[AusNOG] Switch installation in data centre racks - front facing, or rear facing?

[Paul Wilkins]

Sure, but when one observes the default vendor position is front to back
airflow, if one then applies logic, you can conclude back to front is
deployed as a cost cutting measure sans structured cabling.

Kind regards

Paul Wilkins

On 4 October 2017 at 16:10, Jay Dixon <jaybobo at gmail.com> wrote:

> I think Sam's point was that the original email/question was asking purely
> about direction front or back, not whether you use TOR switches or
> structured cabling back to a central point :)
>
> On Wed, Oct 4, 2017 at 4:06 PM, Paul Wilkins <paulwilkins369 at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Sam,
>> In an SP environment, you may well have whole rows dedicated to a single
>> service - email, or web say. In the rack itself, you'll have web_node_5007,
>> web_node_5008 etc.
>>
>> In the enterprise, you'll have a few email blades, internal web, external
>> web, next to a bunch of file and print etc etc etc. These then likely are
>> all on different firewall interfaces/firewalls in different zones requiring
>> different routing and security.
>>
>> Kind regards
>>
>> Paul Wilkins
>>
>> On 4 October 2017 at 15:41, Sam Silvester <sam.silvester at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> On Wed, Oct 4, 2017 at 2:38 PM, Paul Wilkins <paulwilkins369 at gmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Because SPs have the luxury to not use structured cabling, due to scale
>>>> where all switch ports share a common configuration, so there's no need for
>>>> a patch panel, just patch direct to the switch, whereas in enterprise,
>>>> inadvertent swapping of ports leads to P1s, hence, structured cabling is
>>>> fairly ubiquitous.
>>>>
>>>>
>>> I'm not sure I understand.
>>>
>>> We're talking about "ToR" switching in this thread i.e. switches share a
>>> rack with the servers in question.
>>>
>>> In both front and rear mounted switches, I'd assume all cables go direct
>>> from the server to the switch. If that's not what you mean, can you perhaps
>>> share what kind of cabling arrangement you've come across? I'd be
>>> interested in how it would work and what logic would go into such a
>>> decision.
>>>
>>> I'm also not sure how such a distinction between enterprise and SP would
>>> change anything. SPs would still have a mapping of server to port, it's not
>>> like just any server / cable goes into any old port and swapping them to a
>>> new/different arrangement during a switch change wouldn't matter...or am I
>>> making an incorrect assumption there?
>>>
>>> Cheers,
>>>
>>> Sam
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
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>
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