I’ve had a few ask me…

I flew back from Las Vegas on Friday from Cisco Live 2016, after a horrible day of flying, and getting home, and a day of jet lag recovery – plus a day out at http://www.racelab.co  another thing that I have now committed my personal time to – I find myself back at my regular day job.

It is not without complete and utter amazement that I return to “real life” completely overwhelmed by Cisco Live 2016 this year.    I felt every waking moment, I was feeling the beat of the event in ways I have never experienced before.

Honestly the event could have gone an extra 3 days for me to get everything I wanted out of it – but I don’t think my body would have held up.   Each day I walked in excess of 20,000 steps (The American Heart Association recommends 10,000 as a “goal”).   This is no picnic vacation, waking at 6AM every day, to be in sessions for 8AM, and then not getting to bed until midnight (or later for some)

I was overwhelmed – more than ever with what was happening at Cisco Live – and in the coming days I am expecting to pen BLOG articles on the following topics.

• Cisco Live – 2016 Wrap Up
• Cisco Live – Social Pass Benefits
• OpenGear
• VEEAM
• Cisco Cloud Connected ISR Security
• APIC-EM / EasyDNS
• Cisco Digital Network Architecture

Coming from an event where I was asked to be a speaker, I will also talk about my experiences as a speaker, and what I got out of that.

I had an amazing technical experience, learned a ton of information thanks to Tech Field Day (More on that later),  and those mentors and amazing technical people I was hanging with.   I mean at one point I was having a few drinks with two product designers listening to them wax and wane over design.   Is this where innovation happens?   I think so.

Add to that the best Pink Floyd rendition for a friends birthday in the end and you cap off an amazing week of learning from both the event and friends alike.

Like I said in my own session – content is king, and at least I have a fair bit to work with for the next while.

We all say that technology moves even faster than the speed of business.

Right now Meraki MC74 and Cisco Spark Voice services are available in the USA, but currently not in the Canadian market.   Hosted Skype for Business (Lync) and Broadsoft based offerings have been available for YEARS here in Canada.

The biggest push from IT manufacturers and VARs these days is of course all forms of Software as a Service (SaaS), with the obvious push by all organisations for recurring revenue, and customer looking for a more “user cost” based model the industry is changing to a service based model.

Disrupt or be Disrupted

This has been Cisco’s latest trend,  go and disrupt a marketplace.   Something like the MC74 is a dream for SMB, ok the features are limited today, but for the travel agent, or retail store – it’s dialtone – many don’t need more.     A single IT manager could manage 20-30-50 locations of Meraki infrastructure with ease.

Cisco SPARK aims at a more medium business, more feature rich, a collab and instant message service platform, and full voice services.

However like anyone who has played Command and Conquer (throwback!) if you let your enemy build their base while you are popping the popcorn and going to the bathroom, you may find yourself fight off SCUD missiles with nothing more than a weak infantry.

Ok, let me get past the video game references.    Skype and Broadsoft offerings are everywhere, and they are now quite mature.   The MC74?   Well it’s a new offering, once again not in Canada.      How much market share will be lost in 8+ months – and let’s remember, the push is multi year contracts for the big discount.  So these customers are lost for years

The Phone Lock In

Telephones are the lock in – once I have sold you MY phone, which doesn’t work on another service – that will prevent you from leaving.  Why are so many clients still using M2616 telephones on old Nortel CS1000 systems (Option 11-81C) – because telephones are $300+ items, so an office of 100 people is $30,000 in hardware.    1000 people?   Now we are talking $300K

TDM System Retirement

CS1000 systems are getting old in the tooth – with many clients looking to remove it.   As basic voice becomes the new requirements, and online services prodiving the rich experiences, “Basic Voice” is what many SMB’s are looking for.

Nortel Norstar customers are finally seeing hardware start to fail on these bulletproof systems – these customers need out, and they need out now.

Older TDM systems are coming out – right now – how many will be removed in 8+ months?

Some just need Dial Tone

Skpye (consumer),  Spark Free or paid,  and other platforms provide a lot of rich capabilities, many for free.    I could go ahead and just buy Spark non voice later on if I wanted.

Retail, basic commercial and other markets really just need dial tone, and those basic needs could be augmented with services later on.

Is 2017 too late for Cisco Spark and Meraki?

I guess we will find out – my opinion is that a lot of market share and ground will be lost in the meantime to competitive solutions, and all of these will be multi-year contracts.

The Cisco Champions – A group of very experienced Cisco Live attendee’s share tips and tricks to get you to, and from the event to make the most of your week.

Join me and my fellow champions on this weeks episode!

http://www.talkshoe.com/talkshoe/web/audioPop.jsp?episodeId=1093055&cmd=apop

http://blogs.cisco.com/perspectives/ciscochampion-radio-s3ep-18-cisco-live-tips-tricks-clus

Enough said…  Bag is looking pretty snazzy…

WOW!  Cisco Live #CLUS is approaching, and my planning is in shambles!

Unexpected Requests

This year I have been very surprised (and honoured) to be asked to speak at multiple Live! events and sessions this year.    I am pleased to be speaking at Field Day as well as the Social Panel, and the Mentor-ship talk on Sunday.    I’ve had others as well, and I am trying to get to see everyone.

I’ve also been contacted by vendors on the floor to come see their new wares as well, and I want to make time for the World of Solutions – because I love it in there.

Wish I had 2 more days.

Next year, i’m going on Saturday, simply because some of the personal things I always want to do – I never get to do, so next time I am going Saturday.  I’ve done this in the past, and this year due to a personal conflict (The Galways Cavendish Forest Rally – GCFR is on Saturday here in Ontario)  I was not able to go in Saturday.

So the plan this year will be arrive Sunday, run to the Hotel and check-in and drop my stuff, then rush to the venue to register,  then off to do the ONE shopping trip I planned the entire week (5.11 Tactical has a store in Vegas,  we don’t have those in Canada, so i’m planning 1 Hour to go and shop like mad, to be honest a limited time frame in that store is best anyway) and then rush to the hotel and drop that off, and then head back to the venue for the Tweet-Up / Newbie discussion.       This will probably fail, and if my flight is late – i’m really screwed.

I needed another day, I should have planned my shopping day at the END of the week like I did with Kai @kajtzu in Orlando a few years ago, it worked out quite well.

Planner Needs Improvement

The planning is killing me,  first getting to the scheduler/planner on the Cisco Live! site is a real pain.    You have to go to Learn, Session Catalog, My Sessions, that’s assuming you have logged in – which there is no obvious login button.

You cannot put personal appointments in anymore!   This is horrible, I book my World of Solutions time, I also book my appearances and interviews.

The scheduler this year is a pretty serious let down – especially when planning is so important.   I hope they can learn from it for next year.

Limited Focus for Time Management

The key here is to limit your focus.   I know it sounds bad, but to take it all in – there is so little time.   Get to each place,  learn what you need to – and then move on.

I am totally against walking out of sessions, and I think it’s disrespectful a bit to the presenter – but i’ll say it in public now – this is why I sit at the back, so I can sneak out.  There just isn’t enough time for everything.  If the content isn’t going “as planned” or I “Got what I needed”  – I sometimes will slip out, giving me more World of Solutions time, or to get to my next engagement – or sometimes to just use the rest room before the line up!

Wow a red letter day – the Cisco (Selsius) 12SP phone is officially dead.   It had a good run.  However along with this many that are actually more in use will also lose support in version 11.5 – this is the first release of Cisco CallManager / Communications Manager in the history of Cisco that has ever significantly removed support for telephones.

Cisco has officially announced that in 11.5,  the 12SP+, 30 VIP, 7902, 7905, 7910, 7910SW, 7912, 7920, and 7935 will not be supported.

I’ll be honest, most of those do not surprise me, but 7920 and 7935?   I have tons of clients – I might even go as far as to say many have 7935’s for sure – mostly because many are not a fan of the 8831 and the calculator style dial pad.

Release notes for 11.5 are found at Cisco HERE

Customers all over have 7912, 7905 as public area phones, they are very popular, 7920’s are still in use, and 7935’s are beloved.

I can understand the 7910, 12SP, and 30VIP phones being removed from support, but there will be customers who are unhappy about some of these others – many of these phones live in back alleys, hallways and as door phones.

The positive news is many of these are well supported on Asterisk and other geeky voice platforms, so expect ebay to light up with these models very soon.

So we are mere weeks away at this point, so it’s time to start thinking about what you will bring with you…  If this is your first #CLUS then first – CONGRATS!   You will be overwhelmed.    Here’s my random ramblings about how to prep.

Do Not Show Up On Monday If Possible – If you can show up Sunday with time to register – do it, the line up on Monday is crazyness!

Here are some basic tips that you need to know

A)  Assume you will leave your hotel in the morning – and you don’t return until your head is ready to hit the pillow

B) Consider the weather, and the effect it may have on you when packing

C)  Comfortable shoes – forget the fancy leather unless you are really looking to make a fashion statement, you will be on your feet – a lot – and walking – a lot.

D)  Day Bag – You will be gone all day, and you might get some swag – bring a backpack or a bag.    The event provides a bag normally – but sometimes the bags have missed the mark, so bring another one just in case – trust me you will need an extra bag for swag you bring home.

E) There are shuttles.   The event provides shuttles from hotels to the event venue on a very constant basis.

F) You could be busy – every – single – night.  There are events all over every night.

G)  Lunch is provided

H)  Get your calendar, but plan some time for the World of Solutions.  Sometimes there is just as much good stuff there, as there is in the sessions

I)  Don’t fret if you didn’t get into a session – if you didn’t get the session you really wanted, don’t worry – go anyway, just before it starts they will let in a standee line.

J) Internet Access:  Have a plan, especially if you are an international traveller, for Canadians I use ROAM Mobility.     The event has WiFi and it has been good the last few years, check your hotel and see if it is included.     Just a tip – Internet Access WiFi almost never works when in the large general sessions, you are better on LTE or 3G if you are blogging or vlogging.

K)  Get A Map – Map where your hotel is, figure out how to get to the venue, then figure out how to get around.  The good news is if you are rushing between sessions #CLUS has literally 300+ people just standing around to give directions, normally in a funny hat or shirt, use them.

L) Have fun.

Stuff to bring and things to plan

1.  Cash – seems obvious but sometimes if you are out and about it is easier to pay in cash, especially in groups.
2. Cards – If you have more than 1 credit card, bring both, just in case one is lost, or locked out.
3. Reservations and Confirmations – Print these, yes old school hard copy that way in case you need to reference it
4.  Plan your route to and from the airport ahead of time – Uber, Shuttle, either way figure this out ahead of time
5.  Extra clothing, different clothing, interesting clothing, an extra pair of shoes, de-odourant, toothbrush, hair brush.
6. Extra phone chargers, with longer than normal cords
7. Power Bar – compact if possible
8. Portable Power Block – One of those USB power charger things comes in handy.
9. Laptop, Tablet, and Phone – I tend to find the tablet works better than the laptop, and I like the weight.   I also bring a MacBook Air instead of a full size laptop.
10. Hat, Sunglasses.

Meraki MC74 Update

Yesterday we received additional details in a Podcast with Simon Tompson @merakisimon about how the MC74 came to be, and a small glimpse into what is ahead.

The Meraki MC74 isn’t the first phone they have built.  The original phone had a full keypad and many more buttons, however it  became very clear that they simply couldn’t built what they wanted using something that restrictive

The team has seen the 7″ IPS display as a “Blank Canvas” of which they can develop any features they please.   Buttons are too restrictive.

They wanted to launch a “Flagship product” to show what they could do, and what is coming,  it is a natural next step to offer up a more value oriented product which we could see in the coming months.

Reporting in the Meraki portal is a huge feature today, I am sure lots of reporting will be coming.   Along with many features, and while I cannot prove it, I have a feeling – we are running Android here.

Everything in the MC74 is encrypted, all of the signalling, and all audio traffic is SRTP.    Audio paths are all point to point for phones, or point to gateway for PSTN calls.   Everything this phone does – is SIP.

Dashboard is Live!

You can now create phone networks in Dashboard.

Hardware

In my opinion the device itself is of exceptional quality in the hand

In a video I posted on Youtube at Cisco Connect Toronto I was able to put my hands on the device.  It has a sculpted back which is rounded.   3 buttons, 2 for volume and one for hardware mute.   The handset itself magnet locks to the phone and feels very natural even without a noisy old school hookswitch.     The audio quality is SUPERB running G.722 and the handset feels good in the hand and comfortable to use.    My only concern is the same with many other VoIP platforms – the lack of sidetone when using G.722 makes the phone feel hollow a bit.

Make A Wish – Revealed!

I am sure you have seen this button

By now you might know, Meraki does actually READ these wishes, many are correlated with software, word matching and that kind of thing.   Many features you see today in other Meraki products are derived directly from “Make a wish”

In a Meraki blog post they posted a view of the screen displayed in San Francisco that the developers see when you post.  So go ahead and send in your wishes, they are listening.   The MC74 team will be using this to generate new features and functionality.

Last but not least, go ahead and make a wish “Make me a sandwich”  and when you are done that “Konami Code”   – you will get a little surprise with both.