| | August 20228CIOReviewIN MY OPINIONEVOLVING DATA CENTER NETWORK FROM CLOUD-READY TO CLOUD-NATIVEBy Parantap Lahiri, VP, Network and Datacenter Engineering, eBayMonolithic applications running on dedicated servers have evolved into cloud-native microservices that freely scale on the cloud. However, in the enterprise space, more often than not, `networking' has acted as a necessary evil that slows down progress and results in unplanned outages. Interestingly enough, networks can quickly become an asset from liability if used properly. Let's take a deeper look.Networking in the enterprise domain grew up to provide connectivity between office buildings and provide access to the Internet and corporate services within data centers. Since many enterprise applications came as third party software, physical networks had to facilitate and enforce segmentation and security needs. The networks were complex, inconsistent, and fragile, with heavy dependence on a set of in-house support staff as well as dedicated engineers from vendors.Other than configuration inconsistency and failures due to lack of change rigor, the primary factor that contributed to this fragility was the inherent weakness of protocols like "spanning-tree" that were used to ensure a loop-free forwarding path for switching domains. Layer 2 switching domains were needed to support VLAN (Virtual Local Area Network), which has been an integral part of most enterprise networks to ensure IP mobility, enforcing firewalls as the default gateways, etc. These domains frequently suffered from broadcast storms that melted the networks due to loop creation. More so, loop-free requirements created topologies that resulted in congestion.Parantap Lahiri
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