Second part of Tech Field Day NFD16 day 1 continues with Arista.

Arista’s presentation included 400G (hist: it’s fast!), EOS programmability , Network Automation and Telemetry, Routing Architecture Transformations.

All video recording are in the youtube channel of TechFielDay .

EOS Programmability

Ken Duda (Founder, CTO, and Senior VP of Software Engineering) did a great session about EOS programmability explaining the reason of some technical choices and the available options. I really enjoyed to listen his open and honest presentation.

I strongly suggest to watch the whole recording , it contains some useful consideration about APIs including performances and caveats.

I think the only improvement, as Jason suggested , would be to send a data structure via API to apply changes instead of plain CLI commands.

Network Telemetry

Ryan Madsen ’s presentation of telemetry and CloudVision generated most comments and excitement.

We all used SNMP and Syslog to have information from network devices and we now we deserve better.

Network Telemetry is a different approach: let network devices to send information when needed, the management platform subscribes to the telemetry feed to receive telemetry data.

Information includes real-time updates and control plane state. After an initial synchronization only changes are sent so the impact on device and network is very low.

All that would be wasted without a proper GUI, Arista got it right and CloudVision is clear, fast, easy to use.

CloudVision and Veriflow can work together so the model is updated when a configuration change is applied. Isn’t that cool?

Video recordings are available HERE .

Wrap up Arista

This is the first time I met Arista and I really liked their approach on software and automation. Many switch vendors present their product with a great focus on the number of ports and back-plane speed but the software looks like coming out from the ’90s. Arista’s differentiation is on Programmability and Telemetry, that’s the right path for today’s network needs.

DISCLAIMER

Tech Field Day (TFD) is a commercial activity for TFD and the presenting companies. When I attend TFD events my travel and accommodation expenses are usually paid for by TFD. At the events, most of my meals are provided by TFD. In addition, the companies that present at TFD usually give the delegates gifts. At TFD the presenting companies engage with delegates to educate us about their products and services. The smart companies also want to learn from delegates (a few are very smart about this). The aim of the event is to help the presenting companies connect with delegates. Ultimately get the company’s message spread by delegates. Usually, delegates will write about some or all of the presenting companies.

Neither the TFD staff nor the presenting companies get to review what the delegates write. There is no obligation on delegates to write about any or all presenters. Nor is there an obligation to write nice things about presenters. In fact, the greatest expectation is that delegates will be honest in any writing that they do.

This (ifconfig.it) is my personal blog. Everything I write here is my thoughts and opinions. None of it is reviewed by the organizations I write about before publication. I could get corrections from the companies I write about and may incorporate the parts I agree with into my posts here.