The Everything Feed - All Packet Pushers Pods

Scott talks with Andy Lapteff, a Senior Product Marketing Manager and passionate podcaster with a rich background in telecom. Andy reflects on his non-linear career journey from blue-collar jobs to tech, revealing how he turned challenges into opportunities. He shares insights on the demanding nature of fieldwork and his pivotal shift to networking through Cisco NetAcad. The conversation touches on resilience, mentorship, and the creation of the Art of Network Engineering podcast, driven by a desire to help others transition into tech.

Urs Bauman, a network automation practitioner and maintainer of the open-source Network Unit Testing System (NUTS), teams up with Marco Martinez, a Swisscom architect focused on network automation. They dive into the essence of unit testing for networks, emphasizing small, verifiable checks and the importance of pre- and post-change testing workflows. The duo introduces NUTS as a versatile testing tool leveraging YAML and pytest, making automation accessible. They also discuss community contributions, digital twins, and the seamless generation of YAML tests from source-of-truth.

Discover the unique challenges of bringing IPv6 to the remote islands of Tuvalu. CEO Noya shares how satellite reliance shapes their connectivity. Learn about the groundbreaking BACA submarine cable and its transformative impact. With IPv4 exhaustion looming, Tuvalu's proactive IPv6 adoption ensures a brighter digital future. Dive into discussions on education and telemedicine improvements, regional digital leadership, and the cultural digitization that bolsters community voices. Get insights on the dual-stack approach and the roadmap for future connectivity.

Holly and Ethan dissect the crucial differences between redundancy and high availability, sharing real-world insights from various industries. They tackle common objections about cost and space when implementing redundancy strategies. The duo navigates through protocol-level redundancy with DHCP and DNS, as well as routing protocols like ECMP. They also dive into advanced topics such as Anycast for global load sharing and strategies for redundant data centers. Expect a preview of challenges related to complexity and failure detection in subsequent discussions!

Darya Petrashka, a Senior Data Scientist at SLB with expertise in natural language processing, shares her unique journey from management and linguistics into data science. She breaks down the data science umbrella, discussing the roles of data engineering and machine learning. Darya contrasts junior and senior positions, emphasizing the importance of business understanding in senior roles. She also highlights common challenges in data quality, team communication, and the impact of AI tools in coding. Her advice for newcomers? Leverage your unique background to enhance your career.

Josh Hardy, Co-founder and CTO of Orb, dives into internet connectivity with a focus on responsiveness over speed. He discusses Orb's innovative methodology for measuring connectivity, including latency, jitter, and packet loss. Josh explains how traditional speed tests often overlook these aspects and why optimized speed can harm user experience. Listeners learn about Orb's user-friendly scoring system, which simplifies complex metrics into an overall score. Hardy also shares insights on how the app continuously monitors connections with minimal impact.

In this engaging discussion, DevSecOps expert Natalie Somersall shares her rich experience from Booz Allen Hamilton and GitHub, diving into the world of Software Bills of Materials (SBOMs). She explains how SBOMs serve as crucial inventories for software components, aiding in vulnerability detection and transparency. Natalie also addresses challenges around SBOM adoption and offers insights into their operational value. Additionally, she introduces VEX for enhancing vulnerability context and stresses the importance of collaboration across teams for effective SBOM management.

Join Jonathan Ciccio, Continuous Improvement Manager at The Siemon Company, an expert in ESG initiatives, as he dives into the importance of Environmental, Social, and Governance practices. He discusses how ESG isn't just ethical but also cost-effective for companies investing in data centers. Jonathan breaks down scope emissions and reveals Siemon's impressive commitment to renewable energy and waste reduction. He highlights the competitive edge gained through transparency in product impacts and governance policies, showcasing how such initiatives can drive customer trust and business success.

Joe Doherty, Product Solutions Architect at Cisco ThousandEyes, dives into the fascinating realm of agentic AI and network performance. He explains how agentic AI differs from traditional chatbots, leveraging context-aware actions. The conversation highlights key performance metrics for AI inference, such as HTTP response time and DNS efficiency, emphasizing the importance of monitoring. Joe also discusses how ThousandEyes instruments agent environments, ensuring network engineers can maintain their core skills while adapting to new technologies.

Joe Doherty, a Product Solutions Architect at Cisco ThousandEyes, dives into the fascinating world of AI agents and Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers. He explains how ThousandEyes provides crucial visibility into network performance for AI models and services. Topics include agentic AI use cases like automated refunds, key performance metrics to monitor, and the role of DNS and network dependencies. Joe emphasizes that familiar network skills still apply, making it accessible for engineers venturing into AI monitoring.