• Human Infrastructure
  • Posts
  • Human Infrastructure 369: Podcast Feed Drama, MTUs, Being the First Idiot, and More

Human Infrastructure 369: Podcast Feed Drama, MTUs, Being the First Idiot, and More

AuthorAuthor

Drew Conry-Murray & Ethan Banks
September 12, 2024

PODCAST FEED DRAMA 🎭

Several months ago, we Packet Pushers nerds noticed drops in downloads in various podcasts—podcasts that we’ve been running for a long time like Heavy Networking and Day Two DevOps with loads of subscribers. We talked to some folks and did a little thinking. It seemed to us that the problem was the Fat Pipe (and Full Feed) aggregation feeds were getting so busy that new shows were eclipsing old shows before podcast clients could cope with them.

Thus, we started a project to thin down the Fat Pipe. Fewer shows. Less cramming of the channel with content. As we’ve added several new podcasts to our network in the last year, this all seemed to make sense.

Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics

Nope. This analysis was wrong. As we removed shows from the Fat Pipe, we didn’t see downloads of our long-standing shows recover in any way. We just saw downloads of the shows we removed going down.

So what’s really been happening? In iOS 17, the Apple Podcasts client’s default download behavior changed. While Apple Podcasts is not the most heavily used podcast client among you out there (Spotify is), it’s a big one. The change Apple made means that Podcasts doesn’t download a new episode by default. It streams it when you choose to listen to it.

Oh. Okay. Fair enough. This is a good thing because now we have a better idea of how many of you actually listened to an episode—not just that a client downloaded the episode, which is a somewhat useless metric. With that information, we can more accurately determine the shows that are interesting to you. For those of us planning content (I’m working on 2025 right now), that’s massively helpful.

So What’s Changing?

What’s the upshot of this? We’ve put our feeds back to the way they were, and we’re going to stop messing with them now. (Sorry.) If you search in your podcast client for Packet Pushers, you’ll see…

  • The Everything Feed. This used to be called The Full Feed, but we rebranded it so that it’s very clear what’s in this feed—literally every single podcast we publish. We publish a show almost every weekday, and often more than one. This is a LOT of content. We’ve got 11 shows (some weekly, some not) in the network, with another to launch before the end of 2024.

  • The Fat Pipe. This contains the most popular shows in the network, with a good spread of technology coverage—Heavy Networking, Network Break (news), Day Two DevOps, Packet Protector (security), and Network Automation Nerds. We will also launch new shows here for their first 5 episodes or so to help them get started.

  • Individual feeds. Every show has its own individual feed if you’d rather pick and choose your shows.

One More Thing…

One other feed-related change worth mentioning. We’ve increased the maximum number of shows on each feed to 250. There are supposedly limits in the world o’ podcasting of how large a feed can be (although documentation is sparse and inconsistent on details), and thus the reason why we don’t just slam every episode back to Ep.1 into a show’s feed. 250 episodes gets you back 4-5 years for most shows. Anything older, you can go to our website and stream it from there.

Interestingly, upping to 250 means The Everything Feed and The Fat Pipe will be really big as they are just collections of other feeds. But so far, nothing is broken that I’ve seen. Maybe that means we can increase the size of the individual shows to their full back catalog. The situation is actively developing.

If you see any weirdness in your podcast client with these changes, tell me all about it here. - Ethan

THIS WEEK’S MUST-READ BLOGS 🤓

Daniel Dib has been a blogging whirlwind of late, and we’re all the better for it. A recent post digs into how Maximum Segment Size (MSS) and MSS clamping relate to MTU. He provides essential background, and then walks through a lab example. This is a very detailed post that gets into Ethernet, IP, and TCP overhead; frame size signaling, and more. - Drew

Pat Allen provides a clear breakdown of the benefits of automation, how they tie into a network engineer’s job functions, and where to start if you’re looking to up-skill. I like the way Pat positions automation as an opportunity for network pros not just to adapt to a trend, but to thrive in their roles. This positive approach is better than either hand-wringing about being made redundant or scoffing at automation as just another fad. - Drew

In this very short post, Tyler Wolf Leonhardt suggests that speaking up with your idea has only upsides. You have to be willing to be the first idiot, though. Getting over yourself is hard. - Ethan

This piece covers useful Python constructs such as the collection module, the with keyword, the decimal module, the statistics module, and several others. - Ethan

For all you network automators out there, this one should prove interesting. Should your IaC codebase live in one giant repository, or should it be split into multiple repositories? There are pros and cons to each approach. Author Brian Grant walks you through them in a thoughtful way that starts out by explaining the challenges of version control systems. - Ethan

Each year we ask for your feedback. It’s that time! Please take a few minutes to fill out this survey. We’re desperately seeking 500+ responses. Okay, we’re not desperate, but we want statistically significant data. We’re not there yet and we need your input. Thanks in advance!

TECH NEWS 📣

The Open Compute Project is working with hyperscalers to test the potential of using low-carbon concrete for building data centers. As a building material, concrete is not carbon-friendly, so I guess this is fine? But given the power demands of GPUs and AI, which are obliterating Big Tech’s carbon neutrality efforts, fiddling with low-carbon concrete seems about as effective as tweaking your thermostat while the house is on fire. - Drew

A county council in Dublin, Ireland, shot down Google’s request to build a new data center in an area where the search giant already has existing facilities. The request was denied because of insufficient capacity in the electric grid and a lack of renewable power sources at the site. For years, Ireland welcomed tech companies to its shores to help revitalize its economy and create good jobs in the IT sector, so a “No” vote is significant. Ireland, like other countries, is running up hard against resource limits. And as an EU member, Ireland has carbon restriction goals to meet. Those goals will be harder to achieve as hyperscalers, binging on power-hungry AI infrastructure, are going in the opposite direction.  - Drew

OpenStack? Wait…what? Oh, yes. OpenStack might not have made major inroads into the enterprises many of you are working at, but it might be coming. Why? Because money. Okay, also data sovereignty, but mostly money. Running workloads on OpenStack as a private cloud is cheaper—potentially a LOT cheaper—than running them on the Big 3 public clouds or on VMware in the Broadcom era. OpenStack has the benefit of having been around for a while, so there’s some code maturity there, too.

Kata containers are about security and data sovereignty, as well. Depending on the workload, these are increasingly of concern to companies. - Ethan

FOR THE LULZ 🤣

RESEARCH & RESOURCES 📒

In this YouTube video, David Alicea walks through the steps to take an on-prem Cisco Firepower and move the management of that physical device into the cloud. It’s just one firewall in a lab, but he goes step-by-step through the console to show you how it’s done, covers essential prerequisites, and how to verify the migration. - Drew

Princeton University Press has made the first chapter of this book available online as a preview. I’m always looking for reliable information to help me understand how AI works, and I like the fact that I can preview the book with a free chapter. If you’re looking for resources, this may be helpful. - Drew

AutoCon2 is November 18-22 in Denver, Colorado and Conference Registration is open!

  • Hotel registration is open - grab a room SOON!

  • We already have the most proposals for talks that we've ever had

  • We have a great slate of workshop options covering a range of topics in network automation and orchestration

  • Note that it's a separate event conveniently preceding AC2

NAF is a watering hole - a place where we can have harmonious collaboration in network automation: the practice of network automation, orchestration, observability, AI tooling, education, process and standards, and more. Come hear what your peers are doing in their networks (on the stage and in the hallways), what solution providers are bringing to the table, what's happening with open source, and all things network automation. AutoCon is THE Forum for Network Automation. See you in Denver!

INDUSTRY BLOGS & VENDOR ANNOUNCEMENTS 💬 

WLAN sales have stagnated for the past year. Now Dell’Oro spots signs of life as WLAN revenues increased $2.2 billion quarter over quarter. The analyst firm sees a jump in sales of Wi-Fi 7 and Wi-Fi 6e. Juniper has climbed past competitors such as Extreme and CommScope in marketshare, while Huawei sold about half of all global Wi-Fi 7 units. - Drew

The summary is straightforward. “The tl;dr is that we will be adding AGPL as another license option next to ELv2 and SSPL in the coming weeks. We never stopped believing and behaving like an open source community after we changed the license. But being able to use the term Open Source, by using AGPL, an OSI approved license, removes any questions, or fud, people might have.”

If you’re skeptical of the change for whatever reason, Shay Banon anticipates and preemptively answers your dubious questions. - Ethan

Exercism teaches programming languages via exercises. The platform is 100% free forever. They rely on donations to fund the endeavor. As you might imagine, that’s risky. The vast majority of consumers of free services will never support them (ask me how I know), which is why advertising pervades to keep these services alive. That’s not the route Exercism has gone thus far, however.

“The one area we have had some promising success is in advertising on the site. But the effort it takes to find advertisers and manage them, and my general desire not to flood Exercism with adverts, has meant that I feel this isn't a very sustainable strategy.”

“Right now, we have about 800 monthly donors and about $7,500 in monthly donations. That covers our server costs pretty much exactly. So if you're donating right now, thank you. You are literally keeping our servers on. Our donor base is generally quite stable, so I'm not too worried about Exercism's existential prospects.”

Even so, Exercism had to lay off one of their two devs, and cash is tight. Support the services you use, folks.

In case you’re wondering, Packet Pushers is fine. We fund the operation with the sponsors that appear on our podcasts. If you want to support us, listen to the sponsored shows that offer a product or service that might be useful at the company where you do your IT magic. When you reach out to them, tell them you heard about them on Packet Pushers. That helps us keep doing what we do. - Ethan

TOO MANY LINKS WOULD NEVER BE ENOUGH 🐳

  1. lwIP - lwIP is a small independent implementation of the TCP/IP protocol suite

  2. Go Wireless With This DIY Laser Ethernet Link (2017) - Hackaday

  3. FutureRack - data center racks used as a furniture form factor for your home

  4. MCMC addresses misinformation on DNS redirection & internet access restrictions - The Sun Malaysia

  5. MCMC asked not to proceed with DNS redirection method - Fahmi - The Sun Malaysia

LAST LAUGH 😆