Lee's is about as good an analysis as you can get: "Put another less cynical way, the cloud stuff works well when IT resources (or patience) are thin as it takes a few major headaches out of the equation. But there is no free lunch- the hidden costs of cloud managed is less features (this is good and bad IMO), less visibility down deep in the individual pieces, and as you are hinting at… a leap of faith on trusting the cloud."
We've run a 700 AP cloud-based deployment for 5 years with just one minor cloud problem early on that lasted a couple of hours with minimal practical impact. This is much better uptime than I can provide botching maintenance now and then. Rand Rand P. Hall Director, Network Services askIT! Merrimack College 978-837-3532 rand.h...@merrimack.edu If I had an hour to save the world, I would spend 55 minutes defining the problem and five minutes finding solutions. – Einstein On Fri, Jan 13, 2017 at 1:03 PM, Lee H Badman <lhbad...@syr.edu> wrote: > To add a bit to Sam’s input- running both on prem and cloud systems makes > me thoroughly appreciate that on the cloud side, someone else is on the > hook for care and feeding of things like the management system and the > “cloud controller” or the “no controller” or whatever each vendor wants to > call their magic. If the premise versions weren’t too-frequently > bug-ridden, it may be a different story. But spending copious amounts of > time keeping up system building blocks through their code issues makes you > appreciate the cloud versions that just generally work. > > > > Put another less cynical way, the cloud stuff works well when IT resources > (or patience) are thin as it takes a few major headaches out of the > equation. But there is no free lunch- the hidden costs of cloud managed is > less features (this is good and bad IMO), less visibility down deep in the > individual pieces, and as you are hinting at… a leap of faith on trusting > the cloud. I’ve been cloudy for almost 7 years at a number of small sites, > and in each case it was absolutely the right choice. > > > > But all cloud-managed systems aren’t equivalent either- my advice is to > unequivocally trial anything that you might purchase and make sure it fits > what you need, the way you need it. > > > > *Lee Badman* | CWNE #200 | Network Architect > > Information Technology Services > 206 Machinery Hall > 120 Smith Drive > Syracuse, New York 13244 > > *t* 315.443.3003 <(315)%20443-3003> * f* 315.443.4325 <(315)%20443-4325> > *e* lhbad...@syr.edu *w* its.syr.edu > > *SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY* > syr.edu > > > > *From:* The EDUCAUSE Wireless Issues Constituent Group Listserv [mailto: > WIRELESS-LAN@LISTSERV.EDUCAUSE.EDU] *On Behalf Of *Samuel Clements > *Sent:* Friday, January 13, 2017 12:19 PM > *To:* WIRELESS-LAN@LISTSERV.EDUCAUSE.EDU > *Subject:* Re: [WIRELESS-LAN] Cloud managed infrastructure > > > > Disclaimer, I work for a VAR. > > > > Having said that, my personal opinion is that there is always a specific > time and a place for your control plane and that's really the > consideration. In situations where you have sites that would require low > compute (typically smaller sites) that would be appropriate for Aruba > Instant for example, those would be ripe for considering moving control > plane to the cloud. Of course the big name in that space is Meraki and they > have an awesome page over at http://meraki.com/trust - but there is a ton > of space to consider private cloud options (in Azure/AWS for instance) with > 'real Cisco', Aruba, Ruckus, etc - all having virtual WLCs that can play in > those spaces. If your goal is to remove on-premises gear, in those > situations where the architecture makes sense, there are tons of not only > public cloud offerings (that come with their own OpEx considerations) as > well as private cloud options that generally fit in your already preferred > vendor-of-choice. This makes things like code-qualification, support, > purchase discounts, hardware investment all become less of a challenge when > you abstract out the architecture from your existing platforms today. Said > differently, if vendor-lock in is important for your consideration, many of > your existing APs today can be moved to the Cloud - which is of course just > a fancy word for someone else's computer. :) > > > > It's still a touch on the nascent side in my opinion, but it's one that, > for smaller sites, makes sense in a lot of environments. > > -Sam > > > > On Fri, Jan 13, 2017 at 10:57 AM, Dexter Caldwell < > dexter.caldw...@furman.edu> wrote: > > Hi Everyone, > > I’d be interested in hearing your thoughts, concerns about > cloud-managed AP’s, or other infrastructure devices. Specifically do you > have security concern? Have any of you implemented any such solutions and > which management model do you prefer. > > > > > > Dexter Caldwell > > Dir. Systems & Networks > > Furman University > > dexter.caldw...@furman.edu > > > > ********** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE > Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/ > discuss. > > > > ********** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE > Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/ > discuss. > ********** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE > Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/ > discuss. > > ********** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/discuss.
