Caution: boring tech porn blather ahead!
It recently became obvious to me that the lab I had setup for our development team was not aging very well. When I first configured it, I was under the impression that creating a boatload of VLANs and using routing everywhere was the way to go. Of course that belief held true for about 2 days, ’til I realized that what we really need is an agile network, of which subsets can be reconfigured in no time, to mimic particular real-life configurations.
Thus, my new setup is going to be as follows:
- An edge switch, that will connect the lab to the outside world
- A core of routers that will be immutable
- Everything else will vary daily
First consequence: instead of labeling every device with an IP address,they will now sport names.I have yet to decide whether these will be planets, super heroes, or what not… We will have to maintain a very light web page that will show name mappings, based on which developer is trying which feature: link aggregation, adjacency protocols, spanning tree testing…
It all starts with a patch panel.
Of course it’s only a temporary connection but it is convenient to be able to connect to the outside world without first rolling out hundreds of feet of cable.
When connecting distant labs, of course, the ideal scenario involves fiber optics. But in real life it is more realistic to use stranded CAT-5.
Be sure to get the stranded type, when buying a roll. And be sure your connectors match that cabling type.
There is a reason why network cables come in different colors. Use color-coding as much as possible. Simple conventions will save you a lot of headaches. For instance: blue = end-station connected to a switch port.
Think of red and orange as “red-hot”, carrying the most traffic.
Think you have enough cables? Be sure to have a comfortable surplus stashed not far away. This will save you a lot of walking.
Anti-static bags. Keep a generous serving ready 
Whenever you are using chassis rather than just stackable units, you want to be able to carry boards around without shocking them. That’s bad karma, you know.
Another great example of something you NEED unless you enjoy walking around all day long. This one is empty but it’s not going to last.
Notice the tables’ feet? A tiny chain hangs off each of them and grounds the tables by making contact with the floor. It’s no stupid floor; this one is waxed monthly with ESD wax to provide this delicious grounding effect. Racks may also come with chains but nowadays they do not really have to as every piece of equipment they carry is supposed to be grounded already.
Power strips such as this one are connected to electrical drops from the ceiling. Typically one power strip per rack is good enough. What really matters is what you do with that power in the rack itself.
Our edge device! This is where all your lab’s life begins or ends. You can wire your edge device first or last; first if you do not have all your equipment ready; last if, like me, you’re actually relocating your lab.
Give the little guy a local VLAN and connect its “other end” to whatever is made available to you. If you are not looking for full isolation, RIP is your easiest protocol.
These are the old guys that were used to play with our network. Count them. And now allow me to introduce…
…the young dude! Actually we have two of these but one is more than enough the put the old guys to shame.
Thanks to our friends at Rackmountsetc. I was already familiar with their products from my web hosting days so when I had to pick new servers for our lab it did not take me more than 10 seconds to decide to go with them again.
OK, all the pieces are here…next time -meaning: whenever I find the time!- I will go over the actual setup.
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