EP 548 | OCTOBER 20, 2025

Broadcom Brings Chips to Wi-Fi 8 Party; Attorneys General Scrutinize HPE/Juniper Settlement

It's chips aplenty on today's Network Break as Broadcom double-dips with an 800G NIC and pre-standard Wi-Fi 8 chips. Plus, F5 rolls out an emergency software update after attackers breach internal systems, the Open Compute Project rolls out a new industry effort to drive scale-up AI Ethernet networking, and 13 Attorneys General equest a public hearing into the settlement reached between the Justice Department and HPE and Juniper. ASML posts a tiny rise in net sales, TSMC revenues jump 30% in a prosperous Q3, and even more tech news analysis. | LISTEN NOW

EP 063 | OCTOBER 21, 2025

Designing a Wireless-First Office

A wireless-first office is a sensible goal these days when most laptops don't have an Ethernet port and lots of devices use Wi-Fi. Wireless architect Phil Sosaya led the transition to wireless-first offices at sites across the globe. He details his design approach, including why he doesn't bother with site survey software. He discusses tools he uses, how to properly secure Wi-Fi, and some challenges he and his team faced along the way. | LISTEN NOW

EP 083 | OCTOBER 21, 2025

A CISO’s Perspective on Model Context Protocol (MCP)

Chuck Kesler, a CISO, has a front-row seat on how new technologies such as Model Context Protocol (MCP) are reshaping the way enterprises connect AI systems with the tools and data they use every day. We talk about why his organization adopted MCP, how they’re using it internally, and how he's working to support this business initiative while also managing risk. We also talk about what MCP and other protocols mean for the future of enterprise security, automation, and AI risk management. | LISTEN NOW

EP 285 | OCTOBER 22, 2025

The Death of IaC Has Been Greatly Exaggerated

While declaring the death of Infrastructure as Code (IaC) may get you clicks on LinkedIn, IaC is alive and kicking. Guest Malcolm Matalka argues that IaC provides the tools and a model for managing infrastructure across its lifecycle in a structured way. It also bridges the gap between representing infrastructure so that both humans and machines can consume it. We also discuss IaC tools, and speculate on what could maybe supplant IaC in the future. | LISTEN NOW

EP 041 | OCTOBER 23, 2025

Switched Virtual Interface (SVI) and Integrated Routing and Bridging (IRB)

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 work. They move on to when you'd need to implement SVI or IRB and how they relate to VLANs and EVPN/VXLANs. | LISTEN NOW

EP 186 | OCTOBER 23, 2025

An Inside Look at RFC 9872 for Discovering v6 Prefixes

RFC 9872 makes recommendations for NAT64 prefix discovery for hosts supporting v4-to-v6 translation. Co-host Nick Buralgio is a co-author of this RFC, so we're taking the opportunity to talk about it in detail. We discuss the problems RFC 9872 is addressing and why a new RFC was needed for operational guidance, not necessarily defining a protocol or standard. We learn the effects of this RFC on previous RFCs, specifically 7050 and 8781. Lastly, we share the implications of RFC 9872 on listeners and recommend they do a little labbing to see what this really means for the networks they manage. | LISTEN NOW

EP 047 | OCTOBER 24, 2025

Advice From Both Sides of the Network Aisle

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 also talks about how the skills of communication and motivation have served his career regardless of the role. | LISTEN NOW

EP 802 | OCTOBER 24, 2025

Unifying Networking and Security with Fortinet SASE: Architecture, Reality, and Lessons Learned (Sponsored)

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 so we can dig into its unified networking and security elements and learn how they're architected, discuss its analytics and AI capabilities, drill into agent-based and agentless ZTNA, understand Fortinet's simplified licensing, and more. You'll come away from today's episode with a good grounding in how Fortinet SASE works and what it's like to live with as an engineer. | LISTEN NOW