Tech Interviews: Recent Episodes
Tech Interviews
Welcome to the Tech Interviews podcast. For the very latest in business focussed tech. We chat with tech community leaders on wide range of topics from containers to cloud, from data to DevOps, you can find them all here! Enjoy the show and if you do, tell your friends!
Data is the lifeblood of today's enterprise. Making sure we secure it properly is critical to modern business. We cannot afford data to leave our control in any way that puts our sensitive and important information at risk. In a world of increased data focussed regulations where data, privacy and trust are so critical in our business relationships, the impact of a data breach can be significant.
How do we address this challenge? How do we empower our use of data and keep it secure and under our control?
That is the subject of this Tech Interviews Episode with my guest Justin Bortnick of Digital Guardian. Justin is a long-time data security practitioner and uses that experience to help simplify the often-complex issues that come with data security. I take this opportunity to learn from Justin’s experience and build an understanding of modern data loss prevention techniques and how technology from industry leaders like Digital Guardian can help you to effectively enable your data security strategy.
Join us in this fascinating discussion as we bust some DLP myths by covering.
• Learn the basics • Get buy-in • Your first goal – know where your data is • Context is crucial to accurate DLP • Crawl before you run • What are your data loss drivers? • This is not just a technical problem • The Digital Guardian approach • The one thing you should be doing
Data loss prevention is a priority for any business serious about its data and Justin’s enthusiasm for the subject and the level of insight he provided was hugely valuable for me and I trust there were for you too.
If you have any questions, then please email podacast@techstringy.com and to catch the next episode then please subscribe.
For now, thanks for joining me.
Full show notes are here : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Sq
In our last show, we talked about the idea of cyber fit and cyber protection and how, as our demands and the threats to our data change, so must our approach to security and protection. We continue that theme this week as we look at the changing world in which we operate and how that is driving the need to think not only about protection but also resilience, digital resilience.
Joining me this week is Edwin Weijdema a global technologist at Veeam. This idea of resilience is key when it comes to security, while much of the security discussion is focussed on prevention, and rightly so, it is important to realise that even the best-laid plans cannot always stop a cyber security incident. When that happens, what is the plan?
The way we operate as businesses, our reliance on technology in all walks of life, as well as the ever-evolving cyber threat, have all changed the way we need to look at our security plans and it's crucial that we also know not only how to protect ourselves, but handle it when the worst happens. Join us as Edwin shares with us his experiences and ideas around.
• The evolving world • How the cyber threat has grown • Cyber Security Still an IT problem • Building digital resilience • The security triangle People, Process, Technology • Protection without recovery is nothing • Veeam the Risk Management Company
I always enjoy discussing this stuff with Edwin, he has great enthusiasm and experience for the topic and a passion for helping others to develop cyber resilience. You can find more from Edwin by following him on Twitter @Viperian or LinkedIn.
I hope you found that as useful as I always do when I chat with Edwin. To make sure you catch the next show, why not subscribe.
But for now, thanks for joining me.
For full show notes including links : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Sc
Cyber Security continues to be top of the list of IT challenges most enterprises face. While our businesses continue to evolve in how we use technology, how we work, and how we consume data, so the threat continues to evolve.
In the face of this challenge we need to think carefully about how we deliver our security strategy, these modern threats need a modern approach. Earlier this year, I was asked to present at an event hosted by Acronis, this event focussed on taking a new approach to security. The contents of that day stuck with me and I wanted to share with you some of the information from that event. To help me to do that is one of my co-presenters Acronis’s Candid Wuest.
Join us as we discuss.
• What is Cyber Fit and Cyber Protection? • No single technology will protect you from everything • The holistic approach • Enjoy the SAPAS • Security is complex, but its management shouldn’t be • Having a security business continuity plan • Some tips for getting cyber fit • A little more about the Acronis approach • The value of learning from vendors
This is such a crucial topic in the enterprise and as we mentioned in summary, taking the opportunity to learn from leading vendors, can be extremely useful as you help build your cyber defences.
More details and follow up information can be found in the show notes : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1S7
Until next time, thanks for listening.
Tech Interviews has come out of semi-retirement for a short series of shows looking at another range of Enterprise IT topics.
First up, is an old familiar subject of the evolving world of storage, specifically object storage.
Why is object storage increasingly becoming part of the everyday enterprise data platform conversation? Is it better suited to modern ways of working, that need data portability at scale? Does it fit better with our modern application development processes, such as containers? To find out I am joined on this episode by field CTO and co-founder of Scality Brad King.
Join us as we discuss • What is object Storage • Why object and not just block and file? • Is it time for more object in the enterprise? • The value of metadata • The object use cases • About Scality • Artesca bringing object to the smaller use case
The case for object storage as a primary platform for your data continues to grow and there are some use cases it meets extremely well. Although it may not be right every time If you are looking at new approaches to data in your business, it may well be time to explore what object storage can bring.
For full show notes https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1RY
Thanks for listening.
The demands on business IT continue to evolve rapidly, we need our technology to respond to change, to be deployed quickly, provide scale and flexibility. This is changing the way applications are developing with approaches such as low/no-code and serverless becoming increasingly common.
On this week's Tech Interviews we look at these new development approaches and ask what does low-code and serverless mean for you and your enterprise? Joining me to discuss this is Mike Williams, founder, and CTO at BuildLab.
We discuss.
Trends driving change. What is low code and serverless? Don't get hung up on how, focus on the what It isn't for everyone How do you define the right route for you? What makes a good project? This is not a silver bullet BuildLab, building more with less.
I found this a really useful introduction to a technology and approach that is becoming more commonplace. I like Mike's approach, using these technologies to allow the focus to be on outcomes while appreciating that this doesn't work for everyone.
I hope you enjoyed that, if you have an idea for a show or would like to be a guest email me at podcast@techstringy.com.
Until next time, thanks for listening.
Full show notes with links can be found here: https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1R6
When you talk to any business today and ask them about their top strategic IT goals using artificial intelligence and machine learning to help the business be “better” is often right at the top. It is not a surprise, is it?
But not all in the AI garden is necessarily rosy, there are still many, including some high-profile, incidents of major AI/ML projects going bad, with millions of $’s spent for little or no return. Why is that? What does it mean for AI in the enterprise now and in the future?
That is what we explore on this week’s podcast as I am joined by Slater Victoroff CTO at indico. He shares thoughts on the current state of intelligence in the enterprise, sharing thoughts on how to avoid project failure, the importance of quality data, how to avoid the data “charlatan” as well as providing some top tips on getting your AI investment right.
Join us as we chat about.
• AI is not the answer to everything, but it is great at some things. • AI adoption is immature. • Not an android more a bionic arm. • The embarrassing failures. • Get the basics right. • You cannot solve problems you cannot scope. • Clever Hans. • Tips to getting your AI investment right. • Avoid data charlatans. • What do indico do? • Empowering the right people with the right tools.
Data analytics, intelligence and machine learning are a core part of most businesses short, medium and long term plans and used right it is a powerful technology that can deliver huge value. However, doing it right takes thought, planning, time and effort. Hopefully, Slater has provided you with some great tips.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest, then please email me at podcast@techstringy.com and to catch the next episode then please subscribe.
Until next time thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1QT
The last 12 months or so have seen the biggest shift in working practices in many generations, the restrictions imposed around the world because of COVID has forced us all to look at the way we operate as both businesses and people.
A key part of our ability to survive the last 12 months was, of course, technology, collaboration tools particularly have had a significant role to play, allowing us to easily communicate with each other and our customers, to share information and data, to meet up in daily online meetings to ensure we still had some level of “face to face” communications. Without those tools, the challenges of day-to-day operations would have been much harder.
Collaboration technology of course is not something that businesses just consume, there are vendors who build the tools that have allowed so many of us to adapt during this time of massive change. What has the last 12 months looked like for them? What have they learned? What does that mean for us and the future of work moving forward?
Joining me this week is Michael Peachey is Vice President, User Experience, at collaboration giants RingCentral and I get the chance to find out from him what the global collaboration picture has looked like over the last 12 months, the changes they’ve seen and what they envision for the future of work.
We discuss.
• The 12-month experiment. • What RingCentral have learned as a business. • Accelerating change. • Surprises! • Online fatigue. • Cultural changes. • Replicating the “human experience”. • What happens when half the world goes back to the office and the other doesn’t? • Check out RingCentral.
I enjoyed this chat with Michael, the future of work is not set in stone for either businesses or those building the tools we are going to rely on, but what is clear, is there is real enthusiasm and innovation not just about how the technology should work, but how the human experience should be improved and that can only be a good thing.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest drop a line to podcast@techstringy.com. To catch the next episode then subscribe on all good homes of podcasts or YouTube.
Until next time, thanks for listening.
For full show notes visit https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1QM
"Transformation" is a phrase we hear a lot, in fact, it almost feels like everyone in the world has some kind of transformation project going on. In reality, over the last 12 months or so, we all have, we have changed the way we operate as businesses and as people.
But what does it mean to go through a transformation as a business? What is transformation? How do we do it well?
That's the question I ask this week with my guest Chris Gherardini.
Chris is founder of Turnkey Technologies a US-based consultancy business, focussed on helping companies deliver business transformation projects. Chris started Turnkey 27 years ago after cutting his technology teeth in an accountancy practice, so comes to this conversation with a lot of experience.
Join us as we discuss.
The four pillars of transformation. What drives change? Seeing transformation as an opportunity. Things to avoid in your approach. The importance of vision. It is a cultural thing. Top tips for getting transformation right.
We are all constantly facing change and any tips on how to do it well are always welcomed, so I hope you found as much useful information in what Chris said as I did.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear email podcast@techstringy.com and to catch the next episode, please subscribe.
Until next time thanks for listening.
For full show notes https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1QH
Data is everywhere and part of every strategic business conversation how do we use it better? How do get more value from it? How do we truly make it a business asset? The answers to those questions are driving a whole new way of thinking in the way we deliver IT services to a business. New workflows, new development architectures and exploiting technology shifts to try to break the shackles that traditional infrastructure often enforces on how we can use data to meet our business needs. This has led to a steady evolution, virtualisation, cloud and architectures such as serverless which allows us to run our code and services independent of any underlying platform.
What if we could achieve that same flexibility for our data?
If your business could use its data without restriction what would that allow you to do? That was the thesis of a blog post that I read recently from David Flynn the CEO of my guest Doug Fallstrom’s company Hammerspace and is the topic for this weeks show.
Join us as we discuss.
• Why we need to be data-centric. • Getting additional value from our data. • Users don’t care where the data is and why should they? • Talk to the non-storage people in your business to know how they use data. • Tips for shifting to a data focussed approach. • The Hammerspace Tech. • The power of the “as a service” model.
For today’s enterprise taking a data-centric approach to the way, we build our IT platforms is critical if you want to be a data-driven business. Approaches such as those discussed by Doug, coupled with technical innovations to enable your data strategy is going to be central to your success.
For full show notes visit here https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Qx
Finally, If you have an idea for a show or would like to be a guest, then email podcast@techstringy.com.
Until next time, thanks for listening.
The IT landscape is changing extremely quickly as we embrace new ways of working, new technologies, adopt the cloud and have ever more distributed workforces, all demanding increased access to our services and data. These changes are being embraced by modern business as they see technology as a way of driving improved outcomes and new opportunities. However, one thing that often does not change in our business is networking, not only the technology behind it but more importantly the processes we have in place to operationally support our enterprises rapidly changing demands.
What then, do we need to change, why and how? That’s what I chat about with this week’s guest Andrew Wertkin, Andrew is the Chief Strategy Officer at BlueCat a company specialising in the management, control and automation of DNS, DHCP and IP address management or DDI (an acronym of acronyms), join us as we look at how the network has changed, how not changing our operational approach is inhibiting us and how to plan for better network management.
It’s a fascinating chat as we discuss. • What is DDI • DNS, DHCP, IP Management modern critical services • Without control and governance, you can’t enable change • IT cannot be a blocker • That’s not transforming it’s just upgrading • If you don’t expect your IT to change you’re not paying attention • If you’re not planning you will have problems • Getting your DDI right
Andrew offers a range of great insight that I trust you found as useful as I did. For more information and links to some of the things we spoke about visit https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Qd for show notes.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to join me as a guest email podcast@techstringy.com. To catch the next episode then subscribe in any of the usual ways.
Thanks for listening.
More effective data analytics is part of most organisations plans, we see the ability to extract useful information that helps us make better business decisions as a crucial part of digital transformation into a more data-driven enterprise. However, perhaps it is not as easy as it sounds, many enterprises have had cause to re-evaluate their shift after their analytics projects failed to deliver the value they had hoped for, but why?
This week’s podcast was inspired by a whitepaper I was sent, produced by Analytics company Aginity, the paper was entitled “Forget about AI and ML” which, while a provocative title, offered some interesting insights as it discusses how delivering an analytics project is about much more than technology and has much wider requirements from culture, to who we involve, to how we ensure we have the appropriate data to operate with. This is a topic that intrigues me, so joining me to discuss this in more detail is CEO of Aginity, Rick Hall, he has worked in the data analytics industry for 30 years now and has seen many analytics projects succeed as well as fail and in this episode, he shares some thoughts on how to get it right.
Join us as we discuss. • How are we currently using AI? • You’ve got to do the “dirty work first” • What are the challenges we face with analytics? • The “third phase” of analytics. • Democratising analytics. • How to make analytics work better. • Empowering people. • It’s not just a technology shift. • What Aginity do. • The power of collaborative analytics • Top tips for driving better analytics.
Data Analytics is high on the agenda of most enterprises, but doing it right needs careful thought and planning, as well as making sure we empower the right people with the right tools. Rick did a great job here for articulating that and providing some tips on how to get this kind of project delivered right in your enterprise.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest, then why not email me at podcast@techstringy.com and to catch the next episode, subscribe.
Until next time, thanks for listening.
For full show notes and links please visit : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Q5
As the world of technology and data continues to evolve, so must the solutions that we use to build our enterprise technology stacks, which of course means new versions of products and services from our leading vendors. At the end of February 2021 Cloud Data Management specialists Veeam released Version 11 of their highly successful availability suite. But what does that mean for those of us who deliver, manage and maintain enterprise infrastructure?
Because while the world we operate in continues to evolve are vendors listening to the challenges that their customers have? Understanding evolving trends and how they are likely to impact both them and their customers?
In this episode, I'm joined by Veeam Senior Global Technologists and regular Tech Interviews contributors, Michael Cade and Anthony Spiteri, as I put those questions to them as we explore some of the key announcements from Veeam's V11 launch. We discuss what was behind some of those design decisions and how are these developments helping to solve enterprise challenges.
We discuss.
The V11 Strategy Continuous data protection and the critical workload. Be right, not first. Immutable backups made easy. Making innovation available to all. The power of the cloud for long term retention. Helping to balance costs. Improving instant recovery. Protect it anywhere, recover it anywhere. Getting more value from our backup data.
This was a jam-packed show and it is always great to catch up with the Veeam team, there is always a real enthusiasm from them for their technology and it's great to see that not only are customers listened to, but what they hear is then acted upon. Michael and Anthony, as always, offered great insight into this significant technology release.
For all the links as well as how to watch the Veeam V11 announcement visit the show notes page https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1PY
If you have an idea for a show email me at podcast@techstringy.com and to catch the next episode, then subscribe in all good homes of podcast and YouTube.
Thanks for listening.
Networks are at the very heart of the way business operates in the modern world, with so much of what we do driven digitally the need for us to connect our devices with our applications and data is central to almost everything the enterprise does to function. For something so central to our operations it’s interesting how little we think about it, networks are like a utility, you turn on the tap water comes out, you flick a switch electricity flows, you hook up your device you expect to get connected and in many enterprises, we are as confident of our network as we are any other utility.
But should we be? How sure are we that our networks are as robust and resilient as the modern enterprise requires? Is that confidence misplaced?
That is something I’ve been considering recently after been sent the latest Network Field Report from network management specialists Auvik. Joining me on this week’s podcast is Steve Petryschuk a Network management expert at Auvik to discuss what they discovered in their survey, how they are seeing the enterprise network changing and what we can do as IT pro’s to ensure our network continues to meet the demands placed upon it.
Join us as we discuss. • The background behind the report • The changing role of the networking professional • How has the enterprise view of networking changed? • Why we need network knowledge? • The problem of over-confidence! • The increasing rate of change and are we tracking it? • Embrace change • Proactive management giving us time back • The benefit of better insight • Steps to improving your network posture • The power of automation
Steve shared some great insights into what he is seeing in the modern enterprise network, some of the challenges as well as some of the strategic shifts we need to make to ensure we continue to meet the demands placed upon it.
The Auvik network report is well worth a look and you can request your copy here www.auvik.com/networkfield21.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to join me as a guest then why not email me at podcast@techstringy.com and to make sure you catch our future episodes you can subscribe, you’ll find Tech Interviews in all good home of podcasts and on YouTube.
Until next time, thanks for listening.
For full show notes with all links : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1PS
The entire way we look at delivering IT in the enterprise is changing, the environment we operate in, the operational expectation of our business, how we interact with customers, the speed with which we can react to change are all demanding new ways of architecting and operating our IT systems. Of course, this has led to rapid innovations across enterprise technology from the adoption of the cloud, the way we deliver applications (Kubernetes for example) through to the increasing use of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) to a point where all of these are now common conversations around the technologist's table.
The innovations have led to new views of how we see operations as increasingly we adopt DevOps, SecOps, DataOps and of course AIOps. The risk of course with this kind of shift is hype, getting wrapped up with the excitement but finding our changes never really delivered value.
How do we avoid that trap and ensure if we are going to use more intelligence and analytics in our operations, we avoid the hype and deliver maximum benefit?
That is the topic of this week's show with my guest Casey Kindiger, CEO at Grokstream.
Join us as we discuss.
What is AIOPS? Pavlov's Dog and IT Ops. Rules-based approaches must change. What is driving change? Wasting quality data! Can't we just throw machine learning at it? It's a cultural shift. Tips for doing AIOPS well. Avoiding the traps. About Grokstream.
There is no doubt that analytics and AI, if they are not already, are going to be a daily part of enterprise IT and Casey provided wide-ranging insight into, what for me, is a fascinating topic and I hope you got plenty from it.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to be a guest, email podcast@techstringy.com and to catch the next episode why not subscribe.
Thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here: https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1PK
Compliance is a serious discussion point in most organisations, as the use of our information has become an increasingly everyday part of the way we operate our lives, ensuring organisations take care of it appropriately is critical to the privacy and security of our "digital selves". However much of the compliance technology organisations rely on is based on understanding our digital footprint, to ensure the person making the transaction is authorised to be doing it and that transaction is legal and correct.
That's great when the use of technology is commonplace, but what when it isn't, how do you examine a digital footprint when there isn't one?
On this week’s show, I am joined by Shubhradeep Nandi, co-founder at PiChain Labs a company looking at how they can use leading-edge technology trends to start to deal with the global problem of reducing fraudulent transactions in a world where technology is not always easily accessible and digital footprints are harder to identify.
We discuss.
Fintech and Regtech what do they mean? How a "black box" attitude means we are missing the gaps in compliance. The size of the problem. How not actively engaging with compliance is a problem. When regulation impacts a financial institution. The problems of "hotfixes". The problem of scale. What happens when there is no digital record? The three steps to making compliance sustainable. Using leading-edge technology to solve the compliance problem.
Thanks to Shub for providing insight into what is a massive problem impacting us on a global scale and how by using technological advances we may be able to solve it.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest email podcast@techstringy.com and to catch the next episode then please subscribe on YouTube or all good homes of podcasts.
Full show notes are here: https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1PD
It is 2021 and Tech Interviews is back with new shows looking at all aspects of enterprise IT. For this first show of the year, we do what all good podcasts like to do and take a look ahead to 2021 and what we expect to see in the technology space. The topic of our look ahead this week is the storage industry, as I catch up with some of my fellow delegates from a recent industry event we attended, Storage Field Day 21.
What of Storage Field Day 21? What did it have to offer? What were the key themes? And what did it tell us about current storage industry trends? That is the topic of this first show of the year as I join up with three of my fellow delegates to hear what they thought and their key “takeaways” from the event.
I am joined by Barry Coombs, Jason Collier and Max Mortillaro to discuss the key moments from another excellent Storage Field Day Event and hopefully apply some context to what we heard.
Thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Pt
2020 has been one heck of a year, for all kinds of reasons, many of them of course less than positive. The world has been turned on its head, with lots of the things we took for granted as our “normal” behaviour no longer allowed or drastically changed. 2020 has also put a strain on the global community in unprecedented ways, straining healthcare, education, and business.
The technology industry has been at the forefront of much of the global response, not just in business, but across all areas of life tools like Zoom and Teams moved from corporate apps to an everyday part of people’s lives, a way to do business, yes, but also a way to stay in touch, have get-togethers, quizzes and of course of ways of carrying on education from the youngest to those studying for advanced qualifications.
However, this move to a more technologically driven world, also highlighted real disparity while for many they have plentiful access to technology and are tech literate, for swathes of the population that is not true. It was this disparity that was noted by two of my close IT community friends, Michael Cade and Jason Benedicic, both are regular guests on the show, and both have very busy day jobs, but both saw examples of that technology gap and wondered what they could do about it. This led them to start to look at different ways of making technology available, what exists today, and what we may need to change to truly make technology accessible to more people than it is today.
It was this work that caught my eye and felt like a great topic for our last Tech Interviews of 2020, so that is exactly what we do as I’m joined by Michael and Jason to explore what we can do as individuals and industry to make technology available to all. It’s a great chat and with a fine collection of Christmas outfits for you to enjoy (if you watch the YouTube version).
What Jason and Michael have taken on is a great example of what we can do as a tech community, if we just think about the way we can use technology a little differently and look to solve problems.
As this is the last show of the year, I would just like to say thanks for all of the support of the show this year from both a fantastic collection of guests and to you the listener, because without listeners there wouldn’t be a show.
May you all have an enjoyable holiday season and let’s hope 2021 is a bit of an improvement on 2020!
Until next year, thanks for listening and watching.
Full show notes are here : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1P0
Thanks to PowerTribe for the use of their version of Carol of the Bells in our festive theme tune.
As our technology stack continues to evolve and the demands on our IT systems grow, we need to become increasingly smarter with the way we deliver it. Increasingly we want all elements of our technology infrastructure to be software-driven, we want intelligence about performance so we can use it to drive and automate change.
However, one area that is often not considered is the area of networking. Networking is at the very heart of modern infrastructure but often we still see very traditional approaches to how it is designed and deployed. Why is that and how do we change it?
That is the topic of this week’s show as I catch up with Rich Martin, Senior Technical Marketing Engineer at intelligent network automation specialists Intential. Join us as we discuss.
• The networking bottleneck in IT automation. • Why can’t we “spin-up” networking? • How do we modernise when there a lack of strategy, skills and tools? • The COVID effect. • The problems with a traditional approach. • The cloud networking quandary! • Automation “sprawl”. • Cloud networking, like a network but different! • How networking is evolving. • Building a network automation strategy. • What Itential do. • Building a network platform. • Tips for your network modernisation approach
I find network automation an interesting part of the evolution of the way we deliver technology and one that is beginning to change. I think Itential is offering some strong solutions in helping enterprises to evolve their network automation capabilities and are well worth checking out.
If you have an idea for a show why not email podcast@techstringy.com. If you want to be sure to catch our last show of 2020 then why not subscribe, you’ll find us in all good homes of podcasts or over on YouTube.
Until next time thanks listening.
For full show notes : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1OQ
As we have covered many times on this podcast, data is a core asset for modern enterprises, how we gather it and use it is amongst the hottest topics for enterprise IT decision-makers. Of course, along with that comes how we protect and secure that data, making sure we do not lose it for technical, commercial and regulatory reasons is vital. However, there is one area of data, that in my experience gets far less consideration and that is erasure.
There is always a lifecycle when it comes to data, it is created, it is used and then when it has served its production purpose there is the question of “what do we do with it now?”.
That is the subject of this weeks show as I’m joined by Paul Katzoff, CEO of WhiteCanyon Software a company specialising in the secure erasure of data. Paul brings a great perspective to understanding the challenge and the things you need to consider when you include erasure as part of your data strategy.
Join us as we discuss.
• While erasure is not new the challenge continues to evolve. • How do I verify erasure? • The issues in “physical destruction”. • Compatibility and standards. • The evolving challenge of data erasure. • “Consumer” tech and enterprise data. • Data erasure is not just a technology problem. • Plan for your data’s lifecycle. • How is the tech evolving? • Tips for your data erasure strategy at scale • Should I do it myself?
Paul’s experience in the industry offered me a fresh perspective on the challenges of data erasure and the importance of not forgetting that data is not all about collection, analytics and production use, we need to consider what happens when our need for data or the repositories that hold it ends.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest, then please drop me a line at podcast@techstringy.com. To catch the next episode be sure to subscribe.
Thanks for listening.
Full Show Notes are here : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1OJ
Security is a constant challenge for organisations big or small whether it is the security of our systems, network or data the problem continues to get more complex. Our complexity doesn’t stop there as increasingly more enterprises look to embrace Internet of things (IoT) projects our challenge grows significantly.
But why, why does IoT present such a peculiar challenge? This is an interesting question and a major security challenge.
On this week’s show, I’m joined by AgilePQ CEO Paul Clayson as we discuss both the IoT problem as well as some of those approaches to addressing it, including the innovative and elegant approach Paul’s company is taking. An approach not only looking at solving the IoT issues of today but also is looking ahead to how they can use the same approach to help crack one of the security industries biggest conundrums, quantum computing.
Join us as we go all quantum and discuss. • The IoT security challenge. • The inadequacy of today’s approaches. • Is the IoT security risk real? • When just good enough is not good enough! • Rethinking encryption for IoT. • The importance of simplicity in security at scale • The quantum computing problem. • Quantum hacks are closer than you think! • Tips for the top of your IoT security list.
I enjoyed this chat with Paul, it’s an area that is new to me but one that is hugely interesting not only for today's threat posed by IoT devices but the real threat, that maybe is closer than we think, posed by a quantum computing future.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest then why not drop me a line at podcast@techstringy.com and to make sure you catch the next episode then please subscribe.
Until next time thanks for listening.
For full show notes :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1OD
There is no doubt that the way businesses operate has changed significantly throughout 2020 and while many of us had plans for and technology in place to deal with a distributed workforce, not many of us have the plans, technology or processes in place to deal with all of our workforce been distributed.
Now then, is the time for us to take a step back and rethink our distributed workforce, how we approach it? To help me to explore this is this week’s podcast guest Doug Miller, CEO of Brightworks Group, a company specialising in helping enterprises of all sizes to modernise their approach to IT and help to service a distributed workforce.
Join us as we discuss.
• Doug’s props! • The demands of our changing world • The opportunity of distributed workforces • The power user problem! • Big issues are not necessarily technical • The digital transformation “lag” • The data portability problem • When the leadership does not embrace technology • The importance of working with specialists who can help you • Tips on rethinking your distributed workforce.
Doug brought a fabulous insight to the topic and shared it with not only great enthusiasm but also with a sword! You cannot ask for more than that! His knowledge and experience shone through as he shared some fantastic tips on how to re-tool your business to not only support but to take advantage of the opportunities presented by a distributed workforce.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest then email podcast@techstringy.com. To catch then next episode then why not subscribe.
Until next time thanks for listening.
For full show notes : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Ow
The public cloud is playing an ever more important part in the modern enterprise’s infrastructure, whether they are SaaS services such as Microsoft 365 or native cloud services from compute to storage. The challenge when we look to adopt the cloud is how do we avoid developing a technology silo in our business, how do we make sure we don’t put the cloud on an island all of its own, one that has no integration into our enterprise datacentre. Because that is not the point is it? We want the cloud to be a valuable extension of what we do, something we can use “tactically” to solve problems and enable us to do things that are hard on-premises.
How then do we build appropriate bridges between what we do in the datacentre and those resources and services the public cloud has to offer? That is the subject of this week’s show as I am joined by Principal Architect and Cloud Evangelist at NetApp, Phoebe Goh.
We discuss. • Why we need a Cloud data strategy. • We need an Enterprise-ready cloud. • It is not just about “somebody else’s computer”. • Cloud is a “mindset”. • Make your datacentre more cloud-like and your cloud more enterprise. • Avoiding the human nature of silos! • Joining the technology dots. • The value of “specialists”. • Tips for “joining the cloudy dots!” • Looking forward to NetApp INSIGHT.
I always enjoy catching up with Phoebe her knowledge and enthusiasm are a great mix for sharing her experience of cloud architecture and providing tips on how you can make sure your use of public cloud is as effective as it can be. Phoebe also talked about NetApp INSIGHT during this session and regardless of whether you are a NetApp customer or not, this is a really useful event to hear from a specialist in data storage both on-premises and in the cloud and with a great line up of speakers Including Microsoft’s Satya Nadella.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest, then email me podcast@techstringy.com and to catch the next episode why not subscribe.
Until next time thanks for watching and listening.
You'll find full show notes here : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Or
The fact that the importance of data to every business continues to grow is not a surprise. Our data estates been more complex, more geographically spread and housed in more data repositories than ever before, again should not be a surprise and neither is it that our demands on our data are also increasing, we want it to be more useful to us, be used as part of new data strategies, but we also need it to be more highly available than ever, more portable and more flexible.
However, it is these challenges that are also leading to us needing to consider another part of our data infrastructure and that is our data protection. The state of our data protection strategy should also be under constant review, does what we are doing today meet the demands of our business?
A few months ago, I attended VeeamON, Veeam’s annual technical conference, one of the sessions I found extremely useful dealt with the exact topic I’ve just described, the state of the data protection industry in 2020. With that in mind, I asked the presenter of the session if he’d be happy to share those thoughts with the Tech Interviews audience and he said yes, so on this week’s show I’m joined by Dave Russell, Veeam’s Vice President of Enterprise Strategy to share some of the ideas from that session as well as applying some updates to it based on the changes we have all witnessed in 2020.
We discuss. Data strategy is for businesses of all sizes. The current state of the protection market. The enterprise “frustration”. The complexity of data protection. How 2020 has changed the market. Do not underestimate “it just works”. The risk of “cyber threat” and data protection. How can we get our “backups” to do more? How does a backup vendor be a part of “transformation”? The importance of data portability. Three tips for your data strategy. Even licences need to be portable.
Data protection remains critical to every business and ensuring the strategy you have is right for your business needs is crucial. Dave mentioned the upcoming Veeam Live event on 20th October, for those of you interested in your data protection strategy and developing cloud data management best practices, this may be an event you find very useful you can find out more and register for it at veeamlive.com .
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest why not email podcast@techstringy.com and to ensure you catch the next episode then please subscribe on YouTube or via your favourite podcast app.
Until next time thanks for listening.
For full show notes please visit https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1O9
The need to modernise the way we deliver technology continues to be high on the agenda of both IT and broader enterprise leadership, whether it's how we manage and store data, build security or work with partners and customers we are looking at ways to do this more effectively and efficiently. This is also true of the applications that we use across the enterprise.
The public cloud has changed the perception of how we want to see our technology, including our applications, behave. This has led to new app development methodologies and tools, one of these is serverless. But what is serverless? Can I use it? I have got lots of big enterprise applications is it all relevant?
All of which are good questions and are the subject of this week's podcast as I'm joined by Ezhilarasi Chezhiyan of KOVAI.co to talk about serverless architecture.
Join us as we discuss. Serverless is not without servers! The LEGO approach to applications Abstracting the infrastructure Flexibility Serverless use cases Serverless limitations Integrating with legacy applications Defining serverless candidates Building one thing supporting Serverless is something else!
I am new to the world of serverless and what it can do, but I learnt a lot from Ezhilarasi, I hope you did too.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest then why not email me at podcast@techstringy.com. To make sure you catch the next episode of Tech Interviews please subscribe either on YouTube or via you podcast app of choice.
Thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1O2
As September rolls around it seems that the technology industry has decided this should be digital conference season, as we publish this week’s podcast in the week of the 28th September we see VMworld 2020 happening online and throughout October companies like Veeam, NetApp, ONUG and others will be holding their own digital events. Ahead of all of those we have had Microsoft Ignite, their major conference for the technical community.
What did we hear at Ignite? What Microsoft announcements should we go and check out? In the first of what is going to become a series of event wrap up shows over the coming weeks, I’m joined by Microsoft’s Sarah Lean and NetApp’s Kirk Ryan to give their views of Ignite, what surprised them and excited them. So technical issues (with the video version of the show) aside, settle back and join our chat as we talk about.
• Microsoft’s aims for ignite • Azure in Space and in the sea • Automating your Azure estate • Windows is not dead • Putting the power in the hands of those who need it • If you could only check out one session
As you can tell from our chat there was a significant amount of content and a wide range of strategic and technical information. Kirk and Sarah did a great job of summing them up as Ignite again demonstrated just how much Microsoft has changed over the last few years and how cloud is helping them and their customers to innovate and grow in ways that would have seemed unlikely before Satya Nadella's time in charge.
If you'd like to appear as a guest on the show or have an idea for a show then email podcast@techstringy.com and to catch the next episode then please subscribe on YouTube or you usual home of quality podcasts!
Thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1NX
There are two camps when it comes to the world of technology, there are those who use it and those who make it. The challenge is, how do we make sure that those who are developing and selling technology are supplying things that are useful to and solving the challenges of those who are buying and using it? How do you bring those two disparate groups together in a way that allows for constructive dialogue which in turn leads to delivering products that solve business problems while still allowing tech vendors to innovate and of course make money?
On this week's show, we look at an organisation who although new to me, has since 2012 been looking to address this problem and have done so with a fair degree of success, ONUG, as I'm joined by Co-founder and Co-chair Nick Lippis joins me to share the ideas behind ONUG and how you can get involved.
We discuss.
Where do execs go to talk to their peers? Getting beyond price only influence with vendors. It's not about users v sellers – it's about healthy debate! ONUG successes – talking about things that end up getting built. Pushing back on vendors. The integration of business and digital strategy. Upcoming ONUG conference. Digital platforms for modern business. Not new just quicker! Leaving the datacentre. The ONUG collaborative.
ONUG is certainly attempting to find a way of bringing together those disparate communities and ensure we get the right kind of solutions into the technology market and I'm certainly looking forward to catching some sessions at the upcoming conference.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest then why not email podcast@techstringy.com. To ensure you catch the next episode please subscribe on either YouTube or your favourite podcast app.
for full show notes and links : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1NR
2020 has of course been a very different year for most of us and for those of us in the technology industry one major impact has been on the tech community. For many of us the community is one of our core career tenants for us as we develop, it is where we learn and where we build relationships and friendships.
As VMworld 2020 approaches, like most of the major conferences this year, it will only happen online and while this is a great opportunity for many to attend for the first time, it also means that we will lose that chance for the tech community to be brought together.
On this week's show, I'm joined by VMware content strategist and founder of the excellent community initiative The Tech Level Up Project, Yadin Porter De León as we discuss what VMworld 2020 has to offer.
Join us as we discuss.
Inclusion in numbers Community side channels The no-risk chance to try out VMworld A chance to pick and mix "the future forward" them A chance to "really deliver for the widest audience" The Tech Level Up Project Community and your career The vTrailmap – signposting your way into the vCommunity
VMworld remains a key part of the technology calendar and this year, while different, still offers a great chance to learn and make new community connections. Thanks to the work Yadin has done and his enthusiasm for the tech community, the vTrialMap provides a great resource to guide you through this big and valuable community.
To find out more about Yadin and his work check out the full shownotes here https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1NH
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest then email at podcast@techstringy.com and if you want to make sure you catch future episodes then please subscribe via YouTube or your podcast app.
It's pretty much the norm for us now that when we visit a website we are increasingly used to seeing the arrival on-screen of a helpful chat assistant, normally popping up in the bottom corner of the page and offering to help us out and to try to triage our requirements.
The issue though is these types of services are limited and are not smart enough to understand our requirements or add context to the conversation, but what if they were smarter?
That is the question we ask on this week's Tech interviews with my guest CEO and founder of aigo.ai, Peter Voss.
Join us as we discuss; the current state of "assistants" where is the value in deploying them? the limitations of assistants without a brain! how is the technology and the market changing? the power of cognitive intelligence how a good assistant can help retain customers how aigo.ai are helping where to start with a cognitive assistant project
Peter provides a fascinating insight into a part of the technology market that is going to become increasingly prevalent to business as we all look at ways we can use technology to help us be more efficient and improve the experience of our customers, partners and employees.
If you have an idea for the show or would like to appear as a guest then email me at podcast@techstringy.com. To catch the next episode, you can subscribe in all the usual ways.
Thanks for listening.
For full show notes :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Ny
There is no doubt the world has changed in many ways in the last 3 months, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the global response to it has been something we have not witnessed before. From a technology point of view, it has presented many challenges. However as things start to change we are starting to turn our attention to returning to some kind of "normal", but this also presents an opportunity to us, the chance to take what we have learned over this period and take that knowledge and experience to help plan what we do next, so that next time we need to react quickly to change we can do it better.
To help with that I have put together a short series of shows looking at where do we go next for some of our technology decision making. In this episode, we take a look at an area that has been pushed more than most during the COVID response and that is the area of connectivity and especially how the reliance on connectivity.
To discuss that I'm joined by Rob Shore, Rob is a Senior Vice President of Marketing for Infinera a specialist in connectivity solutions for the most demanding of networks. Rob has 27 years' experience in the telecoms industry and offer a fascinating take on what he's seen during the COVID response and what it means for the telecoms industry in the future.
We discuss.
Where are the telecoms industry now and where does it need to go? COVID has accelerated issues and changes that were already planned The datacentre revolution. COVID driven reliance on the cloud. While we are used to compute flexibility and scale where is this in our connectivity? COVID highlighting the access problem. The need for "software-fication" Redesigning lasers. 5G – it is more than a 4G update.
Rob's experience in the industry allowed us to have a really interesting conversation touching on the cloud, communications and the need for more intelligence in our network layers and how this is going to be key to take connectivity and network access that today, is struggling to cope with the huge changes that COVID has brought, into the future and make it fit for purpose.
This is the last Tech Interviews for a few weeks as we have a summer break, but to catch our shows on our return then you can subscribe in all good homes of podcasts.
We will be back with a bunch of new shows later in the year and if you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest then email me at podcast@techstringy.com.
For now, enjoy the summer months, stay safe and healthy until next time, thanks for listening.
For full show notes : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Na
In this episode, we look at a topic that is not normal Tech Interviews territory, but one that is going to be a huge focus for businesses of all shapes and sizes as we come to grips with the COVID realities that will be with us for some time to come and that is how do we use technology to better market our organisations and sell our services?
My guest is Vlad Edelman, CEO and founder of Targetable a digital marketing platform and service that helps businesses to use technology to better market and sell to their customers base. Vlad has vast experience in the areas of both digital platforms and online marketing services with a very impressive CV developing solutions for some of the best-known brands in the world, in this episode Vlad shares some of that experience as we discuss some of the pitfalls with today’s marketing approaches and how marketing may not be quite as easy as everyone likes to think!
We discuss.
• I’m in IT why should I care about marketing? • Why everyone thinks they can do a marketeer’s job! • Contextually aware marketing. • It’s all about the data. • Not all interesting data is valuable. • Nobody spends enough on marketing! • The issue with tools from the big online providers. • Importance of consistency and quick reactions.
Vlad shares some fascinating insights into the challenges and potential solutions when it comes to targeted transactional marketing in the modern world and how for many of us finding ways to win new customers is going to be crucial in the months to come and Vlad provides some valuable tips on how to achieve better results.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest then why not email me at podcast@techstringy.com.
If you want to ensure you catch the next episode then please subscribe.
For full show notes including links : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Mu
One of the few COVID-19 benefits has been the shift of many major technology vendors to taking their key events online, we've already seen Microsoft, NetApp, HPE, Cisco and many more move their big in-person conferences to an online version and while they may not replace all elements of those in-person events, what it has done is opened up the opportunity to attend events that you may not normally be able with the bonus of much of the content been left available for many weeks after the event so you can consume what you need at your own pace.
June saw Veeam's popular VeeamON event move online for 2020 with nearly 30,000 registrations it seems to have proved a huge success, so on this week's show, we look at how was it running such a big event online? What were the key messages and announcements from the conference that would be relevant for Veeam partners, customers and the wider data management industry? With a focus on "Elevating your cloud data-strategy" we also ask what that means and how Veeam is hoping to enable their customers to do just that.
Joining me to discuss it is regular contributor to the show is Veeam Senior Global Technologist, Michael Cade as we cover.
What was the online experience like? The challenges of scale and online anxiety! The benefit of on-line events live and on-demand. Even in a changing world we need to manage our data Key announcements Backup for AWS, 365 and Teams, Availability orchestration More key announcements Availability suite V11, CDP, Capacity Tier, Instant Recovery for NAS and Databases. The importance of a data focussed conversation. Portability and flexibility. Are Veeam a cloud data management company?
Veeam as with several online events I have attended did a really good job of making the session an experience and as businesses learn from each other these online events will only get better. From a content perspective, Michael shared the importance of some of those key messages as Veeam continues to innovate and evolve to meet the ever-changing demands that enterprises are placing on their data.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest then please email me at podcast@techstringy.com
If you'd like to watch the YouTube version of the show you can find it here : https://youtu.be/rIj7wmfpmnI
For full show notes : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Mn
There is no doubt the world has changed in many ways in the last 3 months, the COVID-19 pandemic and the global response to it has been something we have not witnessed before. From a technology point of view, it has presented many challenges, delivering remote IT at scale, stretched VPN's, flexibility, support, security, the list is long. However as things start to change we are starting to turn our attention to returning to some kind of "normal", but this also presents an opportunity to us, the chance to take what we have learned over this period and take that knowledge and experience to help plan what we do next, so that next time we need to react quickly to change we can do it better.
To help with that I've put together a short series of shows and in this third part we pick up on something we discussed in the initial episode the "journey to cloud" and how do we make that easier?
On this week's episode, I'm joined by Microsoft Cloud Advocate Sarah Lean to discuss Microsoft's Cloud Adoption Framework, a hugely valuable set of resources that you can take advantage of regardless of where you are in your cloud project.
We discuss.
What the framework is and why it exists. How it can help educate users and dispel some of the myths of the public cloud. The importance of knowing where you currently are before you start deploying more cloud. You don't know what you don't know. Where people slip up! Don't get lost in the tech remember the business case. Nuggets of wisdom. Other types of Microsoft help.
As Sarah discusses in the show, the Cloud Adoption Framework is not the only way to move to the cloud, but what it does provide is a good set of reference documents that you can use to help you with your cloud projects regardless of whether you want to follow the document closely or just use it to see if there is something you've forgotten it doesn't matter it's just another useful tool in your cloud project "armoury".
If you have an idea for the show or would like to appear as a guest you can contact me via podcast@techstringy.com and to catch futures episodes please subscribe.
Until next time, thanks for listening.
For show notes with links :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Mg
The move to the cloud is hardly a new topic, for many the value of services like Microsoft 365 have proved their worth over the opening months of 2020, having key services running in the public cloud has delivered the flexibility, scale and accessibility that it promised. Beyond that we are also starting to see ever increasing tactical use of public cloud, integration into backup and archive tools, storage, cloud-based security appliances, the list continues to grow. But what about those big enterprise core applications like SAP, the systems that are running every element of a business, are we starting to move them as well?
I ask that question because of an announcement that caught my attention this week (w/c June 15th 2020) from NetApp proudly declaring they are the first to offer SAP HANA certified storage via their Cloud Volumes Service (CVS) inside of Google Cloud Platform (GCP). What I wanted to know was why? NetApp has no doubt put a lot of time, effort and money into gaining this certification, but is there an opportunity for this and are companies moving platforms as potentially complex at SAP HANA into the cloud at all?
'm happy to admit that I don't know a lot about SAP and their products but luckily I have a friend who does and he was happy to join me on this weeks show to share some of his experience. Andre Schmitz is a Senior Consultant for Datacenter Infrastructure in Germany for Bechtle and has been delivering major enterprise systems like SAP HANA for 17 years so was well placed to give me his view on the market.
We cover. What is SAP HANA? Why are people struggling to shift to it? Complexity and the cloud. Is there a shift for enterprise applications to the cloud? Are NetApp's enterprise storage services a useful addition? Are they going to help with a shift to the cloud? The importance of enterprise-class storage features in the cloud. Moving to the cloud, here are some things to consider.
This was Andre's podcast debut and he did a great job at sharing a wide range of experience, some insight into the challenges of having systems like SAP HANA running in the cloud and some thoughts on whether NetApp (or anyone else) offering these kinds of enterprise-class features has real value.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to be a guest on a future show why not email me at podcast@techstringy.com.
Until next time, thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1M8
There is no doubt the world has changed in many ways in the last 3 months, the COVID-19 pandemic and the global response to it has been something we have witnessed before. From a technology point of view, it has presented many challenges, delivering remote IT at scale, stretched VPN’s, scale, flexibility, support, security, the list is long. However as things start to change we are starting to turn our attention to returning to some kind of “normal”, but this also presents an opportunity to us, the chance to take what we have learned over this period and take that knowledge and experience to help plan what we do next, so that next time we need to react quickly to change we can do it better.
To help with the “what next” planning is a short series of shows looking at that topic, in this second part we look at the world from a user point of view and explore how we need to rethink our end-user experience.
Joining me to discuss this is Tony Main of Italian end-user device company Praim as we explore how the world has changed and what have Praim and their customers learnt that can help the rest of us?
Tony provides some thoughtful insights and shares some ideas that should get you thinking as we discuss.
• How Remote working has changed. • Supporting our users when we’ve broken the rules. • Going back? • Did you realise enterprise tech was too tricky? • How to make enterprise IT just work. • Changing support models. • We need to simplify. • What Praim have learnt. • Managing devices like they were on the LAN. • Flexibility is key. • How the “nice to haves” have become the necessities. • Focus on the user and the data.
While end-user computing devices and “thin clients” may not seem the sexiest of topics, to ensure we have the right technology foundations in the future and are giving our users a workable, reliable and secure user experience is crucial and Tony shares some valuable insight in some of the areas we need to consider.
Thanks for listening.
For full show notes and contact information visit :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Lw
There is no doubt the world has changed in many ways in the last 3 months, the COVID-19 pandemic and the global response to it has been something we have not witnessed before. From a technology point of view, it has presented many challenges, delivering remote IT at scale, stretched VPN's, scale, flexibility, support, security, the list is long. However as things start to change we are starting to turn our attention to returning to some kind of "normal", but this also presents an opportunity to us, the chance to take what we have learned over this period and use it to better plan what we do next, so that next time we need to react quickly to change we can do it better.
To help with the what next conversation is a short series of shows looking at what next, we start with the public cloud, which is first on the list of most "what next" discussions.
To help me to explore this first topic is first time guest to the show, but long time industry friend, Grant Caley, he is Chief Technologist for NetApp in the UK and Ireland and brings with him 20 years of experience in helping enterprises change the way they operate and of course, in most cases, this now means how they use the cloud.
We dsicuss. What is a "journey to the cloud"? COVID-19 accelerating the demand. Do not throw away your datacenter good practice. Cost, cost, cost. Data is often the biggest problem in the datacentre, that does not change in the cloud. What you lose moving to the cloud. What should the areas of focus be? Be flexible. The NetApp cloud story. Building bridges.
Grant provides some great insight and raises a range of crucial points when it comes to cloud, cost, security and the importance of treating your cloud infrastructure as you would your datacentre.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest why not contact me via email podcast@techstringy.com or via twitter @techstringy.
Next time we talk about how to rethink the way we work from different locations, to catch that show why not subscribe.
full show notes are here : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Lf
Over the last few weeks the use of collaboration tools has grown exponentially as they have become critical to enterprises of all types to enable their staff to continue to work together and to keep business moving in these most challenging of times. Many of them have moved from business tools to household names, now everyone knows what a Zoom meeting is and of course, we are all familiar with the phrase "living in Microsoft Teams".
While Teams itself is an excellent collaboration tool, easy for users to work with and to work together on, its backend complexity can be a challenge, especially as much of that complexity is hidden from not only users but administrators too which leads to increased risks that can impact your sensitive data assets.
That problem has inspired this week's show, my guest is Stephen Nesbitt of Varonis, Steve has been with them for about a year, but before that had worked for Microsoft with a particular focus on SharePoint. Recently I recorded a video with Steve highlighting some of the challenges and risks that deploying Teams can present and I thought it would be great to get that information shared on the podcast too, so here it is!
We cover.
What is teams and why does it exist? Teams simplicity is part of the problem! The Teams security conundrum. What creating a Team really does? Teams "sprawl". How do you keep an eye on Teams usage? Native tools and their limitations. What Varonis can add to Teams to secure your "sensitive data". Teams is not "full of holes" but you need to know where the risk lies. Teams can both enable "transformation" and limit it – just putting it in the cloud is not enough!
Over the last couple of months, I've spoken with many organisations who have rolled out Teams and have all been unaware of some of the challenges it poses, I'm hoping this podcast and Steve's eagerness to help to educate those using Teams will help all of us mitigate the risks that it presents so we can use this extremely powerful product without putting our data assets at risk.
If you'd like to contact me, either with an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest you can contact me on twitter @techstringy or email the show at podcast@techstringy.com.
Until next time, thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1L8
Data is essential in modern business, how we store, protect, ensure it's available and portable and of course that it is compliant and meets our business and regulatory needs.
To provide the kind of insight and control we need of our data in the modern enterprise requires us to think beyond how we store it, we need to be more platform focussed, ensuring that in whichever repositories we place our data they give us greater insight and control of its usage.
However, to deliver things like compliance traditionally has needed multiple products, a storage location, a separate compliance tool and professional services to integrate it all together. But what if your storage could do this natively as new data was written to it?
With that in mind, I was intrigued to see NetApp announce their Cloud Compliance tool an integrated compliance solution that would offer immediate native reporting to data written into their cloud storage repositories (Cloud Volumes ONTAP, Azure NetApp Files and Cloud Volumes Service)What does it do? And how can we use this kind of native, cloud based data compliance tool to deliver benefit to our enterprise?
Joining me on this week's podcast are Amit Ashbel and Chilik Hochberg, both security industry veterans with around 20 years' experience prior to NetApp and now are part of a team bringing that experience to the company.
In this episode we discuss.
What we mean by data compliance? Changing how we see our data and its value. Data storage is not enough we need to think “platform”. Why whatever data we have we need to consider how we are handling it. The impact of a lack of visibility. Importance of native compliance. The NetApp solution. The importance of making it easy to use.
I think this is hugely important topic and positive first step to building more intelligence natively into our data repositories and I'll be interested to see how Amit, Chil and the team develop this further.
If you have a topic you'd like us to cover or would like to be a guest email me at podcast@techstringy.com or find me on twitter @techstringy.
Thanks for listening.
Full shownotes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1KY
In our increasingly data focussed world the desire to gain more insight from our data to help us to make better decisions continues to grow. This has lead to a real upsurge in the need to not only find better ways to analyse data, but also approaches that make the ability to analyse it more widespread and get tools into the hands of those inside of an enterprise who need it to help them make better decisions for their companies and customers alike.
How do we go about building this kind of data analytics strategy? That's the question for this week's podcast, the second in our series looking at how we use data. This week I'm joined by Catherine Wilks, Data and Analytics Practice Lead at data specialist Slalom.
Join us as we cover. What do we mean by visualisation? How to avoid making stepping into work seem like stepping back in time? Are we adopting Analytics and why we should be? How starting small can still bring big benefits. Why it's OK to not always find something new. How data analytics can attract talent. 5 Steps to building an analytics strategy. The importance of a "Data Culture"
Data visualisation is a fascinating area and one that is only going to become more prevalent inside of every enterprise as we all strive to find ways to get more value from our data assets. Catherine shares some fantastic tips and insight into starting the process of building your data visualisation strategy.
If you have an idea for or would like to appear as a guest on the show, then drop me an email at podcast@techstringy.com
To make sure you catch our next episode you can subscribe in all the usual places.
Until next time, thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1KP
Data, data everywhere, that seems to be the standard refrain in most businesses, we are collecting more data from more sources than ever, yet in many cases we don’t have a clear and bespoke strategy for dealing with it, how we use, store and secure data tends to be embedded in other strategies and policies. Many enterprises talk about the importance of their data and how they see it as a crucial asset, so is now the time to have a bespoke and specific data strategy?
If it is, why is it? What should it include? How do we go about building one? that is the focus of this weeks show as I’m joined by returning guest Matt Watts, CTO EMEA at NetApp. Matt has been at NetApp for 15 years and during that time he has always had a great enthusiasm for understanding technology trends and that is exactly the same here as we discuss the importance of a data strategy and why now is the time for enterprises to develop theirs.
In this episode we discuss. • Are we still too fixated on “boxes”? • Before we talk tech, what is the strategy? • What is driving the change in how we view data and its use? • Closing the void between business decision makers and IT • DataOPS • Stop having our data strategy dictated by the storage we have bought! • Data platforms not storage • The importance of communication • Tips for building a plan • If you are going to disrupt anyway take a step back and think
As always Matt provides some fascinating insight into the development of a data strategy, why in his view it is important and why its crucial that we are taking all angles of our enterprise needs into consideration when making decisions around our data platform.
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest then contact me at podcast@techstringy.com Until next time, thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1KJ
One of the questions that I always find interesting in the technology industry is whether the technology that industry watchers and analysts talk about and fill column inches with are the things that enterprises are deploying on a wide scale. I often feel that analysts and large tech vendors have a vision of the world that is shaped by the companies on the West coast of the USA and the very largest enterprises, there is nothing wrong at all with listening to the needs and challenges those companies face, but not all enterprises are those types of organisations and does that view of the world translate to everybody else?
On this weeks show we explore exactly that question but a bit differently as this time I’m the guest! as I share with you a podcast I recorded recently with two industry friends and fellow podcasters Chris Evans and Martin Glassborow on their excellent Storage Unpacked podcast.
Between us we have a wide and varied debate about what kind and how technology is used, evaluated, and bought by enterprises of all types, I hope you enjoy our chat as we discuss.
• Hype V Reality • Are enterprises innovating or still trying to keep the lights on? • Technology may evolve but is it still delivered “traditionally”? • What is digital transformation? • Focus on data and outcomes • Technology for business benefit, not technologies sake • The challenge of investigating long-term technological shifts • Day two deployments, what happens after you have deployed? • Are technology business decisions still to “techie” lead? • Vendors, account management is important • Does your technology solution solve a problem that exists?
As you can see, we discuss many varied topics, Chris and Martin bring a lot of experience of the IT industry and share some interesting thoughts and hopefully I contribute a little too!
The show will be taking a break for a few weeks over the Easter holiday here in the UK but we will be back with some brand new (not COVID-19 related!) shows including a series on data analytics, an intro to Kubernetes and native data compliance to make sure you catch those shows then please feel free to subscribe. If you would like to be a guest or have an idea for the show then drop an email to podcast@techstringy.com
Until next time, stay safe and healthy, thanks for listening.
The world finds itself in uncharted territory, gripped by the COVID-19 pandemic putting unprecedented pressure on public health and the global economy. For enterprises of all types, the challenges of trying to continue business as normal are going to be significant. I’ve been wondering how I could help, one idea is to try to share good practice and advice from those in the IT and business continuity industries on dealing with the current crisis and giving your enterprises the very best chance of successfully finding a path through these challenging times. What better way to do that than through the Tech Interviews podcast.
In this special episode, we pick up on something that is a question I’ve been asked on many occasions over the last couple of weeks “with all of these remote users how do I ensure we maintain the security of our systems and data?” It’s a great question to be asking, to help me explore this topic I’ve drafted in a returning guest Amy Stokes-Waters, Amy works for Identity Experts a company that specialises in identity security who has written a handy LinkedIn article called “Secure remote working at short notice” and it was some of the key ideas in this article that I thought would be valuable to share and Amy was good enough to join me at short notice to do just that.
We discuss. • The risk of people working from unusual locations with unusual devices • Pushing people outside of their comfort zones • Tips for maintaining security and effectiveness for our users. • We need security but we need people to be able to operate • Just becomes times are unusual don’t forget the basics • Importance of familiar communication • Let people know what is expected of them • Importance of using sanctioned tools for storing data • Maybe now is not the best time to come up with new ideas • VPN is not the only answer to your remote access problems • Amy’s two top tips
Amy is hugely passionate on this topic and shares with us some great tips on ensuring you retain a strong security posture while enabling your users to continue to work effectively during these vastly changed times.
If you’d like to talk to me professionally you can email me at pauls@gardnersystems.co.uk. If you have a topic you’d like us to cover on Tech Interviews then email me at podcast@techstringy.com or find me on twitter @techstringy.
Until next time, stay safe, healthy and thanks for listening.
Full show notes with links are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Kz
The world finds itself in uncharted territory, gripped by the COVID-19 pandemic putting unprecedented pressure on public health and the global economy. For enterprises of all types, the challenges of trying to continue business as normal are going to be significant.
In this special episode, we discuss one of the biggest challenges that we have seen reported already and that is the robustness of remote connectivity, this goes beyond just those working from home, how are people who work in critical enterprises, who have remote locations and services that are needed and under increased pressure and demand at this time, ensure they remain stable and usable when it is very difficult to access those facilities and services when your IT Pro’s can no longer travel to them.
This topic came up when this episode’s guest contacted me to ask if he could come on and share some of his experiences and of course I was happy to provide the platform. Roger Sands is CEO at Wyebot and he shares some of his experiences in helping their customers deal with this as well as some of the initiatives Wyebot have introduced to help enterprises deal with the challenges presented to them.
We discuss. • The critical wi-fi challenge has moved • The need for increased remote visibility and automation • Remote working easier said than sometimes done • Monitoring and automation • It is not just the public cloud that is stressed but private services as well • Remote performance is no longer a “nice to have” • People are adapting quickly to change if we can give them the tools. • Some of the changes we are making are going to be more “permanent” • Top tips for remote working and remote locations • How Wyebot can help
There is no doubt we are in unusual times and issues around remote locations and working is going to continue to be a challenge as we all readjust. Wyebot has tools that can be very valuable across several industries, but tools that are also going to be valuable in the future of how we work, not just in the short term.
We'll have some more special episodes soon, until then stay healthy and thanks for listening.
Full show notes :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Kp
The world finds itself in uncharted territory, gripped by the COVID-19 pandemic putting unprecedented pressure on public health and the global economy. For enterprises of all types, the challenges of trying to continue business as normal are going significant. How do we go about it? What is our business continuance strategy? What are some of the key things we should be considering and the challenges we need to overcome?
I’ve been wondering over the last few days how I could help, one idea is to try to share good practice and advice from those in the IT and business continuity industries on dealing with the current crisis and giving your enterprises the very best chance of successfully finding a path through these challenging times. What better way to do that than through the Tech Interviews podcast.
In this first Tech Interviews special, I speak with business continuity specialist and returning guest, Steve Lambert of Biscon, a UK based risk and business continuity consultancy to share with us their experience and tips on how delivering an effective plan for dealing with this current global crisis.
We discuss.
The main areas of consideration Why crisis communication is crucial The challenge of dealing with IT that has never been tested like this before Thinking about your staff – can they really work remotely? Keeping in contact Not all communication is technology! Be flexible Supplying and suppliers What things may catch you out? Keeping informed The advice is fluid, your continuity plan needs to be too. Prioritize what’s important today Make sure you learn your lessons
These are certainly unprecedented challenges we are dealing with and to a degree we are all learning as we go but having a plan is hugely valuable and Steve shared some great tips, experience and advice.
If you have questions about the topics covered or other areas you’d like us to cover on the podcast, then of course, you can email me at podcast@techstringy.com
I’ll have some more special shows coming soon alongside the more usual content, but for the time been, stay healthy and thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Kl
The use of virtual desktops is seemingly always about to become the next big wave of technology, there is an industry running joke that this year will be the year of VDI (and completely coincidentally for this podcast, flexible and remote working technology has never been more in the news) but it has never quite happened, it’s not that VDI or centralised desktops aren’t deployed or remain a strategically relevant consideration, it just never quite seems to get the critical mass that it often promises too.
Why hasn’t VDI become a widely adopted technology?
On this week’s show, I’m joined by NetApp’s Laurence James (Products and Solutions Manager for Northern EMEA), to explore VDI, why it has not been more widely adopted up to this point and how both changing end-user computer demands, as well as more powerful and flexible technology, may be evolving just enough to drive wider virtual desktop adoption, is this finally the year of VDI?
In this week’s episode, we discuss. • What is VDI? • How a changing world is driving the need for richer content to be more widely available • The $12bn market • The Changing demands of the end user “experience” • Why VDI has failed before • It’s not applications it’s end user demand • How flexible compute can make VDI investments more realistic • If VDI hasn’t been for me in the past, why would it be now? • How are vendors like NetApp helping their customers to adopt this kind of technology
The centralised desktop with all the simplification of management and better control and security for our data makes a lot of sense, however it has, up to now, never quite taken off, but Loz makes some fascinating points and a strong case as to why that may be about to change, as evolving end-user demands and more flexible hardware infrastructure may just make VDI a more attractive option when we discuss our future technology and data strategies.
Thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Kf
Modernisation is a buzzword across the IT industry, but it is more than just a technology subject, it is about changing the way you view and use technology, deliver services, products, deal with customers and drive innovation across all aspects of the enterprise and of course IT plays a part in that, but how?
This week’s podcast was recorded at Microsoft’s Ignite Tour in London early in 2020 where I caught up with two of my friends from the IT industry, Ruairi McBride and Jason Benedicic to discuss modernisation across applications, datacentres and businesses and how technology providers like Microsoft are helping to enable this kind of transformational change.
Amongst our topics, we discuss.
What we mean by modernisation How and what is application modernisation How the speed of development and delivery is key What types of companies are investing in application modernisation Who is modernising their datacentres? Why it is much more than just technology refresh Why “consumer” technology is driving enterprise thinking Microsoft modernisation technologies The “enterprise focussed” cloud What is driving companies to modernise?
I really enjoyed this chat and learned a lot about how and what is driving enterprises of all shapes and sizes to modernise their business practices and technologies. I hope you gain as much from the insights Ruairi and Jason provide as I did.
Next week we take a fresh look at the changing face of the virtual desktop, to make sure you catch that show, why not subscribe?
If you have an idea for a show or would like to appear as a guest on Tech Interviews then email me at podcast@techstringy.com
Until next time, thanks for listening.
Full show notes :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1K1
It’s a big week for Veeam software with the release of Version 10 of their core product set Veeam Availability Suite. Major software releases are often about much more than just a set of new features, they are about solving evolving industry and customer challenges and helping to drive forward a company strategy (I wrote a piece recently discussing this). What then are some of the drivers behind these software releases? What thinking goes into them? Why do they sometimes take a long time to come out? And why do they focus on some of the features they do?
With Veeam having a major software release, I thought it would be a great time to explore some of those questions with two friends of Tech Interviews Michael Cade and Adam Bergh of Veeam Software.
We discuss. • Why V10 took 3 years? • The importance or recognising the changing landscape • 5 keys of cloud data management • V10 helping deliver an overall strategy • Delivering what customers need and putting data to work • The value of close partnerships • Taking a holistic approach • Be better than “good enough”
I’m a fan of what Veeam do both as a software solution but more importantly as a company with a very clear strategic direction and I think what shows in my chat with Michael and Adam is how Veeam have a very clear direction and that V10 is more than just a software release but is part of a much bigger picture. I hope you find their insight useful.
Thanks for listening.
Show notes are here : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1JP
When we deploy technology into an organisation it’s important we focus on the right thing, technology shouldn’t be deployed for its own sake, it is there to serve a purpose, deliver an outcome and provide a good and useful experience for our customers and end-users. But how do we know that our technology is providing that?
Understanding our user experience is not something that is easy to do, but Why does it matter? Why is a good end-user experience important? And do we really need to care?
They are some of the questions we cover on this week’s podcast as we examine the idea of Digital Customer Experience monitoring with Catchpoint founder and CEO Medhi Daoudi. He formed Catchpoint 11 years ago but has spent most of his career working in technology monitoring and shares with us that experience and how you can build a strategy for ensuring that both your customers and employee experience with your technology is a positive one.
We discuss; • What is digital experience monitoring? • The positive experience monitoring can deliver. • How more complexity is driving more sophisticated monitoring. • Monitor outcomes, not things, the “outcome economy”. • The increasing drive to monitor the employee experience. • Examples of what happens when we don’t monitor employees experience. • How to start your digital experience monitoring plan. • The importance of proactively identifying issues and customer experience.
Mehdi shared some great ideas and certainly provided a lot of food for thought during our chat on this increasingly important topic.
Full show notes are here : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1JK
Thanks for listening.
The move to the cloud continues at a pace as more organisations look to harness cloud-like capabilities like scale, flexibility and commercial value into their business operations. These companies are now more likely to be more "traditional" types that already have a datacentre and an enterprise IT environment, finding ways to tactically use the cloud in these environments is high on the priory list for IT teams across many types of business.
One interesting consideration for helping with this integration is looking at how to exploit more traditional enterprise technology to ease adoption and integration and that is the premise of this week's show.
To discuss this I'm joined by Kelly Goolsby a Presales Solutions Architect at Liquidweb, working with customers to help them find the right technology to meet their changing business demands, he has 17 years in the IT industry under his belt spent predominately in the cloud and hosting space.
During the show we cover; Cloud, more than just someone else's computer? Is cloud about more than a technology shift? The innovation driver to cloud adoption The shrinking datacentre The VMware reality and meeting customers where they are Private versus Public clouds and the process to help decide The value of private cloud partnerships
Kelly's experience in the area opened up a really interesting chat and makes some great points and provides a fascinating insight into the topic.
Thanks for listening.
For full show notes visit https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1JF
It’s part two of our new year look ahead last week we looked at areas such as tech company consolidation, more acceptance of the move to cloud and maybe even the death of blockchain. In this second part, I catch up with two more respected industry figures Rick Vanover and John Nicholson. Rick and John are highly experienced technologists and provide some fascinating thoughts on what the next 12 months may bring.
We cover topics from 5G networks, accepting that hybrid cloud is OK and Kubernetes moving from hype to adoption.
Background on our guests. Rick Vanover @RickVanover Rick is Senior Director of Product Strategy at Veeam and a well-known figure across the technology community. He’s now entering his 10th year at Veeam and has spent much of his career in the data management and protection field.
John Nicholson @lost_signal John is part of the technical marketing team at VMware, focussing on their HCI and VSAN technologies, also a well know tech community figure, John co-hosts the excellent Virtually Speaking podcast (find it here you can also contact the show podcast@vmware.com) which covers all things VMware as well as a broader look at the technology industry.
Next week we look at the part VMware plays in building cloud solutions, public, private and hybrid with my guest Kelly Goolsby. To get that you can subscribe to the show in all good homes of podcasts, now including Spotify.
If you would like to be a guest or have an idea for the show, then email podcast@techstringy.com
Thanks for listening.
Full show notes here: https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Js
A new year a new set of Tech Interviews podcasts for you to enjoy. In our first two shows of 2020 I chat with five people from across the technology industry to find out what trends, technologies and ideas they expect to see shape the next 12 months in enterprise IT.
In this first episode, I speak with Chris Evans, Sarah Lean and Greg Knieriemen to see how they think 2020 is going to shape up. In our conversations it's interesting to see a number of subjects that run as common threads, data and cloud is at the core of much of the thinking as most of the contributors feel that both better understanding and a growing maturity of these technologies and what they can deliver will see them continue to dominate as topics throughout the year.
Background on the guests; Chris Evans - Chris is a well known and respected industry analyst who can be found hosting the excellent Storage Unpacked podcast as well as some fascinating analysis, particularly on the enterprise storage market, on his website architecting.it.
Sarah Lean - Sarah is a cloud advocate at Microsoft and spends her time working with the technical community to understand how cloud can better meet the demands of the modern business.
Greg Knieriermen - Greg is a wearer of many hats at NetApp, but mainly spends his time advocating NetApp strategy to the wider community, a well known IT community figure, Greg is the co-host of the excellent Go Your Way podcast with Phoebe Goh.
Some interesting insights from all our guests. Next week in part two, I speak with two more people from the technology industry about what they think 2020 has instore for Enterprise IT.
If you would like to be a guest or have an idea for the show, then email podcast@techstringy.com
Thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Jp
One of the biggest technology changes of the last 5-10 years for consumers as well as businesses has been the growth in the use of Wi-Fi. Today we almost feel it is our right to be connected to high performance, resilient and reliable wireless infrastructure so that we can remain online doing everything from updating social media to carrying out conference calls, the demand for wireless is endless.
Wi-Fi also presents us with new challenges, its complex nature, amount of devices and speed of growth are making managing and delivering reliable and enterprise-class wireless increasingly difficult, how then do we look to ensure the quality of our wireless networks to meet these business mission-critical demands?
That is the topic of this week's podcast as I chat with Roger Sands, CEO at Wyebot. Roger has 25 years' experience in the IT industry with the last 15 of those spent working in the Wi-Fi space, in that time he has seen a huge growth in demand and of course a massive growth in complexity and challenge of delivering Wi-Fi to our modern connectivity hungry world.
We chat about;
The trend to "mission-critical" Wi-Fi Is Wi-Fi architecture "growing up"? Wi-Fi complexity presenting new challenges Little problems cause big issues The security risk Importance of Wi-Fi intelligence to augment our IT teams The Wyebot approach Why you need Wi-Fi assurance
One of the great values of doing this show is learning about something new and this chat with Roger was a great example of that, the critical nature of Wi-Fi was not something I'd considered and in my experience is still considered a nice to have benefit rather than core infrastructure, Roger shares some great insights into why that needs to change and how to do it and I hope you found it as useful as I did.
Thanks for listening.
For show notes :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1J3
There isn’t a day goes by that our IT security isn’t under threat, been tested or questioned, it is a continual headache for organisations of all types, from ransomware to targeted attacks the issues are constant and of the highest priority to most of us.
Sadly, there is no magic button that takes away all our security woes, building IT security is difficult, multi-faceted and multi-layered. Earlier this year I read a great series of articles from a friend of mine over on Solarwinds Orangematters community site, this series looked at the importance of taking multi-layered approach to security and building a Security In-Depth Strategy, since reading those articles I thought it would make a great podcast episode.
Well, this week here it is, as I’m joined by Becky Elliott an experienced IT professional who, based in the US, has worked in some of the most secure infrastructures you will see, as well some places security was a little more “loose”. Currently Becky is working as a freelance consultant and blogger and has been creating some great IT related content, so hopefully this episode adds to that fine body of work!
In this episode we explore the series that Becky produced, the inspiration for it and her experiences of each of the topics she covered;
• Why we need Security in depth • Judging a company’s security posture by its patching! • Security still an afterthought • Importance of security buy-in • When trust but verify isn’t enough • The weakest security link might be you • The story patching tells • Logs, logs and more logs • What security layers to consider • User education • Make security the path of least resistance • Security is hard!
If you have ideas for the show or would like to be a guest you can email podcast@techstringy.com and as always thanks for listening.
For show notes and links to Becky's articles : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1IY
IT loves an acronym and a trend, but eventually many of them do start to evolve, become more accessible and businesses start to deploy them and publicise the benefits, then another and another before finally the technology starts to become more commonplace and increasingly companies want to investigate the potential benefits to them.
Roll back 7 or 8 years, Cloud found itself in that position, but today Cloud is the norm and becoming standard practice in businesses of all types.
Over the last 12 months I've started to see this increasingly with another trendy tech acronym IoT.
On this week's Tech Interviews we ask why? And try to discover what is driving the uptake in IoT projects. To help me to do this I'm joined by Mark Carlton, Solutions Architect for IoT and Edge at Arrow ECS, he joins me to share his experiences of the last 18 months, and how he's seen the IoT space evolve.
On this week's show we discuss;
What is IoT The importance of understanding business value The importance of connectivity Sensors are not the heart of IoT The components of IoT Cloud making IoT accessible Example projects What makes a good IoT project? How to get started
I really enjoyed this chat and find the world of IoT both interesting and increasingly relevant and accessible, Mark provides excellent insight and shares some great experiences.
Next time we look at building a security-in-depth strategy, to make sure you catch that episode you can subscribe to the show wherever you get your podcasts.
If you have an idea for the show or would like to be a guest then email podcast@techstringy.com
Until next time, thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1IH
Whenever I speak with those tasked with deploying enterprise technology one of the most common challenges I find they have is finding a way to compare what they are doing with others in similar roles.
How do you best find and deploy new technology? How do you encourage open dialogue in your business to identify needs and opportunities? How do you learn more about what technology is available? And how do you ensure you are not seen as the IT department who always says no?
These are all real challenges and finding out how others deal with them is not easy, especially when you are already very busy delivering the IT you have.
In this week's podcast, recorded at the recent NetApp INSIGHT event in Las Vegas, I wanted to explore this topic with people who actually deliver IT for a living. Donny Lang, Sr. Systems Administrator at GDC, Christopher Olsen, Solutions Architect at Los Alamos National Laboratory and Matthew Underhill from Alfred H. Knight. All three had differing challenges, but all took very similar approaches to how they tackled the daily conundrum of delivering effective IT.
In this episode we cover; * Using Cloud * The primary aim of your IT * Selling IT's capabilities * Discovering problems * Rules of "engagement" * Dealing with the "smartest people in the room" * How do you define a solution? * Don't be afraid to ask why * Trusted partners * Importance of events * Becoming data focussed
I thought this was a fantastic and frank conversation and each of the guests provided some valuable insight.
Next time we delve back into the world of IoT, if you want to catch it then subscribe to the show which is available in all good podcast stores!
If you'd like to be a guest or have an idea for a show then email podcast@techstringy.com
Thanks for listening.
Show Notes are here https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1IC
Increasingly automation is becoming a way of life in IT, tools that take repetitive or complex tasks and simplify them by automating much of the work they require are increasingly popular. They also have real value for many organisations, it frees up resources, improves the time of delivery and reduces risk of errors that often come when humans deliver repetitive tasks or ones they have to deliver quickly or under pressure.
One such tool is Veeam Availability Orchestrator (VAO) which provides the ability to automate the testing, documentation and invocation of a business recovery plan.
Last week at NetApp INSIGHT in Las Vegas, Veeam announced a new update to this product, version 3.0. As someone who has always been a fan of this tool and ones like it for managing such a complex process as DR, I thought it would make a good podcast, so I caught with Alec King a Vice President of Product Management at Veeam, to discuss the new release and also its first attempt to enhance a 3rd parties DR capability by integrating with NetApp's snapshot and SnapMirror technologies.
During my chat with Alec, we discuss.
What do we mean by availability? Why availability is more than technology The value of orchestration Documenting your DR Why automation can give DR confidence Business DR is not a technology problem it needs everyone's input NetApp integration and the value it brings Improving each other's capabilities to deliver better outcomes Why would I consider VAO?
I really like Veeam Availability Orchestrator as a product and as someone who has sat at the sharp end of a DR plan invocation a set of tools that automated much of the process and that had given me confidence in it previously would have made life a whole lot easier.
If you would like to be a guest or have topic suggestions for the show why not drop me an email to podcast@techstringy.com.
Thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Ie
A little while back I wrote a blog post inspired by a presentation by a friend of mine, Michael Cade, at Cloud Field Day 5 back in April ,where he talked about how Veeam were developing their workload and data portability strategy.
This really struck a chord with me as it closely mirrored a lot of the conversations I was having, across businesses of all types, as they looked to develop more data-centric strategies, that focussed on ensuring that their data was where they needed it when.
It appealed so much that I’ve wanted to get it into a podcast episode. This week myself and Michael finally managed to get our diaries together to do just that. For those of you who’ve not heard Michael on the show before, he’s a Global Technologist at Veeam and a well-known face in the IT community and always a great Tech Interviews guest.
On this week’s show we cover; • The portability why • Why cost isn’t the only driver of public cloud • Portability and a data-centric strategy • Portability use cases • Putting our “backup data” to work • Three Drivers of innovation • The importance of licensing in innovation • How to build a portability platform
Data portability, for me, is core to a modern data strategy ensuring that our data and how we use it is the focus of our technology plans and companies like Veeam are delivering technology that can help us to enable the kind of portability modern business demands.
If you’d like to follow up with Michael, the best way is via twitter @MichaelCade1 and you can find more on data portability, amongst other things, on his blog vzilla.co.uk.
Thanks for listening.
If you have an idea for the show or would like to appear, why not email me at podcast@techstringy.com
For full show notes: https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1I9
When it comes to keeping up with the latest IT industry trends, the good, the bad, the things to keep an eye on, how do we even begin to get started when the industry is so large and diverse?
There are, however, lots of places we can go to find different opinions and views, vendor events, blogs, briefings or even Podcasts. One other avenue open to us are analysts.
Recently major analyst firm, Gartner, published one of their Magic Quadrant reports, this one focussed on the storage industry. As always these reports reflect really well on some and not always so well for others. I was discussing this recently with a friend of mine from storage vendor NetApp, it was a really interesting chat and I thought it would make a great podcast.
So, this week, I'm joined by Greg Knieriemen, Chief Technologist at NetApp as we replay our discussion for the benefit of the Tech Interviews audience.
What analysts do Types of analysts and their differing value Changing view of analysts from skepticism to appreciation The importance of an independent voice for the enterprise Gartner's primary storage magic quadrant report The maturity of flash storage Storage isn't just about disks Why NetApp did well in the report Where they didn't Moving beyond speeds and feeds *Data focussed strategy not platform focussed
I always enjoying chatting with Greg, he has a long and varied experience in the IT sector and a great way of sharing that information. Analyst reports clearly have a place in the technology industry, although they should not be treated as the definitive source for your technology decisions, they certainly offer a lot of value and provide a good basis for those in IT to help the decision making process.
As always, thanks for listening.
full show notes are here:- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1I3
There is no question that our IT systems are critical to the operation of the modern enterprise, its ability to meet ever-changing demands and do this quickly means our IT stack continues to grow and evolve into an ever larger and more complex beast, which presents a constant challenge to Enterprise IT teams to ensure our systems continue to perform as needed, remain secure and available to deliver the outcomes our enterprises need.
When we used to have half a dozen servers, a small network and some storage, monitoring and managing these systems was relatively easy, we could have the management platform of our choice, providing our IT team with alerts and data and using their skills and experience they could quickly turn this into useful and actionable information.
However, today, when we have dozens of virtual machines, systems, complex networks that are not only in our datacentre but in multiple locations including of course the public cloud. The environments no longer generate a handful of metrics, they are generating hundreds if not thousands per day, how do we keep on top of them? pick out what is important and action it?
That is the topic of this weeks show as we explore AIOPS a term and approach that is becoming increasingly important to modern IT management with my guest Gadi Oren, VP of Technical Evangelism at LogicMonitor.
How the size and complexity of our infrastructures are creating data overload. Looking for smaller needles in bigger haystacks! The impact of alert fatigue. More complexity doesn't mean more IT resources to deal with it. The Shift in the perception of what we expect from monitoring. The development of AIOPS. How AIOPS can do our "heavy lifting". How freeing our most valuable IT resources from the mundane, benefits them and the organisation. The benefits of smarter monitoring. Development of "opinionated" systems.
I hope you enjoyed this show and as always thanks for listening.
Full show notes with links are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1HY
Teams, Zoom, Slack, Webex, the list of platforms that are now commonplace in organisations and changing the way we work together and collaborate continue to grow. These applications are not only providing a conference platform for hosting meetings but are also replacing some of our traditional communications methods such as voice, video and increasingly becoming the standard message exchange application, slowly starting to replace email as a day to day tool.
As we adopt these tools, how many of us have considered the risk these platforms pose to the security of our data? How do we track the voice and video communications that these platforms provide to ensure that we are not leaking sensitive data? Do we understand how the platform is been used, are there patterns of usage that should concern us?
These are the questions we cover on this week's podcast as I'm joined by Devin Redmond, Co-Founder and CEO of Theta Lake. Devin has a long history in data compliance, governance and security and now with Theta Lake he is taking on the difficult challenge presented by modern collaboration tools.
What is the challenge? What's wrong with current approaches? How do you spot compliance risk in voice and video? Why the speed of innovation in these modern platforms adds to the problem. The importance of context. The challenge of volume. The importance of human interaction when it comes to tackling the problem. Enabling these tools and their benefits in an effective and safe way.
This is a fascinating debate and not one I'd considered when using Teams, Slack and other collaboration tools, but Devin provides a lot of food for thought and already has me considering the usage of these platforms and how to better manage and control them.
Thanks for listening.
For full show notes and links :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1HT
The world of infrastructure is changing rapidly, the way we use and access data is driving significant change in the way we design data infrastructure to deliver at scale, with flexibility, openness and portability.
One such shift is the increasing adoption of open database technology, back in episode 88 I spoke with Patrick Callaghan of Cassandra on this topic. it was a popular episode and the use of such databases is continuing to grow.
With that in mind, I wanted to revisit the topic and take another look at what open source databases mean, what their place in the enterprise is and how to take those first steps to explore the value of open source database in your business.
To help me investigate this topic, I caught up with Peter Zaitsev founder and CEO of Percona, a company who specialises in open source databases. I chatted with Peter a couple of weeks ahead of their Percona Live event in Amsterdam, a 3 day event focussed on the open source database market and how to get the best from it.
In the show we discuss;
Why an enterprise sees open source differently from a developer. How the debate about open source is mirrored by those around public cloud adoption. How multi location environments are driving a new model for database adoption. Why not all open source DB's are as open as you think. If open source provides such flexibility, choice and cost benefits what is stopping enterprise adoption? How to overcome resistance and see if open source database can work for you. Who are Percona and how do they help people adopt open source databases? The Cloud native autonomous database initiative what is it and why the capability to deploy public cloud like flexibility anywhere is important.
I think this technology area is really interesting and its development and adoption continues to grow, Peter provides us with some great insights into Percona's approach and his own experience of adoption of open source database, as well as some of the inhibitors he sees to its adoption.
Thanks for listening.
If you have any comments, an idea for or would like to appear on the show then drop me an email to podcast@techstringy.com.
Full show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1HO
As an IT Professional, one of the things I believe is crucial is continued learning and development. Over the last few months I’ve spent more time in the world of cloud infrastructure, both public and private and have started to want to understand more how to automate much of its delivery.
This led me to the concept of Infrastructure as Code (IAC), the idea that we can deploy infrastructure in our cloud via templates, meaning that we retain a consistent repeatable deployment experience, allowing us to build infrastructure quickly and efficiently. One of the challenges in this space is how each cloud provider has its own method for deploying IAC, so what if you are using multiple cloud platforms do you need to learn a new methodology every time?
Luckily this is not the case, with an increasing set of tools from 3rd party providers which offer a single consistent deployment across multiple providers, meaning you only need to learn one set of codes and templates which can then be quickly modified to work on different environments, so we not only get speed and consistency in one cloud, but across any suitable infrastructure.
While that is all well and good, what is the real value of IAC? Do I really need the ability to deploy over multiple clouds? How do these 3rd party tools work and deliver useful outcomes?
It sounded like a great set of questions for our first post summer break Tech Interviews, so that is exactly what we are doing.
Helping me to learn more and give an introduction to the IAC space is Rosemary Wang of Hashicorp, the developers of one of the leading IAC tools, Terraform. Rosemary is a Developer Advocate and helps developers and organisations to understand how they can use IAC and the value it can bring, I caught up with Rosemary ahead of Hashicorps’s US Conference Hahsiconf which runs in Seattle from September 9th.
In this episode we discuss;
What is infrastructure and can we deploy software development practices to it? What is driving the need for IAC and is simplification the key? The key benefits for IAC. Is it only a public cloud thing? Risk v Agility, how to help the risk averse to innovate. What infrastructure can we “codify”? The importance of API’s. What is Terraform? *IAC for the more traditional “enterprise”. Why an IT decision maker should consider IAC in their enterprise.
These new cloud inspired, but not cloud exclusive, deployment methods are really interesting and Rosemary provides a great intro to the power of Infrastructure as Code and where tools like Terraform can help in a multi-location world.
Next week we revisit the topic of open source, webscale databases, to make sure you catch that show why not subscribe you’ll find us in all the usual places.
If you have an idea for the show or would like to appear as a guest, then contact me via email at podcast@techstringy.com.
Thanks for listening.
The ever changing cyber security threat landscape is high on the IT agenda for enterprises as they attempt to deal with numerous threats and attacks. One area constantly under attack and a rapidly growing risk is user identities, numerous phishing scams, key loggers and social engineering are all attempts to compromise a user's identity and their security credentials.
The risk posed by the theft of credentials and identity is significant, how then do we protect ourselves, how do we build a security stack that is capable of providing robust identity management, securing user credentials and stop us being victims of an identity-based attack?
That is what we cover on this week's podcast with my two guests, who I came across after reading some excellent blogs on the topic from my first Guest Amy Stokes Waters who is joined by her colleague Shelley Hill, who both work for identity security company, Identity Experts and provide some brilliant insights into this complex area.
In this week's show we cover; * What makes up our identity * Why identities are more than technology * The part automation and intelligence play * Why we need multi-factor not just in the enterprise but also in our consumer technologies * Balancing security and productivity * How to start building your security platform.
Amy and Shelley offer lots of great tips, enjoy the show.
Tech Interviews is on its summer holidays for a few weeks, but if you have an idea for the show email podcast@techstringy.com
Enjoy the summer and thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here: https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Ho
As more of us move infrastructure to the cloud we come up against an age old IT problem, how do we know if we are getting the best from our cloud investment, we have deployed it following best practice, we have optimised its performance and increasingly have we secured our infrastructure in the way we need too?
These queries are not new to cloud infrastructure, these are challenges we have whenever and wherever we deploy infrastructure and applications. However, one thing that cloud does allow us to do is to look at an extremely wide body of evidence, literally 1000’s of deployments of applications to determine their optimal configuration for performance and security.
How do we get that kind of information and how do we use the metrics available to us to make sure we are following the best practice when utilising cloud services and infrastructure? Today we are starting to see a range of companies developing platforms to aggregate together this information and provide actionable insights that we can all use, one such company who are excelling in this space is Sumo Logic and this week I’m joined by Christian Beedgen, their Co-Founder and CTO as we discuss how to baseline cloud infrastructure.
We discuss; * Differing attitudes to cloud adoption * Datacentre as an API * The dangers on an anti-cloud stance * How to compare our infrastructure to others * The problem of the information firehose * Sumo Logic and AWS GuardDuty * The future on intelligent monitoring
Sumo Logic is on an interesting journey and it will be fascinating to see how they further develop their model of providing insight to their customers allowing them to get the best from infrastructure deployments ensuring they are efficient, effective and secure.
Thanks for listening.
For full show notes :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1H7
Earlier this year I got the chance to chat with Cumulus Networks as part of a series of articles I was working on with my friends at Gestalt IT. It was an interesting piece of research focussed on an area that was new to me, the idea of open networking, using a software driven approach to deliver infrastructure with the scale and flexibility that is required to meet the demands of many modern businesses.
Cumulus introduce this idea as part of their Infrastructure with Purpose strategy an approach that tries to change the way we think about delivering infrastructure, since writing those articles I’ve been keen to have them on the show to introduce the concept to the Tech Interviews audience. This week, I get that chance as I’m joined by Cumulus’s Pete Lumbis to explore the idea of Infrastructure with Purpose, Pete is Senior Technical Marketing Manager at Cumulus, but don’t be put off, he’s a networking techie at heart maintaining his CCDE as well as having a long history In the networking field.
During the show we discuss;
• The Cumulus approach and keeping everyone “honest” • Why Infrastructure matters and why we need purpose • The flexibility of a software driven approach • Choosing infrastructure based on real value • The power of Linux for Cumulus • De-risking our infrastructure
Infrastructure with Purpose is a really interesting strategy and one that stretches beyond networking. Enjoy the episode and thanks for listening.
If you’d have a question or would like to be a Tech Interviews guest contact podcast@techstringy.com
Full show notes :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1GY
Back in February, I saw a presentation from Hammerspace, a startup company in the field of data management. Their proposition was based on dealing with one of IT’s most challenging problems, that of successfully sharing data across multiple locations, be that datacentres, branch offices or cloud repositories.
What appealed to me with their approach was how they not only thought of a new way of addressing the problem but also redefined how the problem should be looked at.
On this week’s show, I’m joined by Hammerspace’s CEO, David Flynn, to explore their approach in more detail and get an update on how their solution has developed. David has a long and distinguished background in IT including been behind Fusion IO.
During the show we discuss: * The importance of a datacentric view to solving the problem * How containers show the way to solving complex data management problems * How metadata drives their solution * How it works * Don't solve the data silo problem with another data silo!
There are a couple of really interesting things about what Hammerspace is doing, both their technological approach and importantly their efforts to shift thinking to one that takes a more data focussed view. Will their technology be the right solution for everyone? Probably not, but their idea that your decisions around your data platform need to be datacentric and based on stated goals for the data, that really should be the case for everyone. It will be interesting to see how Hammerspace continues to evolve and progress.
Thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here: https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1GS
One of the biggest challenges that IT Pro’s face is trying to evaluate new technology and select the right solution for you.
One of the tools available is the use of Proof of Concepts (POC), a POC is a short project to evaluate the suitability of potential solutions. POC’s can, when done properly, be a valuable tool in our assessment of potential solutions. But POC’s are not always a success, why is that the case? The main issue tends to be a fundamental misunderstanding of what a POC is, often this can be caused by the suppliers misusing the phrase POC when really they are delivering no more than a demonstration.
A few weeks back I heard an episode of the excellent Virtually Speaking Podcast in which they discussed performance testing a significant part of which included a properly delivered POC.
The incorrect use of the term and poor definitions of POC’s is something I see often and find frustrating. Inspired by the Virtually Speaking Podcast team I wanted to take the opportunity to do a Tech Interviews episode on that very topic and who better to help me than the guest on that episode, VMware’s Dave Morera.
Dave is a Senior Solutions Architect and a primary part of his role is to help people to fully evaluate solutions with the use of POC’s, which makes him well placed to share some advice with Tech Interviews on how to effectively use them to help you make better technology decisions.
In this episode we discuss: * What is POC * How it differs from demo's and pilots * What makes up a POC * The importance of accurate definition of the problem , the scope and success criteria. * Building a test strategy * The importance of "owning" you POC
Dave’s experience and advice is hugely valuable, POC’s, when done well, are a great way of ensuring you can fully evaluate a solution and ensure it is right for you, Dave’s advice should help more of us deliver successful POC’s in the future.
Thanks for listening.
For full show notes:- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1GA
Back in October 2018, I attended Microsoft's Future Decoded event in London, the presentation that stayed with me the most was from Jenny Lay-Flurrie, Microsoft's Chief Accessibility Officer.
Jenny, who is herself deaf, spoke with great enthusiasm and passion about how the work Microsoft is doing with accessibility technology was changing people's lives. As a technology enthusiast, I love to see how technology impacts the world around us, however, nothing is more inspirational than seeing how technology can literally change lives allowing people the opportunity to achieve their potential by enabling them to do something that previously they couldn't.
It's been a subject I've wanted to explore on the podcast ever since and this week I finally got the chance as I'm joined by Arran Smith, an accessibility consultant, to discuss how and why we need to make accessibility a core part of our technology strategy.
Arran himself suffers from Dyslexia and discusses how rather than hold him back it has been his inspiration to develop his own successful career. We discuss how technology plays its part in levelling the playing field for people with disabilities and how it can allow people to properly fulfil their potential.
We also discuss: * Why accessibility shouldn't be only something "we have too" do * While an impairment may affect a person it is often compensated by a strength elsewhere * How Cloud is making access to accessibility technology easier * How to build an accessibility strategy
This topic if one of the most inspiring I've had the pleasure to cover on this show and Arran provides some fantastic insights into the benefits of embracing accessibility rather than seeing it as a chore and shares his knowledge with real passion and enthusiasm.
Full show notes: https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Gu
The Tech Conference is always an interesting source of information, a chance to learn about anything from strategy to technical details. I'm lucky enough to attend quite a few events throughout the year but one that I've never attended is Dell Technologies World. Dell with their wide portfolio, including VMware, can potentially impact and influence organisations of all types, with that in mind, Dell Technologies World is becoming an increasingly interesting event as their wide portfolio has the ability to meet many of our modern technology demands.
On this week's show, we take a look at the main announcements from the Vegas event, what they mean for those buying enterprise IT and for Dell themselves. To help me pick through the event I'm joined by industry analyst and the host of the excellent Storage Unpacked podcast, Chris Evans.
During this show we cover; * Who the event is aimed at * Dell Storage and data protection * Dell's cloud strategy including VMware Cloud on Azure * Edge to Core to Cloud
Chris as always gives fantastic insight into the event, with some interesting takes on what Dell covered as well as asking some interesting questions about Dell’s direction.
Thanks for listening.
For full show notes:- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Go
Security and compliance of systems is right at the top of the priority list for almost all organisations and as our data and the systems that hold it are ever more critical, the impact of the loss of these systems or the data that resides upon them is significant. As our systems become more complex and diversely spread managing and reducing their vulnerabilities is a real challenge.
On this week's show we discuss how we take a modern approach to security, governance and vulnerability control with my guest Marco Rottigni, Chief Technical Security Officer, EMEA at Qualys.
Our topics include; * Understanding transformation maturity * The shift of assessment to management * The value of a single source of information * Why we need a new approach * The criticality of visibility * Transparent automation
Marco shares some fascinating thoughts on this topic bringing an interesting and fresh perspective.
If you'd like to contact the show email podcast@techstringy.com
Until next time, thanks for listening.
For full show notes: https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1G5
Your modern infrastructure is highly unlikely to be built on a single platform, in fact not only unlikely to be on a single platform but unlikely to be built in a single location, as increasingly we are developing hybrid infrastructure that can be spread across datacentres, remote locations and of course the public cloud. While this adds complexity to our technology stack, it also adds opportunities when technology vendors work together to bring value to each other’s offerings, improving end-user experience and business outcomes.
That is the focus of this week’s show, recorded on the road at Arrow ECS as we discuss how NetApp HCI and Veeam integrate to work better together and what this means for modern infrastructure in our hybrid world.
I’m joined by a team of people to discuss this week’s topic Alun Griffiths and Paul Stillitano from Arrow ECS, Kev Ridings from Veeam and Jason Fitzgerald, Technical Consultant from Gardner Systems, all with their own take on the changing infrastructure space and how it impacts the way we deliver our technology.
In this week's show we discuss; * What is HCI and how do we make it more than just a small form factor Consistent and repeatable deployment How Integrating Veeam which HCI brings real value Understanding our "dark data" Why Simplicity is crucial *NetApp and Hybrid Cloud Infrastructure
The team provide some great insights and I hope you found it as useful as I did.
Thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here:- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1G0
The technology world is constantly evolving, what we do with Tech, what it does for us, how we can use it to do things differently and more quickly, innovation is core to the technology industry. One of the fastest moving areas of innovation right now is the development of voice as a way for us to interact with our data and technology platforms, opening new ways for us to perform a wide variety of tasks, from asking your voice assistant to add to the shopping list to making technology accessible in a way its not been before, voice is an exciting, fast moving and fast-growing part of the tech industry.
But how is voice going to change the way we operate as enterprises? Is voice starting to move from the consumer world to the business one? That's the subject of this week's Tech Interviews, as I'm joined by two guests, Geraint John and Will Bradley from Move Digital and importantly for this show, the hosts of the fantastic Voice for Voice podcast.
In this week's episode, we explore the growing world of voice and how it has the potential to be the biggest technology shift since the Internet revolutionised how we use technology in our everyday lives.
We cover: What is Voice and why we need to take it seriously How voice is a more intuitive way for us to interact with technology How voice may be the platform of choice for the next wave of innovation How voice is moving from consumer to enterprise *What does the future look like?
Geraint and Will provide a great introduction into the world of voice and its potential to revolutionise how we use technology and some of the work that they are doing with their customers in this fascinating space.
Enjoy the show and thanks for listening
Full show notes here: https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Fy
In the final part of our series on architecting for Public Cloud we take a slightly different tact to the previous parts which focussed on Cloud as a more primary goal. In this episode, we focus more on the tactical use of Cloud, when the wholesale move to Cloud isn’t the aim but more how we can use it in specific parts of our organisation to deliver better outcomes, improve our technology or serve our customers better.
To do that I’m joined by NetApp Cloud Architect, Phoebe Goh. Phoebe is our first Australian guest and brings an interesting perspective to the show and provides the perfect way to wrap up our brief series, by bringing together themes from our last two shows as well as her own fresh ideas.
In this episode we discuss: The role of the Cloud Architect How Cloud is not just about Tech How non-Cloud companies are using Cloud to deliver outcomes How NetApp are using Cloud in their business and technology How Public Cloud in coming into the Datacentre How simplification is key in Cloud adoption
Phoebe is a great guest with a range of fascinating insights into how Cloud can be a major part of the modern business.
Next time we explore the world of Voice and how it’s revolutionising the way we interact with Technology, to make sure you don’t miss it then remember to subscribe to Tech Interviews.
Full show notes are here: https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Fm
Cybersecurity is at the top of the list of priorities for organisations of all types, as our systems and data become ever more critical to how we operate on a daily basis, the risk posed by security threats, such as malware, data leakage and targeted attacks continues to grow and be even more complex.
The challenge in improving our security posture and ensuring we limit the vulnerabilities of our IT systems is a big one and not solved easily by one technology solution or the pressing of the big red security button. It is complex and like all complex problems often the hardest step in addressing it is knowing where to start? Like most challenges in IT, the starting point is to understand where you are right now, what systems you have and where they are vulnerable.
That is the focus of this week’s podcast as we discuss penetration testing. Pen tests are designed to identify your system vulnerabilities and help to mitigate the risks they pose to your organisation. To help me explore this topic I’m joined by Phil Graham, Phil is a Director at security specialists Secora Consulting and has spent the last 8 years developing his pen testing skills.
In this week's show we discuss; What is a pen test What scope does a test have The Business impact of vulnerabilities Why pen test? Pen tests are not just for external testing Tips on getting a pen test and how to remediate your vulnerabilities
Phil shares some great info and I certainly learned a lot and I'm sure you will too.
Thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here: https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1F4
The adoption of public cloud continues to grow and remains high on the list of priorities of those tasked with delivering technology solutions to their business, be you someone making strategic decisions or the IT pro tasked with delivery of services, the move to public cloud brings with it a whole set of new challenges.
How do I design my cloud infrastructure? How do I integrate it with what I have? How do I get my crucial on-prem assets into the public cloud? Are just some of the questions we ask and need answers to so we can ensure we successfully take advantage of public cloud to deliver better services and outcomes to our organisations, how then do we find those answers and how should we approach our cloud transition?
Over the next three Tech Interviews episodes, in conversation with Cloud Architects and transition specialists we are going to explore just that. In this first episode we look at Cloud transition, as I’m joined by Eric Kraieski, Vice President of the Software Business Unit at Transitional Data Services (TDS), Eric has 10 years of experience in the area of Cloud transition making him a great guest to kick off this series of shows.
During this show we discuss; * The challenges of transition to cloud * The importance of aligning your project with business goals * The impact of not properly planning * Tips on avoiding common mistakes * Advice on building a successful migration strategy
Eric provides some fantastic insight and gets our short series off to a great start. Next time we'll be looking at the world of Microsoft Azure.
Until then, thanks for listening.
Full Show Notes : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1E6
As the importance of our data continues to grow, so does our need to scale its use, be it for performance, resilience or reasons of data locality, the need to architect solutions and find technologies to support this demand for data at scale is increasingly important.
If we look at the way cloud giants use their data, it's clear that "traditional" database methods are not going to be suitable and of course it's not just "cloud giants" who need their data at scale, today, enterprises of all types need to be able to present their data with the same scale, flexibility and resilience.
One widely adopted way of doing this is using Apache Cassandra as a database technology. But why? and how does Cassandra differ from our traditional on-prem solutions such as SQL and Oracle?
That is the topic of this week's Tech Interviews as Patrick Callaghan, Solutions Architect at Datastax joins me to provide an intro to Cassandra as a database technology, how it works and why it's becoming the database of choice in the modern webscale world.
In this episode we discuss; *Cassandra's beginning at Facebook * Why you may need a scalable, distributed database * What challenges does it bring * Why automation at your busiest times is perhaps not the answer * Webscale database use cases * Where Datastax can help
Patrick is a great guest and provided a fantastic intro to the world of Cassandra and what it can mean for the way we handle data in this distributed, webscale world.
Next week we start a brief series talking with Cloud Architects and Migration specialists about making a success of Public Cloud Projects, too make sure you catch that show then please subscribe in all of the usual podcast places and until next time, Thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here: https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1DZ
The ever-evolving cyber threat and how to protect ourselves against It continues to be at the top of the list of priorities for most IT Pros and execs. As technology and our data is more crucial than ever to our day to day operations, the threat of disruption to it and the impact that will have grows almost exponentially.
As we head into February of 2019, what is the current state of the threat? How is it evolving? And how do we build a plan to handle it? That is the topic of this week's Tech Interviews, as I'm joined by Co-Founder and CPO of Infocyte Inc. Chris Gerritz to discuss the art of Cyber Threat Hunting and taking a more proactive approach to the cybersecurity challenge.
In this chat with Chris, we take a look at what we mean by cyber threat hunting, the importance of a proactive approach to cyber threats and why we should "assume breach" when we build our cybersecurity defences.
We also discuss current threats, emerging trends from commodity malware to identity theft, as well as avoiding been the "weakest Gazelle in the pack".
Chris shares some insights into developing a cyber threat hunting strategy and how to build a secure environment, as well as providing some background on Infocyte's approach to the challenge
If you enjoyed the show, then please leave us a review and why not subscribe to ensure you get the latest Tech Interviews episode.
Thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here : https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1DS
On Tuesday of this week (January 22nd, 2019) Veeam made a series of announcements around their technology stack, these announcements showed, in my opinion, the first elements of them really starting to deliver the technology to underpin their intelligent data management strategy that they first shared back in 2017.
In this extra edition of Tech Interviews, I wanted to explore some of the key parts of these announcements and why I believe they are an important step in starting to shift Veeam from a backup company to one that can start to play a part in the orchestration and management of data within the modern enterprise.
Michael Cade, Global Technologists at Veeam joins me to discuss the announcements and provide insight into what's driven some of the strategic shifts, as well as providing some detail into the technology updates that are underpinning these changes.
During the show we discuss, Cloud storage integration, the expansion of Veeam's workload portability capability and finish up looking at some key updates to Data Labs and how it helps guarantee the consistency of your data and apps wherever and whenever you need them.
I hope you enjoyed this additional show, as I thought it would be useful to provide some context to these announcements.
Thanks for listening.
Show notes are here : https://bit.ly/2HtmZCw
Social media, it’s a phrase that we constantly hear, the use of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat etc. are commonplace, but does social media have a place in our day to day professional lives?
Social media has great value, not just in terms of developing relationships, but also in how we are perceived, both as individuals and as businesses, regardless of whether your business is a technology one. How many of us, before we buy a product or service, visit a website or Facebook page before buying? Or take to Twitter for support on a product or service? And of course, how many of us, when making a new contact head off to LinkedIn to check them out?
Social media tools are a core component of 21st-century communications, so the question is, why do so many IT pro’s and IT execs not take the time to invest in social media?
On this week’s show, I’m joined by one of the people, that thanks to social media, I’ve gotten to know over the last few years, Richard Bliss.
Richard is a social media strategist and works with senior execs in global businesses and helps them to develop their online profile so they can better promote themselves, their businesses and engage better with a wider audience.
In a fascinating chat, we cover a wide range of topics, including; * Defining what we mean by social media * Common Myths * The impact of 21st Century Communications tools and the perception not using them creates *The modern buyer's journey.
Richard finished by providing some great tips on developing your Linkedin profile, as well as a discussion on his endless board game collection!
Richard provides some valuable insights that will help anyone trying to improve their digital presence.
Full show notes are here : https://bit.ly/2SW27VM
Welcome to the first Tech Interviews Podcast of 2019, we already have a bunch of shows lined up and ready to go over the next few weeks, there’s a wide range of topics including Social Media and the IT Pro, Cloud Native Databases and Cyber Threat Hunting, all coming up soon.
But how else do you start a new podcast year than by dusting off the crystal ball and looking ahead to some of the trends and developments that will affect your IT decision making, strategies and day to day work in tech.
Our look ahead this year is focused on the world of data management as I’m joined by Dave Russell, VP, Enterprise Strategy at Veeam. Dave’s career of almost 30 years has been predominately focussed on data management, specifically backup and has included working at some of the world’s biggest data management companies as well as a stint as a respected analyst at Gartner.
We discuss a wide range of topics and Dave gives some thoughtful insight into the trends he expects to see impact us during 2019.
During the show, we discuss, what keeps him so enthusiastic about the data industry, key trends including the increased use of multi-cloud, flash storage becoming more commonplace, the development of predictive analytics, the changing role of people in technology as well as some trends that are likely to continue in 2018 and may well inhibit our ability to adopt some of the technology we'd like.
It's a fascinating chat, enjoy the show.
For full show notes: https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1CJ
It's that most wonderful time of the year, yes, the last Tech Interviews of 2018. For this show, we focus on two of technologies biggest trends, ultra-high performance and the world of artificial intelligence and machine learning.
First, we look at ultra-high performance as I chat with Glenn Dekhayser, Field CTO at Red8, about NetApp's new technology MAX Data and how it is changing the very nature of delivering extreme performance.
Glenn provides some insight into what MAX Data is and how it drives the storage industry close to its ultimate goal, to ensure that storage performance is never the bottleneck of any solution. We also discuss not only how this solution delivers extreme performance but how it does so while greatly simplifying your infrastructure.
In the second part of the show, it's the technology industries favourite topics, artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML). John Woodall, VP of engineering at Integrated Archive Systems (IAS) joins me to talk about the industry in general and how NetApp is the latest tech provider, in association with NVIDIA, to offer businesses the chance to buy an "off the shelf" AI solution.
We talk about how the technology industry is finally starting to deliver something that technologists and scientists have spoken about for decades, the ability to build true AI and make it available in our daily lives. Beyond this NetApp solution (known as ONTAP AI) we look at the wider use of AI and ML. John shares some thoughts on why business is looking at these technologies and what it can deliver, but he also cautions on the importance of understanding the questions you want this kind of technology to answer before you get started.
This is the last show of 2018, so I would just like to thank you all for listening to Tech Interviews throughout the year and I hope you'll be able to join me for more shows in 2019.
That leaves me to just wish you all a great Christmas holiday and until next year, thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here:- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Cy
If you spend any time listening to vendors in the technology market, you won't go very far before you hear about how they are embracing automation, ensuring their API's are there for all to use and sharing their expertise in community repositories like GitHub.
But what does it all really mean? What is automation good for and what can it help you achieve? Does it offer more than just a way to simplify repetitive tasks? These are all questions I've had for a while and on this week's podcast I catch up with Jason Benedicic, an independent consultant, who amongst other things, specialises in automation, to help answer some of these basic questions about automation and why it's useful.
In this week's show Jason provides some great insights into the world of automation, we discuss what we mean by automation, what makes a good candidate and why it's more than just coding repetitive tasks.
Jason shares some thoughts on why automation is about more than innovation and how it can be a key part in managing and securing your infrastructure.
We finish up with some tips on how to identify a good candidate and how to get started in the world of automation.
Jason provides some great insights, I hope you enjoy it and it helps you start your automation journey.
Thanks for listening.
Full Show Notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Cl
The data industry is a really interesting place right now, for many organisations their data and the challenges of how they use it, secure it and derive value from it is right at the top of the CIO’s priority list.
However, data is not the only area of the technology industry that is interesting, automation, AI, machine learning, IoT and of course the fascinating world of the hyperscalers.
So, when you are an experienced technologist, well known in the industry and you are presented with a range of new opportunities, what is it that attracts you back to work in the data industry?
That’s the question I put to this week’s guest, experienced tech industry “veteran” Greg Knieriemen. Greg has just left a highly successful stint at Hitachi and was presented with a range of interesting opportunities; however, it was one of those established storage vendors, NetApp that appealed the most to him, but why? What could the data industry continue to offer someone with an already wide experience of it?
During this show, I chat with Greg about why NetApp? Why they are no longer just a storage company.
We discuss the evolution of multi-cloud and how it is becoming the new reality for many organisations.
We finish up looking at what is exciting Greg in his new role and why you should never believe a technology evangelist!
I really enjoyed meeting up with Greg at NetApp Insight and certainly enjoyed our chat here and Greg’s take on the industry, I hope you enjoy listening.
Full show notes :- https://bit.ly/2KgWSwj
As we adopt an ever-increasing amount of cloud services into our businesses, are we part of a technology revolution or is it just the next evolutionary step in the way we do things? There is no doubt that cloud has revolutionized some businesses and that some would not exist without the incredible amount of services and innovation that the public cloud, in particular, can offer to us.
However, that's not the case for everyone, for those whose businesses pre-date "The Cloud", we have legacy systems, "traditional" approaches to doing things and systems that are not architected like cloud applications.
So, what does that mean to us as we adopt cloud services? Especially when it comes to those "boring" topics such as data protection of our cloud integrated systems?
That's the topic I explore with this week's guest "Mr Backup" also known as W. Curtis Preston, Curtis is Chief Technical Architect at Druva and has worked in the data protection space for 25 years.
In this show we discuss the evolution of hosting our data, from datacentres to the cloud. We discuss the challenges of protecting cloud native apps and how Druva are tackling this problem.
We also take a look at how the continued move to the cloud will break our traditional data protection approaches and we finish up with a conversation about VMware cloud on AWS and its impact.
Curtis shares some great information.
Enjoy the show.
Full show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Bz
Cloud is not new, I don’t think that’s news to anyone, many of us have deployed a cloud solution as cloud continues to play a major part in IT strategy for an ever-increasing amount of businesses.
However, this move to cloud has not come without us learning an awful lot on the way, we’ve probably all heard of cloud deployments that have not gone as we expected. Many of the issues that have led to those poor cloud experiences have been driven by an "immaturity" to our approach.
Is our approach to cloud beginning to change? have we got, or do we need to consider our cloud strategy a little differently?
That’s the question we ask on this weeks podcast, an episode inspired by a fantastic article written by my guest Matt Watts, Director of Technology and Strategy, EMEA at NetApp, In the article Matt posed the question Are you Cloud First! or Cloud First? And the difference a simple bit of punctuation can make.
During the show we discuss the article in depth, why Matt felt the need to write it, we look at mistakes people have made in their initial forays into Cloud.
We also look at the problems that come with taking our on-prem infrastructure and "dumping" it in the cloud. We also take a look at why cloud isn't about saving money.
We wrap up looking at examples of building a more mature cloud strategy and how this has worked well, Matt shares some examples of how NetApp’s own cloud maturity has driven their own internal decision making.
Matt, as always, shares some fascinating insight into cloud strategy.
Enjoy the show.
For full show notes :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1Bc
We’re at that time of year when the tech conference season, after a bit of a summer break, swings back into full gear, some we’ve already had, such as MSIgnite and some we have to come, over the next couple of months there’s a range of shows big and small dotted across the globe on a range of topics.
One of the biggest and still one of the most influential tech shows of the year is VMworld, VMware’s showcase event, a long time cornerstone of the technology community for IT pro’s and vendors alike.
VMworld attracts IT Pro’s and vendors from many disciplines’ server and storage vendors, through to automation and analytics companies all working closely with VMware’s platforms to deliver services across enterprise and organisations of all types.
What can you expect to learn from a show like VMware? What’s the benefit for you? Well as we sit handily between VMworld US and Europe, I thought it would be a useful to explore VMworld a little more.
Joining me to discuss this, is the co-host of the fantastic Virtually Speaking podcast Pete Flecha, a veteran of a number of VMworld’s as customer, partner and now as employee, he’s in a great position to provide some background to the show, how it’s changed and some of the key announcements from Vegas and what to look out for in Barcelona.
We discuss what exactly is VMworld, its size, the community it attracts and why it's a show about much more than virtualisation.
We hear Pete's favourite announcements from the show including the intriguing "Project Dimension" and finish up looking ahead to Barcelona and discussing why, if you've never attended VMworld, you may want to get it on your calendar for next year.
Enjoy the show.
Click here for full show notes:- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1B4
In the last couple of weeks the world has shown us how the only predictable thing for many of us who deliver technology is the unpredictability of what we have to deal with, from the massive data breach at British Airways to the catastrophic impacts of hurricanes on both the western and eastern sides of the globe, these are incidents that we should to be prepared for, the question is, are we?
If you don’t have a plan, or not sure if your plan has value? Then this episode of the podcast is for you as we look at business continuity planning, with my guest continuity planning consultant Steve Lambert of Biscon Planning.
I chat with Steve on a range of topics, why do we need a plan at all? And how continuity planning goes beyond IT. We discuss the types of incidents you need to plan for and compare the differences between operational and enterprise risks.
Steve takes us through some of the steps you need to consider when building a plan, from understanding risk appetite, to impact assessment. We also look at the importance of testing plans and crucially how it’s not only your plans, but those of your suppliers.
The importance of incident planning cannot be underestimated, and Steve provides some great tips on how to build and test your plans.
Enjoy the show.
Full show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1AR
In the last of this series looking at the shift to public cloud we discuss getting the best from your cloud and the value of understanding the behaviour of your cloud infrastructure.
On this show I’m joined by Sumo Logic’s Colin Fernandez as we look at public cloud, the value of what it delivers and how an understanding of its performance is crucial to not only help achieve desired outcomes, but to do so while meeting those ever-critical security and governance requirements.
Colin is a self-proclaimed IT veteran with 32 years’ experience in the industry, starting out at ICL and arriving at Sumo Logic via the likes of IBM and VMware and that longevity in the industry puts Colin in a great position to comment on what he sees in today's market and how cloud has and is disrupting our use of technology.
As always, cloud means we discuss a wide range of topics as we chat about new platform paradigms such as serverless and containers, we discuss the impact cloud has on security and compliance and why security has to be a major part of the cloud design cycle.
We wrap up with a chat about Sumo Logic’s platform and how their data and analytics engine is helping their customers to achieve their desired business outcomes.
Enjoy the show.
Full show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1AM
This show was recorded pre the announcement on August 27th, 2018 of CloudHealth Technologies acquisition by VMware.
This is the 3rd in our series looking at the move to public cloud, the challenges involved and some of the tips and technologies that can help you to overcome them. In this episode we look at perhaps the biggest challenge facing most organisations moving to public cloud, the issues of multi-cloud.
To discuss this I'm joined by Joe Kinsella CTO and Founder of CloudHealth Tech, a company that have built a platform to pull together information from numerous environments, consolidate it into one place and allow you to make informed, proactive decisions to ensure you use your technology in the best way you can.
During the episode we explore some wide-ranging topics, we look at why complexity is an issue, how multi-cloud was initially "stumbled upon" but is now becoming a chosen strategy. We ask why don't we expect cloud to be complex when much of what we do in our datacentres is very complicated? Joe also confesses that 3-4 years ago he was predicting the death of the on-prem DC and why he has revaluated that with hybrid becoming the deployment reality.
We wrap up discussing the CloudHealth Tech platform, what it does and how it helps to manage a multi-cloud environment by pulling together clouds, on-prem and automation platforms, connecting all the information to provide the business insights needed for proactive decision making. Finally, we look at the maturity of cloud management and how it needs to move beyond cost control and embrace security and governance as the evolution of multi-cloud management.
Joe gives some great insight and CloudHealth Technologies deliver a very powerful platform, so powerful that VMware saw fit to acquire them.
Enjoy the show.
For show notes visit :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1AH
As the desire to integrate public cloud into our organisations IT continues to grow, the need to ensure we maintain control and security of our key assets is a challenge but one that we need to overcome if we are going to use cloud as a fundamental part of our future IT infrastructure.
The importance of security and reducing our vulnerabilities is not, of course, unique to using public cloud, it's a key part of any organisations IT and data strategy. However, the move to public cloud does introduce some different challenges with many of our services and data now sitting well outside the protective walls of our datacentre. This means that if our risks and vulnerabilities go unidentified and unmanaged it can open us up to the potential of major and wide-reaching security breaches.
This weeks Tech Interviews is the second in our series looking at what organisations need to consider as they make the move to public cloud. In this episode we focus on risk, how to assess it, gain visibility into our systems regardless of location and how to mitigate the risks that our modern infrastructure may come across.
To help discuss the topic of risk management in the cloud, I'm joined by Darron Gibbard. Darron is the Managing Director for EMEA North and Chief Technology Security Officer for Qualys with 25 years' experience in the enterprise security, risk and compliance industry, he is well placed too discuss the challenges of public cloud.
We discuss the vulnerabilities that a move to cloud can create, the importance of visibility and how cloud, when managed correctly, is no riskier than any other part of our enterprise IT.
We also get some tips from Darron on building a risk based approach to cloud, Qualys's 5 principles of security and transparent orchestration.
Darron provides some great information on managing risk in the public cloud.
Enjoy the show.
Full show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1At
The move to public cloud is nothing new, many companies have moved or attempted to move key workloads into the big hyperscale providers, AWS, Azure, Google and IBM, but for some it has been a mixed success.
We have probably all heard of cloud projects (or maybe even had projects) that have not gone to plan, this can be for a range of reasons, cost, technical difficulties, performance. There is a long list of reasons that cloud projects don’t go the way that’s expected. But at the heart of many of those projects is the presumption that cloud is both cheap and easy. It comes as quite the shock we we discover it isn’t!
However, things may be about to change as a new wave of technology companies are emerging that are starting to address, what is, the highly complex world of public cloud platforms.
This week is the first in a few shows where we look at the complexity of using public cloud and chat with some of the technology companies who trying to address some of these challenges by taking fresh approaches to the problem and aiming to make the cloud experience better, both technically and commercially.
In this first show I’m joined by Andrew Hillier, co-founder and CTO of Densify. Densify have taken a fascinating approach to the problem, built on Andrews long and strong analytics background.
Densify uses a robust analytics platform to build a full understanding of the workloads that have moved to the cloud, develop a performance profile then automatically modify those applications to fully take advantage of the cloud platform they are running on, ensuring they are optimised for the right services and right commercial cost models.
If that sounds interesting then dive in as we discuss a wide range of topics including why public cloud is complicated, why it should never be about the money alone, the limitations of first generation approaches to optimisation and how one of the biggest reasons cloud project fails Is people buy the wrong cloud stuff!
Andrew provides some valuable insights and shares what is a pretty smart approach to the problem.
For full show notes :-
A couple of times a year I like to do a show that reviews the current state of the data market, the chance to take a check on the challenges facing both the makers and consumers of data technology, how they are been addressed, the technology changes and trends that decisions makers should consider and what the future holds for the industry.
Earlier this year I spoke with industry analyst Chris Evans to look ahead to 2018. For this half year review, I was very fortunate to get some time with renowned industry analyst Howard Marks.
With over 30 years’ experience as a consultant and writer on the storage industry he is very well placed to comment on the current state of the market and its direction.
In this episode we discuss rate of change V amount of change, the impact of cloud and how SaaS is impacting traditional roles.
We talk about the future of the storage admin and been in charge of data paranoia!
We look ahead at the challenges of data management and storage class memory and the impact of producers and consumers of technology.
Howard shares some fantastic insights and left me with a lot of food for thought. I am sure he will you too.
Thanks for listening.
for full show notes :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1zZ
Compliance of data continues to trouble many business execs, whether IT focused or not, it is high on the agenda for most organisations.
A few weeks ago I wrote an article called, Building a modern data platform "prevention" focused on how Microsoft Office365 could aide an organisation in preventing the loss of data using some excellent, if not well known tools, inside Office365.
This got me to thinking, what else do Microsoft have in their portfolio that people don't know about?
This episode of the podcast explores that exact topic, this is a show I've wanted to do for a while and finally have found the right person to help explore Microsoft's approach and what tools are quickly and easily available to help us deliver robust compliance.
To help me i'm joined by Stefanie Jacobs, a Technology Solutions Professional at Microsoft, with 18 years' experience in compliance. Stefanie shares with fantastic enthusiasm the importance of compliance, Microsoft's approach and how their technology is enabling organisations to make compliance a key part of their business strategy.
In this episode we explore all the compliance areas you'd ever want, including the dreaded "fear of the delete button".
Stefanie is a great guest, with a real enthusiasm for compliance and how Microsoft can help you deliver your strategy.
So settle back and enjoy the show.
Full show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1zU
I recently attended a fascinating event with the British Interactive Media Association (BIMA) and Microsoft. BIMA exist to drive innovation and excellence across the digital industry. One of the ways they do this is via community events and forum to help give their industry leaders an opportunity to share ideas with their peers.
One of the other things communities like BIMA do well is engage with influential organisations who are shaping the way industries develop and BIMA have recently run a series of roadshows with Microsoft. So, when I was invited to the recent event in Liverpool, I was fascinated to understand what Microsoft were doing in the digital agency space and how their technology was shaping the way digitally focussed organisations are innovating and bringing new solutions to market.
What I found however was the technology Microsoft discussed was the same as that they where sharing with all other types of businesses. Why was this message the same? While we may assume “digital” companies are ones focussed on marketing and media creation, but the reality is most organisations are rapidly becoming digital businesses and starting to transform our organisations with technologies that only a few years ago were unavailable to most.
The event covered some fascinating topics and on this weeks podcast we share some of that with you. To help me to do that I am joined by one of the organisers of the BIMA event, Andy Kent CEO of Angel Solutions and the chair of BIMA Liverpool.
In this week show we take a look at BIMA and the work they do and the importance of community.
We discuss how Microsoft have become technology "cool kids" and how a shift in their attitude has encouraged people to try more Microsoft solutions.
We take a look at some of Andy's show highlights and the tech he is seeing having the most transformative effect.
Finally we look at how technological advances have also advanced customer expectations as allowing them to ask brand new questions of their data.
Andy shares with great enthusiasm both the technology and the value of tech community.
Enjoy the show. You'll find full show notes here; http://techstringy.com/2018/06/27/microsoft-the-digital-transformation-cool-kids-andy-kent-ep68/
As the move to cloud continues we are starting to see a new development, with organisations no longer relying on a single cloud provider to deliver their key services, many now opting for multiple providers.
This multi-cloud environment makes perfect sense, the whole point of adopting cloud is to provide you with the flexibility to consume your data, infrastructure, applications and services from the best provider at any given time, which would be very difficult to do if we only had a single provider.
However, multi-cloud comes with a challenge, one rather well summed up at an event recently by the phrase "clouds are the new silo's".
How to avoid cloud silo's is seemingly becoming a technology "holy grail" engaging many of the world's biggest tech vendors.
Taking on this challenge is the subject of this week's podcast with my guest Lauren Malhoit of Juniper Networks and co-host of the excellent Tech Village Podcast.
We open the discussion by trying to define what multi-cloud is and how it doesn't just mean Azure and AWS, but can equally apply to multiples of your own datacenters and infrastructure.
Lauren shares her view on the importance of automation and ask, why bother? Do we really need a multi-cloud infrastructure?
We wrap up looking at the importance of being multi-vendor, multi-platform and open and how that openness cannot come with a cost of complexity and how a multi-cloud world shouldn't be seen as a threat, but as an opportunity for career growth and development.
I hope you enjoy what I thought was a fascinating conversation about an increasingly pressing challenge.
Thanks for listening.
A couple of weeks ago Veeam had their annual technical conference VeeamON at that event they shared among other things their new strategic messaging.
That message is an interesting one and their shift from "backup" company to one focused on intelligent data management across multiple repositories is, in my opinion, exactly the right move to be making.
With that in mind, I wanted to take a look at some of those messages as well as some of the other interesting announcements from the show and that is exactly what we do on this week's podcast, as I'm joined by recurring Tech Interviews guest, Michael Cade, Global Technologist at Veeam.
We start by taking a look at Veeam's last 12 months and how they've started to deliver a wider range of capabilities around more traditional enterprise platforms.
Michael shares some of the thinking behind Veeam's goal to deliver an availability platform to meet the demands of modern business data infrastructures and the importance of doing more than the ability to "back stuff up"
We discuss the development of Veeam's 5 pillars of intelligent data management, a key strategic announcement from the show. We discuss the importance of automation in our future data strategies.
We finish up by investigating the value of data labs and how crucial the ability to get more value from your backup data is becoming. Finally, we take a look at some of the things we can expect from Veeam in the upcoming months.
Enjoy the show.
Full show notes are here :-
I've spoken a bit recently about the world of Hyper Converged Infrastructure (HCI) especially as the technology continues to mature, with both improved hardware stacks and software looking to take advantage of this hardware, it is becoming an ever more compelling prospect.
How do these developments, an HCI version 2.0 if you like, manifest themselves? Recently I saw a good example in a series of blog posts and videos from friend of the show Ruairi McBride, which demonstrated really well both the practical deployment and look and feel of a modern HCI platform.
The videos focussed on NetApp's new offering and covered the out of the box experience, how to physically cable together your HCI building blocks and how to take your build from delivery to deployment in really easy steps.
With that in mind, I thought a chat with Ruairi about his experience with this particular HCI platform, how it goes together, how it is practically deployed and how it meets some of the demands of modern business would make an interesting podcast.
So here it is!
We discuss what HCI is and why it's simplicity of deployment is useful, we also look at the pro's and cons of the HCI approach.
We look at the benefit of a single vendor approach within our infrastructure and how the modern business technology landscape and desire for a more "cloud like" experience within our on-premises datacentres is driving interest in HCI.
We wrap up by looking at why as a business you'd consider HCI, what problems will it solve for you and what are the use cases that are a strong HCI fit and of course, it's important to remember that HCI isn't the answer to every question!
Ruairi shares some great info and experience - so settle back and enjoy the show.
Full show notes are here :-https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1z2
Buzzwords are a constant in IT, Cloud, HCI, Analytics, GDPR are often bandied about and serious discussions are had, however not everyone is sure what some of these buzzwords mean, what the technology consists of and importantly what positive impact does it have on an organisation?
Another contender to the buzzword Olympics is IoT or “The Internet of Things” what does that mean? What is a thing? And do I want things?
When I heard that a friend of the podcast had taken on a new role as an IoT Solutions Architect It seemed like a great opportunity to get some IoT education for not only me, but also the Tech Interviews audience.
So, on this week’s show I’m joined by Mark Carlton, now an IoT Solutions Architect at Arrow ECS and asked him to share what he’s discovered in his time in the role, how he sees IoT as a technology and how implementing it can deliver value to a business.
We start off by trying to define what we mean by IoT and how like many a new IT trend, it isn’t really that new with businesses having used sensors for many years as a way of collecting data. We explore why IoT is more than just sensors and how in reality IoT is a platform architected from sensors, gateways and importantly analytics.
We discuss the importance of focussing on business outcomes, the Why? How? And What? Of a project and not the technology.
We finish up by looking at security and compliance, both crucial elements of an IoT platform design and critical they are included right at the outset and finally Mark shares some advice on where to start and some sources of information to consider.
I hope this episode helps you better understand this emerging technology platform and how it could serve your business, I know it certainly has helped me.
Full Show Notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1yQ
GDPR has been a constant business conversation over the last 18 months or so, it's discussed in the press, on the news and social media, as well as a handful of episodes of this podcast. However, much of the conversation has focussed on what you should be considering and doing to take on the GDPR challenge, while very little has come from those who have already made great strides on their compliance journey.
With that in mind, a few weeks ago I read a fascinating series of blogs from software company Veeam, this series discussed the 5 principles they followed to build their compliance program.
As many of us are currently on our own compliance journey, I thought the opportunity to chat with someone who is already well down this path would be of real interest, so in this week's podcast I'm joined by Mike Resseler, Mike is a Director of Product Management but is also a key member of Veeam's global compliance team and has played a significant part in the way they have dealt with the challenges posed by GDPR.
In this week's show Mike shares with us Veeam's experience. We start at the beginning with the initial advice they took and research they did into what GDPR meant to them. We look at the importance of picking the right team, seeing compliance as a positive and how they dealt with those who felt GDPR didn't effect them.
We also look at the practicalities of building a compliance program as Mike shares the 5 principles Veeam developed to help them. We wrap up looking at the future, discussing continual improvement, training and the way that Veeam are making compliance integral to everything they do across their business.
I hope you enjoy the fantastic insight that Mike provides into the way a company builds a compliance programme and tackles regulation such as GDPR.
Full Show Notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1yK
Cyber Security, be it how we secure our perimeter, infrastructure, mobile devices or data, is a complex and ever-changing challenge. In the face of this complexity where do we start when it comes to building our organisations cyber security standards.
Well perhaps the answer may lie in standardised frameworks and accreditation's. If you think about it, one of the biggest challenges we have when it comes to security is knowing where to start, so having a standard to work towards makes perfect sense.
That is the subject of this weeks show with my guest and colleague Jason Fitzgerald, as we discuss the value of a UK based accreditation, Cyber Essentials.
Jason spends much of his time working with organisations to help them address their IT security concerns and one of the tools he uses extensively is a framework and accreditation produced by the National Cyber Security Centre here in the UK, Cyber Essentials.
During this episode we discuss why such a framework is valuable and can help a business improve its security posture.
We discuss, the confusion in many organisations when it comes to cyber security, the 5 key areas that Cyber Essentials covers, the importance of getting your security foundation right and some tips on where to start when it comes to building a cyber security framework.
Enjoy the show.
Full show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1yA
At the start of 2018 the technology industry was hit by two new threats unlike anything it had seen before. Spectre and Meltdown used vulnerabilities not in operating system code or poorly written applications, but ones at a much lower level than that.
This vulnerability was not only something of concern to today’s technology providers, but also to those looking at architecting the way technology will work in the future.
As we try to push technology further and have it deal with more data, more quickly than ever before. The technology industry is having to look at ways of keeping up and have our tech work in different ways beyond the limits of our current ways of working. One of these developments is storage class memory, or persistent memory, were our data can be housed and accessed at speeds many times greater than they are today.
However, this move brings new vulnerabilities in the way we operate, vulnerabilities like those exposed by Spectre and Meltdown and how did they look to exploit operational level vulnerabilities? and what does that mean for our desire to constantly push technology to use data in ever more creative and powerful ways?
That’s the topic of this week’s Tech Interviews podcast, as I’m joined by the always fascinating Alex McDonald to discuss exactly what Spectre and Meltdown are, how they Impact what we do today and how they may change the way we are developing our future technology.
Alex is part of the Standards Industry Association group at NetApp and represents them on boards such as SNIA (Storage Networking Industry Association).
In this episode we discuss * How Spectre and Meltdown work. * How this has changed with way the technology industry is approaching the future. Risk mitigation The Future and how the tech industry will get it right.
Full show notes can be found here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1yu
Recently I wrote a blog post in which I touched on the importance of availability, especially In a world were our reliance on technology is ever increasing, from the way we operate our business, to the way we live our lives and how digitally focussed businesses can no longer tolerate downtime, planned or unplanned, in the way they could even 5 years ago.
The crux of that article talked about how crucial availability is in our modern platforms. So how do we maintain availability and mitigate against the evils of downtime?
That’s simple, we build recovery and continuity plans to ensure that our system remain on, regardless of the events that go on around it, from planned maintenance to the very much unplanned disaster. But there’s the problem, these things aren’t simple are they?
With that In mind the recent product announcement from Veeam of their new Availability Orchestrator solution, caught my attention and is the topic of this weeks podcast, as serial guest Michael Cade, Global Technologist, at Veeam, joins me to provide an insight into Availability Orchestrator, what challenges it addresses, why Veeam thought it was important to develop and how it can help you deliver better availability to your critical systems.
So settle back and enjoy the show as we discuss "Availability of all of the things!"
You'll find full show notes here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1yp
As our IT systems become ever more complex, with more data, devices and ways of working, the demands on our systems and ensuring they are always operating efficiently grow. This in turn presents us and our IT teams with a whole new range of management challenges.
Systems management has always been a challenge for organisations, how do we keep on top of an ever-increasing amount of systems ? how do we ensure they remain secure and patched ? and how do we cope with our users and their multitude of devices and ensure we can effectively look after them?.
Like most of our technology, systems management is changing, but how? And what should we expect from future management solutions?
That's the subject of this weeks podcast, as I'm joined by returning guest Dave Sobel. Dave is Senior Director of Community at SolarWinds MSP.
As part of this role, Dave is also charged with looking at the future of systems management and what these platforms need to include in them to continue to be relevant and useful.
Dave provides some excellent insight into the way the management market is shifting and some of the technology trends that will change and improve the way we control our ever more complex yet crucial IT systems.
We discuss a wide range of topics including;
Why looking at the future is such an important part of the IT strategists role.
Why we need to rethink how we see a "computer" and how this is leading to a proliferation of different devices with the emergence of Internet of Things (IoT).
The part Artificial Intelligence is going to play in future systems management as we try to supplement our over stretched IT staff.
How increased automation will be crucial as part of systems management.
Finally, we look at the move to human centric rather than device centric management.
We wrap up looking at how smarter systems management is going to allow us to free our IT teams to provide increased value to the business, as well as looking at a couple of areas you can focus on today, to start to look at the way you manage your systems.
Hope you found the chat as interesting as I did.
Until next time, thanks for listening.
You'll find full show notes here:- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1yj
If there is one thing that we can say is a certainty in the technology industry it is the constant state of change, how technology works, how we want to use it, where we want to use it and what we expect from it is constantly changing and in reality is ever more demanding.
One of the things I like to do in my role is spend time looking at technology predictions and listen to ideas from those in the industry tasked with defining the strategic direction of their businesses, not to judge whether they are right or wrong (predicting things in this industry is so very difficult) but to pick out trends and areas that are of interest to the work I do and then at least be aware of it and keep a watching brief on how it develops.
Keeping a watching brief gave me the idea for this week’s podcast as I catch up with two guests who produce an annual technology predictions blog and back that up with episodes on their own successful podcast where they look in more detail at those predictions.
David Fearne and Richard Holmes work for Arrow ECS, a global technology supplier and one of the worlds largest companies. David is Technical Director, charged with looking after the relationship and developing strategy for over 100 different technology partners and suppliers. Richard is Business Development Director for Arrow’s Internet Of Things (IoT) business.
This week we look at their predictions from 2017, we discuss a wide range of areas, we look at data management and the concept of “data divorce” and why in a rapidly changing landscape how we look after our data will become increasingly important.
The second area we explore is data analytics and how do we build into our businesses the ability to make data driven decisions. We discuss the fact that all businesses make decisions based on data, however, how do we remove our human inefficiencies.
We wrap up looking at security and David’s assertion of a change in “security posture” and how it’s crucial that we rethink the way we look at security of our systems. We discuss why “assuming breach” is an important part of that change. We look at, as the security problem becomes ever more complex, how do we continue to address it, is the answer to employ ever more security specialists?
It’s a great chat with David and Richard and we could have discussed these trends for hours, luckily for you, it’s only 40 minutes!
Enjoy the Show.
You'll find full show notes here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1y4
One of the favourite parts of my role over the last few years has been my involvement in tech community, whether that's been working with advocacy groups like the NetApp A-Team, with local user groups like TechUG, presenting at a range of different community events or just answering questions in technical communities, all of these investments (and they are investments) have paid back, they've introduced me to great people, given me access to resources and expertise I would never have found normally and opened up great opportunities for travel and too develop some great friendships.
One of the challenges with tech community is however its size and if you are new to it or even a part of it, it can be overwhelming and hard to know where to start? How do you find the resources you need, find out which events you can attend or find out who the leaders are that you can engage with ?
Last year I was invited to get involved in a project called "Level Up", a project started by this week's guest on the podcast Yadin Porter de Leon, Yadin has been on the show before in his capacity at data protection company Druva, however that's not what we discuss this week as we chat about the Level Up project, why he started it, the project aims and how it can help you in your career.
In this week's episode we discuss why you may want to get involved in community and what benefits it can bring and how involvement in the wider community can benefit both you and your business providing you with opportunities to develop your skills.
We wrap up by asking Yadin about another project he is involved in which is the excellent Tech Village Podcast, again focused on career development and the technology business, a great show which I'd recommend anyone gets on their regular podcast list.
Enjoy the Show...
You can find full show notes here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1xM
Wanting to get the very best from your data and "extracting value" from it seems to be a constant conversation with technology and business leaders in pretty much any organisation, but what does getting value from it mean and how do we go about it?
A couple of weeks ago I read a very interesting article from this weeks guest where he introduced the concept of Data Amplification Ratio, the basic premise of this article was that one of the key ways to get more from your data is to ensure that the datasets you have can be presented to multiple different systems and services all of which can add their own particular value and extract their own unique information from the data presented to them.
I thought this article presented a really good insight in to the practicalities of getting the most from our data and wanted to get the author to share that insight for the Tech Interviews listeners.
That's exactly what we do as I'm joined this week by Matt Watts, Director Technology and Strategy at data management company NetApp.
On the show we explore Matt's article in more detail, we look at what we mean by data amplification, why it can be useful and how you go about "amping" your data.
We also discuss the importance of data mobility as well as what the future holds for "data amplification"
We even throw in some controversy by picking apart a tech industry favourite "data is the new oil" and discussing why maybe that's not as true as you think!
Fascinating insight, enjoy the show.
For full show notes visit :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1xB
Thanks for listening.
As organisations we can see the benefit of cloud and almost all organisations are taking advantage of it, be it a software service such as Office365 or backup and DR, the efficiency and simplicity of deployment of these kinds of services make them an attractive option.
However, what we are not seeing, in general, is organisations moving 100% to a cloud-based IT infrastructure, this can be for many reasons, suitability, complexity and cost, for example.
But our desire to take advantage of cloud services is not going to diminish, especially as we look at how to get the best from our data with analytics, business intelligence and machine learning , often the only practical way to access these services is via cloud.
Recently I watched a video called “What it takes to get your data hybrid cloud ready” in which John Woodall, VP Engineering at Integrated Archive Systems, provided insights on how to prepare your data and infrastructure to operate effectively in a hybrid world.
John covered some great information which I thought would make an interesting Tech Interviews episode, so that’s exactly what I’ve done.
John joins me as we chat about what we mean by hybrid cloud and the importance that it plays in a modern businesses IT strategy and the challenges that come with building a hybrid model.
We talk about the joys of finances and the importance, before we head off on our cloud adventure, of fully appreciating exactly where we are right now.
John also shares some of the basics you need to get in place to not only ensure you get your strategy right, but that you can deploy something that is consistent, secure and extensible. We also get to talk about Lego and Minecraft!
Finally we discuss why you may want to consider hybrid, whether you are a traditional business or one “born in the cloud”.
John has a real enthusiasm for deploying technology and helping customers get the best from their investment and he shares that in this episode.
Enjoy the show.
Full show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1xp
One of my favourite phrases is that "those who make the most of their data, will be the success stories of the future" and I think that is echoed by our obsession with data as a new all-powerful resource for us to mine and exploit.
But, it's not quite that straightforward is it? There is no getting away from the importance of security and privacy when it comes to our data. Be that keeping it from unwarranted access, data leakage or maintaining compliance with ever increasing regulatory requirements, maintaining our data in a secure environment is a primary concern.
That is the focus of this weeks show, as I'm joined by Val Bercovici, a well-respected technology leader, who is today working on a new project with his start-up company Pencildata, a company who's mission it is to try to address this very challenge.
In a fascinating chat with Val, we explore the growing tension between getting value from data while maintaining its security. We examine some of the interesting problems that come with A.I. systems, how do you address the "cold start" problem? or ensure that your A.I. systems have a wider range of data, beyond academic and publicly available data sets to learn from?
We discuss why organisations find it hard to unlock the value of their data and effectively share it, not only with 3rd party providers but even with others inside their organisations.
We wrap up by looking at how to change this, how do we give an organisation the ability to maintain control of their data regardless of where it is shared and crucially the ability to change their minds, so when they no longer want to share that data they can withdraw authorisation, regardless of where that data resides. We also look at the importance of an immutable audit trail so that you always know who, where and how your data is used.
I hope you enjoyed this show and discussion of the fascinating topic.
For full show notes visit :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1xk
There is no doubt for many 2018 will be the year of data privacy, driven, in no small part, by the impending EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).
In my opinion GDPR has many positives elements to it, it's the opportunity for businesses to look at how they manage, secure and retain the privacy of data across their organisations and for too many of us, this is something that's long overdue.
GDPR (and other regulations) however are not just a good idea, they are something that we need to comply with and May 25th 2018 is the date when GDPR becomes enforceable.
With that in mind, what are some of the changes that we should expect? what things are no longer going to acceptable practice? and what are the things really that we should have in place by that date?
This week we look at exactly that topic as I'm joined by data privacy expert and attorney Sheila FitzPatrick, founder of FitzPatrick and Associates and a globally recognised data privacy expert with over 35 years' experience in the data privacy field.
Who better then to ask and get some advice from on some of the pitfalls and common misconceptions of data privacy and, when it comes to GDPR, what are some of the basics that we really need to have in place by May 25th 2018.
During this episode we discuss a range of issues, we look at where we should start and why that place really shouldn't be technology, Sheila also touches on why it's important to be weary of "GDPR" experts selling you their compliance technology.
We discuss some of the common misconceptions and mistakes that organisations are making in their business compliance work and how this often leads to companies spending a lot of money unnecessarily, we also look at why focusing on GDPR alone can be a big problem in itself.
We explore where to start on your compliance journey by understanding your current policies and procedures and what they are based upon and the importance of GAP analysis, so you can understand what work is needed to meet the requirements of GDPR.
To wrap up we look at the things organisations are currently doing with their data that come May 26th 2018 will no longer be acceptable.
Lastly, I ask Sheila whether she has advice for those that think GDPR won't affect them and she does!
Sheila, as always, shares some great insights into the world of data privacy and compliance and does so with her usual enthusiasm for the topic
Enjoy the show.
For full show notes :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1xf
It’s the kind of thing us podcasters like to do this time of year, we like to take a bit of a retrospective view of the previous year as well as a look forward to the new, so not wanting to miss a trick on the Tech Interviews podcast, that’s exactly what we do in this episode.
To help me to look forward and look back at the tech industry I’m joined by Analyst Chris Evans.
We take a look at a whole range of topics, we discuss how a move to a more software defined future has not stopped the re-emergence of the importance of hardware.
We also explore some thoughts around the development of hybrid cloud as more businesses look at how the data they hold on the edge of the cloud can take advantage of cloud compute that is within it.
We also ask why some of the tech we expected to see progress in 2017, didn't.
Of course we also look forward and ask whether 2018 will be the year for NVMe? How we expect to see the continued growth of scale out file storage and of course no look at 2018 would be complete without a chat about GDPR.
Enjoy the show.
Show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1x9
As we become more data-driven in our organisations and ever more used to the way big public cloud providers deliver our services, it is putting more pressure on internal IT to deliver infrastructure that provides this data focussed, cloud like experience, but where do you start in designing this next-generation of datacentre.
That's the subject of this week's podcast, the last of the shows recorded at NetApp Insight in Berlin, where I catch up with two members of a fascinating panel discussion I attended at the event, Ruairi McBride and Jason Benedicic, they were part of a panel hosted by the NetApp A-Team which consisted of people who were not theorists but had practical experience of deploying next-generation technologies and working practices and as I know many listeners to this show are involved in developing their own next-generation strategy, I thought it would make an interesting episode.
We cover a range of topics and begin by looking to define what we mean by next-gen the types of technology and methodologies involved.
We discuss what is driving the move to next-generation datacentres and how businesses who wish to maintain a competitive edge and improve the service to their customers need to look at this next generation approach.
We wrap up by looking at how next-gen datacenters are not about technology alone and is as much about philosophy and working practice, while Jason and Ruairi share ideas about the type of building blocks you need and the help and support that the technology community can bring as you look to deliver a next-generation strategy to your organisation.
This is the last show of 2017, for all who have listened this year, thanks for your support and Tech Interviews will be back in the new year with a whole host of new interviews exploring a range of technology topics.
To make sure you catch next years shows then why not subscribe in all of the usual places.
For all of you who have enjoyed the show in 2017 – thanks for listening.
For full show notes :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1wX
There is no doubt that the amount of data we have, manage, control and analyse continues to grow ever more rapidly and increasingly this is unstructured data, documents, images, engineering drawings, data that often needs to be stored in one place and be easily accessible.
However, this presents problems, how do you get all of this data in one place when it's not just TB's it 100's of TB's and made up of billions of files that need to be accessed quickly, how on earth do you build that kind of capacity and deliver the performance you need?
Well, scale-out NAS may be the answer, in a world where we have these ever growing massive unstructured data repositories scaling out our NAS services makes perfect sense, delivering not only massive capacity but also taking advantage of scaled-out compute to give us the ability to process the billions of transactions that come with a huge repository.
So for Episode 50 of the Tech Interviews podcast, it seemed apt to celebrate the big five-oh talking about big data storage.
To discuss this evolution of NAS storage I'm joined by a returning guest, Justin Parisi to discuss NetApp's approach to this challenge, FlexGroups.
We discuss what a FlexGroup is and why you may want to use them and how it's about more than just capacity, as we discuss the performance benefits of spreading our single storage volume across multiple controllers.
We explore the importance of simplification, and how NetApp has made sure that the complexity of scale-out NAS is hidden away from the user by presenting a simple, intuitive and quick to deploy technology that allows users to have the capacity without the need to rearchitect or relearn their existing solutions.
FlexGroups is a really smart technology designed to simply address this ever-growing capacity and performance problem encountered by our traditional approach to file services and if you are looking at scale-out NAS and file services, it's a technology well worth reviewing.
Next week It's the last show of the year as I'm joined by Jason Benedicic and Ruairi Mcbride to discuss the future of datacentre architecture as we talk next gen technologies.
To catch that show why not subscribe in any of the usual podcast places.
Hope you enjoyed Episode 50 – here's to the next 50!
Thanks for listening.
For full show notes - https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1wP
The IT industry is full of new trends, some you get, some you don't, one such trend, that until recently I didn't really get, was Hyper-Converged, why have I not gotten onboard?
A good test with any new technology is does it solve a problem or improve the way I currently do things? Up to now with Hyper-Converged Infrastructure (HCI) I'm not sure it really does, is it helping me build a more automated, flexible, agile IT infrastructure? Is it helping me build a hybrid environment? Is it automating my IT environment so that my business gets the agility it wants? Not sure.
What HCI does do well is simplify your hardware infrastructure, takes something that may have been installed in a full rack and squeezes it down into 2 or 4U in a single chassis, but is that enough? Not really.
What's changed my view? The starting point is nothing to do with changes to the HCI hardware model or addition of some great new feature, it's actually and maybe not surprisingly driven by software, look at what Microsoft and VMware are doing for example, VMware is delivering an increasingly more software-defined infrastructure with every incremental release of their virtualisation stack and Microsoft with Azurestack looking to bring Azure like functionality into your on-prem datacentre.
This simplification of the software stack is now starting to drive the need for a hardware stack that matches this simplification and can take advantage of these software-defined infrastructure solutions.
It is this changing environment that is the focus of this latest podcast.
At the recent NetApp Insight conference, I met with Troy Mangum who shared some research he's been working on reviewing the HCI market, how it stands today and the changes HCI vendors need to make to ensure they build on the early success of first-generation solutions to take advantage of these software-defined infrastructure stacks.
We explore a range of discussion points from the research, we look at the drivers behind the adoption of HCI, the need for simplification and easier consumption of IT resources. We also discuss how the current technical design of HCI hardware architectures may limit their ability to grow in the way we need them to.
We discuss the risk of silo's and explore HCI tax, before then looking at the future how architectural changes are driving a new breed of HCI allowing a more flexible deployment model, decoupling the component parts so HCI can scale capacity and compute separately, which then begs the question, is this new breed of HCI really HCI at all and does it really matter? And of course, we look at NetApp's entry into this market.
Enjoy the show.
Full show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1wJ
I've discussed in a number of blog posts, as well as previous episodes of Tech Interviews, the importance of building a data strategy.
The term "Data Fabric" is an increasingly common way of describing such a strategy, this was something I first heard 3 years ago at NetApp's annual technical conference Insight as they introduced their first ideas for building a strategy that would start to move them from a storage company to a data management company.
When NetApp first discussed this three years ago, they were a very different company, accused of living in the past, a traditional storage dinosaur with no place in this modern world.
But NetApp has changed, today they are moving headlong into a data management future.
Surely then, as NetApp continue to change, their beloved ONTAP operating system can't still play a key part in building a data fabric.
Nothing could be further from the truth, and that is the focus of this episode, as I'm joined by Justin Parisi, Senior Technical Marketing Engineer at NetApp and the host of NetApp's Tech ONTAP podcast.
In this episode, we explore why ONTAP is anything but a legacy bit of technology and how not only is it still relevant, it is right at the core of NetApp's data fabric future.
We discuss how as a piece of software ONTAP provides the flexibility and versatility are crucial in a modern data strategy, doing so much more than storing data by providing services such as protection, security, efficiency and performance.
We wrap up looking at some of the features in the latest version of ONTAP and how continuous improvements ensure ONTAP remains at the heart of NetApp's data fabric strategy and can play a part in yours.
Next week we look at the development of the hyper-converged market, where it is today and how it needs to change, as I discuss some interesting HCI research with Troy Mangum.
To catch that episode why not subscribe, you'll find Tech Interviews in all the usual podcast places.
Full show notes are here :- https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1wD
One of the main components of any tech conference is the keynote sessions, these are the sessions that share the vision, set the context for the show and a good keynote is a vital part of creating the right atmosphere for those attending.
What I wanted to do with these special shows was to try and grab some of the immediate reaction from those attending the events and the keynote presentations that come with them.
Our first set of keynote reviews come from NetApp Insight 2017 in Berlin, getting the very latest in the data management field.
As we come toward the end of the conference, day three provided us with the final general sessions including a fascinating insight into rocket science as Adam Steltzner, part of the Mars Rover landing team, shared the part data played in their work.
Joining me in this final review from Insight is Jon Woan (@jonwoan) and Mick Kehoe (@mickehoe) providing their views on this session and as it was the final day, they also share their thoughts on what they'd heard throughout the conference, how it met their expectations and where NetApp covering the kind of things that they felt relevant.
Enjoy this last review from NetApp Insight and look out for upcoming reviews from other tech conferences in the future, as well as new episodes of Tech Interviews.
One of the main components of any tech conference is the keynote sessions, these are the sessions that share the vision, set the context for the show and a good keynote is a vital part of creating the right atmosphere for those attending.
What I wanted to do with these special shows was to try and grab some of the immediate reaction from those attending the events and the keynote presentations that come with them.
Our first set of keynote reviews come from NetApp Insight 2017 in Berlin, getting the very latest in the data management field.
We heard views about Monday's keynote yesterday (you can find that here Tech Interviews the Keynote Round Up – NetApp Insight 2017 Day One) What did Day two have for us?
This time I'm joined by Scott Gelb (@scottygelb) and Adam Bergh (@ajbergh) to get their views as we discuss the announcements of new platforms such as HCI and the fascinating move to cloud services including a unique arrangement with Microsoft Azure.
Enjoy and look out for day twos Keynote roundup.
One of the main components of any tech conference is the keynote sessions, these are the sessions that share the vision, set the context for the show and a good keynote is a vital part of creating the right atmosphere for those attending.
What I wanted to do with these special shows was to try and grab some of the immediate reaction from those attending the events and the keynote presentations that come with them.
For these first shows, I'm at NetApp's Insight conference in Berlin, where we expect four days full of the latest in what the data management industry are doing and hearing how data continues to be a focus for transformation for many of us.
With that in mind, what did Monday's keynote session deliver?
To find out, straight from the keynote I caught up with Jason Benedicic (@jabenedicic), Atanas Prezhdarov (@prezblahblah) and Mark Carlton (@mcarlton1983) to get their views on the key messages from the keynote and what they expected from the rest of the event.
Enjoy and look out for day twos Keynote roundup.
As part of my role as a Technical Director, one of my tasks is to attend events and hear from the community about the challenges they have and to hear from tech vendors about how they are fixing them.
However, every now and again one of the things that happens is someone presents something that introduces me to a whole new challenge that I'd never considered.
That happened at a recent User group event, where Francesco Giarletta of Avanite to discussed the mysterious world of the webcache and the vast array of web data that lives within it!
He shared how this cache, alongside the amount of web tracking data that is dropped down onto your systems via web browsing (regardless of browser), can have significant and unexpected consequences.
So it seemed only fair to ask Francesco to come onto the show and introduce you all to this often unconsidered world.
In this episode, we look at the problem of webdata, the kind of information that websites collect about us, the unknown amount of data that they drop onto our machines, from cookies to the tracking information that Windows keeps about our web whereabouts.
We look at the impact of this tracking on both system performance and maybe more importantly security.
Francesco shares some of the security impacts and how they can potentially expose us to the risk of breach, from the storing of unencrypted user credentials, to how this data that we don't fully understand can expose us to regulatory infringement.
Finally, we share some ideas on how you can start to deal with the problem and how Avanite maybe able to help.
Enjoy the show.
Full show notes can be found here https://wp.me/p4IvtA-1tI
As the world continues to "transform" and be more digitally driven, then the inevitable also has to happen, systems that support our day to day processes start to become outdated, inefficient and ineffective for a world that needs to move more quickly and in different ways.
One such innovation that is gathering momentum is the use of blockchain and it is starting to have a major disruptive impact on the way many traditional transactions are done.
If you are like me and interested in the technology and would like to know more, then maybe this week's podcast episode is for you as I'm joined by Ian Moore to provide a beginners guide to blockchain, a blockchain 101 no less.
During our conversation, he introduces us to the importance of ledgers, how the four key blockchain tenants of consensus, provenance, immutability and finality are allowing blockchain transactions to be quick, secure and trusted.
We also discuss how the speed of digital transformation is demanding improvement in speed and efficiency and how transactions that used to take weeks are no longer acceptable as blockchain takes those long slow processes and does them almost instantly.
Ian also shares some great use cases, as well as outlining the basic requirements needed for a blockchain, we wrap up by discussing possible futures uses for this technology approach and how blockchain will do for transactions what the Internet has done for communications.
Ian provides a great introduction to blockchain and you can follow him on twitter @Ian_DMoore.
I hope you enjoyed the show.
Full show notes are here - http://wp.me/p4IvtA-1ty
Sharing our data is an important part of our day to day activities, be that for analysis, collaboration or system development, we need to be able to share data sets.
However, this need to share has to be balanced with our needs to maintain the security of our data assets.
How do we address the problem and maintain that balance?
One answer is data anonymization and that is the subject of this week's show, as I'm joined by Harry Keen, CEO and founder of anon.ai.
In our wide-ranging discussion, we explore the part anonymization plays in compliance and protection and why the difficulty of current techniques means that we often poorly anonymize data, or we are not even bothering.
We explore why anonymization is so difficult and how solutions that can automate and simplify the process will make this important addition to our data security toolkit, more accessible to us all.
Harry provides some great insights into the challenge and some of the ways to address it.
Next week I'm joined by Ian Moore as we take a Blockchain 101, to ensure you catch that episode why not subscribe to the show? you can find us in all the usual podcast homes.
Until next time, thanks for listening.
For full shownotes... http://wp.me/p4IvtA-1sJ
It's not news to anyone listening to this show that the challenge around the security of our data and systems is a substantial one. Our technology seems to be under constant threat, from external hackers, to insiders, from targeted attacks to malware finding its way randomly onto our systems and causing havoc and all of this before we look at increased regulation and compliance demands.
The ever-increasing threat has led to us looking to technology to help protect our systems, however this has now led to its own problems, with many of us investing in numerous platforms and tools which has created a huge sprawl of solutions, that do not interact, all have their own consoles and all are presenting us with alerts and notifications that we then expect our already stretched IT function to understand and act upon.
It is this problem that has inspired this series of Tech Interviews episodes looking at the security challenge.
In this first show, I'm joined by Valory Batchellor of IBM as we discuss their immune system approach.
We explore the current and evolving threat, the challenges presented by multiple, disjointed security tools and we also discuss the future and how machine learning and artificial intelligence could give us an infinite amount of security analysts, working on an infinite amount of security problems, with unlimited resources!
Valory provides some fantastic insight with a real enthusiasm and obvious expertise for her subject, so enjoy the show as we look to "secure all of the things".
Next week I'm joined by Harry Keen from anon.ai as we look at data anonymization and the part it plays in data security.
To catch that show, why not subscribe on iTunes, SoundCloud or Stitcher.
Thanks for listening
Full show notes are here... http://wp.me/p4IvtA-1si
Over the last couple of episodes, we've had some interesting round-ups from the recent VMWorld conference, reviewing the announcements from the show, as well as how VMware are evolving to maintain relevance to their many customers in an ever more software defined, data-centric and of course cloud and as-a-service based world.
Part of the VMware response to these changes ( I hasten to add, not the only technological evolutions they are making) is a smart one, rather than fight the tide King Canute style, VMware is not only embracing that change, but looking to empower it and make businesses ability to embrace a cloud-based world a more straightforward transition.
Embracing this change comes in the form of VMware Cloud on AWS, That is the topic we explore on this week's show as I'm joined by Ben Meadowcroft, a Product Line Manager at VMware with a focus on VMware Cloud on AWS.
I catch up with Ben to understand more about the solution, why it exists, the challenges business face when building a hybrid solution and how VMware Cloud on AWS is helping to ease that transition.
Ben gives some great insight into the platform as well as some helpful use case examples to help you decide whether this kind of technology is a good fit for you.
Personally, I think VMWare cloud on AWS is a really interesting solution and I can see it meeting needs in a number of enterprises, check out the show and provide your feedback, either on here or message me @techstringy on twitter.
Next time we start a series of shows looking at the ever-evolving data security challenge.
To make sure you catch those, why not subscribe and if you have the chance leave a review.
Thanks for listening.
Show notes can be found here: http://wp.me/p4IvtA-1rB
VMware, along with Microsoft, is perhaps the most influential enterprise software company in the industry. VMware and their virtualisation technology has revolutionised the way we deliver IT infrastructure into businesses of all types.
Today, however, the infrastructure revolution they helped create presents challenges to them, as the broad adoption of cloud and new ways of managing and deploying our infrastructure has led to the question "how do VMware remain relevant in a post virtualisation world?"
In last week's show we discussed with 4 attendees their views, this week, we wrap up our VMworld coverage with two more insightful discussions.
I hear from Joel Kaufman, who has worked with VMware over the last 18 years in his role at NetApp, we discuss the changing face of VMware as well as the evolution that NetApp is currently going through as both companies continue to deliver innovation in the technology industry.
To wrap up, I wanted a VMware view of their event and I'm joined by a returning guest to the show and voice of the VMware Virtually Speaking Podcast, Pete Flecha.
I chat with Pete about VMware and their "mojo", the post virtualisation world, connecting together multiple platforms and how VMware are enabling us to "software define, all of the things!".
If you enjoyed the show why not leave us a review and if you want to ensure you catch our future shows then why not subscribe, Tech Interviews can be found in all of the usual homes of podcasts.
Show notes can be found here - http://wp.me/p4IvtA-1qP
This time of the year is a busy one for the technology industry as we move into conference season. But are these events worth your while, or are they just an excuse for a few days off and a good time?
Over the next two shows, I get the views from this years VMworld 2017 conference and ask the question "was it good for you?".
In this first episode, I'm joined by 4 guests; Becky Elliot - Sr. Systems Administrator for a US government contractor Michael Cade - Veeam Mark Carlton - Concorde IT Barry Coombs - Computerworld Group
We discuss what they gained from the event, what did VMware cover, how relevant was their strategic message and the key things they took from the event.
If you want a snapshot of the key points from this years VMworld, then these attendees give you a great view of what was covered, as well as been great examples of the significant benefits you can get by investing in you or your team attending vendor conferences
Enjoy the show.
Full show notes are here - http://wp.me/p4IvtA-1qc
This week is the third and last of our panel discussions looking at the major challenges facing business IT.
We pick up again with our panel from last week to discuss a range of new topics.
We look at how a business vision, without assessment and understanding of the current environment, may well mean you never achieve your end goal.
We look at how our increasingly digitally native workforce may leave us without the skill sets needed to architect our future solutions.
The changing role of the consultant also comes under scrutiny and even though the overall goal remains the same, the way of helping business to get there is certainly changing.
We wrap up looking at the future challenges the panel see and how for one of them, decoupling data from infrastructure is living the tech dream!
Our panel is; Ed Morgan - Sales Engineer at Rubrik Mick Kehoe - Chief Technologist at Logicalis Ruairi McBride - Technical Account Manager at Arrow ECS Jason Benedicic - Principal Consultant at ANS
Lots of great insight again from the team, I hope you enjoyed the show.
Full show notes can be found here :- http://wp.me/p4IvtA-1pv
The IT Avengers are assembling again this week, but this time I'm joined by a whole new team, as four more experts from the IT community share their view on the current state of IT within business, the day to day issues and how to overcome them.
This weeks panel is;
Ed Morgan - Sales Engineer at Rubrik Mick Kehoe - Chief Technologist at Logicalis Ruairi McBride - Technical Account Manager at Arrow ECS Jason Benedicic - Principal Consultant at ANS
This weeks show is so action packed that it's been split into two, with part two next week.
This week the team talk about how many of us have a "cloud first" strategy, without really knowing what that means.
We also discuss why "lifting and shifting it" to AWS is hardly ever the right answer! and why a good foundation is critical to your future success.
Hopefully plenty of valuable information and something to help you tackle your current business IT challenges.
Look out for part two next week.
For show notes visit - http://wp.me/p4IvtA-1oS
This weeks Tech Interviews is the first in a short series, where I bring together a selection of people from the IT community to try to gauge the current state of business IT and to gain some insight into the key day-to-day issues affecting those delivering technology to their organisations.
For this first episode i'm joined by three returning guests to the show.
Michael Cade - Technical Evangelist at Veeam. Mike Andrews - Technical Solutions Architect at NetApp Mark Carlton - Group Technical Manager for Concorde IT Group.
The panel discuss a range of issues, from availability to cloud migration, the importance of getting the basics right and how understanding the why, rather than the how is a crucial part of getting your technology strategy right.
The team provide some excellent insights into a whole range of business IT challenges and I'm sure there's some useful advice for everyone.
Enjoy the show.
Show notes are here... http://wp.me/p4IvtA-1nt
The podcast is back from its summer holidays, a week earlier than expected, with this special episode looking at a problem that is often overlooked.
There is no argument that increasingly we are taking more of our business IT solutions as services, be that building platforms and infrastructure or whether it's consuming specific software as a service (SaaS)solutions like Salesforce or of course the almost omnipotent Microsoft Office 365.
However, many people operate their SaaS solution under the assumption that their service provider is protecting all of their data by inherently providing backup and recovery facilities and it's a real shock to them when they find out that in reality their service provider does not.
It is this that is the focus of this episode as I caught up with Robert Cox of NetApp before he headed off to AWS summit, to talk about NetApp's new SaaS data protection solution Cloud Control for Office 365.
We discuss the move to SaaS, the risks that come with it and why people abdicate responsibility for their data in a way that would be unacceptable in thier own on-premises datacentres.
We wrap at by looking at what is good practice for ensuring we protect our SaaS based data.
I hope you enjoy this extra show. The podcast is back from its holidays fully next week.
Thanks for listening.
Show notes are here.. http://wp.me/p4IvtA-1mt
There has no doubt been a change in the way we look at protecting and securing our key data, with robust data protection, enhanced data security plans and increased governance to ensure compliance with ever-increasing regulatory requirements.
However, much of this is concentrated in our datacentre and our central data sets, which although critical, is not all of our data.
Today critical data no longer lives behind corporate firewalls and security, it lives out on a wide range of mobile devices, laptops, tablets and smartphones, often 1000's of miles away from our datacentre.
When our data is so dispersed, how do we ensure we are protecting it on a wide range of different devices, how do we know where it is and what it contains?
That is the focus of this weeks podcast, as I'm joined by Yadin Porter De Leon of Druva to discuss the challenge of data that lives right on the edge of our network.
We look at the complexity of the problem and why it has too be much more than "backup" and why it's critical we have full visibility of our data, regardless of where it sits in our business.
We look at why it is crucial knowing where our data is, what it contains, who has and is accessing it, while ensuring we have it protected and can always find it, regardless of whether our end device is accessible or not.
We wrap up our edge data discussion by providing a little bit of listener homework, as we point you in the direction of the kind of questions you should be asking yourself, so you can build a data protection policy for all of your data, not just that which is stored in your datacentre.
This is our last show for a few weeks as we head off on a podcasting summer holiday, so I hope you enjoy it.
For full show notes check here... http://wp.me/p4IvtA-1jU
Have a great summer and thanks for listening.
There is no doubt that our organisations are becoming ever more data centric, wanting to know how we can gain insight into our day to day operations and continue to be competitive and relevant to our customers, while delivering a wide range of new experiences for them.
These changes do mean we need to reconsider how we design and deliver technology. Which has led to the idea of "The Next Generation Datacenter", but what does that mean? What is a Next Generation Datacentre?
That is the subject of this week's podcast, as I'm joined by Martin Cooper, Senior Director of the Next Generation Datacentre Group (NGDC), at NetApp.
In this episode, we look at a wide range of topics, starting with trying to define what we mean by Next Generation Datacentre.
We touch on how a modern business needs flexibility in its operations and how a focus on applications and data, not infrastructure, require IT teams to respond in an application and data focused way.
We also provide a word of caution on how not all our current applications and infrastructure are going to migrate to this brave new world of Next Generation Datacentres.
Next Generation Datacentre is not about a technology purchase, but is about understanding how to optimise the things we do, to meet our changing business needs and Martin provides some excellent insight into how we do that and the kind of areas we need to consider.
Enjoy the show and thanks for listening.
Full show notes are here - http://wp.me/p4IvtA-1jf
This weeks episode is a little different, rather than chatting with someone from the tech community about technology trends and IT business issues, we talk to an actual user!
In the final part of our brief series looking at moving to the cloud, we look at a real use case, someone who has embraced cloud technology to bring innovation to an industry as I'm joined by Lee Clark of Givepenny UK.
Lee describes how a 100-mile charity bike ride, that he never got to do, made him think about a whole new way of fundraising and by using the data that we all track and store about our everyday activities he could bring some real innovation to charities in the UK.
We discuss a range of issues that come with attempting to deliver innovation, including how we can often be crippled by our own behavior restricting our ability to embrace change.
Lee shares how important it is to understand how trends are affecting your industry and how those trends can revolutionise the way we operate.
We discuss how cloud has given access to traditionally complex technology, allowing companies like Givepenny the ability to deliver a platform quickly, effectively and importantly at low cost.
Lee shares with great enthusiasm Givepenny's journey from idea, to a platform delivering true innovation to the charity sector, creating new ways of engaging with a very generous population.
Enjoy the show.
For full show notes - http://wp.me/p4IvtA-1hc
This week is the second of three looking at the challenges associated with moving to the cloud as we discuss the area of picking the right cloud service provider partners.
I'm joined by Jon Green, Technical Solutions Director at Navisite Europe Ltd.
We look at a range of issues and potential "gotchas" that can impact our attempts at taking advantage of the flexibility, scale and commercial attractiveness that cloud can bring.
We look at the risk of assuming cloud is simple, the importance of understanding the underlying cloud platform as well as the importance of designing your system availability properly.
We sum up by looking at where an experienced cloud partner can bring real benefits to your cloud adoption.
Jon shares plenty of great information that will help you as you plan you own cloud migration.
Enjoy the show.
Show notes are here - http://wp.me/p4IvtA-1fS
We're all heading to the cloud, data is the new gold, all of our competition is putting its data in the cloud and getting massive competitive advantage, if we don't know how to use our data and take advantage of the cloud we'll be obsolete.
But, if that is all true, why isn't everyone charging headlong into cloud services and finding more and more valuable information from their data and making the rest of us a thing of the past?
Over the next few Tech Interviews episodes we are going to explore that subject and look at how we can take advantage of cloud.
First we take on the data challenge, how do we make it accessible to the cloud? how do we move it there? do we move it there? and if we do how do we keep it under control?
To help me explore that topic, I'm joined by Kirk Ryan, a Cloud Solutions Architect for storage vendor NetApp.
We discuss the challenges companies keen to embrace the cloud need to consider and overcome, the importance of building bridges between on-prem, cloud and hybrid platforms.
We look at the why we need to understand our data's lifecycle from creation to deletion.
And wrap up looking at the importance of not taking our on-premises bad habits into the cloud, as well as just how crucial it is to understand cloud economics.
Kirk shares some great insights - so settle back and enjoy.
Show notes are here - http://wp.me/p4IvtA-1dr
Over the last 15 years or so, there has been major shifts in the way we deliver technology in the enterprise, cloud, mobility and of course virtualisation. You can't look at the virtualisation industry without looking at the company who has defined the industry more than any other, VMware.
However, they are not immune to change and the world is certainly changing as we become more application and data centric and with this our expectations of how we consume our IT services has also changed.
How are VMware changing in response?
On this weeks show I managed to catch up with the hosts of the excellent VMware Virtually Speaking podcast, Pete Flecha and John Nicholson, to ask this question and find out how VMware are changing, how they see the needs of their customers evolving and what future trends they see as the next important areas for focus.
We discuss how technology not only needs to be resilient but also smart. We look at how organisations want their IT to be able to easily consume and integrate "cloud" into their on-prem solutions.
The guys also talk about VMware's shift toward simplifying the technology stack allowing us to focus on our applications and data and not the complexity of the infrastructure below it.
Pete and John provide a fantastic insight into how our organisations technology requirements are changing and how VMware are changing to remain a relevant and important part of our IT stack.
John also introduces me to my all time favourite analogy that involves cavemen and jetpacks.
Enjoy the show.
Full show notes are here... http://wp.me/p4IvtA-1aM
This weeks episode is part two of our view at the wider data availability market as I'm joined by three more guests from the recent VeeamON event to continue our discussion. This week we look at how our data availability strategy is not and can not just be a discussion for the technical department and must be elevated into our overall business strategy.
We also look how technology trends are affecting our views of backup, recovery and availability.
First I'm joined by Dave Stevens of Data Gravity as we chat about how backup data can be a source of valuable information, as well as a crucial part in helping us to be more secure, as well as compliant with ever more stringent data governance rules.
Next I chat with Mike Beevor of HCI vendor Pivot3 about how simplifying our approach to system availability can be a huge benefit. Mike also makes a great point about how, although focussing on application and data availability is right, we must consider the impact on our wider infrastructure, because if we don't we run the risk of doing more "harm than good".
Last but my no means least I speak with Senior Research Analyst at IDC, Andrew Smith, we chat about availability as part of the wider storage market and how over time, as vendors gain feature parity, their goal has to become to add additional value, particularly in areas such as security and analytics.
It's another information packed show, I hope you enjoy it.
For full show notes - http://wp.me/p4IvtA-18k
Now honestly, this episode has not gone out today sponsored by British Airways, or in any way taking advantage of the situation that affected 1000's of BA customers over the weekend, the timing is purely coincidental.
However, those incidents have made this episode quite timely as they again highlight just how crucial to our day to day activities as individuals and businesses technology is.
As part of my time at the recent VeeamON event, I took the opportunity to chat with the wider IT community who attended, not just those charged with delivering availability and data protection, but also those who looked at the industry through a broader lens.
So over the next couple of weeks, I've put together a collection of those chats to give you a wider view of the availability market.
First up, I speak with Justin Warren and Jeff Leeds.
Justin, is a well-known industry analyst and consultant as well as the host of the fantastic Eigencast podcast, Justin is often outspoken, but always provides a fascinating insight into the wider industry.
Jeff was part of a large NetApp contingent at the event and shared how partnerships and complimentary technologies are critical in building an appropriate data strategy, helping us all ensure our businesses remain on.
So hope you enjoy the show.
Pop over to techstringy.com for show notes and please subscribe to catch next weeks episode as we dig further into data availability.
Show notes are here... http://wp.me/p4IvtA-151
One of the biggest challenges we face in technology is constant change. Change is not bad of course, but it presents challenges, from upgrading operating systems and applications, to integrating the latest technology advancements, to responding to new business problems and opportunities.
The IT industry is full of stories of companies who had great technologies but have then been blindsided by a shift in the needs of their customer base, or a technology trend that they failed to anticipate.
It was with this in mind that I visited Veeam's, VeeamON conference.
Veeam are a technology success story, a vendor who arrived into the already established data protection market and shifted how people looked at it. They recognised the impact virtualisation was having on how organisations of all types where deploying their infrastructures and how traditional protection technologies where failing to evolve to meet these new needs.
But now Veeam's market is changing, how are they going to react to that?
For this week's podcast, I look at that very question and discuss Veeam's future with Rick Vanover, Director of Technical Product Marketing & Evangelism.
We discuss their repositioning as an availability company, look at how Veeam are developing a range of solutions to give them an availability platform and how this platform will allow their customers to build a strategy, to not only protect their critical data assets, in a range of different data repositories, but will also allow them to move their data seamlessly between them.
Do Veeam have a good strategy to remain relevant? - I Think so, but, as ever, their success will be dependent on their ability to execute that strategy.
I hope you enjoy the show and of course the new theme tune!
For show notes check out techstringy.com - http://wp.me/p4IvtA-115
The IT world is a funny place, we love a bit of innovation, sometimes it's new and revolutionary, sometimes something whose time has come and sometimes, some just keep coming back and remaining relevant, but maybe relevant in new and different ways.
One such technology is the focus of this week's podcast as I am joined by Tony Main of Italian thin client vendor Praim.
I'll be honest, I was sceptical as to whether a discussion of Thin Client was really relevant in the world of modern IT.
So we discuss how trends around data mobility, security and analytics play very much to the strengths of thin client and are again making thin client an interesting proposition.
Tony shares how the maturity in VDI technology is also changing how organisations view their desktop and application deployment methods making thin client a more attractive proposition.
We wrap up discussing how Praim are looking at the secure desktop market, taking what they know from thin clients and helping organisations repurpose desktops to extend their life, provide a better experience and deliver a more secure and manageable solution.
Are thin clients still a thing? – Have a listen to the show and then why not share your thoughts on twitter with me @techstringy
Show notes for this episode can be found here;
http://wp.me/p4IvtA-ZQ
We look at how the modern technology shift to data mobility, ensuring our data doesn't reside on any one device, plays very much to the strength of thin client.
Shouting at Siri, arguing with Alexa or cursing Cortana the idea of talking at technology, whether on your phone, laptop, tablet or even a specialist device like an Amazon Echo, is becoming increasingly commonplace and is only going to become more common.
Voice is an example of the move to change how we interact with our technology, a move away from monitor, mouse and keyboard, to more flexible and, let's face it, efficient ways of working.
Another such technology is the subject of this weeks show, as I'm joined by Ian Finch of Mando Group as we discuss the development of chatbots.
We don't just focus on the technology, but also how the value of bots is about much more.
Ian provides some brilliant examples of how bots are helping us to greatly improve some of the historically poor experiences we have as users of technology, from customer support to the much maligned exhibition app, using a new approach to these can deliver great results.
Ian provides some fascinating insights - enjoy the show.
You can find show notes here - http://wp.me/p4IvtA-XY
Data is increasingly driving the world we operate in and the way we are using data to drive it is changing rapidly. Business decisions are no longer made just by Fred with his humongous spreadsheets, or Mary and her accounts package wizardry.
Data analytics is now something that we see every day, even if we don't realise it, from the intelligence in our smartphones, to high performance computing crunching masses of numbers, the use of analytics, artificial intelligence and machine learning is becoming increasingly commonplace.
On this weeks show I'm joined by Microsoft Tech Evangelist Amy Nicholson, as we discuss the continued development of the data analytics market and how companies like Microsoft are making data tools more accessible and how platform as a service offerings allow us to focus on getting value from our data without having to worry about the infrastructure behind it, regardless of how complex it may be.
We also look at how the analytics conversation has moved away from one about technologies and is now focussed on how we solve complex business problems.
We look at the importance of design in our analytics solutions about how we both input data and present the results.
We also look at the importance of building a story from our data and how that story can lead to successful actions.
And of course, we have the story of the connected cow!
Don't miss it.
For full show notes visit Techstringy.com... http://wp.me/p4IvtA-Xv
I think we all accept that as individuals, businesses and organisations, the way we see our data is changing, more than ever we see it as an asset and like any asset we see it as something to treat carefully, ensuring it is stored properly, secured, protected and of course something we are getting value from.
A big part of this shift is driven by the technology industry itself, tools, technologies and services are now available that allow us to use our data in ways that previously we had not been able to.
However it is not just the technology, it is also how a new breed of service providers is making this technology much more accessible.
This is the focus of this week's podcast, as I'm Joined by Dave Sobel, Sr. Director of Community and Field Marketing at SolarWinds MSP.
As we look at how these industry changes are enabling us all to get more from our data.
We discuss the evolution of what we see as a computer, how the importance of the device has made way to the importance of the data and of course the ever present data security risk.
Hope you enjoy the show..
Show notes are here.. http://wp.me/p4IvtA-VD
Data it's one of a modern organisations most crucial assets.
With that in mind, how do we build a strategy that meets todays data challenges, how do we make sure we have a strategy not only ensures we can store our data on a resilient and secure platform, but also that we can take advantage of new data trends, like analytics, IoT and public cloud storage.
In this weeks episode I discuss this with NetApp A-Team member Mark Carlton, we look at how NetApp's data fabric strategy can help you to plan, develop and deploy a solution suitable for a modern organisations data needs.
We not only discuss NetApp's implementation but also how the fabric has grown beyond a NetApp centric view and how 3rd party tools from the likes of Varonis, Veritas and Veeam are integrated, making your data management solution more insightful, more complete.
Enjoy the episode.
Accompanying Blog is here... http://wp.me/p4IvtA-RG
There is no doubt that the world we live and work in is changing, in our personal lives we expect an always on experience and ever more digital interaction with the world.
This is not just in our consumer lives. In our work lives expectation is the same, not only in the way we expect to work with technology, but also in the way our businesses expect to operate.
But what does that mean, what does that mean to us as either IT professionals, or those trying to navigate their organisations through the trials and tribulations of our journey to a more digital way of working.
That’s the subject of this week’s podcast, as I’m joined by Veeam’s Michael Cade to discuss how this move to a more digital world is impacting the way we must treat our technology.
In this episode, we discuss exactly what we mean by digital transformation, how this is driving our reliance on communications and technology and the problems not been able to access them bring, not just to consumers, but to our organisations and the impact that has on customers and our ability to do business.
Enjoy the show.
Show notes are here.. http://wp.me/p4IvtA-R9
You don't need to look around the technology industry too much to hear phrases such as "data is the new gold" or "data is the new oil", but like any good marketing phrase, it is based on a degree of fact.
It is certain that the modern organisation is becoming increasingly digital, transforming into one that is relying on data and digital workflows for its success, however when it comes to data, it's not how much data you have, it's what you do with it and learn from it that will determine who really wins.
That's the focus of this week's podcast as I'm joined by NetApp's Director, Technology and Strategy, Matt Watts.
In this episode, Matt provides fascinating insights into the modern data world, how extracting valuable information from data is a significant advantage to an organisation, how 3rd party companies working with storage vendors is critical to the future of data management and how companies like Microsoft, Amazon and IBM with Watson are commoditising machine learning and artificial intelligence to a point where, organisations of all sizes, can take advantage of these very smart tools to give them insights and understanding that just a few years ago was out of the reach for all but the very wealthiest of companies.
Enjoy the show...
Show notes are here - http://wp.me/p4IvtA-QG
We are all familiar with the saying “what you don’t know, won’t hurt you”. Well in the world of data management, security and privacy the opposite is most definitely true.
For most of us, as our organisations become more digital, we are increasingly realising the value of our data, how big an asset it is and how important maintaining it is.
However, although we understand its value, we actually have very little insight into what is happening to it on a day to day basis.
That’s our focus this week, in the last of our data security & privacy episodes, as I chat with John Hughes of Varonis. Varonis provide data analytics and insights into the way we use our data, what our data is, who is using it, what it’s used for and if it’s even used at all.
We discuss the history of Varonis, why data insight is so critical, why it’s a cornerstone of our ability to meet compliance requirements and how it’s a crucial part of our defence against data security attacks.
So settle down and enjoy the show.
Thanks for listening.
Show notes can be found here - http://wp.me/p4IvtA-PC
Losing USB sticks, leaving laptops on trains, installing malware, clicking phishing links. From maliciousness to stupidity, our people are a constant problem. In fact people are our biggest data security issue aren't they?
Aren't they?
We have to ask ourselves, are we doing all we can to help our people? Rather than seeing them as a security problem, have we thought about how we can make them an asset as we continually look to take on the threats to our critical data?
Our people can be a huge benefit in our data security and privacy plans. In this episode, I chat with Dom Saunders of NETconsent, as we look at how we can start to help our people become that asset.
We discuss why many IT policies fail, the risks that poor procedures introduce, why education is so critical and how to make sure our people are getting access to the best help they can.
enjoy the show.
Show notes here - http://wp.me/p4IvtA-Ol
There is no doubt that there are many difficulties presented to organisations when it comes to their data.
We understand it's an asset, something that, if we make the most of it, can be a significant advantage to us, but of course we also understand maintaining the security and privacy of it is critical.
In this weeks podcast, the second part of my conversation with Global Data Protection Attorney Sheila Fitzpatrick, we discuss exactly what GDPR is going to mean to us as organisations, its impact for those both inside and outside the EU.
We wrap up the episode looking at some practical steps you can take to start to build those robust compliance policies.
Enjoy the Show - full show notes are here - http://wp.me/p4IvtA-Ma
Data, it's the new oil, new gold, your Crown Jewels. We've all heard these phrases, but it is hard to deny that data is a fantastic asset.
However, it's fair to say that data also comes with its challenges, we must store it all, make sure we protect it all and of course we need to make sure it's secure.
This week is the first in a short series of shows looking at the challenges of data privacy.
This week is part one of a two part chart with global data privacy attorney Sheila Fitzpatrick, with nearly 35 years experience in the field, she is the ideal guest too provide us with some initial context around the current data privacy landscape, the challenges we have and the challenges we are going to see in the future, including the upcoming EU General Data Protection Regulation, GDPR.
Sheila has lots of great information to share, so settle back, there's plenty to learn.. enjoy the show.
Full show notes are here.. http://wp.me/p4IvtA-Ld
We all love the way cloud has simplified how we deliver technology solutions to our business challenges, its simplicity and efficiency are extremely powerful.
It's a great answer to many a challenge, but what about when public cloud can't be the answer?
Whatever the reason, technical, commercial or data security, sometimes for an organisation public cloud just can't be the answer.
What do we do when we want the simplicity of cloud but can't have it?
Build your own cloud of course!
That is the topic of this weeks show, in part two of my chat with Microsoft Technical Evangelist Matt McSpirit, we explore Azure Stack, Microsoft's on-premises private cloud offering.
Matt Shares with us what Azure Stack is, who it is (and isn't meant for) and how you get your hands on it, both in its current tech preview as well as its general release form later in 2017.
Hope you enjoy the show - show notes are here.. http://wp.me/p4IvtA-J4
This week we explore a bit more DevOps as I chat with Microsoft Tech Evangelist Matt McSpirit.
Matt is based at Microsoft headquarters in Redmond and produces lots of great and helpful content in his role as a tech evangelist.
In the first of a two-part chat, we explore Matt’s two current areas of focus, AzureStack which we will cover next week and, in this first part, we get a Microsoft take on the DevOps movement, how they see it, and how it is affecting how Microsoft deliver their own technology to their customers.
We also look at some of the principles you should follow as you look to build a DevOps approach to your business, as well as discussing whether DevOps is something that stretches beyond the world of just software development.
Enjoy the show, the full show notes can be found here... http://wp.me/p4IvtA-IK
This is the second of our series of episodes looking at emerging technology trends and this week we jump in with one of the most high profile, DevOps.
I attended an event recently ran by Microsoft partner Blackmarble discussing building a DevOps practice using Microsoft tools, after the event I grabbed a little bit of time with Blackmarbles' Engineering Director Richard Fennell.
We chat about what DevOps is and isn't as well as some tips on how to build a DevOps practice.
Enjoy the show - show notes can be found here on TechStringy.com http://wp.me/p4IvtA-GQ
As the amount of data we create continues to grow exponentially, traditional methods of storing it are becoming less and less effective.
One answer to this is Object Storage, designed to overcome the challenges of storing billions of files, across multiple data repositories across potentially many geographic locations, It's the storage that powers the big public cloud providers and, as it's use cases grow, is finding its way into our enterprise IT.
In this episode I'm joined by Robert Cox from NetApp to provide an introduction to object storage, why it exists and why you may want to use it, so if you want to know more about Object Storage, this maybe the episode for you.
Show notes are here http://wp.me/p4IvtA-Fu
When we spend all our time in the technology industry sometimes we can get a little close to it, too close to certain vendors or solutions and it can be very useful on occasion to step back and try too look at a wider picture.
This week we try to do just that as I chat with technology journalist Hannah Breeze. Hannah is deputy editor at CRN (Channel Reseller News) and writes about the relationship between vendors, distributers and sellers of technology, or as it is known, the IT channel.
Full Show Notes are here http://wp.me/p4IvtA-F9
Data sprawling all around us, certainly does not mean those managing IT are having fun! If you think about the kind of organisations many of us are a part of, then we understand what a critical asset our data is and how getting the best from it can give us real edge in our organisations field. But there is so much of it to manage, not just the production data, but the copies that we also have, backups, dev, test and QA, to name just a few. In this episode I speak with Rich Wallace of Catalogic Software and discuss the data sprawl challenge. Full show notes are here - http://wp.me/p4IvtA-Cc
In this episode we discuss whether working more closely with your peers in the IT industry has any benefit.
Does it help you to do your job better? Does it help you develop your career? is there anything to gain?
This week I'm joined by Amy Lewis host of the Geek Whisperers as we discuss those questions and find out about developing your IT superhero!
Enjoy
Show notes are here http://wp.me/p4IvtA-Bs
A couple of months ago, I was at a Tech User Group event and one of the presentations was intriguingly called "my life as a 12 year old software developer". I assumed that this was someone with 12 years of experience, what I hadn't expected was that our presenter was indeed just 12!
Josh, better known to the tech community on twitter as @all_about_code is a smart young man, very passionate about developing and coding, but not just about writing bits of code for games, or entertainment projects, what is really impressive is his passion for developing solutions to problems that he has seen in his own day to day world.
I hope you enjoy this 8 minute chat I had with Josh, about his passions for developing, why he likes tech community and some of the projects he's worked on.
Enjoy the show.
Full show notes are here http://wp.me/p4IvtA-At
The security of our data is a significant challenge for us all, as individuals and as organisations, big or small, keeping our data secure and maintaining privacy is no longer a nice to have, it's a necessity.
In this episode, global data privacy expert Sheila Fitzpatrick joins me, Sheila is data privacy officer for global storage giant NetApp. In our chat, we discuss the difference between privacy and security, is the data security challenge a myth?, the impact of GDPR and how to start building robust data privacy solutions. Sheila is an attorney and renowned global expert in her field. She is truly passionate about the topic of privacy and shares some fantastic tips.
So dive in and enjoy the episode.
Show Notes are here... http://wp.me/p4IvtA-zD
In this episode I'm joined by Pete Flecha, Senior Technical Marketing Architect at VMware, as we discuss VVOL's. VMware's new approach to delivering storage to virtual infrastructures. VVOL's look to address many of the problems traditional SAN based storage presents to Virtual infrastructures. Pete provides an intro to the problems VVOL's look to address, how they go about it and what we can expect from the recent vSphere 6.5 release that brings us VVOL's v2.0... enjoy.
Show notes are here http://wp.me/p4IvtA-z2
In this episode I speak to Michael Cade of Veeam. We discuss if it's fair to say that Veeam are much more than just a virutalisation backup company, what's new and interesting in the data protection industry, how public cloud providers and are providing new an interesting methods for protecting our data.
There is also a bonus, thanks to the NetApp TechONTAP podcast team, who provided me with some additional material from Michael's recent appearance on their show, about what's new in Veeam Availiability 9.5.
Hope you enjoy the episode, if you did, then please subscribe.
The technology industry loves a conference, we all get invited to so many of them, however, are they worth going? - I caught up with three people at the end of the NetApp Insight conference 2016 in Berlin, to get their thoughts, this is what they said..
For show notes check out here... http://wp.me/p4IvtA-uN
A chat with Mike England of Tech UG, talking about the importance of the IT professional community, how it helps us to do a better job and develop our IT careers.
November 1st 2016 was a big day of NetApp announcements, all of which hugely enhanced their Hybrid cloud strategy - in this Interview I speak with NetApp's Mike Andrews as we discuss the technical and strategic benefits of these wide ranging announcements.
In this interview I speak with Marcus Robinson of Microsoft, as we discuss the addition of support for Docker Containers in Windows Server 2016, and the effect this will have on container adoption in the enterprise.
A short interview with Veeam UK SE Michael Cade - discussing the impact of cloud service on data protection, upcoming Microsoft technologies and how Veeam provides modern data protection