NETWORKING

NetApp is making a major effort to support hybrid cloud with a batch of software announcements around storage products, converged infrastructure, and cloud-management services. The main news was the release of the latest version of its flagship ONTAP software, as well as updates to other products designed to help organizations build a better hybrid-cloud strategies. ONTAP is the operating system for NetApp’s FAS (hybrid flash-disk) and AFF (all-flash) storage arrays. The latest version, 9.9, adds…

The more you know about how Linux works, the better you’ll be able do some good troubleshooting when you run into a problem. In this post, we’re going to dive into a problem that a contact of mine, Chris Husted, recently ran into and what he did to determine what was happening on his system, stop the problem in its tracks, and make sure that it was never going to happen again. Disaster strikes It…

The DevNet Specialization for Cisco’s Partners is constantly evolving. A couple of weeks ago, Chuck Stickney (DevNet Specialization Lead) together with Markus Lind (CEO, Miradot), had a great discussion in one of the Partner Interactive Webinars in Cisco’s Europe/Middle East/Africa/Russia region. One of the main topics was how Miradot – our first DevNet Specialized Partner – is applying DevNet to their solutions. How DevNet is helping them transform their business and deliver successful outcomes to…

The pace of new technology adoption and innovation to help prevent future disruption while remaining competitive has accelerated beyond all expectations. When the global pandemic first hit, businesses scrambled to get their workforce and operations back online. What would have taken months, suddenly had to happen instantly. Now, as CIOs continue to drive transformation, there are several ways to get access to the technology needed to recover and grow without having to break your budget….

Virtualization software is dated and does not take full advantage of modern hardware, making it extremely power-inefficient and forcing data centers to overprovision hardware to avoid poor performance. That’s the pitch of Sunlight, a virtualization-software vendor whose products take advantage of technologies that didn’t exist when Xen, KVM, VMware and Hyper-V were first developed. “The cloud infrastructure or virtualization stacks have been designed and built 15 to 20 years ago,” said Kosten Metreweli, chief strategy…

Cisco brought new features to its DNA Center network-control platform that promise to improve performance, management analytics and security for its enterprise network customers. The new software features integration of a ThousandEyes agent that bulks-up the platform’s network-intelligence monitoring, a two-fold increase in the number of clients the system can support, and improved security and operational capabilities. DNA Center is the heart of Cisco’s intent-based networking strategy and is the vendor’s core-networking control platform supporting…

When it comes to being a traditional network engineer, we often have a “go it alone” mindset. This is due to the nature of working in operations. Normally we are given a task or a series of projects that we must complete solo. This is because our teammates are just as loaded with work as we are. Although, this does not mean we can’t ask for help. The DevOps way is a completely different shift…

With today’s multi-cloud and modern application environments, security is more complex than ever before. With the Cisco Secure platform approach, we are helping you take steps to achieve radically simplified security across your organization. Today, we are driving simplified security to your hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI), delivering support for Cisco Secure Firewall Threat Defense Virtual (formerly FTDv/NGFWv) on Cisco HyperFlex. Cisco HyperFlex, recognized by CRN as the HCI product of the year for 2019 and 2020,…

In May, Cisco was proud to host our first-ever summit for the U.S. Federal government to share lessons and a path forward for digital transformation across Federal agencies. Hundreds of Federal leaders joined us for FedFWD: A Roadmap to Digital Transformation. I’m excited to kick off a blog series that recaps some of the incredible insights that came out of those conversations, including leveraging data in government. Accurate and timely data is the backbone of…

If you are preparing the office for the gradual return of workers, you may be adding sensors to monitor environmental conditions, track employee movements, and increase visibility of critical assets. Or you are rearranging the office space so you can rotate the same work area between different people on different days. Or you are busy adding more video equipment for better collaboration and enhanced expectations. Once again, you find the common factor that can help…