>> Announcer: From Santa Clara, California,
in the heart of Silicon Valley,
it's theCube ,covering Altitude 2020,
brought to you by Aviatrix.
(upbeat music)
>> The next panel is the AVH certified engineers,
also known as ACEs.
This is the folks that are certified,
they're engineering, they're building these new solutions.
Please welcome Toby Foss from Informatica,
Stacey Lanier from Teradata,
and Jennifer Reed with Viqtor Davis to the stage.
(upbeat music) (audience cheering)
(panelists exchanging pleasantries)
>> You got to show up.
Where's your jacket Toby? (laughing)
You get it done.
I was just going to rib you guys and say, where's your jackets,
and Jen's got the jacket on.
Okay, good.
>> Love the aviators, ACEs Pilot gear there above the Clouds.
Going to new heights.
>> That's right.
>> So guys Aviatrix aces, I love the name,
think it's great, certified.
This is all about getting things engineered.
So there's a level of certification,
I want to get into that.
But first take us through the day in the life of an ACE,
and just to point out, Stacy is a squad leader.
So he's, he's like a--
>> Squadron Leader. >> Squadron Leader.
>> Yeah.
>> Squadron Leader, so he's got a bunch of ACEs
underneath him, but share your perspective
a day in the Life.
Jennifer, we'll start with you.
>> Sure, so I have actually a whole team
that works for me both in the North America,
both in the US and in Mexico.
So I'm eagerly working to get them certified as well,
so I can become a squad leader myself.
But it's important because one of the critical gaps
that we've found is people having the networking background
because you graduate from college,
and you have a lot of computer science background,
you can program you've got Python,
but networking in packets they just don't get.
So, just taking them through all the processes
that it's really necessary to understand
when you're troubleshooting is really critical.
Because you're going to get an issue
where you need to figure out
where exactly is that happening on the network,
Is my issue just in the VPCs?
Is it on the instance side is a security group,
or is it going on prem?
This is something actually embedded
within Amazon itself?
I mean, I troubleshot an issue for about six months
going back and forth with Amazon,
and it was the VGW VPN.
Because they were auto scaling on two sides,
and we ended up having to pull out the Cisco's,
and put in Aviatrix
so I could just say, " okay, it's fixed,"
and actually helped the application teams
get to that and get it solved.
But I'm taking a lot of junior people
and getting them through that certification process,
so they can understand and see the network,
the way I see the network.
I mean, look, I've been doing this
for 25 years when I got out.
When I went in the Marine Corps, that's what I did,
and coming out, the network is still the network.
But people don't get the same training they got in the 90s.
>> Was just so easy, just write some software,
and they were, takes care of itself.
(unclear cross talk amongst the panel)
I'll come back to that, I want to come back to that,
the problem solved with Amazon, but Toby.
>> I think the only thing I have to add to that
is that it's always the network fault.
As long as I've been in networking,
it's always been the network's fault.
I'm even to this day, it's still the network's fault,
and part of being a network guy is that you need to prove
when it is and when it's not your fault.
That means you need to know a little bit
about 100 different things, to make that.
>> Now you got a full stack DevOps,
you got to know a lot more times another hundred.
>> Toby: And the times are changing, yeah.
>> This year the Squadron Leader and get that right.
What is the Squadron Leader firstly?
Describe what it is.
>> I think is probably just leading on
the network components of it.
But I think, from my perspective,
when to think about what you asked them was,
it's about no issues and no escalations.
So of my day is like that,
I'm happy to be a squadron leader.
>> That is a good outcome, that's a good day.
>> Yeah, sure, it is.
>> Is there good days?
You said you had a good day with Amazon?
Jennifer, you mentioned the Amazon,
and this brings up a good point,
when you have these new waves come in,
you have a lot of new things, new use cases.
A lot of the finger pointing it's that guy's problem ,
that girl's problems, so how do you solve that,
and how do you get the Young Guns up to speed?
Is there training,
is it this where the certification comes in?
>> This is where the certifications really going to come in.
I know when we got together at Reinvent,
one of the questions that we had
with Steve and the team was,
what should our certification look like?
Should we just be teaching about
what AVH troubleshooting brings to bear,
but what should that be like?
I think Toby and I were like, No, no, no, no.
That's going a little too high,
we need to get really low
because the better someone can get
at actually understanding
what's actually happening in the network,
and where to actually troubleshoot the problem,
how to step back each of those processes.
Because without that, it's just a big black box,
and they don't know.
Because everything is abstracted,
in Amazon and in Azure and in Google,
is abstracted, and they have these virtual gateways,
they have VPNs, that you just don't have the logs on,
is you just don't know.
So then what tools can you put in front of them
of where they can look?
Because there are full logs.
Well, as long as they turned on the flow logs
when they built it, and there's like,
each one of those little things that well,
if they'd had decided to do that,
when they built it, it's there.
But if you can come in later to really supplement that
with training to actual troubleshoot,
and do a packet capture here, as it's going through,
then teaching them how to read that even.
>> Yeah, Toby, we were talking before we came on up on stage
about your career, you've been networking all your time,
and then, you're now mentoring a lot of younger people.
How is that going?
Because the people who come in fresh
they don't have all the old war stories,
like they don't talk about it,
There's never for, I walk in bare feet in the snow
when I was your age,
I mean, it's so easy now, right, they say.
What's your take on how you train the young People.
>> So I've noticed two things.
One is that they are up to speed a lot faster
in generalities of networking.
They can tell you what a network is
in high school level now, where I didn't learn that
til midway through my career,
and they're learning it faster,
but they don't necessarily understand
why it's that way here.
Everybody thinks that it's always slash 24
for a subnet, and they don't understand
why you can break it down smaller,
why it's really necessary.
So the ramp up speed is much faster
for these guys that are coming in.
But they don't understand why and they need
some of that background knowledge
to see where it's coming from,
and why is it important, and that's old guys,
that's where we thrive.
>> Jennifer, you mentioned you got in from the Marines,
it helps, but when you got into networking,
what was it like then and compare it now?
Because most like we heard earlier static versus dynamic
Don't be static is like that.
You just set the network, you got a perimeter.
>> Yeah, no, there was no such thing.
So back in the day, I mean,
we had Banyan vines for email,
and we had token ring,
and I had to set up token ring networks
and figure out why that didn't work.
Because how many of things were actually sharing it.
But then actually just cutting fiber
and running fiber cables and dropping them over
shelters to plug them in and all crap,
they swung it too hard and shattered it
and now I got to figure eight Polish this thing
and actually should like to see if it works.
I mean, that was the network ,
current cat five cables to run an Ethernet,
and then from that I just said,
network switches, dumb switches,
like those were the most common ones you had.
Then actually configuring routers
and logging into a Cisco router
and actually knowing how to configure that.
It was funny because I had gone all the way up,
I was the software product manager for a while.
So I've gone all the way up the stack,
and then two and a half, three years ago,
I came across to work with Entity group
that became Viqtor Davis.
But we went to help one of our customers Avis,
and it was like, okay, so we need to fix the network.
Okay, I haven't done this in 20 years,
but all right, let's get to it.
Because it really fundamentally does not change.
It's still the network.
I mean, I've had people tell me,
Well, when we go to containers,
we will not have to worry about the network.
And I'm like, yeah, you don't I do.
>> And that's within programmability is a really interesting,
so I think this brings up the certification.
What are some of the new things
that people should be aware of
that come in with the ABA tricks, a certification?
What are some of the highlights?
Can you guys share
some of the highlights around the certifications?
>> I think some of the importances is that
it doesn't need to be vendor specific for network generality
or basic networking knowledge,
and instead of learning how Cisco does something,
or how Palo Alto does something,
We need to understand how and why it works as a basic model,
and then understand how each vendor
has gone about that problem and solved it in a general.
That's true in MultiCloud as well.
You can't learn how Cloud networking works
without understanding how AWS and Azure and GCP
are all slightly the same but slightly different,
and some things work and some things don't.
I think that's probably the number one take.
>> I think having a certification across Clouds
is really valuable because we heard the global s eyes
as you have a business issues.
What does it mean to do that?
Is it code, is it networking?
Is it configurations of the Aviatrix?
what is, he says,the certification but,
what is it about the multiCloud
that makes it multi networking and multi vendor?
>> The easy answer is yes,
>> Yes is all of us. >> All of us.
So you got to be in general
what's good your hands and all You have to be.
Right, it takes experience.
Because every Cloud vendor
has their own certification.
Whether that's SOPs and advanced networking
and event security, or whatever it might be,
yeah, they can take the test,
but they have no idea how to figure out
what's wrong with that system.
The same thing with any certification,
but it's really getting your hands in there,
and actually having to troubleshoot the problems,
actually work the problem, and calm down.
It's going to be okay.
I mean, because I don't know how many calls I've been on
or even had aviators join me on.
It's like, okay, so everyone calm down,
let's figure out what's happening.
It's like, we've looked at that screen three times,
looking at it again is not going to solve that problem, right.
But at the same time, remaining calm
but knowing that it really is,
I'm getting a packet from here to go over here,
it's not working, so what could be the problem?
Actually stepping them through those scenarios,
but that's like, you only get that by having to do it,
and seeing it, and going through it, and then you get it.
>> I have a question, so, I just see it.
We started this program maybe six months ago,
we're seeing a huge amount of interest.
I mean, we're oversubscribed on all the training sessions.
We've got people flying from around the country,
even with Coronavirus, flying to go to Seattle
to go to these events where we're subscribed, is that--
>> A good emerging leader would put there.
>> Yeah.
So, is that something that you see in your organizations?
Are you recommending that to people?
Do you see, I mean, I'm just, I guess I'm surprised
or not surprised.
But I'm really surprised by the demand if you would,
of this MultiCloud network certification
because there really isn't anything like that.
Is that something you guys can comment on?
Or do you see the same things in your organization?
>> I see from my side, because we operate in a multiCloud
environments that really helps and some beneficial for us.
>> Yeah, true.
I think I would add that networking guys
have always needed to use certifications to prove
that they know what they know.
>> Right.
>> It's not good enough to say, Yeah,
I know IP addresses or I know how a network works.
A couple little check marks or a little
letters body writing helps give you validity.
So even in our team, we can say, Hey, we're using
these certifications to know that you know
enough of the basics and enough of the understandings,
that you have the tools necessary, right.
>> I guess my final question for you guys is,
why an ACE certification is relevant,
and then second part is share with the live stream
folks who aren't yet ACE certified or might want to jump in
to be aviatrix certified engineers.
Why is it important, so why is it relevant
and why should someone want to be
a certified aviatrix certified engineer?
>> I think my views a little different.
I think certification comes
from proving that you have the knowledge,
not proving that you get a certification
to get an army there backwards.
So when you've got the training and the understanding
and you use that to prove
and you can, like, grow your certification list with it,
versus studying for a test to get a certification
and have no understanding of it.
>> Okay, so that who is the right person
that look at this and say, I'm qualified,
is it a network engineer, is it a DevOps person?
What's your view, a little certain.
>> I think Cloud is really the answer.
It's the, as we talked like the edges getting eroded,
so is the network definition getting eroded?
We're getting more and more of some network,
some DevOps, some security,
lots and lots of security,
because network is so involved in so many of them.
That's just the next progression.
>> Do you want to add something there?
>> I would say expand that to more automation engineers,
because we have those now,
so I probably extend it beyond this one.
>> Jennifer you want to?
>> Well, I think the training classes themselves
are helpful, especially the entry level ones
for people who may be "Cloud architects"
but have never done anything in networking
for them to understand why we need those things
to really work, whether or not they go through
to eventually get a certification is something different.
But I really think fundamentally understanding
how these things work,
it makes them a better architect,
makes them better application developer.
But even more so
as you deploy more of your applications into the Cloud,
really getting an understanding, even from people
who have traditionally done Onprem networking,
they can understand how that's going to work in Cloud.
>> Well, I know we've got just under 30 seconds left.
I want to get one more question then just one more,
for the folks watching that are maybe younger
than, that don't have that networking training.
From your experiences each of you can answer
why should they know about networking, what's the benefit?
What's in it for them?
Motivate them, share some insights of
why they should go a little bit deeper in networking.
Stacy, we'll start with you, we'll go then.
>> I'll say it's probably fundamental, right?
If you want to deliver solutions,
networking is the very top.
>> I would say if you, fundamental of an operating system
running on a machine,
how those machines start together is a fundamental changes,
something that start from the base and work your way up.
>> Jennifer?
>> Right, well, I think it's a challenge.
Because you've come from top down,
now you're going to start looking from bottom up,
and you want those different systems to cross-communicate,
and say you've built something,
and you're overlapping IP space,
note that that doesn't happen.
But how can I actually make that still operate
without having to re IP re platform.
Just like those challenges,
like those younger developers or assistant engineers
can really start to get their hands around
and understand those complexities
and bring that forward in their career.
>> They get to know then how the pipes are working,
and they're got to know it as good as plumbing.
>> That's right,
>> They got to know how it works, and how to code it.
>> That's right.
>> Awesome, thank you guys for great insights,
ACE Certified Engineers, also known as ACEs,
give them a round of applause.
(audience clapping)
(upbeat music)
>> Thank you, okay.
All right, that concludes my portion.
Thank you, Steve Thanks for having me.
>> John, thank you very much, that was fantastic.
Everybody round of applause for John Furrier.
(audience applauding)
Yeah, so great event, great event.
I'm not going to take long,
we got lunch outside for the people here,
just a couple of things.
Just to call the action, right?
So we saw the ACEs, for those of you out of the stream here,
become a certified, right, it's great for your career,
it's great for not knowledge, is fantastic.
It's not just an aviator's thing,
it's going to teach you about Cloud networking,
MultiCloud networking, with a little bit of aviatrix,
exactly like the Cisco CCIE program was for IP network,
that type of the thing, that's number one.
Second thing is learning, right?
So there's a link up there to join the community.
Again like I started this, this is a community,
this is the kickoff to this community, and it's a movement.
So go to community.avh.com,
starting a community of multiCloud.
So get get trained, learn.
I'd say the next thing is we're doing over 100 seminars
across the United States and also starting into Europe soon,
we will come out and we'll actually spend a couple hours
and talk about architecture,
and talk about those beginning things.
For those of you on the livestream in here as well,
we're coming to a city near you, go to one of those events,
it's a great way to network with other people
that are in the industry,
as well as to start alone
and get on that MultiCloud journey.
Then I'd say the last thing is,
we haven't talked a lot about what Aviatrix does here,
and that's intentional.
We want you leaving with wanting to know more,
and schedule, get with us and schedule a multi hour
architecture workshop session.
So we sit down with customers,
and we talk about where they're at in that journey,
and more importantly, where they're going,
and define that end state architecture
from networking, computer, storage, everything.
Everything you've heard today, everybody panel
kept talking about architecture, talking about operations.
Those are the types of things that we solve,
we help you define that canonical architecture,
that system architecture, that's yours.
So many of our customers, they have three by five,
plotted lucid charts, architecture drawings,
and it's the customer name slash Aviatrix,
network architecture,
and they put it on their whiteboard.
That's the most valuable thing they get from us.
So this becomes their 20 year network architecture drawing
that they don't do anything without talking to us
and look at that architecture.
That's what we do in these multi hour workshop sessions
with customers, and that's super, super powerful.
So if you're interested, definitely call us,
and let's schedule that with our team.
So anyway, I just want to thank everybody on the livestream.
Thank everybody here.
Hopefully it was it was very useful.
I think it was, and Join the movement,
and for those of you here, join us for lunch,
and thank you very much.
(audience applauding)
(upbeat music)