Replacing Human-Driven Automation With One That Is Event-Driven, With Cisco

In a move to enhance network management efficiency, Cisco is replacing the existing human-driven automation with an innovative event-driven approach. Network controllers centralize operations by maintaining an inventory of network states, and event-driven automation streamlines this further by automating responses to network changes, reducing manual intervention and speeding up the resolution process. Cisco’s event-driven solutions were explored in detail at Tech Field Day Extra at Cisco Live EMEA 2024, promising elevated operational capabilities with a focus on observability and swift auto-configuration. Read more in this article from Gestalt IT.


Policy Management Gets Easier With Cisco AI Assistant

Cisco’s AI Assistant, unveiled at Tech Field Day Extra at Cisco Live EMEA 2024, promises to revolutionize policy management within Secure Access, offering swift and reliable creation and enforcement of security policies. Emphasizing simplicity and risk reduction, the AI tool handles English language prompts to generate comprehensive policies, demonstrating its capability to securely augment and automate IT administrator tasks. Showcasing AI’s monitoring role, Cisco Secure Access also ensures protected use of AI tools within organizations, preventing sensitive data breaches and incorporating intelligent user access control.


Doubling Down on Network Observability With IP Fabric and NetBox Labs

At Tech Field Day Extra at Cisco Live EMEA 2024, IP Fabric revealed a collaboration with NetBox Labs, emphasizing a strengthened focus on Network Observability through their Automated Network Assurance Platform and a versatile NetBox plugin. This strategic alliance addresses the complexities of visualizing and managing multifaceted network environments by merging extensive visibility with dynamic topology modeling. IP Fabric’s innovative approach promises improved data accuracy and operability across network architectures, aligning observed network states with intent-based configurations to support efficient and reliable network operations.


Cisco Live EMEA and Tech Field Day Extra Embodies “Better Together”

Attending Cisco Live EMEA and Tech Field Day Extra as a single mother on maternity leave, Zoe Rose highlighted the significance of community in shaping careers while juggling the demands of parenthood. Her experience underscores not only the flexibility and inclusion of these industry events but also the support structures that make participation feasible for parents. Rose’s story is an inspiring testament to the power of community and organizational support in fostering professional growth, even amidst the complexities of personal life transitions.


Meraki Switching 17 – Encapsulating ‘Better Together’ by Providing Context

Meraki’s upcoming MS17 features, highlighted at Cisco Live EMEA by Brennan Martin and Alex Burger, are tailored to reduce burdens on IT teams through efficient data aggregation, contextualized insights, and trend visualization. As Zoe Rose discusses, the update is set to streamline operations by introducing dynamic profiles for switchports, enhanced packet capture analysis, and comprehensive device health dashboards, with an API to further customize thresholds and alerts. While a ‘single pane of glass’ for network management remains a complex goal, these changes reflect a product evolution responsive to customer feedback and aimed at alleviating workload, underscoring Cisco’s commitment to user-centric innovation.


Cisco Live TFDx 2024 – Meraki and Catalyst Wireless, Better Together!

Attending Tech Field Day at Cisco Live EMEA 2024 allowed Dan Jones to witness the impressive integration of the 9800 WLC into Meraki for simplified monitoring – a boon for helpdesk engineers. The ease of setup, requiring just Meraki Cloud service activation and a claim code, makes advanced network management accessible without extra costs, leveraging existing DNA licensing. This innovation is particularly advantageous for companies lacking the resources to implement a fully-fledged DNA-C appliance, streamlining operations with the tools they already possess. Read more in this article!


BackBox- Network Vulnerability Manager

Girard Kavelines delves into the technical advantages of BackBox’s Network Vulnerability Manager, a system designed to proactively combat cybersecurity threats and vulnerabilities. The Network Vulnerability Manager can identify and prioritize vulnerabilities as they appear, automating patches and upgrades across network devices for efficient remediation. The tool also enables multi-step upgrades in a seamless process, cutting down on intervention and enhancing the overall security of networks.


VMware NSX+ Intelligence: Get Smart With Network Security!

At Explore 2023, VMware introduced their new NSX+ platform, a SaaS-based solution that includes several distinct products focused on managing and securing networking environments through advanced automation. As Matt Tyrer discusses, NSX+ Intelligence provides administrators with granular visibility of data flows and user processes, thus informing more intelligent, AI/ML-driven policies. The platform also leverages both unsupervised and supervised machine learning models for threat detection, emphasizing VMware’s commitment to ensuring robust network security.


Modernizing Aging Legacy Systems Without Cost Creep With AMD

This article by Sulagna Saha explores AMD’s VMware Architecture Migration Tool (VAMT) developed in collaboration with VMware. Addressing the critical need for seamless infrastructure upgrades to evade the “technical debt” of legacy systems, VAMT is a comprehensive tool that offers a swift, efficient, and automated approach to cold migration of machines between different architecture types. By automating the entire migration life cycle and providing customized control over migration tasks, VAMT represents a remarkable solution to drive the modernization of enterprise infrastructure with minimal disruption.


TFDx With AMD: More Than Just a Bag of Chips! (Part2)

AMD presented their VMware Architecture Migration Tool (VAMT), a VM migration and disaster recovery toolkit developed in partnership with VMware. The open-source tool, initially designed to automate the replatforming of VMs to AMD EPYC, also supports any migration between x86-to-x86 architecture, making it valuable for disaster recovery and general data resilience strategy. The tool’s key features include the automation of powering up and down of VMs, their movement to new locations, and clean-up after migration, thereby streamlining migration tasks and ensuring efficient applications functioning. In this article, Matt Tyrer shares his impression of VAMT following their Tech Field Day presentation at VMware Explore 2023.


Rout Intruders With All New VMware NSX+ Network Detection and Response Service

In this Gestalt IT article, Sulagna Saha delves into the complexity of modern cyber threats and the rising need for enhanced cybersecurity. Discussing the issue of lateral movement in attack chains, Saha emphasizes the importance of total visibility to defeat rogue network invaders. VMware’s newly launched Network Detection and Response (NDR) service within the NSX+ suite, presented at Tech Field Day Extra at VMware Explore, promises exactly this kind of visibility, enabling quick detection and elimination of threats.


VMware Explore 2023

The IT Reality podcast offers a recap of VMware Explore 2023 from Las Vegas, providing first-hand experiences and insights beyond the typical marketing narrative typically associated with such tech events. Featuring interviews with Mike Masters and Franky Barragan, the hosts discuss various tech topics within businesses, while also highlighting the fun side of the conference through Sandbox VR experiences. The discussion dives into VMware’s NSX+ announcement, highlighted during their Tech Field Day Extra presentation attended by Richard Kenyan.


Adopting a Standard Operating Format in Multi-Cloud With VMware NSX+

Sulagna Saha discusses VMware’s NSX+ in this article following their presentation at Tech Field Day Extra at VMware Explore, noting its ability to simplify transitions into a multi-cloud environment. NSX+ serves as a comprehensive solution for multi-cloud networking and security delivered as a service, unifying fragmented policies and operations, ensuring consistent security controls, and simplifying migration. Ultimately, NSX+ aims to address the increasing demand for consistent operation, promising comprehensive cross-cloud visibility, multi-tenancy, persistent security, and centralized operations.


Smart Migration With VMware HCX+

Gestalt IT takes a look at VMware’s HCX+ following their Tech Field Day Extra presentation at VMware Explore. HCX+ is designed to streamline workload migration in the multi-cloud environment. The tool seeks to eliminate uncertainty and chaos from the migration process, allowing companies a swift transition to their first migration. HCX+ offers a “bird’s eye view” on multi-cloud estates for consolidated management and higher operational clarity, transforming the normally cumbersome process of migration into a simplified and efficient endeavor.


VMware Goes for Multi-Cloud Support With NSX+

W. Curtis Preston shares his insights on VMware’s presentation of NSX+ at Tech Field Day Extra at VMware Explore 2023. The evolution of NSX+ aims at providing comprehensive multi-cloud network management, with features such as policy management, network detection and response, load balancing, and migration services. Preston highlights the potential of NSX+ to manage not only ESX workloads across multiple clouds, but eventually native workloads too, reflecting VMware’s vision for a robust multi-cloud setup.