I am so excited to know about these latest developments, especially after the introduction of Nexus Switches there is a need for specialist who can manage complex data center. CCIE data center will equip the networking professionals with all the skills required to design, implement, operate, monitor, and troubleshoot complex data center networks. Products tested in this certification include Cisco Catalyst 3750, MDS 9222i, Nexus 7009, 5548, 2232, 1000v and Cisco Unified Computing System (UCS), and Cisco Application Control Engine Appliance.

The beta version of the CCIE Data Center Written Exam will be available for scheduling and testing at all worldwide Cisco-authorized Pearson VUE testing centers beginning May 1 through June 15, 2012.  And the lab exam is expected to be available in September2012.

Currently Cisco is offering US$ 50 as a discount for the beta exam of CCIE Data Centre.

Some of the topics covered in CCIE Data Center are as follows

• General switching technologies
• NX-OS with VPC, OTV, Fabric-Path, RBAC, etc.
• Storage with Fiber Channel, VSAN, FCoE, etc.
• UCS with LAN, SAN connectivity, server profiles, pinning, etc.
• Cisco ACE features in SLB and HA deployments.

For further details on please do check this link.

The Cisco Application Control Engine (ACE) is a load balancer and an application delivery solution that includes server load balancing, content switching, server offloading, and application optimization.

As I am looking for some resources on the Cisco Application Control Engine (ACE) I figured out Cisco Systems is conducting a live interactive workshop “Cisco Application Networking Services Enable Network Intelligence” on May 31, 2011 at 11:30 am CET. So register now.

Agenda May 31, 2011 – 11:30 am CET

Topics include:

• Applications Challenges in the Data Center
• Application Control Engine products family
• ACE in the Virtual Data Center AVDC
• Demo (ACE in the Virtual Data Center)
• Q& A

Register now

Don’t miss this opportunity to engage live with Cisco Data Center experts and have your questions answered during the event.

We all know in Cisco Catalyst Multilayer Switches the matching process of the Access Control list is done at hardware level. In order to do this processing the Ternary Content Addressable Memory (TCAM) comes into picture. Basically the Ternary Content Addressable Memory (TCAM) is used by Cisco Catalyst switches to store information necessary for hardware processing. TCAM allows a packet to be evaluated against the entire access list in a single lookup table. Most Cisco Catalyst Switches comes with multiple TCAMs. Its utilization depends on the features supported by the platform, but the TCAM is generally partitioned into sections designated for unicast routes, multicast routes, VLANs, and entries for routed, VLAN, and QoS ACLs.

The Cisco IOS Software constitutes of two components what are part of the TCAM operation, namely Feature Manager (FD) and Switching Database Manager (SDM, when I saw SDM the first thing came to my mind was Security Device Manager Application.)

The Feature Manager merges or compiles the Access Control Entries (ACE) in the TCAM table of a Cisco Catalyst Switch, whereas the Switching Database Manager (SDM) comes handy in creating a partition of TCAM table on some of Cisco Catalyst Switches into areas of different functions. The Switching Database Manager (SDM) software can configure or tunes the TCAM partition if needed. The Cisco Catalyst 4500 and Cisco Catalyst 6500 Series Switches cannot be repartitioned as it comes with the fixed TCAM memory.