Seasonal Learning Opportunities 2018

The 2018 seasonal update for our continuing quest to Always Be Learning.  You can compare and contrast with those for 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017.

The following are simply in alphabetical order. There are a few lacking details as we wait for the site/vendor to disclose their Cyber Monday deals; I’ll update this post as I see others go public. Please share any others you hear about in the comments.

[Six updates and one addition 20181126]

Books and Videos

Apress [Updated 20181126]

Apress are offering a Cyber Monday sale of only $7 each for any of their ebooks. The site normally offers an ebook Deal of the Day on the Apress.com home page.

Barnes and Noble [Updated 20181126]

One of this year’s Black Friday deals (there are a number of different ones, of course) is for 20% off your entire online order of $40 or more, through the 26th 25th  (today, sorry) using code CYBER20 BLKFRIDAY.

CiscoPress

Cisco Press are having their annual Black Friday/Cyber Monday Sale with 55% off two or more eligible items using code BF2018, or 35% off just one item. This includes books, ebooks, video training, practice exams, and more. They also consistently offer eBook and Video Deals of the Week on the ciscopress.com home page.

HumbleBundle [updated 20181126]

Like prior years’ recommendations, these are not strictly speaking a Black Friday or Cyber Monday deals, but HumbleBundle do have two deals for tech learning: the Do It Yourself by Make bundle starts out with 4 ebooks for just $1 and scales up to 18 ebooks for $18 (though only for the next ~18hrs at time of writing; the Cybersecurity by Packt bundle starts with 3 ebooks & 2 videos  for $1 and scales up to 18 ebooks & 7 videos for and the Big Data & Infographics by Wiley bundle, starting with 4 ebooks for $1 and scaling up to 13 ebooks for $15. For those who don’t know, HumbleBundle offer different  selections (bundles) of books, games, etc. that are sold “pay what you like” – though there are minimums, and increasing your offer unlocks additional items in the bundle. In this example, $15 or $18 will get you all of the ebooks – in multiple ebook formats. Highly recommended.

Lulu [updated 20181126]

Lulu are offering  25% 35% off orders when using the code CM35 BLACKFRIDAY25. Two recommendations for taking advantage of this discount would be for the first two books in the IT Architect series by a cadre of well-known VCDX: IT Architect Series: Foundation in the Art of Infrastructure Design: A Practical Guide for IT Architects and IT Architect Series: The Journey: A Guidebook for Anyone Interested in IT Architecture

Manning Publications

This year they’re again having a “Green Tuesday” sale until midnight of November 26th where all ebook or liveVideo purchases under $50 are 40% off (with code gt112018alt) and purchases over $50 are 50% off (with code gt112018blt).

They’re also having their annual “Countdown” challenge, Countdown to 2019, where every day they present a question and any correct answers submitted are entered into a drawing for a free ebook or liveVideo of the entrants choice.

And of course they always have a Deal of the Day selected from across their entire catalog (eBooks, physical/printed books, or “MEAPs” – Manning Early Access Program books similar to O’Reilly’s Rough Cuts where books are made available as chapters are completed).

PacktPub

Packt Publishing are once again having their Black Friday sale where all of their books and videos are only $10 each.  Of course, Packt’s books are fairly low-priced to begin with, they have frequent sales throughout the year, and they have their regular Deal of the Day as well.

Pearson IT Certification

Pearson are having the same annual Black Friday/Cyber Monday Sale as Cisco Press with 55% off any two digital items and using the same BF2018 code. On their site you’ll find not only tech books from Cisco Press but also VMware Press,  and others, and of course video training, practice exams, and more.  If you miss this sale, they also consistently offer eBook and Video Deals of the Week (which are different from the ones on the Cisco Press site) on the pearsonitcertification.com home page.

Training

Cisco Learning Network [Updated 20181126]

The Cisco Learning Network Store will again be having a Cyber Monday sale with a bunch of different deals on learning bundles, labs, VIRL (Virtual Internet Routing Lab) licenses, etc. VIRL is 25% off at $149.25 while learning bundles and labs range from 25-40% off.

EdX

edX, one of the best known online learning programs founded by MIT and Harvard in 2012, are having a Cyber Monday sale this year for 15% off certain program bundles or verified certificates, including ones covering blockchain, Linux, AWS, cybersecurity, machine learning, and more.

GNS3 Academy

GNS3 may be best known as the defacto vendor-neutral networking simulator , but they’ve also been offering training for a couple years now.  This year they’re again offering a Black Friday sale where some of their courses are only $9: Cisco CCNA prep, Juniper JNCIA prep, a Wireshark course, a Python Network Programming for Network Engineers course, and others . They also have some courses at a normal price of less than $10, as well as several free courses to check out at any time – like this one for NetDevOps.

INE

INE – best known for their Cisco/CCIE training but also offering training on AWS, VMware, Microsoft, and others – have a Black Friday deal of 30% off any of their training, and will have a Cyber Monday deal giving away an iPad, Nintendo Switch, or Facebook Portal to any customer purchasing an All Access Pass

ITX Learning [new 20181126]

ITX is a lesser-known purveyor of online training including videos, test prep, and practice labs. For Cyber Monday, ITX is offering one year subscriptions to the video training for only $99 (95% off), test preps for $199 (80% off), and practice labs for $299 (70% off). Material varies depending on the type, but includes certifications for Microsoft, Cisco, CompTIA, and others.

The Linux Foundation

For Cyber Monday the Linux Foundation will again be having some great deals for their training and certifications: 60% or more off of bundles combining their training with the related certification for only $179 total.  These include the Certified Kubernetes Administrator Bundle, Certified Kubernetes Developer Bundle, Linux Foundation Certified Engineer Bundle, and three others. They’re also again throwing in a free t-shirt with orders, and the new design looks snazzier than last year’s.

Note: this is one of the longer-lasting deals – good until Dec 3rd!

O’Reilly’s Safari Books Online

Arguably, this should be listed under Books and Videos, but Safari – now being marketed more as Online Learning by O’Reilly – includes more than just the all-you-can-read-or-watch buffet of ebooks & videos – there are online tutorials, and even live on-line, instructor-led training available!  Upcoming training just this week includes a Red Hat Certified Systems Administrator (RHCSA) Crash Course, a CISSP Crash Course, an Istio on Kubernetes course, and others.  For Cyber Monday, O’Reilly is offering annual subscriptions for just $199/year (50% off).  I’ve been a very happy subscriber for a number of years and the service just keeps getting better – this and Pluralsight are the two best training deals out there, bar none.

Pluralsight

Pluralsight have rapidly become the leader in IT video training with one of the widest selections of material, broadest topic coverage, very frequent additions to their catalog, and some of the best instructors (and most certified) in the industry. Their Black Friday sale discounts their annual subscriptions by 33%, dropping the standard subscription from $299/year to just $199/year, and their Premium subscription from $449/year to just $299/year.

Udemy

Udemy, fairly quickly became the ubiquitous clearinghouse for video training – much of it technical though not all –  including many of the highly regarded A Cloud Guru  courses, amongst others.  For Black Friday/Cyber Monday they are again discounting many/most of their courses starting at only $9.99.

VMware Education [Updated 20181126]

Once again VMware are discounting select on-demand vSphere courses from their online store by 25%.  There are also deals for 20-50% 30-35% off desktop products (VMware Workstation & VMware Fusion), 25% off exam preps, and 15% off certification exam vouchers.

Take advantage of everything that’s out there, and get prepared for another year of learning and growth!

 

Advertisement

Seasonal Learning Opportunities 2017

The 2017 seasonal update for our continuing quest to Always Be Learning.  You can compare and contrast with those for 2014, 2015, and 2016.

The following are simply in alphabetical order. Right now the list is shorter than the past two years as several sites haven’t yet disclosed their Black Friday/Cyber Monday deals; I’ll update this post as I see others go public. Please share any others you hear about in the comments.

Note: 5 updates added 20171124; 2 updates added 20171129 – see below!

Books and Videos

Amazon

Until 11:59PM Pacific November 26th, Amazon are offering an extra $5 off any one print book using the code GIFTBOOK17.  While hardly a huge discount, it’s a little extra incentive to pick up a tech/learning book that you’ve been putting off – and for better or worse Amazon often already have the lowest price on physical books.

Note: the Amazon link is to smile.amazon.com rather than www.amazon.com.  This is deliberate as Amazon have a not-very-well-known program where customers can define  a charity of their choice to receive a small percentage of some purchases when made via smile rather than http://www.  Yes, it’s only a tiny percentage; no, it’s not for all purchases; and yes, it seems a bit deliberately obtuse for Amazon to require the separate site/URL – but it’s still free money to a good cause, and if you’re shopping on Amazon already, why not go set it up?

Apress

Apress are offering a Cyber Monday sale of $9.99 each for any of their ebooks or only $12.50 for any of their printed books (plus free shipping!). The site normally offers an ebook Deal of the Day on the Apress.com home page.

Barnes and Noble

Last year for Black Friday B&N offered a 30% discount on any single item. This year’s Black Friday deal (there are several but the one I think is most relevant here) is for 20% off your entire online order through the 26th using code GIVETHANKS. While not a great discount in and of itself, it can be very helpful when combined with other existing discounts (like the free express shipping for B&N rewards members – sadly the additional 10% discount for members does not apply to online sales) and/or for items that can’t normally be found discounted on other sites (like Amazon).

CiscoPress

Cisco Press are having their annual Black Friday/Cyber Monday Sale with 55% off two or more eligible items using code BF2017. This includes books, ebooks, video training, practice exams, and more. They also consistently offer eBook and Video Deals of the Week on the ciscopress.com home page.

HumbleBundle

Like last year’s recommendations, this is not strictly speaking a Black Friday or Cyber Monday deal, but HumbleBundle do have a deal for tech learning: the O’Reilly Java Books bundle offers up to 15 ebooks for $15 for the next 10+ days. For those who don’t know, HumbleBundle offer different  selections (bundles) of books, games, etc. that are sold “pay what you like” – though there are minimums, and increasing your offer unlocks additional items in the bundle. In this example, $15 will get you all of the ebooks – in multiple ebook formats. Highly recommended.

LeanPub [Added 20171124]

LeanPub and a few of their authors are giving readers Black Friday/Cyber Monday price reductions at various levels of discounts. While this is not a site-wide sale, there are some interesting ebooks included in the sale. For those who haven’t shopped LeanPub before: customers picks their own price to pay, with each book having a minimum price and a suggested price; for these deals that minimum price has been reduced.

Unfortunately, there doesn’t appear to be a single URL to find them or describing these discounts at the time I’m writing this, so I’ll post them here:

Lulu [Added 20171129]

I didn’t catch this one until late on Cyber Monday, but luckily Lulu have extended their sale until 11:59pm Eastern November 30th:  40% off any print book using the code CYBER40. Two recommendations for taking advantage of this discount would be for the first two books in the IT Architect series by a cadre of well-known VCDX: IT Architect Series: Foundation in the Art of Infrastructure Design: A Practical Guide for IT Architects and IT Architect Series: The Journey: A Guidebook for Anyone Interested in IT Architecture

Manning Publications [Added 20171124]

This year they’re again having a “Green Tuesday” sale until November 27th where all eBook purchases under $50 are 40% off (with code gt112117alt) and purchases over $50 are 50% off (with code gt112117blt).

And of course they always have a Deal of the Day selected from across their entire catalog (eBooks, physical/printed books, or “MEAPs” – Manning Early Access Program books similar to O’Reilly’s Rough Cuts where books are made available as chapters are completed).

PacktPub [Added 20171124]

Packt Publishing are once again having their Black Friday sale where all of their books and videos are only $10 each.  Of course, Packt’s books are fairly low-priced to begin with, they have frequent sales throughout the year, and they have their regular Deal of the Day as well.

Pearson IT Certification

Pearson are having the same annual Black Friday/Cyber Monday Sale as Cisco Press with 55% off any two digital items and using the same BF2017 code. On their site you’ll find not only tech books from Cisco Press but also VMware Press,  and others, and of course video training, practice exams, and more.  If you miss this sale, they also consistently offer eBook and Video Deals of the Week (which are different from the ones on the Cisco Press site) on the pearsonitcertification.com home page.

Training

Cisco Learning Network

The Cisco Learning Network Store will be having a Cyber Monday sale with a bunch of different deals on learning bundles, labs, VIRL (Virtual Internet Routing Lab) licenses, etc. Unfortunately, until the 27th we don’t know exactly what those deals are.

GNS3 Academy [Added 20171124]

You may know GNS3 as the best vendor-neutral networking simulator around (predating Cisco VIRL, which obviously isn’t vendor-neutral), but did you realize they also offer training? This year they’re offering a Black Friday sale where all of their courses (normally priced between $19 – $49) are only $10 using coupon code BLACKFRIDAY2017. They also have some courses at a normal price of less than $10, as well as several free courses to check out at any time.

INE

If you’re ready to take the leap for your CCIE, check out INE.  They’re offering three deals until midnight Eastern time Sunday (November 26th): 30% off All Access Passes, 50% rack rental tokens, and 40% off CCIE Ultimate study bundles – which include lab workbooks, advanced training courses, and, yes, rack rental tokens. This drops the one-year cost for their All Access Pass, for example, from $999 (already a great deal for the amount & quality of material) to just $699.

The Linux Foundation [Added 20171124]

This is a new one on the list: 60% discounts off the organization’s bundles for prep courses and an exam – plus a free t-shirt and coffee mug!  And don’t let the name fool you – besides two Linux certifications, there’s also the official Kubernetes cert and a Cloud Foundry cert. At $179 for each bundle these are a steal – for perspective, a Red Hat certification will cost you $400 for the exam alone.

New Horizons [Added 1120171129]

One of the leaders in the technical training field are offering two related deals until December 1st: 50% off all Microsoft application courses with code CYBER50 and 30% off select technical courses from Cisco, Citrix, CompTIA, and Microsoft with code CYBER30.

Pluralsight

Pluralsight have rapidly become the leader in IT video training with one of the widest selections of material, broadest topic coverage, very frequent additions to their catalog, and some of the best instructors (and most certified) in the industry. Their Black Friday sale discounts their annual subscription by 33%, dropping it from $299/year to just $199/year.

Udemy

Udemy are clearinghouse for video training – much of it technical but also offering courses on design, marketing, health, productivity, and more.  Some of these courses are also available on other sites – for example, they offer quite a few of the courses from A Cloud Guru on AWS, Azure, etc. While they frequently offer short-term deals on some/most/all of their products, for Black Friday/Cyber Monday all 55k of their courses can be had for only $10 for the next five days.

VMware Education

Just like last year, VMware are discounting select courses from their online store by 25%.  Course coverage includes VMware NSX, Horizon, AirWatch, and (unsurprisingly) VMware vSphere. In addition to the normal courses, you can get 25% off exam preps, certification exam vouchers, and VMware Learning Zone subscriptions.

Take advantage of everything that’s out there, and get prepared for another year of learning and growth!

 

Back on the Certification Train: VCAP6-DCV Design

Do certifications matter? When talking about the industry, that’s a subject for a blog post (or series) all on its own.  When talking about myself, the answer is “it depends” – where the dependence is on time period and mood.  For the first 1/4 of my career I simply didn’t think about certifications at all. Then for the next 1/4 I was quite dismissive of certifications after having seen too many certification holders who displayed little or no competence in the areas in which they were “certified.” My opinion changed after my experience with the reality of the recruiting-HR complex, for whom certifications are often first-line filters, and after seeing first-hand the business value of certifications for value-added resellers (VARs).  After achieving a handful of certifications, I then became practically addicted to them for several years – so much so that at one point I sat & passed seven certification exams in less than a 3 month period (4 of which were 3hr+ VCAP exams).

But then, somehow, I stopped. It wasn’t a deliberate decision for me – it just sort of happened.  Similar to this blog, my attention simply seemed to go elsewhere and before I realized it a fairly long period of time had passed by without my having achieved any new certifications. In fact, I realized a few weeks ago that it had been so long that my VCP certs were actually about to expire (on September 4th) – and that’s not something I wanted to have happen. Luckily, passing a VMware Certified Advanced Professional (VCAP) exam has a side benefit of also renewing/extending any of your existing VCPs – and since it had been so long for me, there are now quite a few VCAPs I need to obtain.  I decided to start with what I would consider the cornerstone advanced VMware certification: VCAP6-DCV.

I won’t try to list all of the available study materials out there for this exam.  Many people have already done a good job with this and I’d much rather let them have the credit.  One of the more comprehensive and useful ones is by Andras Herceg (@Konflikt_) on his vThing blog:  https://vthing.wordpress.com/2016/03/21/vcap6-dcv-design-study-resources/comment-page-1/ 

Ultimately, despite all of this good work that had been done collecting relevant background material for the exam, I wasn’t going to have time to review all of it. I decided to review just two things:  the exam blueprint (the one essential resource for any exam, obviously) and the courseware for the VMware vSphere: Design and Deploy Fast Track which the VMware Certification page recommends as a pre-requisite before sitting the VCAP6-DCV.  For the courseware I was lucky: as a VMware employee I was able to review it without actually attending the class. I’ve attended older versions of the vSphere Design class in the past, and while the v6 release is clearly improved and updated for vSphere 6, the core fundamentals of vSphere design have not changed.  If you’ve taken a vSphere Design class in the past, reviewing that courseware along with the changes specific to vSphere 6 would be a good starting point.

So how was it?  Really good, actually – in fact, the best VCAP design exam experience I’ve had.  The reduction in the number of questions greatly reduced the focus on time management and let’s you focus strictly on the questions themselves – this is probably the single best improvement over older design exams.  The user interface, though, has also been greatly improved:  while the basic look & feel appears unchanged, the responsiveness and speed of the UI is massively better – it was a night & day difference.  Add in the little UI enhancements discussed here, particularly the + trick to repeat canvas elements in the diagram questions, and the exam has managed to remove most of the frustrating issues I’ve had with it in the past.  Great job by the VMware Education team!

Happily, I passed the exam on my first try so the pressure’s no longer there on the VCP expiration issue.  The exam experience has also reminded me of how much I enjoy taking these technical exams – yes, I know that’s strange and unpopular, but oh, well… After VMworld I’m looking forward to buckling down and getting all of my VCAPs updated, as well as the newer VCPs (I am sad that passing the VCAPs no longer also gets you the associated VCP; I may enjoy taking tech exams but I’m not a masochist!).  I’m also overdue for some non-VMware exams – most likely something “cloudy”.  After a (relatively) long time, it feels good to be back in motion!

Seasonal Learning Opportunities 2016

The 2016 seasonal update for our continuing quest to Always Be Learning.  You can compare and contrast with those for 2015 and 2014.

The following are simply in alphabetical order, and I’m sure only represent the tip of the iceberg of good deals. Please share any others you hear about in the comments.

[Updated 20161127@1941 EST with additional deals.]

Books and Videos

Apress

Apress are offering a Cyber Monday sale of $10 each for any of their ebooks or only $12.50 for any of their printed books (the print option is new this year!). The  site normally offers an Apress ebook Deal of the Day as well as a Springer Daily Deal.

Barnes and Noble

Why am I listing Barnes and Noble? For one reason only: for Black Friday they are offering a 30% discount on any single item. There are numerous restrictions on this, of course, but it can be very helpful, particularly for items that can’t normally be found discounted on other sites (like Amazon). For example, IT Architect: Foundation in the Art of Infrastructure Design: A Practical Guide for IT Architects by the VCDX trio of John Yani Arrasjid, Mark Gabryjelski, and Chris McCain is not discounted on Amazon at all – yielding a savings of over $17 when ordering the hardcover on B&N today.

CiscoPress

Cisco Press are having their annual Black Friday/Cyber Monday Sale with 55% off eligible items using code CM2016. This includes books, ebooks, video training, practice exams, and more. They also consistently offer eBook and Video Deals of the Week (on their home page).

HumbleBundle

Not strictly speaking a Black Friday or Cyber Monday deal, but HumbleBundle are offering up to 16 O’Reilly ebooks on Unix and related technologies for the next 9+ days. For those who don’t know, HumbleBundle offer different  selections (bundles) of books, games, etc. that are sold “pay what you like” – though there are minimums, and increasing your offer unlocks additional items in the bundle. In this example, $15 will get you all of the ebooks – in multiple ebook formats. Highly recommended.

LeanPub

LeanPub and a few of their authors are giving readers Black Friday price reductions at various levels of discounts. While this is not a site-wide sale, there are some interesting ebooks included in the sale. For those who haven’t shopped LeanPub before: customers picks their own price to pay, with each book having a minimum price and a suggested price; for these deals that minimum price has been reduced. Painless Vim, for example, has a suggested price of $14.99 with a minimum price of $5.99 – which for this sale is reduced to only $1.99.

O’Reilly

O’Reilly have been one of the premier publishers of IT books for decades, and in recent years have of course added ebooks, videos, and other media to their output. While O’Reilly have Ebook Deals of the Day (usually two) and Video Deal of the Week, their biggest sales are at this time of year.

Their annual Cyber Monday Sale is running again this year (till November 29th at 5am PST) and you can score 50% off any ebook or video, or 60% off when ordering $100 or more. And remember – O’Reilly sell/distribute books by other publishers as well including No Starch Press, Wrox, Wiley, Sybex, and many others.

Pearson IT Certification

Pearson are having the same annual Black Friday/Cyber Monday Sale as Cisco Press with 55% off any digital items and using the same CM2016 code. On their site you’ll find not only tech books from Cisco Press but also VMware Press,  and others, and of course video training, practice exams, and more.  If you miss this sale, they also consistently offer eBook and Video Deals of the Week (different from the ones on the Cisco Press site).

Training

Cisco Learning Network

The Cisco Learning Network Store is having a Cyber Monday sale starting with 40% off a one-year subscription to their CCNA/CCNP practice toolkit, 25% off the CCIE Route & Switch Preferred Bundle, and 25% of the CCIE Collaboration Essentials Bundle. These deals are only available 8am-12 noon PST with other special deals to follow.

A Cloud Guru

A Cloud Guru is an online training site for – surprise, surprise – cloud related technology, and in this case mostly on AWS, with courses focused on specific AWS certifications. The courses are purchased once for lifetime access to study at your own pace. If you’ve been considering getting certified on AWS, or just want to learn more about the technology, now’s a good time to pull the trigger: A Cloud Guru are discounting all of their courses by 75% for this sale.

Cloud Academy

Another on-line training vendor for cloud-related technology is Cloud Academy who take a different approach with their training than A Cloud Guru. Cloud Academy offer subscriptions to their available courses at three different levels – Starter, Professional, and Professional Plus – which provide different types of material, at different prices, depending on which you choose. For this Black Friday Sale, the Starter level is discounted 30%, while the Professional is discounted 50%, off the monthly subscription price. The Professional Plus, billed annually, is also discounted 50%.

GNS3 Academy

You may know GNS3 as the best vendor-neutral networking simulator around, but did you realize they also offer training? This year they’re offering a Black Friday sale where all of their courses (normally priced between $19 – $49) are only $10 using coupon code BLACKFRIDAY. They also have some courses at a normal price of less than $10, as well as several free courses to check out at any time.

INE

If you’re ready to take the leap for your CCIE, check out INE.  They’re offering three deals until midnight Pacific time tonight (November 27th): 30% off All Access Passes, 50% rack rental tokens, and 40% off CCIE Ultimate study bundles – which include lab workbooks, advanced training courses, and, yes, rack rental tokens.

Pluralsight

Pluralsight have rapidly become the leader in IT video training with one of the widest selections of material, broadest topic coverage, very frequent additions to their catalog, and some of the best instructors (and most certified) in the industry. Their Black Friday sale discounts their annual subscription by 33% for their

VMware Education

For their “Cyber Week” celebration, which extends until December 2nd, VMware are discounting select courses from their online store by 25%.  Course coverage includes VMware NSX, Horizon, AirWatch, and (unsurprisingly) VMware vSphere. In addition to the normal courses, you can get 25% off exam preps, certification exam vouchers, and VMware Learning Zone subscriptions.

Take advantage of everything that’s out there, and get prepared for another year of learning and growth!

Cisco Throws Its Hat in the HCI Ring with HyperFlex

To the surprise of no one but to the delight of some, Cisco unveiled their official entry into the hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) market today. While there have been preceding Cisco partnerships with HCI vendors like SimpliVity and Maxta, the newly-announced Cisco HyperFlex Systems provide the first Cisco-only branded and supported HCI offering.

Cisco HyperFlex Systems: Hardware

HyperFlex_Portfolio2

The HyperFlex systems consists of two main physical components: Cisco UCS servers for compute and storage, and UCS Fabric Interconnects (FIs)for management. The FIs can be either 6248 or 6296, and there will be two flavors of the servers: HX220c nodes, based upon the UCS C220 platform, and HX240c nodes, based upon the UCS C240 platform. A hybrid cluster that includes UCS B200 blades will also be supported.

The product will be initially offered as bundles of servers plus Fabric Interconnects, with individual servers available to add-on to an existing cluster. The smallest bundle will consist of three nodes (plus FIs) and is priced at under $60k US, while a four node bundle will be offered for less than $70k.

HyperFlex_3nodeBundle

HyperFlex clusters require a minimum of three converged servers, and in the first release can support as many as eight in the same cluster. Servers will be fully configurable at time of order, so customers won’t be as restricted in their component choices as with many other HCI vendors. It’s also worth noting that different node types can be mixed within the same cluster.

New Fabric Interconnects are required for HyperFlex systems, but there are future plans to allow customers to re-use existing FIs, and/or to incorporate into existing UCS systems, rather than having to purchase new FIs.

Cisco HyperFlex Systems: Software

Hypervisors

Unsurprisingly, VMware vSphere is the hypervisor of choice for HyperFlex, and systems will ship with vSphere pre-installed. Hyper-V support will rapidly follow, and the development team is looking hard at both KVM and containers – with the latter a more likely tertiary target than KVM itself.

Storage services

The defining characteristic of HCI – software-defined storage, or as I prefer to call it in this context, aggregated DAS – is provided by Cisco’s HX Data Platform using technology from HCI startup vendor Springpath. Cisco states that their storage implementation is more performant, more resilient, and allows for faster recovery than other HCI platforms.  With HX Data Platform all write data is striped across all nodes simultaneously, rather than the more typical write-local-and-remote methodology.

As has become table stakes for HCI, inline deduplication and inline compression are both provided, though unlike some vendors neither can be turned off but are always enabled.

Management

Cisco, echoing my own experience, says that customers have insisted that they do not want yet-another-management-interface, as is so common in both converged and hyperconverged products, but instead want this new architecture to get incorporated within the context of their current management platforms.  On-going HyperFlex management is comprised of UCS Manager and vCenter, with vCenter expected to be the primary interface for daily operations. HCI operations are embedded within the vCenter UI via the standard UCS Manager plugin and an HX Data Platform plugin. The HX plugin integrates pointer-based snapshots into the vCenter Snapshot Manager, and provides rapid VAAI-assisted VM cloning.

Further down the road are UCS Director and ACI integrations to help Cisco tie HyperFlex into the rest of their datacenter infrastructure and provide full automation and orchestration capabilities (which are lacking in this first release).

Competitiveness

With HyperFlex, Cisco is trying to address some of the deficiencies seen by many of the current crop of HCI vendors:

Independent scaling of compute vs. capacity

HyperFlex supports the addition of compute-only nodes into the cluster. These compute hosts connect to shared storage presented by the converged nodes via a proprietary IOVisor software (not to be confused with the open source and networking-focused IO Visor project).

In the initial release, compute-only nodes can be added to a cluster that already has at least four converged nodes, with a total of four compute-only nodes supported in a  cluster. This means that the largest cluster size supported in the first release is twelve: eight converged nodes and four compute-only nodes. Going forward, there will need to be at least as many converged nodes as compute-only nodes.

Cisco has stressed that is a matter of qualification time and cycles to begin supporting larger cluster sizes, rather than a technical or hard limitation.

Complete convergence

As many people have noted, despite the hyper-moniker the current slate of HCI vendors don’t handle networking convergence at all. With UCS Manager and the Fabric Interconnects, Cisco is providing the same level of convergence as with their standard UCS servers, which, to be frank, helped popularize the entire idea of “converged infrastrucure.” In addition, Cisco has the full SDN capabilities of ACI to wrap and extend the solution from the application to the edge – something no one, other than VMware themselves, can do today.

Summary

Until we get our hands on it and break play with it, the jury is, of course, still out on HyperFlex. On its face, however, Cisco have taken an interesting approach and appear to have a strong product. If the execution can match the overall design and put meat on the current bones of the roadmap, the HCI space will get very interesting over the next 12-18 months.