Intent-Based Networking: How Close Are We (and Should You Prepare)? Over the last several months, intent-based networking (IBNS) has gained momentum as a newly viable technology that aims to further automate traditional network management. Although IBNS has existed for a few years now as a general concept, it was more buzz than reality until Cisco® launched its first IBNS software package earlier this year. What is intent-based networking? Traditionally, network administrators manually translate business policies into network device configurations, a time-intensive and error-prone activity that contributes to rising OpEx. But as digital transformation initiatives continue to reshape the way organizations approach their business and IT strategy, it's becoming more difficult to stay on top of policy and configuration changes by hand. Enter intent-based networking, whic... (more)

Virtual #Storage From @FormationDS | @CloudExpo #SDS #SDN #DataCenter

"We formed Formation several years ago to really address the need for bring complete modernization and software-defined storage to the more classic private cloud marketplace," stated Mark Lewis, Chairman and CEO of Formation Data Systems, in this SYS-CON.tv interview at 18th Cloud Expo, held June 7-9, 2016, at the Javits Center in New York City, NY. 21st International Cloud Expo, taking place October 31 - November 2, 2017, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA, will feature technical sessions from a rock star conference faculty and the leading industry players in the world. Download Show Prospectus ▸ Here Cloud computing is now being embraced by a majority of enterprises of all sizes. Yesterday's debate about public vs. private has transformed into the reality of hybrid cloud: a recent survey shows that 74% of enterprises have a hybrid cloud str... (more)

[slides] Composable Infrastructure | @CloudExpo @HTBase #SDN #DataCenter

Download Slide Deck: ▸ Here Download Slide Deck: ▸ Here Why Composable Infrastructure Instead of HyperConvergence? HyperConvergence came to market with the objective of being simple, flexible and to help drive down operating expenses. It reduced the footprint by bundling the compute/storage/network into one box. This brought a new set of challenges as the HyperConverged vendors are very focused on their own proprietary building blocks. If you want to scale in a certain way, let's say you identified a need for more storage and want to add a device that is not sold by the HyperConverged vendor, forget about it. This meant that up to now the HyperConverged vendors were in charge of the requirements. Download Slide Deck: ▸ Here Composable Infrastructure came to solve this issue by putting the business in charge of the requirements and how you build your infrastructure... (more)

SD-WAN: Symbiosis Without Compromise | @CloudExpo #SDN #Cloud #Storage

SD-WAN - Symbiosis Without Compromise WAN infrastructures are highly persistent due to typically enormous investments in their dedicated hardware and management tools. WAN services like MPLS have undoubtedly been beneficial and enduring, but enterprises and IT departments require more flexible and economical solutions to provide employee access to corporate resources and cloud-based applications. SD-WAN promises to fulfill these needs with software-based, cloud-based solutions - running on commercial off-the-shelf hardware platforms - to connect their various branch offices. For more than a decade technologies like leased lines, VPNs and MPLS were the dominant architectures connecting enterprise entities. Proven to be highly secure and reliable, they nevertheless lack flexibility and typically entail high costs for limited bandwidth. On the other hand, the ubiquity ... (more)

[session] Public Cloud Alternative | @CloudExpo @Cloudistics #SDS #DataCenter

The Need for the Public Cloud Alternative What You Need to Know You know you need the cloud, but you're hesitant to simply dump everything at Amazon since you know that not all workloads are suitable for cloud. You know that you want the kind of ease of use and scalability that you get with public cloud, but your applications are architected in a way that makes the public cloud a non-starter. You're looking at private cloud solutions based on hyperconverged infrastructure, but you're concerned with the limits inherent in those technologies. What do you do? In his session at 21st Cloud Expo, Carmelo McCutcheon, VP of Pre-Sales Engineering and Services at Cloudistics, will discuss how private cloud infrastructure based on composable technologies result in environments that are suitable for all your workloads while also providing you with many of the benefits of the ... (more)

Two Options for Web Content Filtering at the Speed of Now | @CloudExpo #SDN #Cloud #Virtualization

Two Options for Web Content Filtering at the Speed of Now Because not everything the internet offers is suitable for all users, organizations use web filters to block unwanted content. However, filtering content becomes challenging as networks speeds increase. Two filtering architectures are explored below, along with criteria to help you decide which option is the best fit for your organization. How Fast Can You Filter? To ensure service level and capacity as internet traffic increases, organizations need higher-speed networks. In telecom networks, to serve hundreds of thousands of users, 100 Gbps network links are introduced to keep up with the demand. Today, the market has reached a state of maturity regarding solutions for web content filtering at 1 Gbps and 10 Gbps, but filtering at 100 Gbps poses a whole set of new challenges. To filter content this quickly, th... (more)

What Type of File System? | @CloudExpo @CompuverdeSDS #SDS #SDN #DataCenter

What Type of File System Are You Really Getting? The cloud's massive success and the growing desire for Big Data analytics are just two of the factors that are making traditional storage architectures obsolete. Organizations cannot afford to scale bygone storage appliances. Even if they could, the time it would take is unacceptable in the digital world. Adding multiple servers could not accommodate storage demands, either. Vertical storage architecture contains bottlenecks that slow performance to a crawl. Along with cloud and analytics, another technological advancement has emerged in the data center: software-defined storage (SDS). Because SDS decouples the programming that controls storage-related tasks from the physical storage hardware, it dramatically reduces costs associated with hardware. Fewer, less-expensive servers can be used to improve both capacity an... (more)

The VDI Landscape | @CloudExpo #VDI #Cloud #IoT #AI #DX #Virtualization

The VDI Landscape: What Came Before and What's Possible Now Digital transformation can be exciting, but it also can be painful. Organizations are trying to better support a growing mobile workforce that needs the flexibility to work from anywhere on any device. The ability to do so offers a distinct competitive advantage, as productivity soars. Virtualizing applications and desktops has been an important step toward achieving these productivity gains, but the first generation of virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) and application publishing solutions not only failed to deliver on cost savings and streamlined IT promises, but they contributed an overwhelming level of complexity that ballooned the operating expenses of these implementations - an unpleasant surprise. Now, many organizations that implemented these first-generation solutions need to determine a migratio... (more)

Reducing Development Scoping Costs | @CloudExpo #API #Cloud #Virtualization

A common development challenge is accurately scoping the amount of effort required when creating new applications. This can occur when an application's requirements are first being designed, or even before. Since one of the most frequently-overlooked capabilities of service virtualization is the ability to rapidly prototype and test the impact of new services directly from initial user stories, I'm going to address that today. At the very beginning of an application's lifecycle, there comes a time when the team meets to discuss what the code should do. Often, there are many questions surrounding the feasibility of a new application, and the burden falls on the developer to indicate whether something is possible and to scope the level of effort required. When dealing with new technology or a completely new idea, this can be very difficult or nearly impossible. The de... (more)

Multi-Hypervisor #Monitoring | @CloudExpo #DevOps #AI #DX #Virtualization

Simplifying the Monitoring of Multi-Hypervisor Infrastructures Over the years, many enterprises have achieved tremendous cost reductions and management simplicity through virtualizing their IT infrastructure. According to Gartner, while some firms have virtualized over 90% of their servers, on an average, most firms have over 75% of their servers in a virtualized infrastructure, indicating the growth and maturity of the x86 server virtualization market. VMware dominated the virtualization market for several years but organizations are now also adopting other hypervisors such as Microsoft Hyper-V, Citrix XenServer, Oracle VM Server, Red Had Virtualization, etc. Additionally, the Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) is an alternative for handling virtualization in Linux environments. And, the advent of hyper-converged infrastructures has introduced new hypervisors such... (more)

Side of #Serverless BS with Your Hardware FUD | @CloudExpo #SDN #AI #SDDC

Did You Want a Side of SLBS (Serverless BS) with Your Software or Hardware FUD? A few years ago a popular industry buzzword term theme included server less and hardware less. It turns out, serverless BS (SLBS) and hardware less are still trendy, and while some might view the cloud or software-defined data center (SDDC) virtualization, or IoT folks as the culprits, it is more widespread with plenty of bandwagon riders. SLBS can span from IoT to mobile, VDI and workspace clients (zero or similar), workstations, server, storage, networks. To me what’s ironic is that many purveyors of of SLBS also like to talk about hardware. What's the issue with SLBS? Simple, on the one hand, there is no such thing as software that does not need hardware somewhere in the stack. Second, many purveyors of SLBS are solutions that in the past would have been called shrink-wrap. Thirdly ... (more)