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On-Premise IT Podcasts

Commodity Broadband is Inferior to MPLS

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By now, we’re all familiar with software-defined wide area network or SD-WAN. SD-WAN enables the use of multiple circuit types, including both MPLS and commodity broadband. Everyone knows how reliable MPLS can be. Can broadband reach that level of assurance? Given the history of using the technology with enterprise networks, our panel of experts debates the premise that commodity broadband is inferior to MPLS.

Backup is a Security Hole

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The Premise: Backup is a Security Hole 

Backing up data is standard practice and one that both companies and individuals take part in regularly. Having your data at your fingertips to be able to restore any potential loss and keep your forward movement is a must in all of our quick moving industries. How do you make sure that your backup protocols are taking into account proper security measures? How do you know if encryption is taking place? Is malware slipping into your snapshots and being replicated? Do your backups include data access that you shouldn’t have? With every copy of your data being a potential security risk, the question we tackle in this conversation at the On-Premise IT Roundtable is: Is backup a security hole?

Single Pane of Glass is a Myth – The On-Premise IT Roundtable

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From a user’s perspective, it can be argued that single pane of glass doesn’t exist at all, and vendors who push this idea are never looking beyond their product. When users look at heterogeneous networks, there may be a single pane of glass for this and a single pane of glass for that, which ends up being 25+ panes of glass and not really solving anyone’s problems. So how do we reconcile this chasm between the user and vendor perspectives? The question we tackle in this On-Premise IT Roundtable is: Is there such a thing as an all-in-one solution or is “single pane of glass” simply a myth?

Is Backup Dead? – The On-Premise IT Roundtable

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Data protection used to be pretty straightforward. In recent years, there have been a number of changes in enterprise backup. It’s not necessarily that backup has changed, but systems and people have changed. In fact, many small and medium-sized businesses don’t even have servers anymore. Now, we have different applications and different infrastructure, and we have to adjust our processes to accommodate new systems. In this episode, we’re talking about backup. Specifically, the death of backup. If backup has no business value, is out of touch with the times, or doesn’t exist anymore altogether, then what does data protection and recovery look like today? Listen and find out. 

Hadoop is Dead – The On-Premise IT Roundtable

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Big data is on everyone’s mind across IT, and the storage industry is no exception. For a while, Hadoop seemed ready to conquer the world with its promise of reliable, scalable, distributed computing. However the tide has seemingly turned away from the once ubiquitous yellow pachyderm. Big data is very much alive, but the roundtable discusses if the complexities inherent in the Hadoop stack mean it’s fated for an untimely demise. Or will the still increasing investments in Hadoop by some customers keep it in the big data discussion for some time to come? And if Hadoop really is dead, are there any pieces that can find some new life in IT? Listen and find out. This episode is sponsored by Pure Storage.

Toxic People Are Unavoidable in IT- The On-Premise IT Roundtable

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In this roundtable, Tom Hollingsworth discusses whether it’s fundamentally unavoidable to work with toxic people in IT. First the panelists define what we mean by toxic in an IT context. Then they dig into why IT seems to have its fair share of people with toxic characteristics, and why the focus should be on the relationship between individuals, rather than singling out one party as being the problem. From there, they dig into how to work with such people, when too much is enough, and how to perhaps avoid falling into the trap of toxicity yourself.

Wi-Fi Monetization is Bad – The On-Premise IT Roundtable

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In this roundtable, Tom Hollingsworth leads a discussion about the premise that Wi-Fi monetization is bad. Some would argue that it’s evil. If venues and businesses want to offer Wi-Fi, it should be treated the same way other utilities are. These all require a degree of expense to the business, but aren’t added on as charges to customers. Keith Parsons uses the free, frictionless, and fast standard. Does that mean that everyone should offer free Wi-Fi all the time? And how does that fit into an organizations larger IT policy framework. The roundtable makes the case and digs into the details in this episode.

IT Certifications Are More Valuable Than A College Degree – The On-Premise IT Roundtable

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Odds are that if you’ve been in IT for a while, you’ve been asked how many certifications you have. There’s no doubt that these are valuable. Yet many IT pros still feel that they need a college degree to hang on the wall. The roundtable discusses if this is a legacy of times gone by, or if a college degree still holds a more important place than certifications. The panel includes a wide range of experiences, with IT careers build with and without degrees, as well as someone currently in college pursuing an IT career. It’s a great conversation!

The Promise of the Cloud Cannot Be Achieved – The On-Premise IT Roundtable

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We know that The Cloud is a real thing. But of the many things called The Cloud, each of them is remarkablly different. Features, capabilities, functions are vary wildly between them. Every organization is scrambling to figure out how to use the cloud, but is the promise of the cloud simply unachievable? Does the pursuit of multi-cloud mean that organizations must ignore whatever makes a cloud special, and turn it into simply someone else’s infrastructure? The roundtable discusses in this episode. Thanks to NetApp for sponsoring this episode.

Digital Transformation is a Myth – The On-Premise IT Roundtable

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There’s a lot of talk about digital transformation, but are organizations actually achieving that, or are they simply changing IT practices to keep up with changing infrastructure. Should we even view digital transformation into a means in and of itself. And can non-digital companies actually transform, or are industries just going to replace obsolete players over time? In this episode, the roundtable discusses a lot of the nuance often lost in grand visions of digital transformation.