Year in Review – 2007 (by Tim O’Neill)
Editor Profile - Tim O’Neill is an independent technology consultant. He has over 30 years experience working in the WAN, Analog, ISDN, ATM and LAN test market. Tim has worked with companies like Navtel, Network General, Ganymede and ClearSight Networks and is now helping companies get lab recognition and technology verification. Tim is also the Chief Contributing Editor for LoveMyTool.com, a website designed to help network managers gain access to valuable information and real solution stories from other customers. Tim is a patent holding, published and degreed engineer, who has seen this technology grow from Teletype (current loop) data analysis to today’s 10 Gigabit LAN’s focused on business applications with heavy compliance demands. Tim can be reached at oldcommguy (at) bellsouth (dot) net.
I want to start off by giving a BIG THANK YOU to the fantastic Men and Women in uniform!! No truer words were spoken when they say, “Freedom is not free.” So to the Soldiers, the Sailors, the Marines, Policemen, Firemen and Medical Response Teams … and all the others who stand to protect and aid us – Thank You and God Bless!
For all of us in networking, 2007 was a year of changes, successes, challenges and renewals.
My personal favorite event of the year was the merger of Network General and NetScout. I asked in my article if the marriage would work and from what I have seen and with the dedication and focus of the CEO, Anil Singhal, I feel that it has real success potential.
2007 saw a few wonderful friends pass and the beginning of new futures.
My dear friend Mike died in 2007. Mike was the first person who taught me about technology (vacuum tubes, Morse code, etc.) and even helped me pass my amateur radio license. He also taught me about life and his wife often referred to me as her son without birth pains. Mike had been my friend for almost 40 years and had helped me a lot in life. Mike was truly like a father to me and will be missed like my own father.
One of my favorite people at CMP, Sandra Gulam and her husband added a new member to the technology family, Ben. It would not be too many years till Ben is ready to help at CMP and Interop, just like his mom.
We have seen the advent of several compliance acts and CALEA, where these new and confusing regulations will take us is still to be determined.
This year 10 Gigabit Ethernet became real and future speeds like 100 Gigabit do not now seem so far away or unreal.
Capturing terabytes for review and analysis was almost a dream at the beginning of the year and now Solera Networks could handle that function at 10 Gigabit FDX speeds, no problem.
Data access technology has come back not as a convenience but a necessity and out of this a new innovative company has risen, Network Critical. Be sure to watch for some awesome new technology from them in 2008.
We saw Viola and a few other companies fade away but in 2008 there will be new companies to drive the technology and challenge the “old Lions”.
I am sad to see 2007 ends but I am as excited as an 8 year old on Christmas Eve to see the stars of 2008. We have all had our challenges in 2007 but we managed to pull through; 2008 will offer us more challenges to test our steel but we will survive and succeed as we always have.
In 2007, we started LoveMyTool to give an honest voice and unbiased product commentary to customers looking for network monitoring solutions. The responses have been wonderful and new things will be coming in 2008 so be sure to visit us often.
In addition, LoveMyTool’s sponsor, Gigamon, has announced that they have shipped their 1000th unit. Keep in mind that Gigamon has been shipping products for only 30 months, which means they have been shipping an average of 33+ units a month. Not bad for a company with six Founders bootstrapping with their own money.
One must STOP and give this some thoughts.
Timing is everything.
Before Gigamon was started in 2005, RSPAN was an acceptable “remote” data access technology (at least on paper) and non-intrusive remote monitoring of a redundant network was in a very crude state. Today, no one with a “revenue-critical” network would dare to use RSPAN and the only way to collect replica traffic from multiple remote switches is to use a hardware solution such as the Gigamon Data Access Switch.
Also before Gigamon, compliance and database auditing was not even being given serious consideration in the industry. Yet today they are as mission-critical (to both enterprise and telecom customers) as application monitoring, network forensics, and network security, all of which are expensive, best-of-bleed monitoring appliances that compete for data access.
In the history of networking, there are few companies that have created permanent footprints (i.e., features that do not easily get absorbed into a switch blade). First there was NetScreen with their firewall serving as the interface between WAN and LAN. Then there was F5 with their load balancer serving as the interface between LAN and SAN. So in that sense, Gigamon will surely be a sustainable success since their Data Access Switch is serving as the interface between SAN and DAN (Data Access Network).
Gigamon was founded by a number of battle-tested veterans from Network General and Finisar/Shomiti (many of whom are my friends). My personal opinion is that they were smart not to enter the market by competing with monitoring tool companies or existing tap manufacturers. Instead, they think of themselves as a networking company solving an architectural deficiency. As a result, they basically have no enemies in the industry with everyone cheering for their success. Tool vendors love them because Gigamon is a socket that helps sell tools. Even tap manufacturers love them because Gigamon helps them sell more taps.
So my question is, if Gigamon is the leader where are the followers?
Finally, the following are some of what I am planning for LoveMyTool in 2008 …
- An introduction to The Friends of Oldcommguy
- Open Source – Innovations for your discovery and network definition
- Working with Mike Pennacchi of Network Protocol Specialist and other experts like Gerald Combs of Wireshark
- ASTERISK - the Open Source VoIP story
- A review on the Deep Capture Technologies available today
- Old Technology still works, or is it Technique
- More - Where are the standards
- College labs and there specialties and needs
- Introductions to people we should know
- Deep Packet Inspection/Processing working with dPacket.org
- More articles about SHARKFEST 2008
- Interop reviews and thoughts
- Top company reviews as seen by the employees
Plus in 2008 we will be opening a commercial side to LoveMyTool that would help us pay the bills and expand the site to meet even more network information for today’s managers and leaders. We will not change our style for profit. If our values ever come in conflict with a sponsor we will always go with the truth. Anyway I am too old to change now, just ask my wife, if you do not believe me.
From the Oldcommguy – I wish each of you a safe and Merry Christmas and hope that the New Year brings you and your families the very best it has to offer.
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