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Monthly Archives: June 2012

The Business Case for VoFi

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    Voice over Wi-Fi, commonly referred to as VoFi, has already found popularity in certain verticals, including manufacturing, medical and retail. It’s no surprise why these industries are early adopters: their employees are extremely mobile and need to be connected at all times, at all locations in the facility.

    But really, doesn’t this sound like your business?

    Two years ago, we talked about two major business cases for VoFi: indoor call quality and cost savings. In terms of indoor call quality, with the ratification of 802.11n VoFi is now as reliable as calling on any wired system. 802.11n increases overall throughput and range, ensuring that all areas where telephone access is required have exceptional coverage, eliminating dropped calls and guaranteeing excellent call quality – something cellular connections cannot achieve, especially when indoors.

    As for cost savings, VoFi eliminates cellular expenses for campus-based, mobile employees. Let’s use an extremely large home improvement chain as an example. Calls constantly roll in asking about inventory, selection, and even advice. Store employees need mobility, and reliable coverage, so that they can access any aisle anywhere in the store to respond to customer calls. Years back this chain would have relied on cellular phones for each sales associate, at a significant monthly cost and with poor reliability deep within the “big box.” With VoFi, a simple investment in VoFi handsets, and leveraging the existing Wi-Fi network, the cost is one-time, low, and yet delivers the reliability needed. Even if the Wi-Fi network requires a bit of an upgrade to handle the VoFi traffic, the savings still present an overwhelming business case for transitioning to VoFi.

    Although call quality and cost savings are still the primary factors in making a business case for VoFi, another major factor, and maybe the most appealing one to businesses yet, is the new and ever growing trend of Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) to work. With this trend, VoFi can easily move from a vertical to a horizontal play in the overall market.

    The trend is clear, and we probably all experience it every day. How many people now list their mobile numbers on their business cards? My informal survey after collecting a mountain of cards at the last trade show, is most. This says that employees are willing and able to use their cell phones for business. As 802.11 continues to develop, and the promise of “smart hand-off” from cellular to Wi-Fi networks is realized, all companies, not just a few select verticals, can benefit from the technology. And the savings isn’t just in reduced cellular expenses. As the shift is made away from the desk phone and to the mobile phone, companies will no longer need to provide desktop handsets, or the power and wired connections that they require, further enhancing the cost savings from VoFi. We’ve already written a little bit about the BYOD practice, and its positive and negative effects. You can check out our blog post on the subject here.

    With BYOD quickly becoming ubiquitous, creating a VoFi system and updating to 802.11n capabilities is inevitable, being that we live in a culture where the dividing line between work devices and home devices, and even work life and home life, is increasingly blurred. Business is done on an employee’s cell phone, and contracts are signed on the CEOs’ tablet. Thus it’s imperative that when these transactions are performed, they receive the highest quality connectivity, and are done on the most secure network possible.

    As business expenses continue to grow, isn’t it great to find a technology that can help reverse the trend? It’s important to start understanding the benefits of VoFi today, and what this technology can provide for your business. If done correctly it can be a huge asset to your business processes, but along with it you still need to ensure that you are implementing a proper WLAN design, as well as monitoring, testing, and verifying your wireless system, so it can reach its full capacity.

      Conquering 10G Network Analysis with TimeLine

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        Have you made the switch to a 10 Gigabit (10G) network yet?

        Despite being around since 2002, only within the last couple of years has 10G become the core backbone and data center fabric used in enterprise networks.  Although there are many benefits that come with 10G, it also introduces a new set of challenges for network managers when problems occur.

        At 10G, traditional network analysis and troubleshooting techniques based on real-time, deep packet inspection are severely strained. The key here is “real time.” What does this mean at 10G anyway? Traffic is moving so fast on 10G networks that real-time analysis of anything more than high-level statistics, like overall utilization, top talkers, and top applications, is pure folly. At 10G, the focus shifts from real-time troubleshooting to optimizing the capture of all network data for post-capture, or forensic analysis. By capturing all network data at the packet level, you have an unchallengeable record of all network activity, and with forensic analysis you can perform detailed analysis at your own pace. Also, at 10G it is essentially impossible to replicate network problems – there is just too much data to attempt to reproduce problems for analysis.

        This is why WildPackets introduced the TimeLine network recorder in 2010 as the first independently certified monitoring and analysis solution to support 10G connectivity without compromising data accuracy. TimeLine can sustain network data recording with the richest set of real-time statistics at over 11Gbps with zero packet loss, providing both the guidance and the detailed data necessary to determine when, and where, forensic analysis is required.

        Below we take you step-by-step on how TimeLine can help when you’re analyzing and troubleshooting your 10G network.

        First Step: Capturing Network Data to Disk, Ensuring Zero Data Loss
        The biggest challenge in packet-based network analysis at 10G is capturing all the data with zero data loss. You cannot predict in advance what data you might need, so each and every network packet is important. TimeLine has been certified by an independent test lab to capture network data at 11.7Gbps with zero data loss, making it one of the fastest and most versatile appliances on the market today.

        Second Step: Storing Network Data for Forensic Analysis
        One of the key elements in any network recording solution is how long it can retain data, and this is essentially a function of disk space and efficient storage algorithms. With up to 48TB of disk space, TimeLine is capable of storing nearly two days worth of data at a steady state data rate of 10Gbps, or more realistically, better than eight days at a steady state of 2Gbps, providing plenty of runaway to perform critical forensic analyses.

        Third Step: Displaying Real-time Statistics
        Even though the focus of network recording is on forensic analysis, it’s imperative that a network recording solution provide some real-time statistics so you can instantly assess the health of the network, and know when you need to dive in for more detailed analysis. TimeLine provides the most complete set of real-time statistics, including key VoIP statistics, so you can be sure your network is behaving as expected without the need for constant forensic analysis.

        Fourth Step: Forensics Analysis
        Well, this is where the rubber meets the road. You’ve captured and stored the data, and based on the real-time data display you see an area that requires further attention. A simple swipe of the mouse across a time range of interest brings up the network forensics dialog box, allowing you to quickly fine tune your search to return just the data you need, leading you more quickly to the root cause of any network, application, performance, or security issue.

        Conclusion
        At 10G, it’s important to have the right tools in place to capture the data necessary for network analysis, in other words, a complete recording of all network packets. While it may require an up-front investment to monitor your 10G network, it will save you big in the end by avoiding network downtime, improving tier one application performance, and increasing productivity within the company.

        If you are interested in learning more about 10G network analysis check out our TimeLine OnDemand Webcast titled “The Need for Speed – No More Compromises!” and our blog “Why On-the-Fly Analysis Doesn’t Work at 10G.”

          Trends Affecting Network Engineers Today – From Software Designed Networks to Mobile

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            The IT world is currently in the throes of a huge shift — a seismic shift that the industry historically experiences every five to ten years. Today, the entrance of technologies like mobile, software defined networks, virtualization, and cloud computing have changed the landscape for both the consumer and the enterprise.

            Change is of course inevitable, and welcome, and while all of these technologies have either great potential or are already helping to fuel better productivity within IT, there are many unanticipated challenges cropping up. Below we take a look at some of the challenges these top trends are introducing, and how to adjust so your organization can get the most from these new technologies.

            Software Defined Networks and OpenFlow
            Software defined networks (SDN) and OpenFlow have been touted as enabling technologies that will help decrease the complexities of cloud and virtualization. SDN defines the overall technology, while OpenFlow is a specific example of an SDN, and was created as a programmable network protocol to help manage and direct traffic among switches from an assortment of vendors. Ideally this would provide centralized control and easier network management of potentially cheaper switches without the single-vendor lock-in.

            However, these technologies present potential challenges for network engineers. While the promise of centralized network control sounds good in theory, the migration to OpenFlow requires creating new network-wide policies. It’s likely that we’ll hear about large “failed” OpenFlow deployments, where the amount of effort overwhelms the projected ROI. The challenge for OpenFlow now is to live up to the hype: deliver demonstrable performance improvements without requiring a forklift upgrade of the network core. While it’s exciting that OpenFlow has lots of potential, if it’s too hard to deploy, it will never truly leave the research environment where it was born.

            For more details on the history and use cases of SDN and OpenFlow, check out our blog “Software-Defined Networking and OpenFlow to Infinity and Beyond.”

            Virtualized Networks
            More and more companies are turning to virtualized environments to streamline application deployment, to simplify IT operations and to allow IT organizations to respond faster to changing business demands. With decreasing prices and an increase in administrative tools that make management easier, virtualization is now being adopted even by smaller mid-market organizations.

            But virtualization creates “blind spots” in your network, areas where application traffic cannot be properly monitored with traditional techniques, opening the network up to undetected application performance problems. In a traditional server environment, you would normally span a switch port from a physical Ethernet switch or router and the data would stream across into a network/application performance analysis appliance, providing complete visibility. But in the case of a virtual environment, data comes back through a virtual adapter without actually hitting a physical switch. This creates a blind spot in your appliance and the communication between virtualized applications on the same server is never seen.

            In order to combat this blind spot and successfully perform network analysis in a virtual environment, you must plan ahead. Although there is no big difference in network analysis techniques in a virtual environment, there is in the implementation. Instead of capturing data at the physical layer, you must be prepared with a solution that can collect data at the level of the virtual switches.

            Mobile and Wireless Networks
            In today’s digital age, wireless networks are essential to both businesses and consumers. However, maintaining strong performance and security of wireless networks can be difficult — especially in the era of BYOD (Bring Your Own Device). And keeping up with the pace of technology can also be challenging, with 802.11ac and 802.11ad right around the corner.

            The introduction of wireless-enabled smart phones and tablets has ushered in new challenges for wireless network management, most importantly in the areas of security and performance. Now on top of dealing with the authorized workstations, network admins must account for and secure a whole new set of devices, which are not within their direct control. And when it comes to performance, not only do more devices make for a more congested wireless network, but a powered on, inactive smart phone that is not connected causes at least ten times as much damage to your Wi-Fi network as the same phone when it is connected (see http://www.sniffwifi.com/2012/04/phones-on-wlan.html for all the details).

            You need a full-featured wireless network analysis solution in place and monitoring your network 24×7, searching for unauthorized devices and analyzing overall network conditions, like excessive probe requests/responses that can drag down your overall aggregate WLAN throughput. You also need a solution that will future-proof your investment as 802.11ac and 802.11ad begin to take hold.

            Change is always a mix of good and bad, but with these new technologies come a plethora of new opportunities. In order to stay ahead of the curve it’s important to know how and when to adapt, as well as which tools will help you get there.