Heavy Networking
Packet Pushers
Heavy Networking is an unabashedly nerdy dive into all things networking. Described by one listener as "verbal white papers," the weekly episodes feature network engineers, industry experts, and vendors sharing useful information to keep your professional knowledge sharp and your career growing. Hosts Ethan Banks & Drew Conry-Murray cut through the marketing spin to explore what works—and what doesn't—in networking today, while keeping an eye on what's ahead for the industry. On air since 2010, Heavy Networking is the flagship show of the Packet Pushers podcast network.
Episodes
Mentioned books
8 snips
Feb 19, 2021 • 1h 9min
Heavy Networking 563: Automating Documentation With Ansible, Genie, And Jinja2
John Capobianco, an automation expert and Sr. IT Planner for the House of Commons, shares his insights on using Ansible, Genie, and Jinja2 for effective network documentation. He discusses how to transform complex JSON data into accessible CSV formats, streamlining data management for network professionals. The conversation emphasizes the legitimacy of automation in documentation, the benefits of collaboration, and the versatility of Jinja2 for various output formats. Capobianco also highlights community resources for network engineers to enhance their skills.
Feb 16, 2021 • 41min
Heavy Networking 562: Juniper’s Paragon Automation Portfolio Prioritizes Service Experience (Sponsored)
In today’s sponsored show with Juniper Networks, we dive into Juniper's Paragon product portfolio, which measures service quality for critical applications. The portfolio allows service providers and enterprises to get deeper visibility into, and automated control over, their networks. Our guests from Juniper to walk us through the portfolio are Peter Weinberger and Jonas Krogell.
Feb 12, 2021 • 45min
Heavy Networking 561: Modeling Your Network For Intent-Based Assurance With IP Fabric (Sponsored)
In today's podcast, sponsored by IP Fabric, we dive into the IP Fabric Network Assurance platform. This platform gathers network configuration and state, and then builds a network model using a graph database. The result is a "digital twin" of the network that engineers and security teams can use for troubleshooting, to plan and verify changes, for network and security analysis, and to enable closed-loop automation. Our guests from IP Fabric are Pavel Bykov, CEO; and Daren Fulwell, Network Automation Evangelist.
Feb 5, 2021 • 56min
Heavy Networking 560: Moving Big Data Sets From Far-Off Locations
Construction sites generate tons of data but often lack network connectivity. Today's Heavy Networking explores how one CTO has found ways to move huge data sets to HQ and the cloud using everything from Free Space Optics to LTE to consumer broadband. There are also stories about flying drones and robot dogs, and the operational impacts of SD-WAN. Our guest is Michael Shepherd, CTO of Rogers-O’Brien Construction.
Jan 29, 2021 • 57min
Heavy Networking 559: Nokia SR Linux – A Hyperscaler NOS Designed For Everyone (Sponsored)
Today's sponsored Heavy Networking dives into SR Linux, a new network OS built by Nokia. SR Linux combines a microservices architecture with modern data center networking features and is designed to fit multiple use cases while also being automation-friendly and extensible. Our guest is Bruce Wallis, Senior Director of Product Management in Data Center Switching at Nokia.
Jan 22, 2021 • 1h
Heavy Networking 558: No Time For Hardware – The Case For NFV
Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) transforms routers, load balancers, firewalls and other network devices into virtual instances that can be service-chained, spun up and down as needed, and are cloud-friendly. But if you're a hardware hugger or have been been burned by virtualization in the past, should you avoid NFV? Today's Heavy Networking guests want to change your mind. The Packet Pushers speak with Michael Pfeiffer, a Cloud Networking Architect for a VAR; and Brad Gregory, Senior Product Manager at Equinix.
Jan 15, 2021 • 52min
Heavy Networking 557: User Experience Is A Full-Stack Responsibility (Sponsored)
Digital Experience Monitoring (DEM) is the topic on today's Heavy Networking. IT folks tend to view user experience from their own particular area of responsibility--networking, security, app development--but the reality is there's a common set of data that IT should consume and understand. Sponsor Catchpoint joins us to discuss its DEM platform and how it measures user experience using metrics that are relevant across the IT stack. Our guest is JP Blaho, Director, Product Marketing at Catchpoint.
Jan 8, 2021 • 52min
Heavy Networking 556: The State Of GNS3 For Network Labs
GNS3 is a tool for building virtual networks for labbing. Heavy Networking welcomes GNS3 co-founder and developer Jeremy Grossman and networking instructor David Bombal. We cover the state of GNS3 in 2021, including what GNS3 can do that maybe you didn’t know, and what’s on the roadmap.
Dec 18, 2020 • 57min
Heavy Networking 555: Top Network Design Trends Of 2020
Today's episode is the last Heavy Networking of 2020. In the spirit of an end-of-year reflection, we're going to talk about network design trends from this year, some of which were driven, or at least accelerated, by the pandemic hellscape that was 2020. Our guest is Zig Zsiga, a network designer, architect, CCDE, and instructor.
Dec 11, 2020 • 53min
Heavy Networking 554: Mistaking Commercial Software For A Security Blanket
Today's Heavy Networking talks about the tradeoffs between commercial and open source software. While open source takes time and effort to make work, is commercial software any better? Guest Daniel Teycheney is here for the debate.
