An interview with Glenn Wiseman, a corporate systems engineer for Extreme Networks.  You can't miss the purple hardware scattered around Interop - gear from Extreme Networks is found in peds on the expo floor, in the NOCs, and around classrooms. Helping to integrate Extreme's switches within the InteropNet is Wiseman's role. In this interview he explains thte Extreme hardware that will be at the show, and how he helps keep the network up and stable in the face of DOS attacks, ping scans, and other intrusions.

An interview with Steve Hultquist, who's a team lead in the InteropLabs.  The InteropLabs is a sandbox of sorts, where experts develop, implement and test new solutions. Hultquist oversees the lab focused on Network Access Control, and in this lab his team will explore three network access control frameworks: Trusted Computing Group's TNC specification, Cisco's Network Admission Control technologies, and Microsoft's Network Access Protection platform.  This lab will help show attendees understand more about these technologies and show what they are capable of.  Steve explains who's on his team and what the objectives of his lab are.

Here's a conversation with Denny Miu, the CEO of Gigamon.  Gigamon is a fairly new addition to the InteropNet; the company launched at the 2005 Las Vegas event and provided its GigaVUE appliance to the InteropNet simultaneously. The GigaVUE is an out-of-band network monitoring appliance which helps engineers in the network operations center keep an eye on the network traffic. In this podcast, Denny talks about the GigaVUE and its roots at the show.

A conversation with Neal Allen of Fluke Networks, which provides key troubleshooting tools that Interop engineers have used for years.  Neal's history with Interop goes way back - to 1993 - so he's been a part of well over 20 Interop shows. At Interop, support technicians carry around Fluke's portable network testing and analysis tools to help to identify and solve network problems. Neal explains what it's like to support the huge InteropNet, and how Fluke uses the opportunity to help improve its products.

Dan Backman's history with the InteropNet goes back several years, and spans his employment at both Extreme and now Juniper.  This year Dan is helping install and configure Juniper's security and intrusion detection products on Interop's network, which, as he explains, poses some significant challenges.  With a full /8 of IP address space, Backman explains how Juniper's security products must filter out the normal "background radiation" of network communications on the InteropNet in order to quickly detect and block real security attacks.

An interview with Robert Ballecer, the voice and video team lead for the InteropNet. "Padre", as he's known around Interop, is responsible for setting up and managing technologies on the show network like IP telephony, video conferencing, and video streaming. Ballecer explains how products from companies like Avaya, Tandberg, and even Sling Media (maker of the Slingbox television appliance) will be demonstrated on Interop's massive network this year.

At the Interop hotstage we sat down with Glenn Evans, who oversees the InteropNet and InteropLabs. What Glenn goes through to get the massive InteropNet together is formidable, and there is no doubt about the scale of this project once someone arrives at the hotstage warehouse in Belmont, CA, and sees all of the equipment and people who pull it together. Glenn has to figure out how to build a state-of-the-art, somewhat experimental network in California, test it, take it down, then ship it down to Las Vegas and put it back together again. Also note that he has to wrangle most of the gear, too, from vendors, and keep an army of volunteer engineers happy and focused. How does he do it?

At the Interop hotstage we sat down with Brian Chee, a researcher at the University of Hawaii and the director of the school's advanced network computer laboratory. At Interop, Chee is the team lead for wireless technology on the InteropNet, which means he's responsible for setting up and managing Interop's wireless network on the expo floor. In that role he sometimes serves as Interop's wireless "secretary of state" -- and sometimes the show's bouncer, as you'll hear.