On October 26, we held the second NetDevOps Day in New York City and it was another fantastic event. We’d always planned to do a follow up event to NetDevOps Days London and New York seemed like a natural choice as so many of the people with whom we interact at NetBox Labs are in the area.
In my post-event retrospective for NetDevOps Days London I shared that the message I got from many in the room was “the industry needs an event like this” and that message was doubly reinforced in New York.
A huge round of applause for our speakers 👏
A massive thank you must go to our speakers: Christopher Liljenstolpe from Cisco, Felix Windt from Dartmouth, Nathanael Jean-Francois from NS1, Jerrod Gerth from Nokia, Pete Crocker from IPFabric, Carl Buchmann from Arista Networks, Karl Fosburg from Hughes Network Systems, Justin Ryburn from Kentik, Kaon Thana from The New York Times and Chris Wade from Itential.
The quality of the talks was superb throughout the day and what was particularly pleasing for me were the co-presented sessions we had. As we were going through the CfP to select the talks, some themes kept coming up and it was great that we were able to combine submissions to bring different views on various topics. All talks were recorded and we’re looking forward to sharing those in the coming weeks. While you’re waiting, check out the photos from the day here!
It takes a [network automation] village
I’d like to extend a huge thank you to the sponsors who joined NetBox Labs in helping make this event happen: Arista, Cisco, IPFabric, Itential, Kentik, Network to Code, Nokia, and OneMind Services, with a special thanks to IPFabric, Itential, Network to Code, Nokia who came onboard for the second time.
The support our sponsors showed made it possible for us to create a wonderful learning environment for all and that really showed in the lively discussions that I saw happening throughout the day. The view wasn’t bad either…
Alongside our generous sponsors we were also privileged to partner with two local organizations during the event.
NYNOG, the inimitable NYC network operators community, hosted their fall evening event in our venue which led to the type of cross-pollination that is so important in burgeoning movements like network automation and a partnership we hope to keep on developing.
We also hosted some fellows from Pursuit, an incredible organization based in New York with a mission to transform lives by giving people the opportunity to get their first step on the ladder in their technology careers. I had the pleasure of presenting to some of the Pursuit fellows the day before the conference where I met their VP Strategy and Operations, Will Kenney. If you’re in the market for junior talent with excellent skills, speak to Will.
At NetBox Labs, community is core to our mission and being able to push together with such esteemed partners means that this is really working. Our CEO Kris Beevers captured the spirit perfectly:
“At NetBox Labs, we have a product, we make money from it and we reinvest it in the community. We’re proud to be doing that with all of you. We’re learning a lot from each other in these conversations, and I want to ask and challenge all of you to keep doing that. Let’s bring more people into network automation and let’s accelerate this community”
What a crowd!
A big thank you to our incredible attendees, many of whom traveled across the United States with some coming from as far as Europe. I had the opportunity to co-present with Christopher Liljenstolpe as we kicked off the day and the energy in the room was palpable. Just like in London people were enthusiastic, engaged and ready to learn. We took the feedback from NetDevOps Days London that we needed to provide more space for interaction in between the talks and the venue certainly delivered a perfect space for that to happen.
What’s next for NetDevOps Days?
In Q1 2023, we at NetBox Labs and many of our allies and partners looked around, realized there wasn’t an event focussed on network automation, and decided to create one. Now there are (at least) two events pushing network automation which tells me that there’s excitement in the air.
For those of you attending Network Automation Forum’s AutoCon 0 in Denver, we look forward to seeing you there and you can expect more news about NetDevOps Days soon after that. To stay in the loop, you can follow us on Twitter, join the mailing list, or jump into the #netdevopsdays channel in the NetDev Slack.
