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Semi-Pro, All Bad

Sneak peek of book ‘Cisco Networking Simplified, 2nd Edition’

This week's sneak peek of a Cisco Press book is a chapter from Cisco Networking Simplified, 2nd Edition, by Neil Anderson,  Jim Doherty and Paul Della Maggiora.

This is the Cisco Press blurb about the book:

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Canadian bust of fake Cisco gear is part of a larger $76M seizure of counterfeit Cisco goods

Thursday's news of a charge placed by Canadian authorities on two individuals and Network IT, accused of attempting to shift $2 million in counterfeit Cisco goods is part of a larger operation that netted $76 million in fake Cisco gear. An international taskforce made up of the FBI, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, US Customs and Border Protection, and the  Royal Canadian Mounted Police, said it had seized 400 fake Cisco hardware that was being trafficked between the United States, Canada and China.

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Cisco jumps to No. 2 position in enterprise telephony market

More good news for Cisco from Infonetics Research. The research firm said Cisco jumped from fifth to second position in the top 5 vendors that shipped the most enterprise telephony systems in 2007. In the market for PBX/KTS (key telephone system) equipment that topped $9.6 million in 2007, Cisco "was the only one of [the top 5 vendors] with a meaningful increase in market share," according to Infonetics. The vendors in order are: Avaya, Cisco, Nortel, Siemens, and Alcatel-Lucent.

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Linksys guillotines VP of worldwide channels

Nigel Williams - Linksys VP of worldwide channels has done such a terrific job of integrating Linksys with the Cisco channel that he has performed himself out of job!

Nigel states:

“The program has been in some flux this year, we have moved toward closer integration with Cisco’s channel program, while still remaining dedicated to the customers that remain Linksys focused.”

“In the end our channel customers will reap benefits of a robust program that should give them limitless support and maximum potential for growth.”

“What we’ve done is move the worldwide channels role from a global role and pushed it all the way down to the [geographic] theaters, so the theaters now work and collaborate directly with Cisco to bring a better story to our channels of why Cisco and Linksys combined as we both try to penetrate the SMB space,” said Rod Keller - Linksys Vice President of Worldwide Sales. Nigel Williams will be accepting a new position at Cisco.

Do YOU think Linksys sales will increase as a result of integrating with the Cisco channel?

http://www.BradReese.Com

Linksys guillotines VP of worldwide channels

Nigel Williams - Linksys VP of worldwide channels has done such a terrific job of integrating Linksys with the Cisco channel that he has performed himself out of job!

Nigel states:

“The program has been in some flux this year, we have moved toward closer integration with Cisco’s channel program, while still remaining dedicated to the customers that remain Linksys focused.”

“In the end our channel customers will reap benefits of a robust program that should give them limitless support and maximum potential for growth.”

“What we’ve done is move the worldwide channels role from a global role and pushed it all the way down to the [geographic] theaters, so the theaters now work and collaborate directly with Cisco to bring a better story to our channels of why Cisco and Linksys combined as we both try to penetrate the SMB space,” said Rod Keller - Linksys Vice President of Worldwide Sales. Nigel Williams will be accepting a new position at Cisco.

Do YOU think Linksys sales will increase as a result of integrating with the Cisco channel?

http://www.BradReese.Com

Positions In GA And MI

• Unnamed client (Atlanta, GA) is looking for a 2-3 ColdFusion developers with Flex experience. Oracle and Java experience preferred. Contact recruiter Steve Douglas at Kinetix.
• Unnamed client (Ann Arbor, MI) is looking for a ColdFusion developer for a 16-18 month contract. Requirements include experience with CF7 or higher, a good understanding of CFCs, and familiarity with object oriented development. ActionScript experience a plus. Contact recruiter Lancet D. Brothers at TEK Systems.

Ask a Jedi: No cookie for you!

Huawei to 3Com: “I’ll be back”

Just like the famous Terminator character, giant Chinese networking powerhouse Huawei has told 3Com: “I’ll be back” The Wall Street Journal reported today that Huawei and Bain Capital plan to resubmit an application seeking U.S. approval for their planned $2.2 billion buyout of 3Com within the next several weeks, according to people familiar with the matter.

3Com issued a press release that it will immediately adjourn today’s shareholder meeting without taking a vote on the pending merger transaction.

The shareholders’ meeting will be reconvened on Friday, March 7th 2008, hopefully, with a new merger proposal from Huawei and Bain Capital to submit for 3Com shareholder approval.

Do YOU think Huawei will get U.S. government approval to buy 3Com?

http://www.BradReese.Com

Implicit Array And Structure Creation Revisited

Adobe Product Security Incident Response Team Now Blogging

Even more YouTube…

How to Get Search Engines to Discover (Index) All the Web Pages on Your Site

My 30 seconds on ColdFusion

Microsoft Support Surprises

Cisco greens Networkers

Green efforts at Cisco Networkers 2007 in Australia and New Zealand enabled Cisco to save the  equivalent of almost 208 tonnes of carbon emissions, and almost 70% of the waste from the show was recycled, according to a report in CRN Australia. Computerworld Australia is also reporting that the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre, where the event was held last September used low-energy lighting in exhibition halls and reduced food waste by distributing unused food to local charities.

Read more

Royal Canadian Mounties bust swindlers seeking to sell $2 million in counterfeit Cisco

Charged by Royal Canadian Mounties with two counts each of:

Fraud Over $5000

And one count each of:

Passing Off and Possession of Property Obtained by Crime

Are:

	Aaron (Ron) Sananes - age 44 of 30 Charnwood Place, Thornhill, Ontario Canada
	Mandi Fitleberg - age 45, of 30 Charnwood Place, Thornhill, Ontario Canada
	NETWORK IT, located at 210 Don Park Road - Unit 1, Markham, Ontario Canada

Today Thursday, February 28th, 2008 marks their first Canadian Court appearance.

On February 21, 2007 in cooperation with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Royal Canadian Mounties executed a search warrant on the business premises of NETWORK IT, located at 210 Don Park Rd. - Unit 1, Markham, Ontario Canada.

Approximately 1,600 counterfeit Cisco parts were seized with an estimated value of over $2 million dollars.

The investigation commenced in October 2006, when Cisco Brand Protection complained that NETWORK IT was distributing large quantities of counterfeit Cisco to companies in the United States via the Internet.

Additionally, a month later in November 2006, investigators from the Royal Canadian Mounties, ICE and as well as the FBI formed a joint initiative for disrupting the flow of counterfeit Cisco in North America.

“Counterfeit products greatly undermine the integrity of our economy,” said Inspector Peter Goulet - Officer in Charge of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Greater Toronto Area Federal Enforcement Section.

“In many cases the end users were unaware that counterfeit products were being placed in their computers, and depending on the function of those computers this could cause serious health and safety concerns.”

Even after their counterfeit Cisco bust, Network IT still remains in business today selling networking equipment on their website:

Furthermore, NETWORK IT maintains a store on eBay after their counterfeit Cisco bust.

UNEDA - United Network Equipment Dealer Association - provides an immediate response:

NETWORK IT was formally removed from UNEDA membership on March 12th, 2007.

“One of the core objectives of UNEDA is to eradicate the presence of all counterfeit equipment in the used Cisco industry,” said John Stafford - Vice President and Membership Chairman of UNEDA.

“Thousands of customers representing large and small organizations turn to UNEDA for top-quality, reliable and genuine refurbished equipment.”

“Our members abide by a strict code of ethics to protect our customers from the menace of counterfeiters.”

“We react quickly to expel any UNEDA member that is discovered selling stolen or counterfeit gear.”

“UNEDA leverages its unmatched, collective experience in current and past-generation network equipment to continually educate our members—and customers—on the telltale signs of illegitimate equipment.”

“We also work closely with various law enforcement agencies to identify and prosecute counterfeiters.”

ASCDI - Association of Computer Dealers International - fails to respond:

Joseph Marion - President of ASCDI failed to respond to telephone and email requests regarding the continued acceptance of NETWORK IT as a member in good standing with ASCDI. Yours truly is disappointed that Joseph Marion and ASCDI are keeping NETWORK IT as a member in good standing of their association. Marion and ASCDI are certainly undermining the battle against counterfeit Cisco!

Over the last three years more than 400 seizures of counterfeit Cisco network hardware and labels with an estimated retail value of more than $76 million have been seized.

“Crimes like these threaten international commerce, national security and the very safety of our citizens,” said Julie Myers - Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for ICE. “Throughout this investigation, the cooperation and partnership that we received from Cisco Systems, our law enforcement colleagues, and Chinese counterparts are a clear example of the results that can be realized through industry, interagency and international cooperation.”

The FBI named its portion of this ongoing initiative Operation Cisco Raider - an international, coordinated investigation of 15 cases involving nine FBI field offices.

The FBI worked closely with law enforcement partners including ICE, Defense Criminal Investigative Service, General Services Administration, Department of the Interior, Internal Revenue Service, and the Royal Canadian Mounties.

Over the last two years, Operation Cisco Raider has resulted in 36 search warrants that identified approximately 3,500 counterfeit network components with an estimated retail value of over $3.5 million, and has led to a total of ten convictions and $1.7 million in restitution.

ICE and CBP opened a total of 28 investigations in 17 separate field offices since 2005; eight of those investigations were worked jointly with the FBI and several with the Royal Canadian Mounties.

ICE agents have conducted 115 seizures of counterfeit Cisco products having an estimated retail value of $20.4 million.

ICE investigations have led to six indictments and four felony convictions to date.

CBP has made 373 seizures of counterfeit Cisco network hardware since 2005, and 40 seizures of Cisco labels for counterfeit products.

All together, ICE and CBP seized more than 74,000 counterfeit Cisco network components and labels with a total estimated retail value of more than $73 million.

How do YOU feel about ASCDI keeping NETWORK IT as a member in good standing of their association?

http://www.BradReese.Com

Welcome Chet Haase

Early Threat Detection using Human Social Habits

Leave it to the Air Force Institute of Technology to develop technology that detects patterns in email/web usage that could offer leading indicators of insider security threats. 
 
The technology is called Probabilistic Latent Semantic Indexing (try saying that a couple times fast). It sifts through email and web traffic logs to identify trends in human behaviors that could ultimately lead to malfeasance.  For example, an employee who becomes distant with colleagues over email and increases communications with outsiders could be a sign of dissidence. If you’re keeping tabs on this topic, this is an extension of the research MIT is doing around “Reality Mining”.
 
Researchers will argue they are not concerned with the content of data, but rather data about data (i.e. deltas in creation time, volume, etc.) to draw conclusions.  However, this seems a bit flawed with this security guy. 
 
I’m all for finding new ways to find the bad guys especially if good data exists to prove a wrong doing.  But, making security predictions based on historical trends of human behavior seems a bit like guess work at best.  In my opinion, there is too much inherent variability in human behavior for even the savviest computer and slick algorithms to predict what comes next.  If people were truly rational, security would be a heck of a lot easier.
 
When it comes to preventing insider threats, I believe a basic understanding of human psychology is far more effective than directing machine learning at the problem.  People with access to do bad things, combined with a motivating factor and the right opportunity pose a threat to organizations.  No arguments there. 
 
While it is difficult to control motives, we certainly can address the access and opportunity sides of the problem.  Limiting access, managing data and monitoring usage are critical components to any successful security program, but sadly these are often areas of most neglect.  We can’t solve humans, but we can institute pragmatic process and technology to limit them. 
 
Gotta run now and send some emails off…  I don’t want some fancy mainframes out there inferring that my lack of email (because I’m writing this blog) is a sign that I’m about to commit a crime.

Quick and dirty CAPTCHA Guide - for ColdFusion 8

NAC Troubleshooting Tips Podcast

We got a chance to tape a podcast with Prem Ananthakrishnan on the subject of Troubleshooting the Cisco Network Admission Control Appliance.  This really turned into a good 'best practices' session.  Prem used to work in our TAC (Technical Assistance Center) so he turned out to be a great guest for covering this kind of information. 

His list included:

Deploy without looping
Managing Posture
How to troubleshoot AD SSO
Cannot start Active Directory SSO
Certificates
CAM/CAS Communication
User redirect does not work
Agent does not pop up
CAM is unable to get updates
Agent goes into a login loop

Be sure and check out the NAC Chalk Talk Series Prem and the rest of his team has been working on.

Hope you enjoy it!  All of our podcasts are available on iTunes (just search under Cisco Interaction Network or TechWiseTV). You can also get a look at the entire podcast library.

We were focused on NAC recently as we got ready for our NAC Design show airing on TechWiseTV March 6.  Check out the show notes for details on getting registered to view that show with Alok Agrawal as our special guest.

100GB Ethernet

I love Germany. How can you not like a country that is based upon no speed limit and beer. I could move there and not miss a step. Of course the food sucks, so I reckon that is the trade off.  I love speed and performance. A couple years back I purchased a couple of Go-Peds for my kids  but that was not enough...I had to soup those little dudes up squeeze a another ounce of horsepower out of them. I put on a header, bigger carb, manufactured an intake and advanced the timing as well as changed the splines, man those dudes could really fly!!

Now the IEEE has move 100GB closer to reality by forming the 802.3ba task force. The High Speed Study Group has included physical layer two data rates; 40GB @ 100m for servers and storage and 100GB @ 40Km for aggregation and networking gear. It is planned to be ready by 2010. Hey that was a cool flick wasn't it? I didn't think 2001 was all that, truthfully, I think Stanley Kubrick sucks, but I did like 2010 and Full Metal Jacket...

Anyway...

One of the great ideas that is surfacing in that working group for physical coding sublayer interfaces is called inverse multiplexing. It is based upon this way cool concept of virtual lanes. By using 64B/66B framing  and scrambling (compared to 8b/10b) that we use in 10Gb currently we now have a very low overhead (approx 3%)  for up to 100Gb speeds. Now we inverse multiplex that signal for transmission and that means we can use some very basic optics to send these higher data rates. I must admit I am a little confused on how a 10:4 SerDes gearbox is going to map out 20 lanes of traffic with demux-mux  coding, but I know that is my own goober-ness and I just need to work with it a bit. 

I love this idea because it keeps manufacturing cost low and it reuses an already proven technology to run higher data rates. This means for all us speed lovers it is time to put 10GB in the far right lane....

Jimmy Ray

How to configure 802.1Q trunking between Cisco Catalyst switches

How to configure 802.1Q trunking between Cisco Catalyst 4000 - 4500 - 5000 - 5500 - 6000 - 6500 Switches that run CatOS and Cisco IOS System Software.

In 802.1Q trunking, all VLAN packets are tagged on the trunk link, except the native VLAN.

The native VLAN packets are sent untagged on the trunk link.

Therefore, the native VLAN must be the same on both switches configured for trunking.

This makes it easy to deduce to which VLAN a frame belongs when a frame is received with no tag.

By default, VLAN 1 is the native VLAN on all switches.

In Catalyst OS (CatOS), the native VLAN can be changed when the set vlan vlan-id mod/port command is issued, where mod/port is the trunk port.

In Cisco IOS Software, the native VLAN can be changed when the switchport trunk native vlan vlan-id interface command is issued, which is configured on the trunk port.

To enable the 802.1Q trunking on a CatOS and integrated Cisco IOS Software (native mode) switch, issue these commands:

	In the CatOS switch: cat6000>set trunk mod/port [on , desirable , auto , nonegotiate] dot1q
	In the integrated Cisco IOS (native mode) switch: cat6500(config-if)#switchport trunk {encapsulation dot1q}

For more information visit:

802.1Q Trunking Between Catalyst Switches Running CatOS and Cisco IOS System Software

http://www.BradReese.Com

Measuring Identity Theft at Top Banks

ScopeCache on RIAForge

Office 2003 SP3 Automatic Distribution Begins Today

iGoogle Gadgets for Webmaster Tools

How to Insert a YouTube Video into Your Web Page with Nvu or KompoZer

The RSS Platform IE8 User-Agent String

Hello! Just a quick note on some important information just posted to the RSS team blog. The RSS platform is introducing an updated User-Agent string for use with Internet Explorer 8. Check out the details in Walter’s latest post.

Kristen Kibble
Program Manager

Has GMail’s CAPTCHA Been Cracked?

Virtualization equals real security

Hotels in Cannes don’t just sell out for the Film Festival; all rooms are also booked for a big IT show this week: VMware’s first VMworld Europe.

Today I showed an audience of about 4,500 people at VMworld Europe how VMware and McAfee together will be able to protect virtual environments in ways beyond what is available to protect physical environments today.

Our customers are using more and more virtualization. We’ve devoted a lot of time and energy to provide the best protection possible, for both physical and virtualized environments.

Virtualization represents a disruptive change in how the world uses its computing devices. It has also expanded the possibilities for more comprehensive security for the virtualization platforms and the guest operating systems they host.

With the popularity of virtualization and the rush to reap its benefits, security must not become an afterthought. That is why I am excited about today’s big news: VMware VMsafe. With VMsafe, VMware is building adaptable security interfaces as a fundamental part of its products, allowing partners such as McAfee to offer innovative security solutions.

McAfee is the first security company to publicly demonstrate VMsafe. At VMworld we showed how, with VMsafe, we can block a malicious driver being executed in a virtual machine. We also showed that we can scan and clean offline VMs so they are up-to-date when they’re spun up.

We deliver real and meaningful security for virtualized environments today. Our security risk management solutions are fully compatible with VMware virtualization and help organizations create a safe computing environment, spanning virtualized servers, networks and desktops.

In the future, VMsafe could be used in a range of our products, further enhancing the protection. Just as VMware has provided a fundamental change to how computing resources are used, it will allow security technologies to protect virtual environments in ways beyond those possible for a single monolithic OS. VMsafe is the key to that promise.

Aside from our support for VMsafe, we also announced an OEM (original equipment manufacturer) agreement with VMware to use VMware ESX Server in future products. In addition, we announced beta availability of our new Email and Web Security Virtual Appliance, built from the ground up for the VMware platform, and unveiled a new virtual infrastructure security assessment service. 

You can read more about how McAfee secures virtual environments in our news releases and on our virtualization Web site: http://www.mcafee.com/virtualization

Virtually yours,

Christopher

The 3 Master Principles of Web Design

Floating around the universe, are certain universal principles that transcend disciplines. I would like to explore a few of them here, and talk about how they can be applied to web design.

The Three Master Principles

#1 Simplicity

This is such an important principle, that it can easily be made into the top three web design principles, just as location is to real estate:

- location
- location
- location

… we could say the same thing about simplicity in web design:

- simplicity
- simplicity
- simplicity

The important thing to take to heart, is that your web sites should be designed to be as simple as possible. You want to keep it simple for two main reasons:

1. To make it easy for you to update.
2. To make it easy for visitors to navigate the web site.

The simplicity principle applies to design, structure and the code.

What do I mean by ’structure’ of the web site?

I am simply referring to the URL structure. So we are talking about directory structures, page names etc. I’ve detailed this in my article on intelligent paths in websites.

I think the other two (design and code) are self evident.

… Now let’s look at principle number two:

(more…)

Dreamweaver CS3 Video Tutorial - the three editing modes.

I’ve released another video tutorial on Dreamweaver CS3 where I look at the three ways Dreamweaver gives you to edit web pages.

Video: Dreamweaver CS3 Editor Views

You can find all the Dreamweaver CS3 videos in the Dreamweaver section of killersites.com:

Dreamweaver CS3

Thanks,

Stefan Mischook

www.killersites.com
www.killerphp.com

Cisco’s green bus rides the hills of San Francisco

Cisco last week unveiled its Connected Bus developed with the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency for its Muni bus service. The bus offers touch screens that provide real-time NextMuni information and wait times, free wireless, and external LEDs to tell motorists and pedestrians about the environmental benefits of the bus. In the future, the bus will sport technology to reduce vehicle collisions, traffic signal priority to help drivers avoid congestion, onboard video and audio entertainment for passengers, a "Find It" service to locate nearby points of interest and operator services to assist bus drivers and maintenance staff.

Read more

Cisco, Juniper enjoy ‘all-time high’ in carrier router, switch sales

Service provider router and switch sales were at an all-time high in 2007, with Cisco and Juniper leading the pack, according to fresh figures from Infonetics Research. Cisco enjoyed a 20% year-over-year growth of its routers and switches, but Juniper's growth rate was bigger at 25%.

Read more

Tooltips with CSS3

As this is my first post, I’d like to introduce myself. My names James and I’m currently working as a senior User Interface Developer for Teachers TV. Like many of you guys, I’m fanatical about web standards and about creating the leanest, most semantic markup possible. I too am excited about the new possibilities with the arrival of CSS3, and am keen to contribute as much as I can to this great site. My first post is regarding a new method of creating Tooltips that I devised while coming up with a solution for a recent project.

Up until now, there were a few options in existence; ugly Javascript-based methods, or solutions that use blank anchor tags (for IE6 compatibility). Another possibility is to ignore IE6 altogether and make use of the hover pseudo class in conjunction with the parent element that contains the tooltip text. I had to think out the box a bit on this one, but have come up with a completely new CSS3-based solution.

My solution degrades gracefully in browsers that don’t support the CSS3 elements I’ve used and is a lot more elegant than former methods since it utilises an element’s title attribute, rather than creating additional markup within a parent element.

Let’s start with the HTML (Note: the following example is based on use of icon background images for the divs, hence the fixed dimensions):-

<div title="Tooltip text for first div"></div>

<div title="Tooltip text for second div"></div>

In short, my method is achieved by making use of the :before (or :after) pseudo class and content property, combined with the :hover pseudo class.

First off I grab the value of the divs title attribute by using the content property’s attribute function. Notice how I set the generated content to display:none -I’ll make it visible on :hover.

div:before{
	content:attr(title);
	display:none;
}

I now combine both :hover and :content pseudo classes together, to specify values for the generated content when the div is hovered over.

div:hover::before{
	width:200px;
	display:block;
	background:yellow;
	border:1px solid black;
	padding:8px;
	margin:25px 0 0 10px;
}

One of the problems I came across at this stage, was that when having two elements floated left to each other and you hover over one of the elements, although the tooltip displays, it renders underneath the adjacent element. It is a simple case of layering the generated content over the div; my immediate thought was to specify a layering value in the above statement. However, after referring to the relevant W3C spec, it was apparent that in line with their recommendations, user agents ignore the position property in an instance such as the above statement, therefore rendering a z-index value useless.

The solution was to specify the z-index and position properties in a separate statement dealing exclusively with the :hover pseudo class.

div:hover{
	z-index:10;
	position:relative;
}

This meant that it now works! It of course works in every browser above IE7 including Safari 3 and Firefox 2.0.0.12

Obviously there’s nothing you can do to stop the default behaviour of standards compliant browsers regarding rendering of title attributes, so when leaving your cursor on my method for too long, the default browser behaviour will overlay the generated content CSS effect

Live example
Our final code:-

div{
	width:20px;
	height:31px;
	background:red;
	float:left;
	margin:0 0 0 20px;
}

div:before{
	content:attr(title);
	display:none;
}

div:hover{
	z-index:10;
	position:relative;
}

div:hover::before{
	width:200px;
	display:block;
	background:yellow;
	border:1px solid black;
	padding:8px;
	margin:25px 0 0 10px;
}

Cross-submissions via robots.txt on Sitemaps.org

Opera Dragonfly…soon

Opera has a dragonfly that is getting ready to hatch. If any of you are attending SxSW, Opera will be revealing more information there. Catch us at the booth or at the Rock Opera party at Stubbs on the 10^th of March. Keep your eyes open for updates to the Dragonfly site, for more information before then.

Opera Dragonfly will initially launch as a private beta to a select audience for its test flight, before going public when we are satisfied with the trials.

Can you do file uploads with ColdFusion 8’s Ajax features?

Tom Jordahl Presenting On BlazeDS