WAN” before someone in the audience retorted, “I need solutions that help me deal with reality!” Read More »
The month of January always seems to be a very busy time at gyms; everyone resolves to starts the New Year off with good intentions. Now that February is here I can definitely see the trail-off in attendance at the local gym. Have you resolved to deploy video this year, or have your users resolved for you? You’ll need to ensure your network is fit for the job. It won’t be difficult at all. There are features to make it easy to stay on track.
The first of those features is AutoQoS. The concept of AutoQoS is that the hard work of defining a QoS strategy and implementing it on the network is already done for you. Two main things compromise that strategy…
This is the fourth and final blog in a series of campus switching innovation blogs that share our recent switching launch news from Cisco Live London.
How many times have you heard that IT cannot take on as many new projects as they would like to because their resources are tied up to keep the house running? That IT could do much more to drive business growth only if they had more resources?
We announced a number of innovations at Cisco Live London earlier this month, including Cisco Catalyst SmartOperations – a suite of about a dozen tools that offer built-in intelligence on Cisco Catalyst switches for easing many challenges faced by network administrators in their day-to-day tasks. And because most of the tools are included in the base software image, they deliver productivity savings without adding cost!
Hi everyone. Starting this week, every Wednesday we are going to highlight a special security or wireless blog to round out our Borderless Networks theme. Today, we have a real treat for you with this security blog by Panos Kapanakis. Here’s a nugget to pique your interest. Use the link to click through for more.
Problem:
We are often asked by customers about how they can prevent traffic from a certain country (let’s say country X) from entering their network. The motivations for doing this could vary. Sometimes a company does not do business with all countries in the world; therefore, the company doesn’t need to be accessible from all countries. Other times it is an issue of trust and security, where an administrator may not want to allow country X to enter their infrastructure. Finally, there are cases where country X has often been incriminated with malicious activity, so an administrator may want to block country X when there is no need for the organization to interact with this country. In this document I present a methodology on how to write a tool that provides the configuration lines to block country X, using your IOS router or ASA/ASASM firewall.
The biggest buzzword in the network industry is Cloud: the majority of organizations have a strategy to use cloud-based services and applications, whether it be Public or Private clouds. Organizations have come a long way since ’migrating to the cloud’ discussions began . Take a look at this video recorded just a few years ago when cloud was still an enigma:
But Cloud has never been a new concept: IT professionals have been migrating applications to centralized datacenters for decades now…mainly to share recourses and save money by having less IT personnel supporting branch offices. Unfortunately, application performance as well as reliability and uptime requirements quickly became barriers to this centralization. Read More »
Despite the “buzz” around IPv6 right now for many customers it’s not easy to actually test drive an IPv6 connection. When we got the opportunity to sponsor the Wi-Fi customer access at the 2012 v6 World Congress, we jumped at it. …
The actual hardware used at the event is all available right now: a Cisco ASR 1000 router, the Aironet 1142 Access Point, and the Cisco 5508 Wireless LAN Controller. The ASR 1000 is one of Cisco’s most popular routers and in use by over 8000 customers, including both enterprise and service providers. The ASR 1000 is a proven platform for IPv6 applications and has been deployed by two of the industry’s earlier adopters of v6 technology: Iliad Group’s Free and SFR France.
We saw what happened when William Wallace upgraded to the Right Network, but how about Paul Revere? Equipped with a Cisco Cius tablet and a reliable wireless connection, Paul can quickly communicate the impending British invasion to fellow Patriots. There’s no need for a midnight ride when you’ve got the Right Network.
Based on the online dialog on Easy Virtual Network (EVN) that I’ve seen, it appears that some people still have questions. We thought our story was as simple to understand as EVN is to use, but there is a need for clarification. Here’s a bit more information about what EVN is and what it isn’t.
One online comment was, “It’s a Cisco proprietary version of MPLS for the enterprise.” No, we believe in MPLS. It’s supported on a number of Cisco platforms and is used by many of our customers. MPLS is the most scalable and perhaps the most capable means of network virtualization. But it’s also overkill and far too complicated for many enterprises.
I love my job, but I really don’t enjoy my commute….and the unpredictable traffic. Living on the west side of San Francisco and working on the east side of San Jose, Google Maps tells me my journey is a hefty 47.2 miles and 1 hour and 1 minute (without traffic.) Holidays, rain, and accidents can add minutes and sometimes hours.
Twice a day, to and from work, I start asking the questions:
How busy is it on the road right now? Is the road full of tired commuters, semis, or concert traffic?
Which lane should I be in? If I’m in the fast lane, what are the odds of it coming to a screeching halt while I watch the other three lanes go by?
Do I need to detour to another interstate or highway due to an accident or concert?
I am back from a week at Cisco Live London where I presented to a packed room on Enterprise IPv6 Deployment. I added much more emphasis on Internet Edge design this time around and it was VERY well received. The comments were very positive, as were the questions in the room, regarding the Internet Edge as the primary starting point for the majority of the attendees. You can check out details on my IPv6 Internet Edge content at my previous blog post.
In addition to IPv6 in the Internet Edge, IPv6 security was a hot topic as usual. Excellent Cisco speakers such as Eric Vyncke provided attendees at Cisco Live very detailed guidance on securing their networks when using IPv6. One thing that we have come to realize, not just for security, but also for all areas of IPv6 deployment, is that we cannot assume too much regarding the knowledge level of people attending our sessions.
Recently Jon Stine with Cisco IBSG wrote in the Cisco Retail blog an article titled “In Between the Numbers: Bring Your Own Device Do we know what that means?” where he talked about the changes that the BYOD concept brings to the change in the culture of employees leveraging technology to get their job done, and how it not just impacts the end point technology but all the network and information technology infrastructure.
I recently went to New York for the National Retail Federation Conference and I took a picture of all the devices (excluding my laptop) that I carried with me for use at the hotel, in the booth, and while I was at 30,000 ft.
As I think back about working with multiple devices (both issued to me and owned by me) during the week, here are some areas that impacted IT.
Cisco Live! It’s always an exciting time – real customers, sharing real world experiences, looking for news that will make their networks stronger, faster, more capable, more efficient. And for this Yank, visiting ExCeL London in the heart of London’s Royal Docks for the first time, it’s a special treat.
There are a number of announcements coming out of Cisco Live this week – two that build on the story we’ve been telling about the Catalyst 6500… a new 40 Gigabit Ethernet module and 160 Gbps per slot performance in existing Catalyst 6500 E-Series chassis.
Cisco Live London 2012 is underway this week. I’m sure that technical learning and having fun are high on your to-do list. Perhaps you’re also anxious to know what new products and technologies Cisco will announce.
I talked to several customers during the last several weeks. They all wanted to know what Cisco is doing further to help them deal with the wave of cloud computing, video, and mobility. In my previous post From San Jose to London I summarized these questions: Read More »
The other day I took my one year old son on his first train ride. I knew that he would enjoy the short trip (just a couple of stops and back) and I wanted him to get the feeling of riding a train. While on the train I noticed a teenager text messaging on a phone.
I smiled to myself, thinking that here’s a teenager holding a Smartphone in hand on a train with a modern Wi-Fi enabled network with 3G coverage, and yet she’s still communicating via a 30 year old technology.
If you’re attending Cisco Live London this week, don’t miss the opportunity to meet the medianet team as well as the medianet capabilities first hand. We have demos in the World of Solutions, three technical sessions, and on-site executive briefings on 31 January and 1 February.
