Most people agree that automation is the way of the future in enterprise networking, but getting to that point is much more problematic. Brandon Carroll gives an introduction on how to do this in open networking environments with OpenConfig. This vendor-neutral approach uses the data modeling language YANG to create a single model for your automation. This allows admins to not have to dig into individual CLI interfaces for each network device. Brandon’s only drawback to this approach isn’t technical, but rather organizational. Once an IT staff embraces automation, the technical merits become obvious.
