MARCH/APRIL 2016
+ the magazine for ict professionals
THE
ETHERNET ROADMAP also: Welcome, Henry Franc
MWC 2016 coverage
Evolving Analytics
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CONTENTS Fe a t u r e s
16 Hail Ethernet A lot of life left in this 40-year-old technology.
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20 Evolving Analytics Most firms have yet to realize its full potential.
20 Departments
Editor’s Note
4
Infrastructure Systems
6
Networks & The Cloud 10
Mobile Movements 12
New & Noteworthy 23
The Back Page 28
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I n the Ne xt Issue
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EDIT O R ’S N O TE
Amazing Ethernet has staying power n our cover story on The Ethernet Roadmap, independent technology analyst Carmi Levy concludes that on “the surface, it’s easy to dismiss Ethernet as yesterday’s technology. After all, with the wholesale rush toward mobile devices sporting ever-faster and more capable wireless connectivity, the prospect of plugging them in with an RJ-45 connector seems downright quaint. “IoT- and cloud-era networking is incredibly dependent on wired Ethernet connectivity. Traffic from all of those wireless devices eventually gets carried over metropolitan area networks (MANs) and is processed through data centres whose very foundations are built on fast, secure and robust Ethernet-based infrastructure.” Lynn Greiner, writer of the piece, says that the old RJ-45 connector may appear stodgy, but it still has a vibrant life behind the scenes. Meanwhile, IoT – the Internet of Things – will not only generate a lot of data, it will create the need for additional protocol stacks, according to Denise Shiffman, senior vice president, product management at Juniper Networks, although she says that Ethernet provides the foundation for building technologies to address problems such as extremely chatty applications.
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“The networking technology, now in its fifth decade of existence, is continually evolving to serve enterprises, carriers, and the IoT,” she says. “No matter the direction of this evolution, the three requirements of services, security, and synchronization will be an important part of Ethernet’s future evolution to meet end user demands.” Further on the subject of IoT, which is referenced extensively in our coverage of the recent Mobile World Congress 2016 beginning on p. 12, Eric Wenger has both a prediction and a warning. In a blog posted during the conference, Wenger, director for cybersecurity and privacy on Cisco’s global affairs team in Washington, wrote that “we cannot yet see exactly how our lives will change as a result of this next wave of innovation. “What is clear; however, is the potentially transformative nature of a world packed with connected devices. For the potential to be reached, consumers need assurances that their privacy and security will be carefully protected. Here, both industry and government have important roles to play.”
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Volume 3, Issue 2 March/April 2016
+ SPOTLIGHT ON A CHANGING MOBILE WORLD
Editor Paul Barker 416-510-6752 pbarker@connectionsplus.ca
Advertising Sales Group Publisher John MacPherson – 905-713-4335 jmacpherson@annexweb.ca
Senior Publisher
President & CEO Mike Fredericks mfredericks@annexweb.com Editorial Advisory Board Keith Fortune, CET, Western Regional Manager, Electron Metal AIG Inc. Henry Franc, RCDD/OSP Senior Account Manager, Professional Support at Belden
Maureen Levy 416-510-5111 mlevy@connectionsplus.ca
Art Director
Brantz Myers, B.Sc Math and Computing Science Director of Healthcare Business Development, Cisco Systems Canada Co.
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In f ras t r uct ure S y s t e m s
Delving into the
70/20/10 rule By James Donovan
ou might be asking what 70/20/10 stands for. It is the 70/20/10 Learning and Development model that was developed in the early 1990s by Robert Eichinger, Michael Lombardo and Morgan McCall. This model asserts that: • 70% of learning and development comes from real-life/ on-the-job experiences, tasks and problem solving; • 20% comes from informal or formal feedback, mentoring or coaching; and •1 0% comes from formal training.
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A criticism of this model is that formal learning initiatives are devalued and that, if 90% of learning is informal, then it requires no attention. However, the 70/20/10 idea resulted from an effort to raise awareness about the informal and exAD_LCBP_Qtr_Procecessor_Layout 1 3/21/16 1:33 PM Page 1
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periential learning that occurs without conscious acknowledgement or even planning by the learner, unlike formalized learning which is more of a conscious decision. The 70/20/10 rule should be an influence on training strategy rather than a strategy in itself. The most useful application of this powerful model for understanding learners and their learning styles should be to: • Strongly support the 70% learning. • Develop and exploit the power of the 20%. •D esign the 10% within the clear context of the other 90%. Professionals and executives get hung up on the numbers or the right combination of training. But 70/20/10 is all about recognizing that most learning happens informally on the job. Therefore it requires a change in the culture of professional learning that strikes the right balance for an organization. The 70/20/10 rule is about creating a culture of recognizing informal learning as well as promoting opportunities to learn informally. People should realize they are learning as they are doing, rather than always needing to attend a training session in a classroom. Leaders, managers and staff need to shift their thinking about what, where and how learning takes place. Not only do culture and mindset need to change; they also need to explore how systems, policies and procedures are affected.
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Professionals and executives get hung up on the numbers or the right combination of training. But 70/20/10 is all about recognizing that most learning happens informally on the job.
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2016-03-21 1:51 PM
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Infra s t ruct ure Sy stems
Some people may doubt this approach or whether it even works; however, I believe it is a philosophy not a formula. The main doubts people have about it include: • Some feel releasing control from formalized to informal learning may produce issues for the business. • Quality can’t be assured or controlled. •T he knowledge and skill transfer may be incorrect. •T he trainer/coach/mentor may not have the right skills. However this is similar to apprentice-type schemes widely deployed today, which proves that support from students’ managers and supervisors is a powerful way to engage and encourage employees. The Commscope Infrastructure Academy helps facilitate this philosophy by moving formal training material to an online delivery. It enables the 10% of formal training to be delivered, when, where and at the pace of the student. It remains available for further review as students learn on the job and with the support of experienced coaches or mentors. Are you ready to start your 10% today? C+
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Some people may doubt this approach or whether it even works; however, I believe it is a philosophy not a formula.
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James Donovan is the vice president of creative and education services at CommScope. He joined the company in 1993 and has held positions in sales, technical, marketing, training and business development and served most recently as director of channel development and training for CommScope Enterprise Solutions. He currently oversees the CommScope Infrastructure Academy.
Belden launches CFD modeling
offering for data centres elden Inc. recently announced a new simulation software capability to assist data center managers with current and future data centre needs. Through engineering simulation, Belden uses CFD (computational fluid dynamics) modeling to explain to data centre managers the impacts of airflow and thermal management on data centres and energy efficiency. It allows organizations to bridge IT and facilities; facility engineers to visualize and provision power and cooling, and IT planners to deploy IT systems where power and cooling distribution are available. Using 3D and 2D renderings, the software conducts CFD analysis for predictive modeling, what-if and capacity planning. It also provides information on the current state of a data centre, as well as predictions about the potential future state of a facility. The best way to design and operate the space can be determined with this information before equipment is actually put in place, the company said. By making CFD modeling part of the data centre workflow, users can:
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• Reduce capital expenditures and improve data centre design • Predict thermal and electrical resilience of each IT device • Run failure scenarios to confirm that resiliency will be maintained • Compare different vendor choices • Predict, plan, identify and prevent hotspots • Increase usable capacity without sacrificing uptime • Validate thermal solutions “When we can work with clients to tell them whether a planned change can be made without negatively impacting uptime, energy efficiency or productivity, they’ll be able to avoid critical events and make choices more confidently,” said Michael Peterson, technology and applications manager, data centres, at Belden. To offer this capability, Belden said it has partnered with engineering simulation software vendor Future Facilities and its suite of data centre products. “This offering will bring new levels of productivity to data centre design, troubleshooting and operations for Belden customers,” said Robert Schmidt, sales manager at Future Facilities. C+ Mar/Apr 2016
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In f ras t r uct ure S y s t e m s
STANDARDS
Welcome, Henry Franc By Henry Franc
riting my very first standards column for Connections+ has been a little daunting. It’s both an honour and challenge to fill the illustrious shoes of my predecessor, friend and mentor Paul Kish, who previously penned this column as the director of systems and standards at Belden. His insight and passion in regard to the ICT industry – and the standards that support it – have inspired me and many others to get involved. And will, I’m sure, for years to come. Paul took a multifaceted approach to standards, from products and media to applications and their use in our connected world. I cannot hope to bring the same level of expertise or experience that he has to you, so instead I will put my own flavor into this column Paul’s background was very much rooted in his experience as a technology director in the manufacturing industry; my experience is based on the user perspective. I’ve served as a contractor, user, integrator and consultant – and now as a solutions specialist. Based on my knowledge, I will focus less on the “push” of technology and more on the “pull” of the business requirements utilizing that technology. I welcome your feedback, and hope you find my opinions and viewpoint valuable. As part of my first column, I want to discuss a new standard recently approved for publishing by the TIA TR42.1 engineering sub-committee. The ANSI/TIA-5017 Telecommunications Physical Network Security Standard was sent to ANSI for publishing, and should be available shortly. More than three years in the making,with more than 30 participating organizations, I feel that this document will provide much-needed guidance regarding physical security from an infrastructure standpoint. The standard, which was initiated through a need that was identified by the U.S. federal government, has evolved into a diverse, multipurpose document. Not only can it provide guidance on protecting the telecommunications infrastructure, but it can also be used to leverage infrastructure to protect other assets (people, property or premises) as a part of an overall security plan. The document delves into areas such as risk assessment, design, installation, leveraging intelligent building systems (IBSs) and administration.
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Henry Franc is a solutions specialist at Belden and an active standards development participant. The information presented is the author’s view, not official standards organization correspondence.
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Whereas many standard documents tend to be very prescriptive, ANSI/TIA-5017 is much more descriptive in nature from my perspective. Today’s connected world, or the Internet of Things (IoT), is diverse in its capabilities requirements and use. As such, security needs are equally diverse. Further, the threats faced by any particular asset are changing as technology and society evolve. For that reason, the first section of ANSI/TIA5017 is about performing a risk assessment and creating a security plan relevant to your specific situation. The security plan is, or should be, a living process and approach to deal with risk management. You must: • Identify the potential for negative events and their causes • Reduce (and ideally eliminate) negative events • Limit the impacts of these events • Provide recovery from the events • Review the events and subsequent activities (whether or not there are impacts) to evolve the security plan The document also uses a number of security levels (SL1 through SL3) to describe the requirements of a particular installation: •SL1: Basic Security • SL2: Tamper Resistant • SL3: Critical Security From there, the document provides a solid framework and foundation for the thought processes, procedures and actions that will help the user develop a specific security plan for either the telecommunications infrastructure itself or as part of the overall security plan for the facility – or both. Unfortunately, we’re not living in a perfect world, nor do I think we have a dystopian future because, as imperfect as we are, we strive for better. I encourage those involved with secure facilities or security in general to obtain a copy of the standard and review it. I believe you will find the guidance valuable. I look forward to many more discussions with you as industry members and readers. Perhaps in my next column we can talk about the importance of your participation in the standards development process. It’s through celebrating our collective expertise, experience and innovation that we reach the healthy consensus necessary to develop meaningful standards in continued support of our industry. C+ www.connectionsplus.ca
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Netwo r ks & The Clo u d
Esna technology now ‘key piece’ for Avaya Cloud-based offering converges communication, business apps By Paul Barker
Avaya Canada’s Aldo Fazzalari (l.) and Kevin Monaghan oversee the company’s technology laboratory in Markham.
oth current and future renditions of technology ranging from customer engagement offerings to emergency response 911 offerings can be tested and examined at Avaya Canada’s technology laboratory in Markham, Ont. According to Kevin Monaghan, consulting sales engineer with the firm and a former Nortel employee, a critical component of the technology suite arrived last May when the company purchased Richmond Hill, Ont.-based Esna Technologies Inc. Through Esna, a provider of real-time collaboration and communications software, Avaya customers can access multi-vendor communications capabilities – voice, video, IM/ presence, conferencing and messaging – from within cloudbased business applications using their device of choice. Mohammad Nezarati, founder and CEO of Esna, said the two companies are “building the future of collaboration experience – a future where communication is embedded directly into the applications, processes and workflows that drive how work gets done.” “For all the effort that the industry has invested in business communications,”said Gary Barnett, senior vice president and GM of Avaya Engagement Solutions at the time of the purchase, “most offers fall woefully short of the seamless user experience that leads to effortless engagement. “It’s time for the convergence of communications and business applications, time for enabling communication from the browsers of public or private cloud-based applications people use every day and time for the user experience to be one click to engage.” An Esna-enabled Web client is now available for both the Avaya IP Office and Aura platforms and provides video and voice capabilities that can be embedded into public or private cloud-based business applications. A key piece, says Monaghan, is the integration factor that Esna provides. “We can integrate either through our applications into a back-end CRM system and/or action items that an agent needs to work on and push them into the contact centre. We are seeing a blending of the two. “We need to sit down with customers and really understand what their business is. We can’t take the approach of going to a customer and putting on to them what we have to sell. We
need to listen to what they require and what they need.” Another focus area is emergency response 911 offerings. Aldo Fazzalari, Canadian sales engineering director, says that like the call centre space, this sector is going through enormous change. “Everyone has a contextual-aware smartphone and today, when you call 911 you get calling line ID, which triggers a screen pop in a database that basically says, ‘I know where you live, not I know where you are.’ “The ability to take robust, contextual information of a smartphone and pass that to the 911 service means that I know so much more about who is on the phone and what they are saying, but potentially if someone cannot talk, respond to the call. “Mark Fletcher has had personal experience himself when he was using a cell phone in New Jersey and had a brain aneurysm. The ambulance showed up in Dallas because he had a Dallas phone number. He was in a coma for six weeks. Out of that experience he became an advocate to ensure that 911 services are looking at the next generation.” Fletcher also happens to be the chief architect of public safety solutions at Avaya. Now fully recovered, he wrote recently that next-generation 911 (NG 911), represents the capabilities, technology and processes needed to update the emergency networks we rely on today. “While the tools sitting on top of the 911 network have been updated throughout the years, the fundamental core technology – analog-based, 1970s phone switching – has not. That’s a problem, because, 911 was designed to efficiently handle people calling on landline phones, which are quickly disappearing. “How will NG 911 effect me? The answer to this question is limited only by your imagination. Imagine if you could dial 911 from your smartphone and send police and fire a range of digital information – your exact GPS coordinates, live video, you phone’s battery level and default language, possibly even biometric data from your wearable devices. “With a next-generation 911 infrastructure, first responder could send details about your health and condition to the hospital, while enroute. Emergency room doctors could even establish a live video link with the ambulance, to get a sense of what to expect when you arrive.” C+
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Ne t wo rks & T he Cloud
Microsoft delivers ‘enterprise-class ERP’ to the cloud ‘We are bringing massive amounts of data into our business to help control building climates and horticulture environments.’
manage the life cycle of an ERP system in a icrosoft Corp. has announced that way that’s never really been done before,” said its next-generation cloud ERP offerJosh Greenbaum, principal analyst, Enterprise ing, Microsoft Dynamics AX, built Application Consulting. “The ability to test in on and for Microsoft Azure, is now available the cloud and use the cloud’s natural elasticity in 137 markets in 40 languages. The enand functionality to take the test, flip a switch terprise-class business application brings and make it the actual production environthe power, speed and intelligence of cloud ment, that truly is magic.” computing to people and organizations to Through the Azure cloud, Microsoft said achieve more, the company said. Dynamics AX provides “enhanced security “Customers from around the world are along with global availability and scale, enusing the cloud in incredible ways to acabling businesses and people to work more celerate and transform their business,” said safely anywhere, anytime while respecting the Scott Guthrie, executive vice president, Midata sovereignty requirements of global cuscrosoft Cloud and Enterprise. tomers no matter where in According to Microthe globe they operate.” soft, the new Dynamics AX Companies already moves beyond traditional live in production with Dybusiness software applinamics AX include Hacations and brings “ERP, gler Systems, Halbusiness intelligence, index, Icon, Renault Sport frastructure and database Formula One Team, Priservices together in a sinva, Smiles, Travel Albergle offering.” ta and Umbra Group. The company also an“We do everything nounced more than 50 ISV through Dynamics AX offerings related to Dynow; we manage virtunamics AX are available ally all of our operations,” on the Azure Marketplace. said Thomas Mayer, chief It takes the capabilities operating office, Renault of Lifecycle Services (LCS) Sport Formula One Team. – the Azure-based collabo“Having what I need to ration portal – to the next run my business availlevel, it added. “The goal of LCS is to Microsoft said Lifecycle Services, which is part of Dynamics AX, represents able anywhere in the world is invaluable.” deliver the right informa- a shift in how companies manage the life cycle of an ERP system.
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tion, at the right time, to the right people and to help ensure repeatable, predictable success with each roll out of an implementation, update or upgrade. By providing a collaborative workspace that can be used by both customers and partners, separately and together, LCS enables closer collaboration, helps speed implementations and reduces time to value.” Microsoft said businesses will be able to combine the best practices for their mission-critical apps with the flexibility and simplicity of upgrade via the cloud. With LCS, Dynamics AX will formalize the concepts of development, test and production, making the ongoing upgrade quicker to implement and deploy and easier to manage. “Lifecycle Services represents a shift in how companies www.connectionsplus.ca
“We are bringing massive amounts of data into our business to help control building climates and horticulture environments,” said Paul Ossewold, vice president of digital operations at Priva. “That is a huge business transformation, and the cloud was the only way forward for us to make that real. To manage our company with 10 offices around the world, we need systems that are fast.” ERP, said Ben Hagler, co-founder of Hagler Systems, is “core to our business operations and critical to building and delivering products to our customers,” The new release is available as a monthly subscription in three versions that include a self-serve user, a task user and an enterprise user. C+
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Mob il e Mo v em ent s
The show attracted 2,200+ exhibitors. The chief executive officer count alone totaled 5,000.
5G & IoT dominate MWC16 2016 edition draws 100,000 plus exhibitors By Paul Barker
Barcelona, Spain – The 2016 edition of Mobile World Congress showcased many technological advances, but the two that clearly stood out from the rest were 5G and the Internet of Things. In the exhibit halls, during keynote speeches and at press conferences, both topics were front and centre and dominated discussion. Speaking on Sunday night prior to the start of the four-day conference, Nokia CEO Rajeev Suri predicted that necessity will force the industry to implement the updated mobile network faster than expected and it will happen. “All too often, we see opportunities turn into money traps, but 5G is different,” he said. “The industrial Internet can bring massive efficiencies to companies everywhere, but they cannot rely on the existing networks.” “5G must happen fast because important IoT use cases demand it. If we know that (it) can help save lives, improve our environment and make our lives better, we need to move faster, not slower.” As for the show itself, which attracted a record 100,000+ attendees, Sylvain Cornay, service assurance marketing manager with Quebec City-based EXFO, a manufacturer of test and service assurance instruments for fixed and mobile telecom networks, discussed its merits on the second day. “The real value is in the people that come to the show,” he said. “Everybody is here – all the major players and operators from across the world come each year, which makes for a special atmosphere and quite a buzz. 12
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Products on display at the Canadian booth included mobile health services devices and network testing equipment.
“There are some really interesting concepts coming out of the IoT industry, but it’s still relatively early days. The challenge around M2M communication is very different to the type of communication the industry is used to. We use a lot of bandwidth with things like video, but M2M is different. It could be a signal once a day or week, or once every second. So how does the network handle the peaks that will come from billions of connected devices? “5G is clearly on the way, but ultimately it’s not going to make it without NFV (network functions virtualization) and SDN (software-defined networks. It’s really that simple.” Greg Collins, founder and chief analyst for Exact Venwww.connectionsplus.ca
M o b i le M o vemen ts
tures, a Burlingame, Calif.-based market intelligence firm that tracks the networking, telecommunications and wireless sectors, said a lot of people are excited about the direction all three areas are heading. “IoT is a big topic and for the first time I have been noticing a lot more health devices and people understanding how to digitize their traditional bricks and mortar types of businesses. “As for all of this talk about 5G, when I first heard about it I was skeptical thinking, ‘Oh my God, does the industry really need a radio upgrade. What does this do to the business model of the carriers? Do they want the capital-intensity of such an initiative, which will be a burden for many of them. “But 5G is different. It represents the intersection of a lot of things. It’s going to force carriers to transform what they do as well as their business models. What they need to do now is hash out the details.” Meanwhile, according to Ericsson CEO Hans Vestberg, no industry will be able to avoid the digital disruption coming their way this year. He said that three fundamental ICT forces -– broadband, mobility and cloud – are rapidly reshaping value chains, digitalizing business models and creating possibilities that were previously unimaginable. “Along with our industry and our customers, Ericsson is on a transformation journey,” said Vestberg. “Today, 66% of our business comes from software and services; just years ago, the majority was hardware. The majority of our principal competitors are ICT players, rather than telecommunications businesses.” He added that 5G, IoT and cloud are the ICT industry’s hottest topics According to Ericsson, the IoT is quickly becoming a reality and its impact on both industry and society will be profound. The company forecasts that the number of IoT connected devices globally will more than triple from under 5 billion today to 15 billion by 2021. A recent IDC study predicts that global IoT spending will reach US$1.3 trillion by 2019 and the McKinsey Global Institute concludes that IoT will have a potential annual economic impact of up to US$11 trillion by 2025. Prior to the show, the chair of oneM2M Technical Plenary warned that vendors rushing to be the first to release IoT gadgets and ecosystems need to urgently increase collaboration and treat the IoT race as a marathon, rather than a sprint. Dr. Omar Elloumi, a member of the Nokia corporate CTO group, said the full potential of IoT could only be realized if service providers and vendors alike look at it as a customer-centric opportunity while remaining focused on the bigger picture. Without this, said Elloumi, IoT growth will be stunted and the market will become heavily fragmented, leading to security issues and vendor lock-in. “According to the 2015 McKinsey report ‘Unlocking the potential of the Internet of Things’, interoperability will unlock 40% of IoT revenue – that alone shows just how damaging launching products could be without carefully considering interoperability,” he said. “The time required to create globally harmonized standards can create frustration for many of us, but this is nothing compared to the frustration consumers and industries will www.connectionsplus.ca
Guylain RoyMachabee, CEO of RX Networks, holds the firm’s new Fathom Hub .
experience if their newly installed IoT system requires multiple controls for multiple devices and actually complicates their lifestyle or operations rather than simplifying them.” Security is another major obstacle that detailed and welldocumented specifications can overcome, he added, with security functions covering identification, authentication, authorization, security association, sensitive data handling and administration. “The IoT is still a nascent market,” Elloumi said. “The ability to spin up a new solution can be quite daunting; there is a lot of effort involved in integrating a complete solution especially if you have to deal with legacy systems; this is the case for smart cities in particular. “Standards-based solutions give you an eco-system of multiple solution providers which is the only way to ensure multi-vendor interoperability and supplier choice and, therefore, deliver on the actual promise of IoT.” Formed in 2012, oneM2M is the global standards initiative that covers requirements, architecture, API specifications, security solutions and interoperability for Machine-to-Machine and IoT technologies. On the 5G front, one week before the conference, Ottawabased Mitel announced it was investing in a new initiative focused on advanced 5G cloud connectivity. The new unit will be headed by Pardeep Kohli, former CEO of Mavenir, a softwarebased telecommunications networking provider, which Mitel purchased last year. “Wireless connectivity is now an essential aspect of everyday life, but we’ve only just scratched the surface of the economic and social impact it will have in the future as mobile technology continues to advance,” Kohli said. “Mitel’s 5G platform is focused on building that future.” There was no shortage of other news at MWC 2016. Highlights included the following: Nokia announcing purchase of Ottawa-based security firm Nakina Systems: The companies previously had a five-year partnership where Nokia used Nakina’s software in several customer projects. The announcement will see Nakina, which specializes in security and orchestration software for virtual
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Wedge Networks’ co-founder Hongwen Zhang (l.) and Frank Weiner demonstrated the firm’s new software in Barcelona.
Shown is Marc LeClerc, vice president of strategy and marketing with switching vendor NoviFlow of Montreal.
and hybrid networks, become a fully-owned division once the acquisition closes sometime this quarter. “Security is an integral part of any network,” Nokia said in a release. “(This) helps us support customers facing increasing threats coming from 5G networks, Internet of Things, big data, Software Defined Networks and cloud services. Company CEO Mary O’Neil said “Nakina bridges the security and operational gaps between the promise of cloud networks and operational realities of running high performance heterogeneous networks. Wedge Networks launching IoT security platform: Calgarybased Wedge Networks launched a new line of new Securityas-a-Service packages it said provides “urgently needed” security and compliance enforcement services for IoT in enterprise networks. The new packages are available immediately for implementation using Wedge Cloud Network Defense (CND), which can be deployed by enterprises with their own data centre cloud, and by communications service providers (CSPs) to offer Security-as-as-Service to their business customers. “The explosive growth of wirelessly connected monitoring and control devices is ushering in an era of increased productivity and effectiveness, and creating gaps in conventional security and compliance enforcement systems for many enterprises,” the company said in a release. Wedge CND’s IoT Security and Compliance Enforcement packages provide IoT optimized security and compliance services with enforcement at the cloud layer to consistently apply policies to all network connected devices, both physical and virtual. Packages are available to address different vertical markets, such as healthcare which is subject to compliance obligations and manufacturing which is far less regulated but increasingly dependent on the IoT, it added. “IoT, compliance, and Security-as-a-Service are all hot topics at Mobile World Congress and the networking industry at large”, said Alan Zeichick, principal analyst of Camden Associates. “IoT innovation continues to push new boundaries here at Mobile World Congress, 2016”, said Dr. Hongwen Zhang, chief technical officer and co-founder of Wedge Networks.
“Establishing plans to address the unique security and compliance challenges for the IoT is becoming a critical concern for many businesses.” The security platform can provide advanced network security applications such as Web filtering, anti-malware, antispam, data loss prevention, mobile security, application control and server security, application filtering. RX Networks introduce new beacon business unit: Vancouverbased RX Networks predicted it will “redefine” the beacon and IoT space with Fathom, a hardware and software system the company said is designed to address the challenges of managing large-scale beacon deployments. The Fathom Hub “transforms existing, standalone Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacons into a managed proximity network, reporting on the location and status of all beacons in the coverage area. If beacons are moved, lost, or if the battery runs low, an alert is trigged and updates are displayed in the cloud-based Fathom control panel in real-time.” In addition, Fathom renders location data from other nearby BLE devices such as wearables and smartphones, to improve customer engagement, resource monitoring and realtime analytics, the company added. Guylain Roy-MacHabee, president and CEO of RX Networks, said he is confident Fathom will solve a “very real and very painful problem for a lot of companies deploying beacons today: ease of operation and location-context integrity. The very same challenges the IoT industry at large will face, albeit potentially dealing with billions rather than millions of devices.” HP unveils‘new mobile ecosystem’: HP Inc. introduced the HP Elite X3, a Windows 10 mobile device it said will revolutionize the mobile computing experience. The X3, which is expected to be available this summer, “bridges phablet, laptop and desktop use cases.” According to the company, today’s worker expects a different style of computing, yet is forced to rely on multiple different technologies and devices to get work done. “Commercial mobility is prime for disruption,” said Dion Weisler, president and CEO of HP Inc. Further coverage from MWC16 will appear soon.
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HAIL
ETHERNET Just like the Energizer Bunny, this 40-year-old technology keeps going and going and going. By Lynn Greiner
or at least the past decade and a half, whenever anyone has referred to a wired network, they are usually talking about Ethernet. And that is something of a miracle in this world in which a two-year old phone is considered an antique, because, at its core, Ethernet is a 40 year old technology that, like the Energizer Bunny, keeps going and going and going. “On the surface, it’s easy to dismiss Ethernet as yesterday’s technology,” says independent technology analyst Carmi Levy. “After all, with the wholesale rush toward mobile devices sporting ever-faster and more capable wireless connectivity, the prospect of plugging them in with a stodgy old RJ-45 connector seems downright quaint.” That old RJ-45 connector may appear
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stodgy, but it still has a vibrant life behind the scenes. Although to the end user, the world is moving to wireless, Ethernet has become the standard for backhaul, according to Tony Lefebvre, director of product management at Transition Networks, a Minneapolis, Minn.-based manufacturer of fiber-optic networking products. “There’s only so much (wireless) spectrum,” he points out, so it takes a wired network to aggregate all of the traffic from the wireless access points (APs). And those networks were built around Ethernet. “Wireless and wired Ethernet access will continue to be complementary,” adds Bill Kastelic, director of systems engineering at Cisco Canada. “The access trend seems to be that users are mostly moving to wireless while other
types of devices such as video cameras, IP phones, servers, APs, printers, etc. stay wired. Wired Ethernet will continue to be used for aggregation/core designs due to its bandwidth requirements.” Ethernet is relevant wherever there’s a need for a lot of throughput, says Scott Kipp, president of the Ethernet Alliance. Consider, for example, the data centre: rows of servers, each with multiple one gigabit (or better) Ethernet connections that pour masses of data through switches before it is distributed to its destinations on the LAN, WAN, or somewhere on the Internet. You can’t do that over wireless. Yet there are challenges in keeping up even when you have a wired infrastructure – even those wires have their limits. You can’t just re-cable every time www.connectionsplus.ca
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The Ethernet Alliance A non-profit industry consortium, the Ethernet Alliance, was founded in 2006 to promote and support Ethernet as a whole, after a series of groups such as the Fast Ethernet Alliance, the Gigabit Ethernet Alliance, and the 10 Gigabit Ethernet Alliance, supporting various speed standards, were born and then died after their goals were met. It operates as a marketing organization for IEEE standards and efforts are driven by three objectives: • Expanding the Ethernet ecosystem • Supporting Ethernet development through standards • Promoting Ethernet in both existing and emerging markets “To achieve these objectives, (we) pursue both shortand long-term goals,” it says. “In the short-term, we are positioning the Ethernet Alliance as the leading source of information about Ethernet initiatives and IEEE Standards. In addition, we also are proactively distributing information to our members and the industry at large. “Our long-term goals include encouraging and facilitating the expansion of standards-based Ethernet into new applications and markets worldwide. And, as we continue to serve the technological needs of our core members, we also are striving to share more information about Ethernet with end users to increase their understanding of the technology’s many different capabilities.” The Alliance also produces a roadmap for Ethernet technology. The most recent version was published in 2015.
the technology changes and bandwidth increases; in fact, Lefebvre said, in a recent survey, many respondents said that they’d rather demolish a building than rewire it. Emerging Ethernet standards are attempting to mitigate the issue, both for the enterprise data centre and the service provider, by allowing higher speeds over existing infrastructure. “Data centre infrastructures are adopting ways to increase machine to machine bandwidth requirements while preserving existing cabling infrastructures with the evolution of new (25GbE/50GbE) Ethernet standards,” notes Denise Shiffman, senior vice president, product management, at Juniper Networks. “Re-using these cable plants helps minimize costly infrastructure upgrades in enterprise as well as service www.connectionsplus.ca
provider deployments. Inside some data centres, Ethernet access speeds are moving from 10 GbE to 25 GbE/50 GbE, speeds which evenly multiply in to 100 GbE uplinks, making the infrastructure design easier, as uplinks migrate from 10 GbE/40 GbE to 100 GbE with the potential to migrate to 400 GbE in the future.” “In general, what drives, and has driven, Ethernet speeds is the speed of server I/O,” says Dominic Wilde, vice president of global product line management with Aruba Networking, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company. Faster computers and storage need faster network interface cards (NICs) to provide necessary throughput, and they in turn need a faster network. Today’s servers each contain a pair of NICs
which, Wilde says, are moving to 10 GbE, which means that switches have to step up their speeds to 40 GbE. However, the bad news is that those speeds require fiber connections, so although the higher speed NICs have been available for awhile, it took them five years to become mainstream because of the need to convert to fiber connections. The good news, Wilde points out, is that the fiber run for 10/40 GbE can be used for the new 25/100 GbE networks, so he believes it will only take three years to move 25/100 speeds into the mainstream. “The big driver for the rapid speed increase is the explosion of data and applications, driven in the beginning by Web scale cloud guys,” he notes. “Their business depends on greater and greater density.” Mar/Apr 2016
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A Short History of Ethernet Ethernet was developed in the mid-1970s, at Xerox PARC, and commercially introduced in 1980. It became a draft IEEE standard (802.3) in 1983, and was ratified in 1985. The ISO 8802-3 Ethernet standard was published in 1989. The technology was first discussed in a 1973 memo by Robert Metcalfe, who is listed as coinventor on Xerox’s 1975 patent application. The system was deployed at PARC in 1976. In 1979, Metcalfe left PARC to co-found 3Com, which became a networking giant and engaged in a series of mergers and acquisitions (at one point, both Palm and US Robotics were under its umbrella). However, its core network interface card business began to shrink in the early 2000s as separate NICs were replaced by networking chipsets on computer motherboards. Hewlett Packard acquired 3Com in 2010, and the 3Com name has since pretty much disappeared as products were absorbed into HP product lines, or discontinued. Ethernet; however, continued to grow, while other networking technologies faded away. For example, despite support from IBM, Token Ring came and went, pretty much disappearing by 2001, and ARCNet and Banyan Vines are also merely footnotes in networking history. Here’s a look at how Ethernet throughput standards have evolved over the decades. It took 30 years for the first six speeds to be standardized, yet within the next few years, four more standards are expected, with a couple more (200 Gbps and 50 Gbps) on the roadmap as possibilities.
Date
Speed
1983
10 mbps
1995
100 mbps
1998
1 Gbps
2002
10 Gbps
2010
100 Gbps
2010
40 Gbps
By 2020
400 Gbps, 25 Gbps, 5 Gbps, 2.5 Gbps
Cabling has evolved as well. Originally, Ethernet ran over coaxial cable, using shared bandwidth. In 1986, Ethernet over twisted pair cable was introduced as StarLAN. Since then, copper cabling has moved through multiple standards, from Category 5 to the current market leader, Category 6A, and is now moving to Category 7, each increasing possible throughput and transmission distance. More recently, fiber optic cable has been added to the mix, enabling even faster speeds. 18
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The networking technology, now in its fifth decade of existence, is continually evolving to serve enterprises, carriers, and the IoT.
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Levy agrees. “IoT- and cloud-era networking is incredibly dependent on wired Ethernet connectivity,” he says. “Traffic from all of those wireless devices eventually gets carried over metropolitan area networks (MANs) and is processed through data centres whose very foundations are built on fast, secure and robust Ethernet-based infrastructure.” IoT – the Internet of Things – will not only generate a lot of data, it will create the need for additional protocol stacks, according to Shiffman, although she says that Ethernet provides the foundation for building technologies to address problems such as extremely chatty applications. “The networking technology, now in its fifth decade of existence, is continually evolving to serve enterprises, carriers, and the IoT,” she says. “No matter the direction of this evolution, the three requirements of services, security, and synchronization will be an important part of Ethernet’s future evolution to meet end user demands.” However, Wilde says, IoT is a new and somewhat unknown realm. While these systems aren’t new (HVAC control systems have been around for over a quarter of a century, for example), the challenge is to bring these existing systems into an IP-enabled world. He sees some of this happening through aggregation of multiple wireless connections (to save the cost of running cable to each system), running what may be different proprietary protocols, onto an Ethernet backbone. While we tend to think of Ethernet as
merely a data transmission medium, it can have another important function. Power over Ethernet (PoE) allows lowpower connected devices (the current IEEE standard covers devices drawing up to 30 watts; a 60 watt standard is under development) such as security cameras, wireless access points, physical security technology such as electronic door locks and access card readers, LED lighting, sensors, and VoIP phones to dispense with separate electrical connections. That, says Kastelic, can be a huge money saver, since installation of structured cabling costs approximately onefifth that of electrical cabling. In Cisco Canada’s new head office, for example, the lighting not only receives its power over the Ethernet lines, it is centrally managed through the network, as is each climate control component. The Ethernet connections allow users to control the lighting and temperature in their work areas via a smartphone app, and PoE saves the cost of electrical rewiring should lights or phones need to be moved. There is one restriction, however – PoE only works over copper wires. Straight fiber can’t transmit electricity – it only deals with light. However, Kipp says, cabling with a copper sheath around the fiber is getting around the problem. The cloud, says Wilde, has revitalized Ethernet. “Six or seven years ago, networking was in a funk,” he says. “Now with the cloud, and software defined networking, making networks faster, and easier to deploy and operate, they’re
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breaking cost barriers that held back innovation for many years. We will see greater and greater innovation through this explosion, and Ethernet is the single common denominator.” So, why Ethernet? Wilde has a theory. In its early days, he says, Ethernet was good enough technology (maybe not the best), but it revolutionized the economics of networking, just as the Ford Model T did with cars. “The unique thing about Ethernet was that it galvanized an entire industry,” he points out. “Everyone moved to it, and the Internet sealed the deal. Ethernet has held its own because it’s a community of vendors and standards bodies that solve real problems in a timely manner, with economics in mind.” So despite the move to wireless among end-user devices – most vendors have even removed RJ-45 ports from laptops, in large part because it’s
a bulky addition that prevents them from producing the sleek, slim devices that today’s consumer seems to demand – Ethernet is alive and well. In fact, says Shiffman, the move to cloud gives CIOs another reason to standardize on Ethernet in their infrastructure. She notes, “By standardizing on a common technology such as Ethernet/ IP, there is much higher likelihood for seamless migration and integration with cloud-based platforms.” “Wireless does not replace Ethernet,” adds Levy. “Instead, older wired and newer wireless technologies complement each other. If anything, Ethernet’s future is brighter than it’s ever been.” C+ Lynn Greiner is a freelance writer based in Newmarket, Ont. She can be reached at lynng@ca.inter.net.
”
Wireless does not replace Ethernet. Instead, older wired and newer wireless technologies complement each other. If anything, Ethernet’s future is brighter than it’s ever been.
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2016-03-10 10:38 AM
TRENDING
EVOLVING
ANALYTICS
There is a solid foundation of early adopters, but for the most part, organizations have yet to realize the full potential that data analytics can offer. By Denise Deveau
ver since the early days of data warehousing and CRM (customer relationship management), capturing and storing data for analysis has been an ever-evolving contributor to business success. In today’s world of cloud, IoT and highly sophisticated tools and apps,
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data analytics is being applied to everything from predictive maintenance in industrial environments and managing energy usage in commercial buildings and homes, to tracking consumer preferences at retail point of sale or social media activity. The push for advanced analytics has
gained considerable traction with an unprecedented exponential increase in all forms of structured and unstructured data available through a wide range of sources, from machine sensors and financial systems to social media and smartphones. Coupled with that is the dramatic decrease in the cost of storage, processing, networking and other infrastructure components. Yet advanced analytics in and of itself is not as up to speed as it could be, experts says. There is a solid foundation of early adopters, but for the most part, organizations have yet to realize the full potential that data analytics can offer. www.connectionsplus.ca
TRENDING
Where to begin Steve Holder, national lead, analytics at SAS in Toronto cites three pillars that are changing the data landscape today: the declining cost of technology, increased scalability, and analytics. “The smartphone was a tipping point in terms of how people access data and are willing to provide information back to vendors and suppliers.” The face of analytics is changing considerably as organizations move from historical and incident reporting based on stored data, to far more sophisticated levels that require a different model, says Michael O’Neil, with Insightaas in Toronto. “An entire system has to be
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mobile enabled, two-way and real-time updatable, which has significant implications on how you architect your infrastructure. The portal to the system is not necessarily the laptop, desktop or call centre screen; it’s the smartphone. So you need to understand how to build a hybrid environment with high speed communications links, and the ability to balance workloads across different environments.” David Senf, vice president of IDC Canada’s infrastructure solutions group says that in the big data/analytics world, infrastructure components are intersecting from a topology perspective. “With big data and analytics we are seeing much more interest in software defined networks and storage. While most organizations aren’t involved as of yet, onethird are interested in exploring it this year because it allows them to move data around more easily and connect at the hypervisor level.” Extracting functionality at the software layer offers the ability to do realtime information management at a more granular level, he notes. “If you want to quickly embed results from a big data project into apps that employees or customer have on their mobile devices, a software-defined model will help you do that.” To achieve that, organizations are turning to hybrid cloud models to leverage the vast amounts of available data, whether it’s financial performance, governance, weather conditions, geolocation or sentiment analysis across social networks, Senf says. “You should be able to take those results and bring them back into the apps being built and integrate them back into the business.” The next stage is natural language processing and machine learning, which Senf expects to see emerging in largescale big data projects in the coming year. The distributed approach Decisions around infrastructure have become increasingly complex given the varied nature and properties of data and its sources. According to Chris Selland,
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The smartphone was a tipping point in terms of how people access data and are willing to provide information back to vendors and suppliers.
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vice president of business development, big data platform at Hewlett Packard Enterprise in Cambridge, Mass., there has been increased attention spent on big data and open source experimentation. “Open source has given a way for enterprises to store and catalogue data, and activate and do something with it, whether it’s to transform a business, solve a problem, or increase revenues. The cloud hybrid space has become an enabler for IT in achieving that.” A discussion point that comes up time and again is where the analytics should happen, he adds. “We talk a lot about hot, warm and cold data in the context of analytics, which in turn leads to a discussion on combining data analytics at the edge and a more centralized approach. But you can’t simply throw tools up and think they will magically work. “You need an ecosystem to support it that is open, flexible and robust and accessible through a single user interface to address different needs and use cases. Enterprise-class system are not always very flexible, which is challenging given the rapid rise and adoption of ad hoc visualization.” Mar/Apr 2016
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TRENDING
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Decisions around infrastructure have become increasingly complex given the varied nature and properties of data and its sources.
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HPE’s Edgeline IoT Systems announcement in December 2015 is directly aligned to this new direction, as it allows enterprises to enable some degree of analytics to take place closer to the data, while more historical/longitudinal data can continue to be managed centrally. As a result, users can put some storage and processing at the point of action, while at the same time engage in more longitudinal analysis through a central repository for predictive maintenance or determining long-term customer value. With data being generated everywhere at almost every level today, it doesn’t always make sense to feed all data through a network to a centralized location for analysis, contends John K. Thompson, general manager for, Dell Statistica. Dell Statistica has been focusing on its own Native Distributed Analytics Architecture (NDAA) that allows data to remain resident on a gateway or other intermediate point in a network so that analytics can be delivered to the data in the language of choice (Java, CCC, SQL, etc.). Analytics can be delivered and executed at any IP address on a network. Launched in the summer of last year, (a Version 3 is expected this spring), interest in the new architecture has been growing. “The traditional paradigm is to gather information, bring it back and 22
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run it against a data analytics model to do predictions. It’s all tightly controlled by a small group,” he explains. With the proliferation of IoT devices, and the different levels of network intelligence and extraction, the argument follows that a centralized model simply won’t work in all scenarios, Thompson says. In many instances it makes much more sense to take the analytics to the data and have it customized for certain use cases. “Analytical models running at a single plant are dramatically different from one that consolidates data from seven sites across the country. Networks simply don’t have the bandwidth to bring all that data back to a centralized location. But analytics can be more meaningful in a distributed architecture working hand in hand with an existing centralized one.” In instances where analytics need to take place behind the firewall within a data centre (e.g. fraud detection) a centralized model makes the most sense. Ultimately both distributed and centralized models can work hand in hand. “The choice depends on the level of extraction required and use case. The questions around that choice include: what is the level of authority and responsibility? Where do the decisions need to be made and how fast do they need to be made? Are decisions based on granular or aggregated data?” Holder says that analytics at the edge came about with the rise of IoT, which generated an information overload and ample discussion around what to keep and why. It also drove a need to capture information at the source and not store it, but rather make decision in real time. “If you want information in real time you can’t have monolithic infrastructures. You need one that is more agile, which means moving the decision making to the edge in some circumstances. Cloud offers an opportunity for performing analytics.” By way of example, an offshore rig has multiple sensors constantly gathering information. “If you can use the data across the rig ad run analytics (at
the edge) to optimize drill bit or pump performance, you can make better decisions and improve productivity,” Holder says. Analytics at the edge can be equally effective in the consumer space, where retailers can tailor promotions instantaneously based on customer data and movement within stores. The business drivers behind it all Whatever the technology drivers may be, the choices boil down to business objectives, whether it’s to know more about customers, performing microsegmentation or personalization, says David Corrigan, director of marketing, analytics group, distribution sector solutions at IBM in Toronto. “The difference is, technology can get you closer than ever before.” The rise in cloud and IoT may be the technology factors that are facilitating different analytics strategies, he adds. On the other hand, one should also be careful that they’re not just generating insight for the sake of it. “Not all insights create quality results. The questions you need to ask yourself are: is latency a concern? Is the data needed in real time and do you need to analyze it and take action immediately? Do front line workers need access to data analytics in order to do their jobs? The most important consideration is whether the tools you implement are aligned to how they will be used,” Corrigan says. Whatever the choice, democratized access to data analytics is the cornerstone to creating a “thinking business” he believes. “As analytics get smarter, so do the people using it, whether it’s for reporting, predictive modeling, interrogating a database or warehouse, or analyzing data in motion from social media streams and sensors. The final outcome is that human beings become far more effective on the job because analytics makes them a whole lot smarter and proactive.”
Denise Deveau is a Toronto-based freelance writer. She can be reached at denisedeveau@bell.net.
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New & Noteworthy
1 2
4 3 1. TINIFIBER
2. IDEAL NETWORKS
3. PLATINUM TOOLS
4. PASTERNACK
The Micro Armor Fiber from TiniFiber, introduced at the recent BICSI Winter Conference in Orlando, is the company’s first entry into the newly created micro armored category and features the patented stainless “steel tube” coiled protection around the inner jacket of the fiber optic cable. Roman Krawczyk, chief engineer and co-inventor says “this is accomplished by the proprietary Micro Armor machinery designed to tightly wind the stainless steel tubular coil around the fiber strands. This in turn provides the smallest OD of any armored fiber cable in the market as well as the same OD for current non-armored fiber cables.” According to the company, the cabling offers considerable advantages over the conventional Aluminum Interlocking Armor (AIA) widely used today. TiniFiber’s Micro Armor Fiber cable minimally increases the size of the OD of the basic fiber optic cable. www.tinifiber.com
A new online Quote Builder from IDEAL Networks enables network cable installers to easily select a cable certifier package that meets their specific job requirements, helping to drive down purchase costs. The LanTEK III cable certifier, the company said, has been developed to help reduce costs and increase productivity when installing data cabling. The Quote Builder is a visual guide that explains each of the elements, enabling cable installers to make an informed buying decision, while building a tailored cable certifier solution. To begin, users choose either a 500MHz Cat 6A or a 1000MHz Cat 7A certifier, and then add adapters. Permanent Link (PL) adapters can be used for testing cabling from the outlet to the patch panel, or channel adapters can be used to certify the entire link, including the patch cords. www.idealnetworks.net
Platinum Tools featured its recently expanded structured wiring solutions during ISC West 2016, held in Las Vegas in early April at the Sands Expo and Convention Centre. The line now includes new Keystone Jacks, Couplers, and Multi-Port Wall Plates for data, voice, and video installations and applications. Platinum Tools’ Keystone Jacks and Couplers for Cat3, Cat5e, Cat6, and Cat6A applications are colour-coded to make EIA/TIA 568A/B wiring easy. They feature 50 micron gold contacts, meet/ exceed EIA/TIA category standards, they are compatible with industry standard wall plates, and are RoHS compliant and UL listed. The Wall Plates are compatible with most industry standard keystone jacks and EZ-SnapJacks and are engineered to prevent possible fracturing from over tightened screws. www.platinumtools.com
Pasternack, a provider of in-stock and ready to ship RF, microwave and millimeter wave products, recently released a new version of its online tool called The Cable Creator. This new iteration allows the user to not only design and customize special cable configurations online in a few clicks, but also purchase their designs without the need to wait for a quote from the company’s sales team. It enables engineers and buyers to quickly and easily create customized RF cable assemblies that meet their specifications from any combination of compatible connectors and cables offered by the company. Designers can choose from over 1,300 connector types and 115 different coaxial cables to construct a cable solution uniquely qualified for their specific applications. The Creator can also be used to locate any of the company’s existing 40,000+ cable assemblies. www.pasternack.com
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Lite r at ure Re views
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Connections+ 2016 MEDIA KIT The magazine for ICT professionals, Connections+ readership targets individuals who purchase, design, specify, install, maintain and test structured cabling, networking and telecom products as well as facilities management specialists and senior IT executives who are responsible for overseeing the implementation and installation of these initiatives. For more information contact Maureen Levy – 416-510-5111 or mlevy@connectionsplus.ca
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Connections+
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THE B ACK PAG E
The evolution
of analytics By Dave Webb
n the beginning was data mining. And the lineof-business manager saw it, and it was good. OK, a little too biblical and dramatic. And before there was data mining, there was data, which a good line-of-business manager could pore over and adduce trends that led to better pricing, better distribution, better inventory management, and much more. But as more and more of this data came into the business in digital form – transactional data – and database software evolved into relational database software, the ability to adduce those trends became more automated, more efficient, more effective. There were data warehouses, big repositories for enterprise transactional data, and there were data marts, smaller departmental or LoB repositories designed for more efficient manipulation of data by excluding whatever data wasn’t relevant to the smaller business unit. And data mining was born. Data mining allowed line-of-business managers – with considerable help from the IT department – to find patterns that made the business more efficient, or maybe more importantly, more effective. Then, something happened to data. A few things, actually. We started generating and capturing more and more, to the point where every two years, we’re creating more than we did in previous history. It’s coming from more sources; we talk about the explosion of Web and social media traffic, but other sources go under the radar – telemetry from vehicles, input from automated sensors, mobile phone data, geographic information systems, the so-called Internet of Things (IoT). And much more of the data we capture is unstructured, rather than mechanically processed transactional data. What’s evolved from this is a continuum of tools to draw insight from this data. There are three that get the most attention and ink, and they’re often lumped together as interchangeable: business intelligence (BI), data visualization (DV), and advanced analytics.
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Connections+
Mar/Apr 2016
In fact, they’re very different disciplines.The term business intelligence was first coined in the 1860s as a way of describing a process by which market and political information can be used to guide decision-making. Agriculture is a simple example, though I’m sure I’m missing a few inputs. What does the Farmer’s Almanac predict about the climate? How stable is the political situation in your source jurisdiction? BI as we understand it is a set of technologies that allow a business to analyze past performance. How did this parameter affect another parameter, and what was the end result? BI is about reporting. Data visualization is about discovery. An accessible graphical user interface allows business teams to draw inferences about why these relationships are happening. DV allows users to plow through huge sets of data (business intelligence data – credit where credit is due) to discover correlations that might be impossible to find with BI. Advanced analytics allows a business team to manipulate those correlations to determine how changing specific parameters will affect business outcomes. It’s about forecasting. How would changing routing increase the efficiency of the supply chain? I we offer a certain promotion in a certain region, how will that affect the inventory we have to hold? As a friend of mine at SAS Institute Canada Inc. likes to put it, analytics provides the ‘why behind the what.’ So BI is about reporting; DV is about discovery; analytics is about forecasting. There are clear roles for each in different areas of the enterprise. But another fascinating element is how each step along the continuum relieves a level of abstraction from the business user, the level of reliance on IT resources. That’s a good thing. It allows IT to focus on IT-specific strategic priorities rather than scripting queries. Data mining has come a long way. C+ Dave Webb is a Toronto-based freelance writer. He can be reached at dave@dweebmedia.ca. www.connectionsplus.ca
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