The Fat Pipe - All Packet Pushers Pods

This week Drew has snaffled all the virtual donuts and gone on the run to an undisclosed location. The special operations recovery team I sent to recover them hasn’t been heard from for over a week.

But do not fear, we have drafted Ned Bellavance from the Day Two Cloud podcast. 

I encourage you get a Masala Chai tea and a plate of virtual baklava and feast your virtual self while we perambulate with passion through our sweet selection of tech news and industry analysis.

Sponsor: Tufin

Tufin has pioneered a policy-based approach to network security management using automation and analytics. You can make network changes in minutes instead of days, reliably and securely. Tufin. The Security Policy Company. Find out more at 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:

VMware to Advance Network Monitoring with Acquisition of Veriflow – VMware

Cambium Networks Announces the Purchase of Xirrus Wi-Fi Networks from Riverbed Technology, Inc. – Cambium Networks

CenturyLink Drops ‘Several Hundred Million’ Dollars on Edge – Light Reading

CenturyLink to Begin Making Major Investments in Edge Compute Services – CenturyLink

Equinix Investor Relations – Equinix

S1 Filing For CloudFlare’s IPO – SEC

MikroTik Routers and Wireless – Products: CRS326-24S+2Q+RM – Mikrotik

Talk about keeping it in the family: Dell-owned Pivotal shares rocket after Dell-owned VMware mulls gobbling it up – The Register

Strategic Kubernetes Options To Deploy Any App On Any Cloud – VMware (PDF)

Car crash: Ford writes down $181m in Pivotal stock as investors claim cloud biz still can’t do Kubernetes properly – The Register

Ned Bellavance drops in as guest co-host while Drew takes time off to make craft virtual donuts with an artisan baker in a remote mountain village. Ned and Greg analyze VMware's latest acquisition, discuss why Xirrus has changed hands, explore a new low-cost switch, opine on CloudFlare's forthcoming IPO, and more.

Open Systems offers an integrated solution that combines a secure cloud access security broker with cloud integrated SD-WAN and a DevOps mentality that gives you a new way to design your increasingly complex perimeter security. Moritz Mann, Head of Product Management, joins us from Open Systems for our security chat.

As your network perimeter expands into public cloud and mobile, how do you secure it? The answer has been some combination of endless firewalls, host agents, and VPNs, maybe from a variety of vendors. How’s that working out for you? Getting a little hard to keep up with it all?

Our sponsor is Open Systems. Open Systems offers an integrated solution that combines a secure cloud access security broker with cloud integrated SD-WAN and a DevOps mentality that gives you a new way to design your increasingly complex perimeter security.

Moritz Mann, Head of Product Management, joins us from Open Systems for our security chat.

What We Discuss

In our conversation with Moritz, we chat through the following big ideas:

1. Open Systems as an SD-WAN company with integrated security.

2. Whether or not security is table stakes for SD-WAN solutions.

3. The components of the Open Systems security offering, including a firewall, web gateway, DNS filter, and security monitor.

4. The architecture of the appliance delivering these services.

5. Open Systems’ role in securing hybrid and multi-cloud environments.

6. How Open Systems secures mobile users.

7. Why inline firewall approaches struggle in the cloud era.

8. The Open Systems approach to securing cloudy conversations, including their Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB) service.

For More Information

* Website: https://open-systems.com/

* Twitter: https://twitter.com/securesdwan

* LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/open-systems

* Moritz Mann: https://www.linkedin.com/in/moritz-mann-34b24/

In the Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy, the phrase “Don’t Panic” is written across the front to help the reader keep a cool head when facing the dangers of galactic hitchhiking. This may sound like dealing with IT problems–especially when the root cause is a cryptic error or unexpected failure.

Turning to technical folks and their blogs is a good way to “not panic” when it comes to dealing with the trough of woe. In this episode, we’ll talk to prolific technical blogger & VMware employee William Lam to get an insider’s view of what happens to generate such delightful content.

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. Find out more at tufin.com.

Just Some Of The Questions We Discuss

1. Most of your written content looks at things you’ve learned or dealt with (workarounds, hacks, unique takes on features or technology). How do you prioritize your technology focus areas?

2. How do you engage with your community and customers? What information do you suggest gathering to help make a case back to your product and engineering teams?

3. You have a reputation as someone who listens to the community and customers, and then champions their needs internally. What is this experience like? What advice can you share with folks on how to communicate their needs to a vendor?

4. Do certifications play a role in your career? Have they played a role in the past? Do you feel that certifications are a necessary evil, learning blueprint, or something in between?

5. Describe your current lab environment to the audience. What devices, software, clouds, and platforms are you consuming or considering?

6. How would you advise an an engineer building out a lab with today’s options? Should they build a low wattage home lab? A cloud lab? What about simulated learning environments such as Codecademy?

Links, Links, Links!

* William’s Blog: VirtuallyGhetto.com

* William’s Twitter: @lamw

* William’s Home Lab Page – a collection of articles to help you with your own home lab builds

* More of William’s excellent articles we referenced in the show…

* 64GB memory on the Intel NUCs?

* Thunderbolt3 to 10GbE NICs

* Update on running ESXi on Intel NUC Hades Canyon (NUC8i7HNK & NUC8i7HVK)

In the Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy, the phrase “Don’t Panic” is written across the front to help the reader keep a cool head when facing the dangers of galactic hitchhiking. This may sound like dealing with IT problems–especially when the root cause is a cryptic error or unexpected failure.

Turning to technical folks and their blogs is a good way to “not panic” when it comes to dealing with the trough of woe. In this episode, we’ll talk to prolific technical blogger & VMware employee William Lam to get an insider’s view of what happens to generate such delightful content.

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. Find out more at tufin.com.

Just Some Of The Questions We Discuss

1. Most of your written content looks at things you’ve learned or dealt with (workarounds, hacks, unique takes on features or technology). How do you prioritize your technology focus areas?

2. How do you engage with your community and customers? What information do you suggest gathering to help make a case back to your product and engineering teams?

3. You have a reputation as someone who listens to the community and customers, and then champions their needs internally. What is this experience like? What advice can you share with folks on how to communicate their needs to a vendor?

4. Do certifications play a role in your career? Have they played a role in the past? Do you feel that certifications are a necessary evil, learning blueprint, or something in between?

5. Describe your current lab environment to the audience. What devices, software, clouds, and platforms are you consuming or considering?

6. How would you advise an an engineer building out a lab with today’s options? Should they build a low wattage home lab? A cloud lab? What about simulated learning environments such as Codecademy?

Links, Links, Links!

* William’s Blog: VirtuallyGhetto.com

* William’s Twitter: @lamw

* William’s Home Lab Page – a collection of articles to help you with your own home lab builds

* More of William’s excellent articles we referenced in the show…

* 64GB memory on the Intel NUCs?

* Thunderbolt3 to 10GbE NICs

* Update on running ESXi on Intel NUC Hades Canyon (NUC8i7HNK & NUC8i7HVK)

Harry Quackenboss is long time veteran of infrastructure technology. In networking he was a VP of Sales of Crescendo for FDDI networking (to the desktop) which was acquired by Cisco. He later founded Woven Systems as a high speed Ethernet company of the time and more lately CEO of cPlane, a SDN company now relaunched […]

Harry Quackenboss is long time veteran of infrastructure technology. In networking he was a VP of Sales of Crescendo for FDDI networking (to the desktop) which was acquired by Cisco. He later founded Woven Systems as a high speed Ethernet company of the time and more lately CEO of cPlane, a SDN company now relaunched as CPLANE NETWORKS, .  Today, Harry is investor and advisor to a number of companies in the infrastructure space.

Harry talks with Greg about the state of networking based on his experiences.

Sponsor: ITProTV

Get over 65 hours of free 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 for a free membership at itpro.tv/packet-pushers and try it with no obligation.

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.

Topics Covered

* Ethernet, FDDI and did we make the right choice and why ?

* Bundling and unbundling of products

* The invisible cost of product evangelisation.

* Should customers be smarter about demanding free sales effort ?

* Can the WAN / LAN / Campus converge into a single unit of operation ?

* Why SDWAN is taking off ? Permission-less connectivity, Internet is good enough.

* Open Source isn’t free and the cost of software isn’t directly less than hardware.

* The emergence of co-processors for off-load and what that might mean for NFV

* Service Function Chaining or Microsegmentationsomewhat

 

You can find Harry on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/harryquackenboss/

 

Not everything is broken this week although some things definitely are looking grim. We consider how really dead data centers are according to Gartner, Cisco gobbles some more AI for Webex while HPE gets more AI-ish for Bluedata. GTT Communications is in trouble while ATT Bribery case highlights that big companies are dumb. Snark and virtual donuts all round this week.

Take a Network Break!

Not everything is broken this week although some things definitely are looking grim. We consider how really dead data centers are according to Gartner, Cisco gobbles some more AI for Webex this time while HPE gets more AI-ish for Bluedata. GTT Communications is in trouble while ATT Bribery case highlights that big companies are dumb.

Its your weekly dose of snark, technology, corporate idiocy and virtual donuts. We love to present you with the 247th episode of Network Break.

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.

Sponsor : Ignition Membership

If you have ever wanted to support the Packet Pushers then Ignition is a great place to start. We are relaunching the Ignition platform and priming the content engines. We have some good stuff there already but you can sign up to be notified when we publish.

Show Links

Is it worth banning 8chan? Casey Newton

A Technical Analysis of the Capital One Hack – CloudSploit – https://blog.cloudsploit.com/a-technical-analysis-of-the-capital-one-hack-a9b43d7c8aea  

Symantec Announces Sale of Enterprise Security Assets for $10.7 Billion to Broadcom – Symantec https://investor.symantec.com/About/Investors/press-releases/press-release-details/2019/Symantec-Announces-Sale-of-Enterprise-Security-Assets-for-107-Billion-to-Broadcom/default.aspx

When the chips are down, buy a software biz: Broadcom snaffles Symantec for $10.7bn – The Register https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/08/09/broadcom_buys_symantec_for_10bn/ 

Symantec Corporation (SYMC) CEO Rick Hill on Q1 2020 Results – Earnings Call Transcript | Seeking Alpha – https://seekingalpha.com/article/4283681-symantec-corporation-symc-ceo-rick-hill-q1-2020-results-earnings-call-transcript?part=single

Cisco Announces Intent to Acquire Voicea | The Network – https://newsroom.cisco.com/press-release-content?type=webcontent&articleId=2007901&utm_medium=RSS 

Turning Talk into Action…Voicea Technology a Gamechanger in Employee Experience – Cisco Blog – https://blogs.cisco.com/news/cisco-collaboration-news-073119 

BlueData Software | HPE – https://www.hpe.com/us/en/solutions/bluedata.html 

The sun sets on the big-data era: HPE to acquire MapR’s assets – SiliconANGLE – https://siliconangle.com/2019/08/05/end-big-data-era-hpe-acquire-maprs-assets/ 

HPE exec: MapR’s troubles didn’t influence our decision to acquire – CRN –