NFD29: What Would We Do Without Opengear?

Opengear presented at Network Field Day 29. The presentation struck me as a “product refresh” in the sense of reminding old (and new!) customers what Opengear does and giving a feel for their current product line. Also highlighting new capabilities and features being added.?

I would hope all networking people know about Opengear by this point. If you don’t, go watch the videos.?

Leveraging the Power of Opengear

The main point of Opengear and competitors is to provide Out of Band (“OOB”) network access. And Out of Band Management (“OOBM”).?

I see some organizations that are all about OOB, and others that don’t have any.?

Personally, I think OOBM is a MUST HAVE. If you’ve ever done something dumb and cut yourself off from a network device, or broken remote routing, you should appreciate Opengear. The usual consequence of such a problem is having to drive to or get remote hands to the remote site to fix the problem.?

Opengear touts this as “resiliency”, which is exactly right.?

Designing Out Of Band

I prefer totally out of band management networks – no dependencies on the production network.?

The following graphic shows what a typical OpenGear deployment might look like.?

What are the high-priority capabilities? For me, they include:

• Internet Ethernet access to the Opengear devices via OOBM router or firewall.?
• Remote access to the console port, for when the remote device(s) are not reachable or not responsive over the network. This is a “if all else fails” situation.?
• Remote power control is handy, either embedded or controlling an external power supply. For situations where the managed device is totally non-responsive and needs to have power cycled.?
• Remote access to an Ethernet port, either VPN to a management port for CLI or GUI access, or as a way to get images or large files onto the remote device without impacting production.?
• Doing this out of band, so you can fix things when the network is down.?
• Cellular capabilities for backup to Internet Ethernet, or as sole means of remote access.?

Lately I’ve been seeing sites settle for the remote Ethernet management access, and less of the serial console port. Personally, I’d want both.?And you can get Opengear devices that have both capabilities in one box.?

Other (new!) capabilities:

• Docker container capability.
• ThousandEyes agent support.?
• Local file system.?
• Workflow engine.?
• RESTful API.?

The point to this last group of capabilities is that having some onsite “server-like” capabilities enhances the usefulness of the OOBM device. This appears to be a competitive trend in the OOBM device spaces, as well as local and centralized orchestration capabilities.?

The following graphic emphasizes this capability.?

Demo

Opengear demonstrated several things in two demo sessions. Their list, my notes:?

• Extensibility and flexibility of the Opengear platforms
• Lighthouse (central management software) IP Access (VPN to central cloud platform, and from there to remote node).?
• Using Opengear to deploy a custom web app for less-skilled operators
• Using Opengear to virtually deploy a network engineer to any rack = run iperf between two OpenGear devices.?

Links

Network Field Day 29:?https://techfieldday.com/event/nfd29/

Tech Field Day’s Opengear page:?https://techfieldday.com/companies/opengear/

#NFD29?Opengear videos etc. page:?https://techfieldday.com/appearance/opengear-presents-at-networking-field-day-29/

Conclusion

Opengear provides must-have remote access capabilities for when you get cut off from a site. It saves time and travel!

Watch the session recordings (third link above), it is fairly short and will update you concerning OpenGear.

I’d like to thank Opengear for providing a PDF of their slide deck. It really helps when drafting a blog – watching the video recording and finding topics is MUCH slower!

Comments

Comments are welcome, both in agreement or constructive disagreement about the above. I enjoy hearing from readers and carrying on deeper discussion via comments. Thanks in advance!?

Hashtags:?#NetCraftsmen #CCIE1773?#NFD29 #Opengear #OutOfBandManagement #OOB #OOBM #RemoteAccess

Disclosure statement

Twitter:?@pjwelcher

LinkedIn:?Peter Welcher