Learn end-to-end service and resource lifecycle management – and make your life easier – by following the new network automation courses on the GÉANT eAcademy.
Words: Maria Isabel Gandia, CSUC
Digital transformation in R&E organisations has as a main objective: providing their customers with the best possible experience. In order to achieve that, a complete transformation of the organisation’s culture, technology, and processes is required. More specifically, the first step to take when going through the digital transformation of network and associated network services should be network automation.
Even though there are many tools and best practices available to support in this process, it’s not always easy for organisations to get started and to find the correct path towards the adoption of automation principles.
That’s why the Network Automation eAcademy is continuously releasing new learning units to help R&E institutions improve their knowledge about automation principles and the practical implementation steps associated with them. By undertaking this training, organisations can continue to manage their networks with the excellence their users need, while processing all the information required to allow their services to evolve smoothly.
The courses are built around short and modular units, focusing on all sorts of topics about automation in the R&E networking community. Additionally, the training includes hands-on exercises in the more technical units, as well as examples and case studies from various NRENs.
The Network Automation eAcademy is expanding – new courses and learning tracks
In CONNECT38, we introduced a visual guide for the courses in the form of a metro map, presenting the published and planned units as different steps (or stops) and connecting them into dedicated learning paths (or metro lines).
Since then, the Orchestration, Automation and Virtualisation (OAV) team within WP6 of the GÉANT (GN4-3) project released new visual representations of the available learning paths, to facilitate even further the users’ navigation through the training.
That’s not all – the Network Automation eAcademy keeps growing, with the release of:
- Five new units with technical content (GitlabCI, Ansible, NSO, XML and NETCONF).
- One unit on the production block of the Open Digital Architecture (ODA) blueprint (specifically the TM Forum ODA).
- Two architecture mappings to ODA (Network Management as a Service, or NMaaS, and GRNET).
Network automation for all
The Network Automation eAcademy is suited to the needs of both experienced users and starters. Students willing to learn the basic principles can get started by following the introductory track, offering an overview of all the essential aspects of OAV and the key concepts of Open Digital Architecture. Moving on from this starting track, they can then choose to take different and more advanced paths, as the units listed in the OAV training portal under the training packages, or even to explore further by taking the Architecture Deep Dive training.
For all advanced modules, students will find the necessary pre-requisites listed in the first tab of each unit. For instance, if they are interested in learning Ansible and visit the Ansible unit, they will find the recommendation to go through the module on YAML first, with the related link, or similarly if they are willing to follow the course on NSO, they will be recommended to follow the courses on YANG and XML.
Stay tuned: more units are coming soon!
You can find the Network Automation eAcademy in the OAV Training portal: wiki.geant.org/display/NETDEV/OAV+Training+Portal
And in the GÉANT eAcademy (supported by GLAD, the GÉANT Learning and Development team): eacademy.geant.org
Remember: you can suggest new topics to include in the Network Automation eAcademy! The OAV team is available to help identify the best learning experience and answer your questions at oav@lists.geant.org
This article is featured on CONNECT39! Read or download the full magazine here
