The most popular shows from the Packet Pushers Podcast Network in one feed. 1-The Weekly Show (network engineering). 2-Priority Queue (even more network engineering). 3-Datanauts (the full IT stack including cloud). 4-Network Break (IT news and analysis from the week). 5-Briefings In Brief (intere…
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Listeners of Packet Pushers - Fat Pipe that love the show mention: networking, tony, excellent, listening, great, network break.
The Packet Pushers - Fat Pipe podcast is my favorite and main podcast at the moment. It covers a wide range of topics in Networking, allowing me to stay up to date with all the latest innovations and developments. I have been listening since 2011 and have witnessed the show not only maintain its high standard but also improve over time. Greg and Ethan have done an amazing job in maintaining their independence and providing valuable insights in their own unique way.
One of the best aspects of this podcast is that it provides a wealth of technical knowledge without getting bogged down by sales and marketing hype. The hosts keep the discussions focused on the details that most network content tends to gloss over. This makes it an excellent resource for networking professionals who are looking for in-depth technical information.
Another great aspect of this podcast is the variety of topics covered. From traditional route/switch and wireless to data center technologies, there is something for everyone in the networking field. The hosts bring on experts from various backgrounds, providing different perspectives and insights into these topics. This diversity keeps the content fresh and interesting.
As for drawbacks, one could argue that the technical nature of this podcast may not be suitable for beginners or those with limited networking knowledge. However, I believe that even for less experienced individuals, listening to this podcast can be a valuable learning experience as long as they are willing to put in some effort to understand the technical concepts being discussed.
In conclusion, The Packet Pushers - Fat Pipe podcast is an excellent resource for anyone working in networking or interested in staying up to date with the latest developments in this field. With its technical depth, independence, and variety of topics covered, it offers a unique listening experience that is hard to find elsewhere. Bravo to Ethan, Greg, and Tony for creating such an invaluable wealth of knowledge!

Take a Network Break! We start with some educational content on Small Modular Nuclear Reactors, and sound the alarm about a sandbox escape affecting the Firefox browser. On the news front, a DNS issue triggers a major Azure outage that affected numerous services and caused problems around the globe, Palo Alto Networks announces enhancements to... Read more »

On today’s show, sponsored by Itential, we talk about automation in the real world. Guest Jesse Ford is an automation architect at Itential. We talk about his career journey, how he got into network automation, how he decides which is the best tool for a job, and why tool diversity isn’t the same as chaos.... Read more »

On today's episode, we take a break from one's and zero's for a discussion about starting a networking meetup. Our guest is Steinn “Steinzi” Örvar, who recently founded the ISNOG, a network operators' group in Iceland. We quiz Steinzi about what worked and what didn't. We also pick his brain for the nitty-gritty details about... Read more »

Your background and experiences outside of tech can become a significant factor in your tech career. Guest Chris Williams is a good example; he talks about how his undergraduate and graduate studies in psychology influenced his work as a Developer Relations Manger at Hashicorp. Hosts Alexis Bertholf and Kevin Nanns chat with him about how... Read more »

CVEs, or Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures, are such a routine aspect of tech that most IT pros probably take them for granted. But like many things we take for granted, the CVE process takes some serious organizational infrastructure to function. On today's Packet Protector, sponsored by Cisco, we talk about the organizations and processes that... Read more »

Host Eric Chou talks with Jeff Kala, co-author of the newly released “Network Automation Cookbook 2nd Edition,” to discuss his book and the experiences that led him from networking to network automation author. They discuss Jeff’s learning style and why it was helpful when working on his book. Lastly, they dig into Jeff’s predictions on... Read more »

Take a Network Break! Companies spying on…I mean, monitoring…their employees via software called WorkExaminer should be aware of a login bypass that needs to be locked down. On the news front, we opine on whether it’s worth trying to design your way around AWS outages, and speculate on the prospects of a new Ethernet switch... Read more »

The architecture and tech stack of a Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) solution will influence how the service performs, the robustness of its security controls, and the complexity of its operations. Sponsor Fortinet joins Heavy Networking to make the case that a unified offering, which integrates SD-WAN and SSE from a single vendor, provides a... Read more »

Senad Palislamovic has held many roles in his time, from engineer to network operator to sales engineer and back again. He’s been around long enough to see trends come and go. Senad visits Total Network Operations to share some of his observations on network automation, AI for NetOps, and the quality of network data. Senad... Read more »

If you’ve ever wondered what the difference is between a Switched Virtual Interface (SVI) and Integrated Routing and Bridging (IRB), today’s show is for you! Ethan Banks and Holly Metlitzky start with some history and the basics of communication between layer 2 and layer 3 and then explain how the concepts of SVI and IRB... Read more »

While declaring the death of Infrastructure as Code (IaC) or Terraform may get you clicks on LinkedIn, IaC is alive and kicking. On today’s Day Two DevOps we talk about why IaC still matters. Guest Malcolm Matalka argues that IaC provides the tools and a model for managing infrastructure across its lifecycle in a structured... Read more »

Model Context Protocol (MCP) is an open-source protocol that enables AI agents to connect to data, tools, workflows, and other agents both within and outside of enterprise borders. As organizations dive head-first into AI projects, MCP and other agentic protocols are being quickly adopted. And that means security and network teams need to understand how... Read more »

Take a Network Break! On today’s coverage, F5 releases an emergency security update after state-backed threat actors breach internal systems, and North Korean attackers use the blockchain to host and hide malware. Broadcom is shipping an 800G NIC aimed at AI workloads, and Broadcom joins the Wi-Fi 8 party early with a sampling of pre-standard... Read more »

Could an LLM or some kind of an AI-driven language model, such as a natural language interface, someday replace our beloved CLI? That is, instead of needing to understand the syntax of a specific vendor’s CLI, could a language model allow network operators to use plain language to get the information they need or the... Read more »

Multi-cloud, automation, and AI are changing how modern networks operate and how firewalls and security policies are administered. In today’s sponsored episode with Palo Alto Networks, we dig into offerings such as CLARA (Cloud and AI Risk Assessment) that help ops teams gain more visibility into the structure and workflows of their multi-cloud networks. We... Read more »

A college degree can be a useful stepping stone into a tech career, and it certainly doesn’t hurt to have it on your resume. But do you really need that college degree to succeed in IT? Maybe, maybe not. Today’s guest is Wes Noonan, whose non-traditional path into and through a career in IT has... Read more »

We’re thrilled to welcome Tim McConnaughy back to the podcast. Tim is a hybrid cloud network architect, author, and co-host of the Cables to Cloud podcast. He recently wrote a 5-part blog series titled ‘Goodbye, Yellow Brick Road' that reflects on his career path, including his decision to leave a startup. We discuss the impetus... Read more »

Today we're bringing back one of our favorite guests — Akili Akridge. He's a former Baltimore cop who transitioned to building and leading mobile offense and defense teams for federal agencies and Fortune 100s. These days he's a straight-talking expert on all things mobile security. We're digging into mobile threats, why they keep CISOs up... Read more »

Take a Network Break! We start with listener follow-up on security browsers, and then dive into a deep pool of Juniper vulnerabilities to pick two critical ones affecting Juniper Space. We also get an update from SonicWall that the breach of its cloud storage service affected all users of the service. Cisco announces a new... Read more »

LightRiver has software and service products focused on the automation, optimization, and simplification of multi-layer, multi-vendor, and multi-generation networking. Today we have a team from LightRiver lead by Jim Brinksma to help explain how LightRiver is advancing automation in optical and bridging the gap between the IP and optical layers. They discuss the challenges, obstacles... Read more »

Today’s show is one of those “We're living in the future” episodes, where we talk about using AI to perform root cause analysis of a performance issue. But not root cause analysis for just the networking part of the stack. The full stack. Why? Because it's not good enough to say “it's not the network”.... Read more »

The job interview is an inescapable part of a career journey. Today on N Is For Networking, we conduct a mock interview with a candidate who's applying for a junior network administration role. The goal is to give Toni Mrowetz, our candidate, feedback. At the same time, we hope this helps anyone listening who might... Read more »

AI is developing at an incredible pace. With that development comes questions. For instance, how do you connect your resources to agents? How do agents connect with each other? And how do you keep it all secure? Our guest Christian Posta is here to guide us through AI, MCP, and the concept of workload identities.... Read more »

From a massive SIM farm takedown to dealing with supply chain attacks targeting npm, our news roundup provides context and commentary on a fresh crop of security news. We discuss exploits against Cisco firewalls and switches, a SonicWall firmware update to remove a rootkit targeting its SMA 100, and GitHub’s plans to harden npm packages.... Read more »

Take a Network Break! We start with a two-part listener follow-up and sound alarms about a serious flaw in Termix and tens of thousands of still-vulnerable Cisco security devices. Alkira debuts an MCP server and AI copilot for its multi-cloud networking platform; Cato Networks releases a Chrome-based browser extension to help secure contractor and personal... Read more »

Today we get an inside look at a major data center migration that Nokia is undertaking. Nokia is our sponsor for today’s episode. The company is moving legacy sets of data center networking equipment to its own Event Driven Automation (EDA) solution. We go behind the scenes of Nokia’s own IT department, which is supporting... Read more »

If you’ve got an Autonomous System Number (ASN) and an IPv6 block, you too can multi-home IPv6 to your home lab! Sounds easy, right? Well, maybe…but today we’re going to discuss why you’d want to and how you can do that with guest Anton Lönnerbro. Anton is a solutions architect at a managed service provider... Read more »

Starting any new endeavor is hard. That’s particularly true for a career in tech. And that’s the reason Alexis Bertholf and Kevin Nanns are launching the Life In Uptime podcast. In each episode they’ll sit down with engineers, leaders, and builders in tech to uncover the stories behind their careers to help you see how... Read more »

As AI becomes more integrated into the IT landscape, developers, engineers, and operators are looking for practical ways to use these new tools. Joining us today is Ryan Booth; he’s built a career around network automation, giving him a unique perspective on how network engineering, operations, software development, and AI intersect. We explore the practical... Read more »

What does the risk environment for Operational Technology (OT) look like in 2025? JJ and Drew review four recent reports on the state of OT security from Dragos, Fortinet, and others. We discuss ransomware impacts, ongoing risks of RDP traffic, directly exposed OT devices, and overall attack trends and the tools and processes that organizations... Read more »

There’s an abundance of vulnerabilities in this week’s Network Break. We start with a red alert on a cluster of Cisco vulnerabilities in its firewall and threat defense products. On the news front, the vulnerability spotlight stays on Cisco as the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) issues an emergency directive to all federal... Read more »

On today's Heavy Networking: the Security Operations Center, or SOC. When I think of a SOC, I picture a miniature version of NASA's mission control: lots of computers, lots of people, some big boards with lines and arrows and telemetry scrolling across the screens. I also think of SOCs as requiring a lot of gear,... Read more »

In an IT world full of abstraction, overlays, and virtualization, it’s important to remember the physical infrastructure that supports all those things. So let’s get inside Mass IX, the Massachusetts Internet Exchange, to get a holistic view of the logical architecture and protocol mechanics of peering and Internet exchanges, as well as the iron, steel,... Read more »

We dive back into the world of IPsec with an episode dedicated to configuring IPsec tunnels. After discussing a listener comment regarding transport mode in IPsec tunnels, Ethan Banks and Holly Metlitzky work through topics such as multi-vendor IPsec configuration, licensing, and the details of configuration and routing. Bonus material: MTU size and NAT-T. Episode... Read more »

Today we talk to Elad Ben-Israel about his former startup Wing Cloud, and the language that was built along with it, Winglang. We discuss why Eland started Wing Cloud, lessons learned about founding a start up, and what the future holds for the Winglang language. Ad Spot: Faddom Faddom helps you discover and map your... Read more »

Transforming over 5,000 network devices across 56 data centers is no small feat. Doing that with a very small team is even more impressive. On today’s episode, sponsored by Network To Code, we talk to Greg Botts from Intel, who with his team accomplished just that. They started with YAML files and DNS records and... Read more »

Microsegmentation is a complex topic. We did an overview episode earlier this year, and we invited listeners to reach out to keep the microsegmentation conversation going. Today's guest did just that. Philip Griffiths is Head of Strategic Sales at Netfoundry. However, this isn't a sponsored show about NetFoundry. Philip is also involved in a working... Read more »

It’s big-money deals and ever-more AI on this week’s Network Break. We start with a red alert from NVIDIA, which has rolled out a software upgrade to patch multiple bugs in its Triton Inference Server, one of which is a dangerous remote code execution vulnerability. On the news front, NVIDIA pledges a $5 billion investment... Read more »

The digital twin is an evolving technology in the networking space. On today’s sponsored episode of Total Network Operations, we dig into details and definitions of the digital twin, how it ties into network automation and autonomy, and the power of abstraction layers. We’ll also talk about how the concepts in today’s show might influence... Read more »

When someone from the executive suite starts an AI initiative, what does that mean to you, the network engineer? The executive suite probably doesn’t know what their AI idea might mean for infrastructure. They might only have a vague idea of what they’re even trying to accomplish with an AI initiative. Regardless, that initiative puts... Read more »

Life In Uptime is a brand-new podcast that explores the real journeys of the people who build and run enterprise IT. Each episode dives into the personal and professional paths that got each guest to where they are today—because the road to a career in technology isn't one-size-fits-all. This show is for anyone wondering how... Read more »

Network Automation Nerds has reached a special milestone: episode 100! Eric Chou looks back on 5 years of conversations with network automation pioneers, practitioners, and visionaries. Drew Conry-Murray from the Packet Pushers joins Eric, along with online guest Ioannis Theodoridis, to find out why Eric started the podcast, his goals for all these conversations, a... Read more »

You can build effective, scalable detection pipelines using free and open-source tools like Zeek, Suricata, YARA, and Security Onion. Today on Packet Protector we welcome Matt Gracie, Senior Engineer at Security Onion Solutions — the team behind the open-source platform used for detection engineering, network security monitoring, and log management. Matt has over 15 years... Read more »

We got some interesting listener feedback from our series on OSPF, so today’s N Is for Networking is another “Well actually” episode where we dig into that feedback. In particular, we’ll cover a defense of OSPF multi-area deployments, and dig into OSPF LSA types. Episode Links: OSPF Basics – N Is For Networking Episode 38... Read more »

Take a Network Break! We start with a listener correction on Cisco’s history of wireless certifications, then dig into a couple of red alerts on Microsoft Defender and a backdoor in Outlook. On the news front, Cisco announces new AI agents and SoC packages for Splunk; F5 spends $180 million to buy an AI security... Read more »

Jeremy Schulman has been working at network automation for much of his professional life. On today’s Total Network Operations, host Scott Robohn talks with Jeremy about his ongoing quest to get the network engineering bottleneck out of production. They discuss the early days of network automation when engineers tried to adopt tools from compute side... Read more »

Your production IT operations are almost certainly using cryptography libraries that are not quantum-safe, and the time to begin planning a cryptography overhaul is now. But this is likely to be a daunting project because it touches everything: clients, servers, apps, network devices, middleboxes, and so on. Daunting, but doable. We talk with Richu Channakeshava, Principal... Read more »

We got some interesting listener feedback from our series on OSPF, so today’s N Is for Networking is another “Well actually” episode where we dig into that feedback. In particular, we’ll cover a defense of OSPF multi-area deployments, and dig into OSPF LSA types. Episode Links: N4N032 – OSPF Basics – Packet Pushers Episode Transcript:... Read more »

Kubernetes is flexible and customizable, but it can also be notoriously complex and difficult to deploy to. On today’s Day Two DevOps we learn about kro (Kube Resource Operator), an open-source tool that helps simplify complex application deployments. Our guest is Islam Mahgoub, a Solutions Architect at AWS focused on building kro. We talk about... Read more »

Is any publicity good publicity? On today’s News Roundup we talk about how Salesloft, which makes the Drift chat agent that’s been used as a jumping-off point for credential harvesting and data breach attacks against a bunch of big-name companies, is testing that proposition. We also discuss bugs affecting industrial refrigeration controllers, and Microsoft making... Read more »

Take a Network Break! We shine a red light on an AnyShare Service Agent API vulnerability and an active exploit against FreePBX. SASE vendor Cato Networks makes first-ever acquisition with purchase of AI security startup AIM, Microsoft researchers tout hollow core fiber tests that out-perform glass core fiber optics, and Wi-Fi 7 helps drive up... Read more »