P.J. Connolly and Wayne Rash
Disruptive networking
|
 |
Executive Summary:
Wireless networking and virtualization combine to give workers a ubiquitous connection to the Internet and their work spaces.
Together, these technologies will help create the demand for a third, 10GbE, which allows companies to use a single standard
for all of their high-volume networks.
Test Center Perspective:
Wireless networking and virtualization create demand for bandwidth far in excess of what companies currently need. 10GbE is
necessary if enterprises are to support ubiquitous access to corporate data in a manageable and cost-effective way.
|
|
|
|
|
NETWORKING TECHNOLOGIES are often taken for granted, dismissed as mere "speeds and feeds," whereas operating systems, middleware,
and applications get special attention. But sometimes the network itself is the disruptive technology.
Go to a downtown Starbucks and watch people writing e-mail while they sip on coffee at three bucks a cup. Or go to a meeting
and watch everyone start checking their e-mail when they're bored with whatever it is you're saying.
Wireless networking is changing nearly everything about the way we work and, in the process, everything about how we define
our places in the enterprise.
Although 802.11b has been a disruptive technology for a while, other forms of wireless communication are joining it. Expect
to see new forms of wireless access next year that will help produce the much-anticipated ubiquitous computing environment.
Meanwhile, the three flavors of 802.11 wireless networking -- a, b, and g -- will increase pressure on IT departments to adapt
to wireless networking.
The pressure is likely to overwhelm companies that fail to move fast enough. Individual users are already installing their
own access points and wireless routers. Eventually, the IT department will have to acknowledge their existence and bring them
into the overall network security and management environment.
Gathering steam
So how is a technology that's already disruptive going to become a disruptive technology next year? Simple. Despite all
the hoopla about wireless networking this past year, the groundswell has just begun. Only a small minority of companies have
embraced wireless networking, and only a few more are starting to tolerate it. In '03, the rate of adoption will accelerate
and profoundly affect companies and their IT departments.
If your company isn't already feeling the effects of wireless nets, it will begin to feel them soon. Wireless technology
isn't going to go away, users aren't going to abandon its convenience and freedom, and companies won't want to lose the potential
gains in productivity. But they will be faced with the problems of dealing with changes, and those problems, despite the apparent
simplicity of wireless, are significant.
Embracing wireless communications means a couple of important things to your IT organization. First, you'll definitely
need to pay attention to security. Second, although you'll be freed from having to deal with most of the cable plant, you'll
instead need to either hire or train people who understand radio. You know that geezer in the mail room with the ham radio
license plates on his car? Maybe you should start talking to him about a career change.
It's no secret that out-of-the-box wireless security leaves something to be desired. Even if you enable the default security
for your wireless environment, it's probably not enough to meet the security requirements of your business. So, in addition
to implementing a new wireless infrastructure, you'll need to implement a new layer of security.
And, of course, you'll need to deal with the issues of communicating by radio. Implementing a wireless infrastructure is
fundamentally different from installing wires. Radio waves from different access points can interfere with one another, and
with other devices that may share the same part of the radio spectrum. As you move to wireless devices with radio frequencies
in the microwave part of the spectrum, you'll find yourself dealing with propagation characteristics you probably don't expect.
For example, you might discover two workers sitting right next to each other using the same type of hardware and identically
configured software, but only one of them will be able to successfully communicate with the wireless network.
The reason you and your IT department are going to find yourselves moving toward a wireless infrastructure is because of
the increased freedom and productivity it provides to the people who work at your company. As your fellow employees find that
they can have access to their work, and to their desktops, regardless of where they find themselves, they're going to demand
that access. And that demand will increase at all levels.
One prime mover driving wireless technology is the virtualization of computing resources. Employees are already discovering
that it's possible to access their company workspaces from nearly any wireless device ranging from their laptop computer to
their cell phone. It's unlikely that you'll be typing long reports on your cell phone, but sending and receiving e-mail from
these devices is already routine. And the technology exists to attach office documents and files your to those e-mails.
Feeding the virtual office
Virtual desktops, virtual workspaces, sending documents by cell phone -- cool technologies all. But you know that nothing
this handy comes without some price, usually a high one. Your new virtual office is no exception.
Beyond the wireless infrastructure you'll have to implement and the security provisions that you probably should be putting
in place already, the price is yet more infrastructure, more software, additional servers, and of course, additional staff.
The reason is obvious: The software that makes those virtual workspaces and desktops possible has to run somewhere, and if
it's not at your place, then it will be at a service provider. Either way, it's not going to be free. Nor will you get away
with unloading everything on that service provider. Somewhere along the line, you'll need to provide access -- secured access
-- to your network.
But the work doesn't start or end with simply planning for virtual offices. Not only must you get a handle on your security
and your wireless access, you also must figure out what the people who work at your company really need, what they want (not
necessarily the same thing), and what you're prepared to deliver to them.
Just while you're cursing any and all disruptive technology, and finding ways to eliminate any sort of virtual access, the
other shoe drops. You suddenly have a lot more information moving about your enterprise, and that Fast Ethernet network you
installed a couple of years ago is inadequate. In fact, you realize that there are places on your network where the new gigabit
ports on a few of your switches will be maxed out.
Fortunately, your options may not prove too costly or disruptive if your infrastructure is fairly up to date. If you're
going to be moving to faster communications than the existing Gigabit Ethernet on part of your network, putting 10Gigabit
Ethernet into service is fairly straightforward. For example, the fiber you already have may work just fine with 10GbE. Likewise,
the switch backplanes may support 10GbE simply by adding a new blade to what you've already got. And you can use those gigabit
ports with your servers. Maybe.
Unfortunately, if you're like many, perhaps most, enterprises, your infrastructure isn't particularly up to date. You don't
have much fiber in the datacenter, your switches don't support 10gigabit speeds, and your servers support Fast Ethernet only
with great difficulty. The move to a 10GbE environment will be an ambitious effort, as well as a necessity. On the other hand,
it can be fairly easy to justify the need. After all, you're being required to support a whole new wireless infrastructure
and virtual offices for everyone. You need to move more data to do this, and if you can't move more data, you can't support
the other needs.
On the plus side, you can also point out that because 10Gigabit Ethernet is so standardized, it eliminates much of the cost
of maintaining your old ATM backbone connection to the other office across town. Even better, you can use the same long-haul
fiber with 10GbE that you used with ATM.
But one thing is certain: You don't have a lot of time to start moving. Gigabit Ethernet went from being exotic to being
the default for switches and servers in a few months. The even more standardized 10Gigabit Ethernet may move even faster.
The good news and the bad news are the same. The demand for virtual offices and wireless access, and the fact that one intimately
affects the other, will coalesce into an urgent, enterprisewide demand that may be impossible to resist.
Fortunately, you won't have to resist. Instead, just get used to the idea that this great disruption may help your company
move forward to new levels of productivity and responsiveness, and help to stay ahead of your competitors (who are thinking
the same thing, of course).
In one sense, the new freedom of time and space will change everything. In another, it will also give you new freedoms,
and perhaps discover that there's life outside the datacenter.
Disruptive?
Sure. But not necessarily bad.
E-mail
Printer Friendly
Reprints
(InfoWorld) - In the litigious world we live in, deploying a unified communications platform in your enterprise could...
