The Hedge

  What's the deal with SONiC? Is it easy to build and use, or hard? Is it something you should be looking at? Jeff Doyle joins Russ and Tom to look at the SONiC operating system, ecosystem, and deployment.

  It's episode 300, and it's roundtable time. In this episode, Tom, Eyvonne, and Russ talk about how systems can be designed to prevent injection attacks, and then the perennial unpleasantness of layoffs.

  As we discussed in the prior episode, the 6G hype is building. What's in 6G, though, and how realistic is it that a new wireless technology is going to radically change the world? In this episode of the Hedge, George Michaelson joins us from Australia to discuss the ins and outs of 6G.

  It's 2026, and it's time for a new cellular telephone hype cycle: 6G! Doug Dawson from CCG joins Russ and Tom to talk about why 5G is really 4.5G, the proposed changes for 6G, and the challenges higher frequency ranges and bandwidths face in the real world.   It's definitely worth following Doug's daily post about the telecom and wireless worlds over at Pots and Pans.

  Has MPLS really "died" because of SD-WAN services? Scott Robohon joins Tom and Russ to talk about the past and future of MPLS.

  AS-SETs (not that kind) were originally designed to simplify filtering at eBGP peering points--but they seem to have gone horribly wrong. Job Snijders and Doug Madory join Tom and Russ to discuss the history, use, problems, and (hopeful) demise of AS-SETs.

  Should network engineers focus on specializing in one technology, vendor, or solution, or should they think about building a diverse skill set? Eyvonne, Tom, and Russ discuss the advantages of each, how these options relate to the future of network engineering, and skill diversification.

  The future of network design and architecture is--based on current trends--is going to be working with and around resource constraints. How would resource constraints impact the way we design and manage networks? Mike Bushong joins Tom, Eyvonne, and Russ to ponder network engineering in a resource constrained world.

  Is there an interaction between Moore's Law and network computing? If so, what is the relationship? How do advances in silicon capabilities and network speeds and feeds rely and drive one another. Geoff Huston joins Russ on this episode of the Hedge to look at a bit of the history.

  The cost of building and maintaining a data center is rising rapidly--and not just in financial terms. George Michaelson joins Tom and Russ to discuss the wider costs of data centers.

  Nash King (@gammacapricorni) joins Russ White and Tom Ammon in a wide ranging discussion of ethics in IT, including being comfortable with standing up and saying “no” when asked to do something you consider unethical and the virtue ethic.

  As the Internet centralizes and gets "big," standards are often being sidelined or consumed. What are the possible results of abandoning standards? Is there anything "normal network engineers" can do about it?

  In this Hedge roundtable, Eyvonne, Tom, and Russ discuss The Amoeba and the Mathematician

  In this episode of the Hedge, Geoff Huston joins Tom Ammon and Russ White to finish the discussion on the ideas behind DNS over HTTPS (DoH), and to consider the implications of its widespread adoption. Is it time to bow to our new overlords?

In this episode of the Hedge, Geoff Huston joins Tom Ammon and Russ White to discuss the ideas behind DNS over HTTPS (DoH), and to consider the implications of its widespread adoption. Is it time to bow to our new overlords?

If you are struggling with building labs on lighter weight systems--or if you're just interested in what Containerlab is and does--join Rick, Roman, and Russ for this discussion of what Containerlab is, what it does, and where its going.

Sometimes we just like to talk about "life issues" as they relate to network engineering and technology career fields. Loneliness seems to especially plague network engineering and other "small" IT fields, where communities are small, change is rapid, and stress is high. Loneliness expert Lucy Rose joins Eyvonne, Tom, and Russ to discuss loneliness.

Do planned economies, like China, have an advantage in deploying IPv6? What do the numbers on the DFZ show? George Michaelson joins Russ and Tom to discuss.

It's time again for Tom, Eyvonne, and Russ to talk about current articles they've run across in their day-to-day reading. This time we talk about WiFi in the home, how often users think a global problem is really local, and why providers have a hard time supporting individual homes and businesses. The second topic is one no one really cares about ... apathy. What causes apathy? How can we combat it? Join us for this episode of the Hedge ... if you can bring yourself to care!

Is quantum really an immediate and dangerous threat to current cryptography systems, or are we pushing to hastily adopt new technologies we won't necessarily need for a few more years? Should we allow the quantum pie to bake a few more years before slicing a piece and digging in? George Michaelson joins Russ and Tom to discuss.

We all know netops, NRE, and devops can increase productivity, increase Mean Time Between Mistakes (MTBM), and decrease MTTR--but how do we deploy and use these tools? We often think of the technical hurdles you face in their deployment, but most of the blockers are actually cultural. Chris Grundemann, Eyvonne, Russ, and Tom discuss the cultural issues with deploying netops on this episode of the Hedge.

We network engineers often find ourselves without a viable plan--our plans always seem to go awry, to the point that many network engineers just give up on planning. Is "giving up" the right solution? Or can we learn to be better planners? Jonathan Adams and Tim McConnaughy join Russ to discussion planning for network engineers.

On this episode of the Hedge, Anil Varanasi joins Russ to talk about the complexities of network operations and what Meter is doing in this space. note: even though this is a more product-heavy episode of the Hedge than usual, it is not sponsored

  What is the relationship between blockchain technologies and network engineering? Is blockchain "just another application," or are there implications for naming, performance, and connectivity? Austin Federa joins Tom and Russ to discuss the intersection of blockchain and networks.

  When you think of careers in network engineering, you probably think of being a console jockey, racking and stacking and configuring boxes. There is, however, much larger than just these things. Ethan Banks joins Eyvonne and Russ to talk about the broader world of careers in network engineering.

Returning to a thread here at the Hedge, Rick Graziani joins Tom and Russ to discuss a college professor's perspective on why network engineers should learn the theory, and not just the configuration.

  "Advocate for yourself!" What does this mean, and how can you do it? Alexis Bertholf joins Tom and Russ to discuss practical strategies to advocate for yourself.

Network automation efforts tend to focus on building and maintaining configurations–but is this the right place to be putting our automation efforts? Derick Winkworth joins Tom Ammon and Russ White at the Hedge for a conversation about what engineers really do, and what this means for automation.

What is the relationship between humans and machines? Do we adapt to machines, or do we adapt machines to humans? Does technology drive culture, or does our culture drive our technology? Join Mark Prosser, Eyvonne, Tom, and Russ as they discuss what a sociotechnical system is and how it impacts our lives.

Requests for proposals (RFPs) are a little understood part of running a network--or any other IT system. What are some common mistakes, and some things engineers should think about, when building and executing RFPs? Andreas Taudte joins Tom and Russ to discuss RFPs.