Three Future Technology Trends That Network Engineers Should Know About

 Network technology is oftentimes adjusting, and thus, individuals' lives and the manner in which they work together are additionally evolving. Consider phones: As the updates on fifth era (5G) cell systems spreads, US remote organizations are ready to spend more than $ 275 billion to address this broadcast communications advancement.

How will the network technology unrest affect the future occupation showcase? As organizations and associations dynamically more depend on arrange advancements, network engineers assume a significant job in looking after, refreshing, and checking system development. Not exclusively is that, network engineers scrupulous for maintenance the system running on workers, switches, PCs, and even individual links. As business and innovation adjust, future network engineers must keep speed with changing system patterns.Network engineers who think about the degree of these movements can keep businesses powerful in a making world.

Three Future Technology Trends That Network Engineers Should Know About

Nobody comprehends what organized innovation will resemble a long time from now. However, the accompanying patterns ought to apply to all future network engineer radars.

Prescient investigation 

Cloud networking 

Network Automation

Prescient investigation  and Future Network Security 

Prescient investigation is the usage of evident data to set up the chance of future results.Instruments like AI and ML empower future system architects to apply Prescient investigation  to focus on imminent system introduction issues. As network technology  keeps on advancing, information technology (IT) experts see prescient models that actually coordinate veritable outcomes, making predictive analytics an extremely supportive apparatus.

Network security can be altogether improved utilizing predictive analytics. Typically, organized security experts have depended on the "mark. In any case, since the marks are obsolete, Prescient investigation can be utilized to screen arrange security progressively on numerous systems. The network security of things to come depends on composite answers for continuously more intricate issues.

Cloud networking 

Hybrid cloud computing, consolidating an on location IT framework with open cloud design, is as of now drawing in light of a legitimate concern for organizations. The fundamental explanation is the adaptability of the hybrid cloud, which permits clients to adjust the innovation to their necessities. Generally, organizations have been required to keep information hidden in arranges for security. Be that as it may, with the development of cloud organizing innovation, organizations are with affirmation downloading to half breed distributed computing frameworks. This permits you to utilize Different open cloud assets, for example, blockchain, analytics, and AI. Architects utilize these instruments most consistently for configuration, arranging, management, maintenance, and support tasks.

Network Automation

Network automation promises to substitute a considerable lot of the troublesome errands that network engineers perform physically. Via mechanizing certain repeatable assignments, IT experts can invest additional time and vitality on long haul extends and improve operational productivity.

The Scope of Network Engineer in Future

The extent of the strategic network engineer shifts incredibly. Its principle work is that of system manager that works and keeps up the whole foundation of the associated gadgets. Many system executives make the most of their work since it has little to do with complex frameworks of intrigue. In systems, it for the most part acts as structured, so it is totally disengaged and dry. Requesting occupations are very much supplemented and the present system specialist's innovation is continually growing their comprehension of the stages, systems, programming applications, and different parts of system administrators.

The Future of Network Engineer

Can Automation Take Your Job?

Some contend that automation can put a network engineer jobless, however the inverse is valid for industry information. Computerization will surely turn out to be more prevailing, however network engineers don't lose work, they simply change their way to deal with work and get new abilities.

They Never Miss Work!

Organizations consistently need network engineers. Therefore, network engineers can appreciate the security of their work by adjusting to changes in their work. Network specialists bring up that network engineers have consistently been in transition. Ten years back, distributed computing didn't exist and individuals utilized dial-up Internet to get to. In any case, since innovation has changed throughout the years, network engineers are appropriate. That is the reason network designing is changing, however it never replaces that engineer.

Network Engineers Need Improvement and Skill Mix

Later on for networking engineers must plan application-accommodating networks. Applications can make changes, and thus, information traffic is better off than restricted to a solid foundation. After around 5 to 10 years, network administrators will be nearer to designers. So on the off chance that you need to stay pertinent in the networking field, presently is the perfect opportunity to grow your range of abilities and fuse programming languages. This cross-capacity assists with adjusting to new changes in the field of networks. Else, you should rack the hardware and course the links. 

With network automation, the obligations of network engineers are moving from more manual assignments to more innovative errands. Rather than composing network code line by line, new age network engineers are working in dialects ​​like Java and figuring out how to code for new applications.

Network Engineer

A Network Engineer is a technology professional who has the skills to plan, implement and monitor computer networks supporting internal voice, data, video and wireless networks.

Although the names of network professions and the network administrator are sometimes used synonymously, a network engineer generally has more executive responsibilities than a network administrator. The engineering part tends to deal more with planning, design and technical specifications, while the administrative part mainly concerns daily maintenance, management and problem-solving efforts.

Job titles can also be differentiated by education and / or income. Usually, a network engineer has more education and earns more than a network administrator.

Responsibility of a network engineer

Network engineers focus on offering high-availability network infrastructures to maintain information technology activities online and on user sites. Network engineers often overlap with other functions, such as computer network architects or security systems engineers, and work internally within an organization or as external consultants.

Network engineers design and implement network configurations, solve performance problems, monitor the network and configure security systems such as firewalls. They often inform a CIO, the director of information security and other business line leaders to discuss and decide on general company goals, policies and updates on network status. In many situations, network engineers work closely with project managers and other engineers, manage capacity and perform remote or on-site support.

Qualifications for a Network Engineer

Several universities and other institutions offer training programs in network engineering. A Network Engineer may only need an associates degree to get an entry level job, but most positions will require a degree in computer science or additional experience. Many network engineers also come from areas such as electrical, physical or mathematical engineering. For many engineers, additional qualifications and training are closely related to the Cisco engineering certification program, which offers five levels of professional training. Other certifications are available from suppliers and organizations such as Juniper Networks, Microsoft, Aruba, Alcatel-Lucent, Riverbed Technology Inc., SolarWinds, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Extreme Networks Inc. and IPv6 Forums.

In addition to technical skills, network engineers need analytical skills, leadership and organizational skills. Attention to detail and the ability to solve problems are also important. Engineers must be able to understand complex networks and detect problems or suggest ways to solve them. They must also be able to work collaboratively, as well as instruct other engineers and support staff to manage the network. And they must be flexible enough to work with engineers and business line colleagues who may not understand the networks.

Increasingly, network engineers must also learn about application and software development, reflecting the growing role of automation and software-defined networks. Therefore, engineers must understand traffic flows, application priority and data transport. In addition, engineers should also familiarize themselves with hyper-convergence, virtualization, security, containers, geographic networks and storage engineering.

Network Engineer Career Path

Network engineers' salaries range from $ 46,500 to over $ 115,000 a year, depending on skills and experience. Engineers can also earn bonuses and some employers also offer profit sharing. Network engineers work 40 hours a week, but can be called on weekends, evenings and after work hours to solve technical problems.

Network Engineer can also follow different paths in the field of networks. Network analysts specialize in the installation and maintenance of networks and often cross over into the technical and commercial aspects of an organization. Network administrators perform a similar function, but must train and direct network technicians. The most specialized roles include cloud network architects, who help organizations with cloud infrastructure deployment and network security specialists, which detect and prevent network security threats. Other specialists focus on engineering for VoIP, telecommunications and data centers.

How to Design a Secure Network Architecture

How to Design a Secure Network Architecture

For sophisticated security, there are some standard design principles that must be followed. Here are some of these principles:

Weak link security: On all systems there are some weak links that are not paid much attention to. Let's take an example: Consider the online site of a banking company. Some of the portal pages provide the most commonly used and rudimentary services (eg account transfer, account summary, etc.), but there are some pages (e.g. the policies / regulations page) that are rarely visited, if at all. Even though the latter may seem unimportant to the network architect and the user, it can still be a potential source of attack if a hacker finds a route through the page to another page of significantly greater importance. Developers often ignore these "weak links" because they do not see them as carrying important information that may interest the hacker, but these weak links have long been hackers' primary targets, so they need to be protected.

Fail-safe implementation: Any system can fail in times of chaos and failure is virtually inevitable. What a network architect needs to ensure is that the network / system does not fail to open. Therefore, proper fail-safe implementation is substantially important. John Viega says in his book, Building Secure Software, “Any sufficiently complex system will have failure modes. Failure is inevitable and must be planned. What is preventable are fault-related safety issues. The problem is that when many systems fail, they exhibit unsafe behavior. "

The Least Privilege Model: The Least Privilege Model dictates that whenever you need to grant someone permission and / or access to perform some actions on your resources, you must grant them as few privileges as possible.

Use cutting-edge cryptographic models and techniques: Encryption and other cryptographic techniques have become absolutely necessary for modern networks and systems. A network engineer should always use standard encryption techniques and also ensure periodic updates of all distributed keys and certificates.

Run vulnerability tests: No network is as secure as it seems. Be sure to run as many vulnerability tests as possible on your network before you make it active, as you can. The smaller the number of vulnerabilities, the greater your chances of developing a secure network architecture.

The OSI Model and the CISSP

The open system interconnection (OSI) model provides a framework for protocol implementation in the following seven layers:

(Note: The OSI model is not tangible and is just a concept through which we can understand how network communications occur)

Physical layer: This is the layer in which the bit stream / radio signal / electric pulse is transmitted.

Data link layer: In the data link layer, packets are encoded and decoded into bits.

Network layer: All switching and routing logic is implemented at the network layer.

Transport Layer: End-to-end flow control and information data integrity occur at the transport layer.

Session Layer: All session management tasks (establishment, maintenance, and termination, etc.) occur here.

Presentation Layer: This layer converts data from network format to application format (and vice versa) for presentation and transport purposes.

Application tier: All end-user (and application) processes occur at the application tier of the network.

The TCP/IP Model and the CISSP

Similar to the OSI model, the TCP / IP model is another framework through which we can explain (and build) our network protocols. It has the following four layers:

Network access layer: This is the first layer in the four layer model. All details of how data will be sent over the physical network are set here. The most commonly used protocols at the network access layer are FDDI, Ethernet, Token Ring, Frame Relay, X.25, etc.

Internet layer: The responsibility of the Internet layer is to group data into datagrams (data packets) that will be carried by the network access layer. These datagrams contain the source and destination addresses (can be IP addresses or logical recipients) that are used to forward the datagrams between multiple hosts as well as legacy networks. The most commonly used protocols in this layer are: Internet Protocol (IP), Reverse Address Resolution Protocol (RARP), Address Resolution Protocol (ARP), Internet Group Management Protocol (IGMP), and ICMP (Internet Protocol). Control Message Message).

Transport Layer: Like the OSI model transport layer, the TCP / IP model transport layer ensures data flow control and data integrity. The most famous protocols used at the transport layer are TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) and UDP (User Datagram Protocol).

Application tier: The application tier is responsible for converting data received from the transport layer into a format presentable to the end user. Some of the protocols worth mentioning at this level are: Telnet, SSH, Domain Name System (DNS), Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP), File Transfer Protocol (FTP), Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) , Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP), X Windows, Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP), Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP), and so on.

Some implications

While multi-tier architectures allow protocol stacks to be deployed through different combinations of protocols, network devices, and programming interfaces, flexibility comes with a performance shift. Transitions between layers can lead to increased time costs and programming efforts. Data storage and transfer abstractions used at all layers also require data transformation at all layers. All of these can lead to huge performance disadvantages, as seen by [Crowcroft et al. 1992] [Clark 1982]. The DNP3 protocol also shares the same performance / efficiency disadvantages.

UNDERSTANDING IP NETWORKING

To communicate on an IP network, every device must have three different information; that is, the subnet mask, broadcast address, and IP address. All of these addresses are usually written as octets (for example, 198.41.11.151, 255.255.255.0, and 198.41.11.255).

All IP addresses are made up of two parts; one is the network part, which lets routers know which device group a packet should ideally visit, and the other is the host part, which allows routers to know the specific device to which the packet needs to be sent.

When managing IP addresses, a network architect can assign a distinct identity to each specific device. IP address classes can be viewed as:

Class	Network Portion	Hosts Allowed
A	From 1.0 to 127.0	Approx. 16 million
B	From 128.0 to 191.255	65,536
C	From 192.0 to 223.255.255	255

The Standard IP Subnet

Classes:

Classes	Subnet Mask
A	255.0.0.0
B	255.255.0.0
C	255.255.255.0

Some Examples of Broadcast Addresses are:

Class	Network	Subnet Mask	Broadcast
A	45.0.0.0	255.0.0.0	45.255.255.255
B	128.138.0.0	255.255.0.0	128.138.255.255
C	198.41.9.0	255.255.255.0	198.41.9.255
A*	45.21.16.0	255.255.252.0	42.21.19.255
C*	198.41.9.64	255.255.255.224	198.41.9.95

Software Defined Networking and CISSP

Software Defined Networking (SDN) is an emerging technology focused on replacing the physical network infrastructure with a software-controlled network design. It's dynamic, cost effective and adaptable, meaning it meets the high bandwidth needs of modern applications with peace of mind.

The SDN architecture is responsible for separating network control and routing functions, allowing the architect to manually program network control and abstract the underlying infrastructure for network services and applications. Following are some of the features of an SDN architecture:

Agility: The ability to bypass routing control allows administrators to dynamically adjust network-wide traffic and meet changing needs.

Central Management: SDN controllers are responsible for maintaining a global view of the entire network. This is apparent to policy engines and applications as a concrete logical option.

The ability to be programmatically configured: Probably the best part of an SDN infrastructure is that it can be programmed. It allows network managers to add configurations at will. This enables better management, security and optimization of network resources via automated SDN code, which programmers of course have the luxury of writing for themselves.

Directly programmable: All network control can be programmed directly because, as already mentioned, it is kept segregated from routing functions.

Vendor Neutrality: If you deploy an infrastructure using open standards, SDN allows you to simplify network design and eventual operation. This is because instructions are not blocked by the vendor but are obtained from SDN controllers.

COVERAGED PROTOCOLS

The converged protocol model promotes the transport and transmission of various types of data / traffic (such as voice, data, video, images, etc.) in a single converged network.

ETHERNET FIBER CHANNEL (FCoE):

FCoE, or Fiber Channel over Ethernet, is a sophisticated storage protocol that allows Fiber Channel communications to be performed directly over Ethernet. All Fiber Channel traffic can be moved through the Ethernet infrastructure already in place. More information about the protocol can be found here.

MULTI-PROTOCOL LABEL SWITCH (MPLS):

MPLS is a technique by which the performance of telecommunications networks can be enhanced using sophisticated data transport techniques. It directs data from one node to the next, depending on short-path labels rather than heavy network addresses. This avoids tedious routing table lookups. Labels can identify the virtual link (path) between distant nodes instead of endpoints.

Voice over IP (VOIP):

As the name implies, Voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP) is a technology that allows you to make voice calls using an Internet connection (instead of a telephone line). Some VoIP services may allow you to call only people who use the same service, but others allow you to call anyone who can be reached by a telephone number (including long distance calls and international numbers). VoIP works by encapsulating audio in data packets through a codec, transmitting them over an IP network, and decapsing them back to audio at the receiver end. Endpoints on a VoIP network include softphone applications (running on computers), WebRTC-enabled browsers, mobile devices, and VoIP phones.

FINAL WORD:

The security and integrity of communications on a network can only be ensured if standard network design principles are remembered by the engineer during the configuration of the network infrastructure.

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