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In this article I expose my review of the Shift8 CDN solution, based on my own experience. What is Shift8? Shift8 is a provider of a free CDN solution that is compatible with WordPress. The company is based in Toronto. Their CDN solution is relies currently on a handful of servers which are located around the world, as illustrated below: Setting my Shift8 CDN account in WordPress In order to review Shift8 CDN, I installed it on my blog. To do that: Go to the Shift8 CDN webpage, create an account, fill out your wordpress site details. Then go back to your wordpress site -> Plugins and add Shift8 CDN. Copy the Shift8 CDN API key in there. You should see this picture as a proof of a successful integration: It is important to test the integration with the Test URL before enabling link, before activating the CDN. If you see the following image, it means there is an integration problem and you need to address your issue to the support through their forum or per email. I personally had ...

ACI includes a RESTful API in its implementation, which has the following characteristics: the REST API uses HTTP or HTTPS as a transport protocol it uses GET&POST HTTP verbs an API Call includes in its body XML or JSON it does not use HTTP authentication mechanism, but rather an API call with an authentication request in the body. Once authenticated, an authentication token is generated. There are two good ways to learn the ACI API: with API Inspector, with Visore: which is a case-sensitive HTML page on the APIC. ACI Python SDK: is the Python SDK for ACI which is downloadable offline from the APIC. We find it in the literature also under the name Cobra. ACI Debug feature is activated from the GUI. It displays a bar with debugging information such as Managed Object names (MO), class names, etc. The information we get from the ACI Debug tool can be entered as input in Visore, which will analyze them and display the output for you. Arya is a Python code generator. It takes as input ...

NETCONF: NETwork-CONFiguration-based API uses XML can be coupled to YANG YANG: Yet Another Next Generation is a data model based on XML constructs named XPath is human readable, thus easier to interpret than XML. NETCONF with YANG is a popular combination among network engineers. However, NETCONF is network-centric while REST API is widely popular in the IT community. Github: a popular public repository of sample codes. There is a saying among network engineers that says “steal with pride. Don’t reinvent the wheel”. So leverage Github codes and customize them to your needs.

ALE: the leaf ports that connect to the spine If we connect a 40G FEX to a 10G leaf, we need to use Breakout cables, which are cables with a QSFP on a one side and 04 10G SFP on the other side. And it is a Cisco cable. A FEX connects only to leafs. There is no dual-homed FEXes; only normal port channels to a parent switch. Between the FEXes we can configure a vPC and apply the same VPC Interface Policy Group to both FEXes. On the FEX user-facing ports, we can attach a server through vPC: Connectivity between FEX and Leaf © Cisco.com We must distinguish the FEX Switch Profile from the normal Switch Profiles. To indicate in a Leaf that we are connecting a FEX, we activate the checkbox “connected to a FEX” under the Access Port Selector of the parent switch (i.e. the leaf). When attaching and booting FEXs to ACI fabric, it downloads its code from APIC. It can take some time to appear with the following command: Leaf# show fex For the FEX we must create: a dedicated AAEP, a VLA...

In this article I am going to expose the best resources according to me there are on the market that help you study for the new CCNA 200-301 exam. Before the Cisco certification renovation, I reviewed a couple of video training products. Unfortunately, there is still not enough training material for the new 200-301 exam out there. Sure there is the Cisco Press book. But, speaking from my experience, it would be not enough to pass a Cisco exam that just came fresh out of the oven with only the official study guide… Cisco New CCNA 200-301 Vol1 and Vol2 Deluxe, by Laz Diaz The good news is that Lazaro Diaz, a popular name in the Cisco video training industry, is publishing, in pre-release, the new updated Cisco 200-301 video course on Globed.net . Course cover © Laz Diaz As of 01.03.2020, the course is still on pre-sale for about 249$ and the promotional code is “NEWCERT”. And every few weeks, the price will change until it reaches the full price of $2,200.00! Who is Laz...

Below are my study notes about the integration of Openstack with ACI. I begin with defining some concepts. Then I describe NAT feature within Openstack and I finish with discussing networking plugins. Openstack is a group of technologies that provide enterprise cloud computing capabilities. has the following minimal components or node types: a compute node (aka Nova), it runs the nova-compute service, a controller node which comprises many services. These services can be distributed over dedicated servers such as: storage nodes (aka Swift) and network nodes (aka Quantum or later as Neutron). A compute node hosts one or more instances (the equivalent of virtual machines). Each instance is referenced with its Instance ID. Each Openstack Compute node has a virtual bridge interface named br-int. Each Compute instance is connected to br-int through a tap virtual interface, then through a virtual switch, then to the br-int bridge. Neutron provides VLAN, VXLAN and NVGRE encapsulation possibi...

ACI VLAN Pools: Definitions A VLAN Pool defines one or more groups (one or more blocks) of VLAN IDs. A single VLAN Pool can be associated to many or all domains configured in the APIC. A VLAN Pool is used internally by the fabric to map endpoints to EPGs. Remember that the concept of VLAN has in ACI a local significance: a VLAN in ACI is just telling the leaf port which encapsulation it should put on the frame travelling southbound from APIC. A VLAN Pool has a VLAN allocation type. It means how the VLANs from this VLAN Pool will be allocated. VLAN allocation can be Static Allocation or Dynamic Allocation . We will learn the difference between the two in a moment. ACI VLAN Pool: Encap Blocks In VLAN Pool, we need to define one or more ranges of VLAN IDs, called Encap Blocks or VLAN Ranges : Encap Blocks or VLAN Ranges in a VLAN Pool A VLAN Pool Encap Block is simply a range of VLAN IDs: Encap Block in a VLAN Pool The Encap Block have two possible allocation types: a static allocation ...