Monthly Archives: April 2020

kernel of truth podcast

Routing protocols in the datacenter fabric



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Click here for our previous episode.

Hosts Roopa Prabhu and Pete Lumbis are joined by a special guest to the podcast, Russ White! The group come together virtually to discuss what we should think about when it comes to routing protocols in the datcenter. What are the tradeoffs when using traditional protocols like OSPF or BGP? What about new protocols like RIFT or a hybrid approach with things like BGP-link state? Spoiler alert: it depends.

Guest Bios

Roopa Prabhu: Roopa Prabhu is Chief Linux Architect at Cumulus Networks. At Cumulus she and her team work on all things kernel networking and Linux system infrastructure areas. Her primary focus areas in the Linux kernel are Linux bridge, Netlink, VxLAN, Lightweight tunnels. She is currently focused on building Linux kernel dataplane for E-VPN. She loves working at Cumulus and with the Linux kernel networking and debian communities. Her past experience includes Linux clusters, ethernet drivers and Linux KVM virtualization platforms. She has a BS and MS in Computer Science. You can find her on Twitter at @__roopa.

Pete Lumbis: Pete, CCIE R&S #28677 and CCDE 2012::3, is the Director of Technical Marketing and Documentation at Cumulus Networks. He helps customers build and design next generation, fully automated datacenters. He can be found on Twitter at @PeteCCDE

Russ White: Who is Russ White? The short answer— he’s worked around electronics from the early 1970’s through the late 1980’s, moved into computers in the 1980’s, and become seriously into network engineering in the late 1980’s. He’s never looked back and if you’re curious to learn more you can find out all you need to know about him via his website here.

Episode links

Join our community Slack channel here. We’re also on LinkedInTwitterFacebook and Instagram!

Russ’s podcast “the hedge” can be found via his website listed above or you can find it here.

Resource referenced: Distributed flood optimization 


kernel of truth podcast

Production Ready Automation



Subscribe to Kernel of Truth on iTunes, Google Play, SpotifyCast Box and Sticher!

Click here for our previous episode.

In this episode hosts Roopa Prabhu and Brian O’Sullivan chat with Justin Betz about production grade automation and CI/CD workflows for continuous maintenance and deployment of your “infrastructure as code.” They also discuss how like any other software code, code to manage and automate your infrastructure (IAC) has to be maintained, fixed, withstand hardware and software upgrades — so how do you do that? Finally, the group talks about Open Source production quality automation code. Enjoy!

Guest Bios

Roopa Prabhu: Roopa Prabhu is Chief Linux Architect at Cumulus Networks. At Cumulus she and her team work on all things kernel networking and Linux system infrastructure areas. Her primary focus areas in the Linux kernel are Linux bridge, Netlink, VxLAN, Lightweight tunnels. She is currently focused on building Linux kernel dataplane for E-VPN. She loves working at Cumulus and with the Linux kernel networking and debian communities. Her past experience includes Linux clusters, ethernet drivers and Linux KVM virtualization platforms. She has a BS and MS in Computer Science. You can find her on Twitter at @__roopa.

Brian O’Sullivan: Brian currently heads Product Management for Cumulus Linux. For 15 or so years he’s held software Product Management positions at Juniper Networks as well as other smaller companies. Once he saw the change that was happening in the networking space, he decided to join Cumulus Networks to be a part of the open networking innovation. When not working, Brian is a voracious reader and has held a variety of jobs, including bartending in three countries and working as an extra in a German soap opera. You can find him on Twitter at @bosullivan00.

Justin Betz: Justin is a Technical Marketing Engineer at Cumulus Networks. He holds both a CCIE and a CCONP certification and brings over a decade of experience in network operations to help Cumulus change the networking industry. Outside of the office, you’ll find him on the trails, either hiking or mountain biking. Find him on LinkedIn here.

Episode links

Join our community Slack channel here. We’re also on LinkedInTwitterFacebook and Instagram!

Give production-ready network automations a try! It’s as simple as copy, paste, deploy. Cumulus in the Cloud now offers the industry’s first open source and fully packaged automation solution. Sign-up for your free 3-day trial here.