Tag: Networking

Tech Talk: What is an Application Delivery Controller?

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Tech Talk: What is an Application Delivery Controller?
What is an Application Delivery Controller header

IT Complexity is becoming an issue talked about more due to the multitude of new technologies being introduced into business infrastructure. However, when implementing these new technologies, IT teams must consider if performance to the network can become adversely affected. This is why solutions like an Application Delivery Controller (ADC) can help drastically improve a businesses IT Infrastructure. With its mix of both security and performance features, it is built to reduce the IT complexity of businesses.

ADC solutions isn’t new, it’s been out in the market for a while but has been constantly improved over time. Recently however, vendors talk more on its security features rather than its network performance capabilities. This is due to the recent trend of pushing more security centric products to the market due to increased cyber security risks. However, the networking capabilities of ADC solutions such as Citrix ADC can help businesses improve even if you factor the security out.

Citrix ADC Networking Capabilities

What is an Application Delivery Controller acceleration

There are many ways in which an ADC can help improve your network, below are a few in which Citrix ADC specializes in to create a better user experience for your business:

Application Acceleration

Citrix ADC can boost the performance of web applications through multiple methods. One way is by using caching and compression. By creating a cache of high traffic data in your network, it lessens the number of requests that your servers have to handle at any given time. This also follows with large media connected to certain https, it may cause a delay once requested to download. This is due to the servers needing to compress the traffic for an easier transfer and also to encrypt the file. This is where the ADC as well can help simplify the process as it takes the task rather than the server needing to use resources.

High Availability

What is an Application Delivery Controller availability

It is important for businesses to experience as little to no downtime as possible. This is to ensure that the business operations and efficiency is not compromised. Citrix ADC’s high availability feature helps companies experience as little downtime or disruptions by through features such Load Balancing or Surge Protection. By allocating requests to healthier servers, it can ensure that your users experience as little disruption to their work as possible. Surge protection protects the servers from being overwhelmed by an increased amount of requests by allocating the requests by only what the server can handle at a steady rate to prevent slow downs to the server.

Performance and Offloading

What is an Application Delivery Controller performance

Another feature of the ADC solution is that it can help offload requests from your servers to the ADC solution. Offloading SSL requests can help improve the bandwidth usage of your business. Citrix ADC also handles multiple requests through a single connection to lessen the number of requests a server has to respond to. Combine this with its feature as well to compress the webpages to simplify and compress the requested data, performance improves significantly.

To learn more about Citrix ADC or other Citrix Solutions, please contact us at marketing@www.ctlink.com.ph and we would be happy to set a more in-depth meeting with you and your business!

Cisco Meraki Hits 1 Million network Milestone!

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Cisco Meraki Hits 1 Million network Milestone!

On May 23, 2017, about 10 years since the first shipped Meraki product, the Meraki network community reached a milestone of 1 million networks!

This comes as no surprise as more and more industries demand that their IT is able do more with less which may include tasks such as:

  • Supporting corporate devices and any preferred user devices
  • Transitioning to wireless offices and the ability to support remote working
  • Enabling massive device expansion and constant digital collaboration
  • Ensuring zero downtime and constant change
  • And most importantly, Mission Focused Technology, technology which drives the main function of industries such as education in schools and patient care in healthcare.

With so many tasks to deliver, IT teams will need to have simple infrastructures which will allow them to be nimble while being able to adapt with the business.  It was at this time Cisco started shipping simpler IT, managed via the cloud, through the Meraki Mini which was well received within the IT community.  IT teams were grossly overloaded and spread thin worldwide under the load of legacy systems with clunky interfaces so the then emerging cloud option given was a helpful option to help solve these issues.  A far cry from today, cloud services have become an integral part of our daily and corporate lives, even more so as the confidence is growing in the dependability and security of the cloud.

Meraki Mini (2006)                                               Meraki MV (2017)

We are happy to say that we partnered with one of the pioneers of cloud-native IT and will continue to support them the best way we can so that our customers will be able to enjoy all the benefits!  To learn more about their products, please see our Cisco product page here.

VeloCloud Launches a SD- WAN Security Technology Partner Ecosystem!

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VeloCloud Launches a SD- WAN Security Technology Partner Ecosystem!

The SD-WAN market is growing at a very fast pace.  It is estimated to exceed $6 billion in revenue worldwide by 2020 while still compounding an annual growth rate of more than 90% over a forecast period between 2015 to 2020.  By 2018, it is also expected that about 82% of North American enterprises will be using SD-WAN which is remarkable considering the technology is still in its early days.

With the option to choose what kind of link is best in a given situation (MPLS, broadband, LTE, or any combination of these), besides optimizing your WAN link, you will also be able to provide additional capacity to avoid blackouts and brownouts.

With such features, VeloCloud makes sure to take the necessary steps to ensure that your data will be secure when using its comprehensive SD-WAN solution.  Recently, VeloCloud has taken a big step towards a more comprehensive security ecosystem which it calls the “SD- WAN Security Technology Partner Program”.  A multifaceted effort of collaboration between a wide range of technology companies to help protect users’ branch, data center and cloud networks which results in a top notch end-to-end security option for SD-WAN which seamlessly includes both on premise and cloud networks.

Partners are given access to VeloCloud’s APIs through a formal software development kit which helps simplify the process for partners who are interested in developing security solutions for VeloCloud’s SD-WAN architecture.  VeloCloud has also opened up a virtual network function (VNF) framework to its partners in the security ecosystem to help develop their own security VNFs within its framework.  VeloCloud also allows for cloud security by allowing third party security vendors to bring their own services into marketplaces operated by service providers such as Azure and Amazon.

Besides the security ecosystem, VeloCloud also has its own security capabilities which are integral parts of its SD-WAN architecture.  One example would be its zero-touch deployment model in which you can be shipped a non-configured VeloCloud edge to any of your branches or remote locations and once connected to your link it will securely authenticate and encrypt across your network.  With its unique way of key management for vCPEs on your network, it will be able to help check your tunnel integrity while helping with scalability and your dynamic multipath VPN.

To learn more about VeloCloud’s security, please read the article here!