As today’s networks continue to move to an all IP infrastructure (if they have not done so already), the virtualization and consolidation of network capabilities and resources becomes a key requirement of any new data center technology. Every device has to do more than its predecessor. Today we are taking a few moments to look at this trend which is especially true in the load balancer arena.

Converging voice, data and video onto a single network infrastructure can be a complex task. Here are some tips to ensure the transmission runs smoothly.

What typically happens at customer advisory board (CAB) meetings? What should happen? Our SevOne CAB Summit 2011 was held last week in Atlantic City. The first day was one of meetings and conversations. We spent the second day golfing. The summit was a surprise for me. Brian Harvell, SevOne’s VP of Product Engineering recalled from his experience as a leader at Comcast and AOL, “Customer advisory board meetings are heated.” A group of powerful leaders gets together, under tremendous pressure to figure out cost effective ways to manage the performance of their critical IT infrastructure, services, and applications. But often times, the host is not hearing customers’ pain. Sometimes, the host company simply can’t understand their users and/or customers' problems. So, sparks fly.

Last night, I accepted an award on behalf of everyone at SevOne. We made Deloitte’s 2011 Greater Philadelphia Fast 50 ranking of the 50 fastest growing technology, media, telecommunications, life sciences and clean technology companies in the Greater Philadelphia region. Not only that, but we are NUMBER TWO!

It’s that time again… another video whiteboard. And as I mentioned in our last whiteboard video blog (Cisco IP SLA: The High Definition Latency Probe you Already Own), we have another new SevOne celeb to introduce. Meet Ross Maurer, one of our Systems Engineers in EMEA. Ross joined SevOne form Nomura, where he was responsible for the design and implementation of a global network management solution and strategy across Nomura's investment bank, and he previously worked at JPM Chase in network engineering.

In February 2011 the IANA assigned the last top level (/8) block of free IPv4 addresses. Although the standard for IPv6 was proposed in the mid-late 1990s, to date mostly the government and educational institutions and service providers serving these markets have deployed IPv6 in their networks. Needless to say, the transition from IPv4 to IPv6 will only accelerate from here on out due to the significant explosion in mobile devices like tablets and smart phones; IP addresses are being consumed at much faster rates than in the early 2000s.

SevOne’s vision is to remove all limits to data collection, reporting, and affordability. The perception of limits is always changing. The way enterprises and service providers define affordability limits have changed dramatically because of market uncertainty. 

Discussing a particular web technology may seem like a far-off topic from network performance management. However, to ensure that a team is capable of constructing anything, from a football stadium to a rocket ship, you must have the right tools. Choosing the wrong tools leaves you with limited functionality, sluggish performance, and no hope for scalability. The right tools for the job are the ones that you shouldn't have to think about. These are the tools that let you focus on innovating and creating, rather than working within a set of boundaries. Finding and adopting these tools is part of my job, and it makes me smile when I say that.