The Fat Pipe - All Packet Pushers Pods

KubeCon 2019 is a wrap. In today's Day Two Cloud podcast, Ethan Banks and Ned Bellavance share their impressions of the event and dive into why Kubernetes is so complex, what that means for enterprises considering Kubernetes, the role of community, and more.

BBR is a congestion control algorithm (CCA) designed for low latency. Backed by Google, BBR’s use is growing on the Internet, including as the default CCA for YouTube.

However, an element in BBR’s design means that the 1.0 version of the algorithm crowds out other commonly used CCAs, such as Cubic and Reno.

As today’s guests discovered in their research, when BBR and Cubic flows share a link, a single BBR flow will take up as much as 40% of the link’s bandwidth, leaving 16 Cubic flows to divide the rest among themselves.

This leads to questions about how BBR will interact with the legacy algorithms that are the status-quo today.

Our guests for today’s show are Ranysha Ware, a Ph.D. student in Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University; and Justine Sherry, Assistant Professor of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon. Ranysha recently presented her findings on BBR at the Internet Measurement Conference in October 2019 in the Netherlands.

Ranysha and Justine come on the podcast to discuss:

* How BBR works, including differences with legacy loss-based CCAs

* Research comparing BBR, Cubic, and Reno

* Why BBR behaves the way it does

* Potential impacts for the Internet

* Using harm, rather than fairness, as a measure for new algorithms

* More

Ranysha has also created a Congestion Control Evaluation Survey for network engineers and operators to get feedback on a proposed testbed for evaluating the impact of CCAs on applications and networks. She’d appreciate your input!

Sponsor: Tufin

Tufin has pioneered a policy-based approach to network security management using automation and analytics. As a result, you can make network changes in minutes instead of days, reliably and securely. Tufin. The Security Policy Company. Get details at www.tufin.com.

Sponsor: ThousandEyes

ThousandEyes gives you performance visibility from every user to every app over any network, both internal and external, so you can migrate to the cloud, troubleshoot faster and deliver exceptional user experiences. Sign up for a free account at thousandeyes.com/packetpushers and choose a free ThousandEyes t-shirt.

Show Links:

Modeling BBR’s Interactions withLoss-Based Congestion Control (PDF)

Ranysha Ware – Carnegie Mellon University

Congestion Control Evaluation Survey

Ranysha Ware on Twitter

Dr. Justine Sherry

Justine Sherry on Twitter

BBR Congestion Control Work at Google – IETF

Employing QUIC Protocol to Optimize Uber’s App Performance – Uber Engineering Blog

SolarWinds stops by the Tech Bytes podcast to talk about its Application Performance Management suite, which includes Web app and user experience monitoring, log management and analysis, and app infrastructure monitoring. We look at how they work together to help IT teams get to the bottom of application issues. Our guest is Denny LeCompte, senior vice president and general manager of application management at SolarWinds.

Keysight took a different approach to this Tech Field Day briefing and spent a lot of time talking about the current state of networking threats and the events that you are protecting against. If you aren’t aware from what your network security is doing, its an good presentation for that.     Keysight has many... Read more »

Today's Network Break episode discusses new data center software and switches from Extreme, new networking cloud tools from Google, Microsoft's support for DoH, an internal re-organization at Cisco and more tech news.

I'm talking about Forescout after receiving a briefing during Tech Field Day 20.

Today on Heavy Networking, we’re going to evolve using genetic algorithms. You heard me right.

Researchers at the University of Maryland in the United States have developed a project called Geneva that uses genetic algorithms to automatically figure out the best way to, in this use case, avoid Internet censorship.

Essentially, we’re going to discuss how to get through the Great Firewall of China with about 6,000 lines of Python.

So put on your propellor beanie, and let’s introduce our guests: David Levin, Assistant Professor, Computer Science and Co-Chair, CS Undergraduate Honors Program at the University of Maryland; and Kevin Bock, a graduate student at the University of Maryland who did much of the work on this project.

We discuss:

* Common techniques state censors use to detect and stop traffic, including encrypted traffic

* Limits to these approaches that Geneva can exploit

* How genetic algorithms work

* Training genetic algorithms against censorship techniques

* Testing mechanisms, including against real-world censors

* Could Geneva be used to thwart legitimate security controls

* More

Sponsor: ITProTV

Get over in-depth technical training from ITProTV. ITProTV offers online instruction in CompTIA, Cisco, VMWare, Microsoft and more. You can stream courses live and on demand on your favorite device. Sign up at itpro.tv/packet and save 25%. Use the code PACKET25 when you check out.

Sponsor: ExtraHop

ExtraHop is the enterprise cyber analytics company delivering performance and security from the inside out. ExtraHop offers complete visibility with machine learning to help you make quick, confident decisions about your IT environment. Explore the ExtraHop Performance Platform at extrahop.com/packetpushers.

Show Links:

Geneva: Evolving Censorship Evasion – University of Maryland

Geneva – GitHub

Dave Levin on Twitter

PQ 58: Alibi Routing With UMD’s Dave Levin – Packet Pushers

You need a cloud strategy so you can tackle complex issues such as access and identity management, security and compliance, and networking. Ed Horley sits in on the Day Two Cloud podcast to share sensible advice on how to build a workable strategy that incorporates high-level business goals with more nitty-gritty operational requirements.

Fortinet sponsors today’s Heavy Networking podcast. You probably know Fortinet as a firewall company, but today’s conversation focuses on Fortinet’s Secure SD-WAN capabilities.

Fortinet’s offering combines SD-WAN and security features such as Next-Gen firewall in the same appliance, including key features such as application identification, dynamic path selection, and SLA monitoring.

Joining us today to talk about Secure SD-WAN are Nirav Shah, senior director of products and solutions; and Alex Samonte, director of technical architecture.

We discuss:

* The evolution of business drivers for SD-WAN from cost savings to application optimization

* How Fortinet leverages its application ID capabilities from its NGFW for SD-WAN

* Fortient’s ability to decrypt and inspect SSL/TLS traffic for SD-WAN and security policies

* Centralized management for SD-WAN and security from one console

* Hardware acceleration with purpose-built ASICs

* How Fortinet supports public cloud use cases

* More

Show Links:

Fortinet

Fortinet SD-WAN Solutions

Fortinet on Twitter

Time for a break! Enjoy a virtual donut as we analyze the latest tech news, including a new wired automation service from Juniper, Docker's divestment of its enterprise biz, a new SD-WAN entrant from Untangle, the rollout of a commercial version of AT&T's open network OS, and more!