Scott Lowe

FEBRUARY 24, 2018

VMware recently released a reference design guide for NSX-T; see here for more details. Servers/Hardware. Dimitri de Swart has a write-up on LAMP stacks made easy with VMware and Puppet. Courtesy of Corey Quinn, here’s an awesome AWS versus Azure comparison , comic book style. I hope it proves useful! Networking.

Vmware 60

Vmware Load Balancer Network Open Source 60

Scott Lowe

MARCH 17, 2016

I recently came across a couple useful troubleshooting guides, one for Open vSwitch (OVS) and OpenStack Neutron and one for VMware NSX. Servers/Hardware. Russell Pope at Kovarus recently wrote about using security groups to manage the VMware NSX distributed firewall. VMware recently GA’d version 6.2 Virtualization.

Vmware 60

Vmware Linux Network Open Source 60

Scott Lowe

JANUARY 14, 2016

Cumulus VX, if you aren’t aware, is a community-supported virtual appliance version of Cumulus Linux aimed at helping folks preview and test “full-blown” Cumulus Linux (which, of course, requires compatible hardware). Servers/Hardware. Dwayne Sinclair (an NSX SE at VMware) has a write-up on what micro-segmentation is not.

Vmware 60

Vmware Devops Storage Linux 60

Scott Lowe

MARCH 10, 2015

Anthony Burke (disclaimer: Anthony works for VMware in the NSBU) has a post on how to use Python to automate the bulk creation of firewall rules for use with the VMware NSX distributed firewall. You may have heard about the “6-pack”, Facebook’s new open modular hardware switch introduced recently ( here’s a post on it ).

Vmware 60

Vmware Linux Hardware Software Development 60

Scott Lowe

FEBRUARY 1, 2019

The folks over at Cilium took a look at a recent CNI benchmark comparison and unpacked it a bit. Servers/Hardware. Christopher Damerau explains how to use Ansible to manage VMware resources. Next is an older article from Patrick Ogenstad that provides an introduction to ZTP (Zero Touch Provisioning).

Network 60

Network Resources Devops Vmware 60

Scott Lowe

JANUARY 14, 2016

Cumulus VX, if you aren’t aware, is a community-supported virtual appliance version of Cumulus Linux aimed at helping folks preview and test “full-blown” Cumulus Linux (which, of course, requires compatible hardware). Servers/Hardware. Dwayne Sinclair (an NSX SE at VMware) has a write-up on what micro-segmentation is not.

Devops 60

Devops Vmware Storage Open Source 60

Scott Lowe

JANUARY 6, 2018

Erik Hinderer takes a stab (based on his field experience) at estimating how long it takes to upgrade VMware NSX. Servers/Hardware. I thought I also saw a VMware blog post on the provider as well, but couldn’t find any link (guess I was mistaken). There is more work ahead, but it’s great to see progress being made.

Linux 60

Linux Vmware Comparison Network 60

Scott Lowe

MAY 25, 2017

Anthony Shaw has a good comparison of Ansible, StackStorm, and Salt (with a particular view at applicability in a networking context). Servers/Hardware. John Welsh has a post on why someone might use VMware NSX. Check out the GitHub repository. This one is definitely worth a read, in my opinion.

Linux 60

Linux Open Source Network Vmware 60

Scott Lowe

MAY 25, 2017

Anthony Shaw has a good comparison of Ansible, StackStorm, and Salt (with a particular view at applicability in a networking context). Servers/Hardware. John Welsh has a post on why someone might use VMware NSX. Check out the GitHub repository. This one is definitely worth a read, in my opinion.

Linux 60

Linux Open Source Network Vmware 60

Scott Lowe

MARCH 8, 2016

PowerNSX is pretty cool—it’s a set of PowerShell cmdlets for administrators of VMware NSX running in vSphere environments. Tony Sangha has a nice article providing step-by-step instructions on setting up a site-to-site IPSec VPN between VMware NSX and a Cisco CSR 1000v. Servers/Hardware. Networking. Seen this ?

Vmware 60

Vmware Linux Intel Network 60

Scott Lowe

NOVEMBER 9, 2018

Servers/Hardware. Serve The Home takes a critical look at the Bloomberg Supermicro stories, debunking or at least calling into question many details of the alleged hardware hack as reported by Bloomberg. Fellow VMware alum Steve Flanders has a write-up on running Kubernetes locally (on a Mac).

Load Balancer 60

Load Balancer Operating Systems Intel Hardware 60

Scott Lowe

MARCH 23, 2017

Gabriele Gerbino has a nice write-up about Cisco’s efforts with APIs ; his article includes a brief description of YANG data models and a comparison of working with network devices via SSH or via API. Servers/Hardware. This is great news, and something VMware needed to do. installation caused by duplicate NSX Manager UUIDs.

Open Source 60

Open Source Storage Vmware Network 60

Scott Lowe

MARCH 30, 2018

This Tech Short Take marks the end of an era (sort of); it’s the last Tech Short Take published while I’m a VMware employee (today is my last day; see here for more details). Servers/Hardware. Tirumarai Selvan has a comparison. Welcome to Technology Short Take 97! But enough about me—let’s talk some tech!

Linux 60

Linux Vmware Windows Applications 60

Scott Lowe

AUGUST 26, 2017

Servers/Hardware. Werner Ruegg has a post on an alternative hardware solution for vSphere home labs. Need a comparison of CloudFormation versus Terraform? (Do I need to talk about how understanding a service mesh is a good thing for networking professionals? That might be a good blog post topic right there!).

Hardware 60

Hardware Devops Network Vmware 60

Scott Lowe

APRIL 24, 2015

Servers/Hardware. Kevin Houston’s March 2015 blade server comparisons might be a useful place to start. By now you’ve probably heard about VMware Integrated OpenStack (VIO), which was announced in early February. Anthony Metcalf has a collection of posts over at PlanetVM on NSX packet walks (see here , here , and here ).

Vmware 60

Vmware Storage Firewall Network 60

Scott Lowe

AUGUST 16, 2017

Anthony Shaw has a good comparison of Ansible, StackStorm, and Salt (with a particular view at applicability in a networking context). Servers/Hardware. John Welsh has a post on why someone might use VMware NSX. Check out the GitHub repository. This one is definitely worth a read, in my opinion.

Open Source 60

Open Source Network Linux Engineering 60

Fountainhead

JUNE 29, 2009

The only major things missing from their "Starter Kit" suite they offer are the addition of VMware - not cheap if you choose to purchase it - as well as the addition of a blade (or two) to serve as controllers of the system. A little comparison chart (at right) shows what an IT shop might have to do to accomplish a list of typical functions.

Analysis 147

Analysis HP Data Center Virtualization 147

Scott Lowe

APRIL 2, 2021

Servers/Hardware. Given the prevalence of VMware’s ESXi hypervisor, I suppose it was only a matter of time before the bad guys really started targeting it in a major way. This time, they’re exploiting a weakness that VMware can’t patch: people. I’m not sure about that. Cloud Computing/Cloud Management.

Vmware 60

Vmware Firewall Storage Comparison 60

Scott Lowe

DECEMBER 6, 2012

First up is Brent Salisbury’s how to build an SDN lab without needing OpenFlow hardware. Bruce Davie and Martin Casado (with Nicira, now part of VMware) have written a post comparing the VXLAN and STT tunneling protocols. Servers/Hardware. I needed to fill in some other knowledge gaps first.) Why is this important?

Vmware 109

Vmware Virtualization Storage Hardware 109

Scott Lowe

JUNE 11, 2014

Anthony Burke’s series on VMware NSX continues with part 5. He makes comparisons among server virtualization, 10 Gigabit Ethernet, and SDN, and feels that in order for SDN to really hit this market it needs to be “not a user-facing feature, but rather a means to an end” (his words). Servers/Hardware.

Vmware 60

Vmware Storage Network Virtualization 60

Scott Lowe

AUGUST 26, 2014

Ben Fathi, CTO of VMware, takes the stage to start the keynote, and goes through a recap of yesterday’s announcements: EVO and EVO:RAIL, vCloud Air rebranding and the availability of new services, VMware Integrated OpenStack (VIO), and new product versions (vCloud Suite 5.8, betas of vSphere and VSAN).

Vmware 65

Vmware Architecture Applications Storage 65

Scott Lowe

MARCH 5, 2013

He starts out by discussing proactive vs. reactive flows , in which Brent explains that OpenFlow performance is less about OpenFlow and more about how flows are inserted into the hardware. Servers/Hardware. Well worth reading for VMware admins and architects. Cloud Computing/Cloud Management. Virtualization.

Virtualization 102

Virtualization Storage Vmware Network 102

Scott Lowe

OCTOBER 22, 2015

Servers/Hardware. VMware recently announced some integrations between Ansible and vCloud Air that will allow customers to use Ansible playbooks to create resources in vCloud Air. Speaking of metadata services, have a look at this comparison of metadata services (which compares DigitalOcean, Amazon, and Google, but not OpenStack).

Vmware 60

Vmware Virtualization Guidelines Network 60