Vendor Fun Times

[deanwebb]

Going through training on my employer's product and all its features.

And all its third-party collaborations.

This is a lot of stuff.

A LOT OF STUFF.



Oh well, I knew the job was dangerous when I took it. 

[deanwebb]

And, since I'm doing architect stuff, I get to read over lots of regulatory requirements so that I can speak as to how our product can help meet compliance. Lesson of the day is this: if you want to work for a vendor or a VAR, be prepared to do a lot of reading, watching, and remembering. This is not a complaint, this is an observation. Since I prefer lots of study to getting those 2AM outage calls, I'll keep on reading.

[icecream-guy]

And, since I'm doing architect stuff, I get to read over lots of regulatory requirements so that I can speak as to how our product can help meet compliance. Lesson of the day is this: if you want to work for a vendor or a VAR, be prepared to do a lot of reading, watching, and remembering. This is not a complaint, this is an observation. Since I prefer lots of study to getting those 2AM outage calls, I'll keep on reading.

...and when will you be available for engagements?   our facility is well integrated with $vendor.
got to see if the NAC team needs some architecture help.

[deanwebb]

My availability is subject to my finishing up all the reading and product videos. 

But let me not use this forum for personal gain, let me use it to describe my role... 

For starters, at no point will I be getting a call about an outage. Not for my $VENDOR technology, not for something I'm backfilling another guy for, nothing. That's not this job. I don't even do initial sales work - that's for the SE, who pretty much stays with the customer throughout, pre- and post-sales. As an architect, I review major deployments and look to see if they're sized right, if they're asking us to do the things we really can do, and to make sure that if they want us to do the work of an entirely different product that I call that out and talk about third-party integrations in that area.

I also get to write up white papers, solution guidelines, best practice recommendations, stuff like that. That's where the PCI and HIPAA stuff comes in. We'd like something more precise on how to tackle those concerns, so I'm the guy that's gonna do the precise stuff. 

[icecream-guy]

My availability is subject to my finishing up all the reading and product videos. 

But let me not use this forum for personal gain, let me use it to describe my role... 

For starters, at no point will I be getting a call about an outage. Not for my $VENDOR technology, not for something I'm backfilling another guy for, nothing. That's not this job. I don't even do initial sales work - that's for the SE, who pretty much stays with the customer throughout, pre- and post-sales. As an architect, I review major deployments and look to see if they're sized right, if they're asking us to do the things we really can do, and to make sure that if they want us to do the work of an entirely different product that I call that out and talk about third-party integrations in that area.


I also get to write up white papers, solution guidelines, best practice recommendations, stuff like that. That's where the PCI and HIPAA stuff comes in. We'd like something more precise on how to tackle those concerns, so I'm the guy that's gonna do the precise stuff. 

sounds like you found a real fun opportunity there.   I smell Cisco ISE integrations in your future.

[deanwebb]

sounds like you found a real fun opportunity there.   I smell Cisco ISE integrations in your future.

Could very well happen. My job is to figure out how to make things work for a customer environment and if they want my stuff to play nicely with others, that's just what I'll do.

[wintermute000]

Isn't your stuff a direct competitor to ISE?

[deanwebb]

Isn't your stuff a direct competitor to ISE?

At first glance.

Buuuuuut... there can be a number of use cases where ForeScout CounterACT would be used in conjunction with ISE.

1. Company is using ISE for dot1x and RADIUS, but uses CounterACT as an overlay to provide full IoT visibility and integrations with non-Cisco ecology vendors.

2. Merger situation where a company is going forward with a CounterACT deployment and the company being bought is using ISE. I've actually used ISE as a RADIUS server for CounterACT and CounterACT as a RADIUS server for ISE. I had lots of fun doing the PoC at Global Megacorp, GmbH, to discover that fact.

Fun fact: The US HQ for ForeScout is right across the street from Cisco's US HQ. As in ForeScout is the even-numbered side of Tasman and Cisco is the odd-numbered side, with a crosswalk between the two.

[deanwebb]

As an architect, I'm getting exposed to and interested in a LOT more stuff in terms of figuring out how it all works with or works around my product. This is a great broadening of my knowledge.

[icecream-guy]

As an architect, I'm getting exposed to and interested in a LOT more stuff in terms of figuring out how it all works with or works around my product. This is a great broadening of my knowledge.

you will find, not everything works the cisco way.


on a side note, Arista is coming on site next month for a demo and preview of DANZ. Now that _is_ fun times.

[icecream-guy]

on a side note, Arista is coming on site next month for a demo and preview of DANZ. Now that _is_ fun times.

Turned out be be about Tapp Agg discussion, that was pretty interesting stuff there

[wintermute000]

DANZ is neat and cost-effective, but the devil is in the detail with these kinds of tools.... can they e.g.
- reconcile ECMP flows
- reconcile ECMP flows across different physical tap switches/units and reassemble for the tooling
- IPS (in-line) including above ECMP considerations
- unpack VXLAN and send only payload

etc

[icecream-guy]

I setup Tufin to come out and do a demo of their policy orchestration tool in a few weeks. Considering it a partial replacement for HP NA, since HP isn't keeping up with the latest drivers (Cisco FPR-4100 series for example). that should be a fun time.

[deanwebb]

I setup Tufin to come out and do a demo of their policy orchestration tool in a few weeks. Considering it a partial replacement for HP NA, since HP isn't keeping up with the latest drivers (Cisco FPR-4100 series for example). that should be a fun time.

Should be fun, indeed. Tufin's a good product, hope they got support for the firewalls you're using.

[deanwebb]

Meanwhile, life continues on the vendor side...

Being a vendor means I don't touch the customer gear. Even if the customers don't know what they're doing and I have to provide repeated instructions on what to do. It's like teaching a kid how to drive, sometimes.