Hello Newbie here (hopefully I have the correct list), I was just wondering if anyone knows of a website with recommended colors for cables for a new datacenter? I have written some things down but I don't want to get stuck saying 'darn, I wish I would have bought this color for this type, now I am stuck'. What standard color to use if voice and data on same interface etc. Thanks. -- Thank You, Joe
JoeSox wrote:
Hello Newbie here (hopefully I have the correct list),
I was just wondering if anyone knows of a website with recommended colors for cables for a new datacenter? I have written some things down but I don't want to get stuck saying 'darn, I wish I would have bought this color for this type, now I am stuck'. What standard color to use if voice and data on same interface etc. Thanks.
Hmm. I've always done blue for "safe" or "internal" connections, red for machines on the DMZ or outside. Perhaps Blue for internal data, Yellow for internal voice, Green for data/voice? Don't know if there's a website on this, but you can definitely read about it in Tom Limoncelli's The Practice of System and Network Administration book. Best, --Glenn -- ...destination is merely a byproduct of the journey --Eric Hansen
On Jun 16, 2008, at 6:41 PM, Glenn Sieb wrote:
Hmm. I've always done blue for "safe" or "internal" connections, red for machines on the DMZ or outside.
I think this varies a lot based on the environment... I've seen : - Red for external ("hot"), Blue for internal ("cold") - Red for external ("stop this"), green for internal ("go/trusted") - Red for internal ("stop this from leaving") and green for external ("go go go to the outside world") - A combination of the either of the last two with "Yellow" for a cautionary DMZ area And then there's the environment I'm in right now, where there are a LOT of different cable colors for different reasons. The reality is, from my experience, to find a color combination that makes sense to you and is intuitive to you and the people who'll be working with the cables. Amusing cautionary tale: confirm that you don't have any color-blind staff, and if you do, make sure they can differentiate all your cable colors before you set them in stone and deploy them. :-) cheers, D
Perhaps Blue for internal data, Yellow for internal voice, Green for data/voice?
Some people reserve yellow for cross-over cables. -- Scott Hebert http://slaptijack.com
TIA-606A and some of the other TIA docs have cable color recommendations. Scott Hebert wrote:
Perhaps Blue for internal data, Yellow for internal voice, Green for data/voice?
Some people reserve yellow for cross-over cables.
-- Scott Hebert http://slaptijack.com
On Mon, Jun 16, 2008 at 06:55:14PM -0400, Soren Telfer wrote:
TIA-606A and some of the other TIA docs have cable color recommendations.
This is the standard recommended by the Yellow Book for cable jacket color selection, yes. Cheers, -- jra -- Jay R. Ashworth Baylink jra@baylink.com Designer The Things I Think RFC 2100 Ashworth & Associates http://baylink.pitas.com '87 e24 St Petersburg FL USA http://photo.imageinc.us +1 727 647 1274 Those who cast the vote decide nothing. Those who count the vote decide everything. -- (Joseph Stalin)
On Jun 16, 2008, at 6:55 PM, telmnstr@757.org wrote:
I was going to say yellow for serial consoles... but in this day and age, I guess the crossover cables AND serial console connection are fading fast.
Crossover cables maybe, but I'm not convinced about serial. I just went through a whole installation of OOB access to all our network equipment "just in case".... Cheers, D
all you people are just sooooo retro and boring. i like purple, fluorescent lime, ... the colors make no difference as long as you are consistent. labeling, consistent port use (oob port == power port == switch port ==) are what will bail you out at three in the morning. randy
Very true. Another suggestion I will offer is that it is relatively inexpensive to order cables with pre-printed serial numbers. I get them for about $0.20/cable more than I could buy in bulk and I get them in relatively low quantities. They cost about half of what buying a cable at Fry's would cost. I use a format of XXXXXX-YY.Y where XXXXXX is a unique six digit number for the particular cable and YY.Y is the length of that particular cable. Having these serial numbers triple-printed on self-laminating labels at each end of the cable makes them very easy to read and makes it very easy to be sure before you pull a cable that the A and Z ends are of the same cable, which, can also be a saving factor at 3AM. Owen On Jun 16, 2008, at 4:00 PM, Randy Bush wrote:
all you people are just sooooo retro and boring. i like purple, fluorescent lime, ...
the colors make no difference as long as you are consistent. labeling, consistent port use (oob port == power port == switch port ==) are what will bail you out at three in the morning.
randy
On 17/06/08 9:00 AM, "Randy Bush" <randy@psg.com> wrote:
the colors make no difference as long as you are consistent. labeling, consistent port use (oob port == power port == switch port ==) are what will bail you out at three in the morning.
randy
And there you have it. Finding the group of backbone cables (as an example) out of a bundle of cables is much easier when they're a different colour. What colours we use depends on what area of the network we're in. For example (for the DC): - Access layer (ie: to servers): Blue - Management network (KVM, power, etc): Green - Private network (internal only): Black - Inter-rack links (don't touch): yellow - Network uplinks (really don't touch): red -Shaun
On 17/06/08 10:47 AM, "Shaun Ewing" <s.ewing@aussiehq.com.au> wrote:
And there you have it. Finding the group of backbone cables (as an example) out of a bundle of cables is much easier when they're a different colour.
What colours we use depends on what area of the network we're in.
For example (for the DC):
- Access layer (ie: to servers): Blue - Management network (KVM, power, etc): Green - Private network (internal only): Black - Inter-rack links (don't touch): yellow - Network uplinks (really don't touch): red
And, as I forgot to mention. Crossover cables are the same colours based on their function above with a different colour boot (red, unless the cable itself is red). -Shaun
On 17/06/2008, at 11:00 AM, Randy Bush wrote:
all you people are just sooooo retro and boring. i like purple, fluorescent lime, ...
the colors make no difference as long as you are consistent. labeling, consistent port use (oob port == power port == switch port ==) are what will bail you out at three in the morning.
My cables are all black, and are scented with different citrus fruits. When I have a customer without as keen a sense of smell, I've noticed that my local patch cable vendor only does x-over in purple or beige. That made that decision for me fairly quickly. -- Nathan Ward
I don't know of any hard standard in use anywhere. I've generally taken to the following: Green == low-bandwidth straigh-through Telephone, T1, Serial, etc. Purple == Roll Cables (almost always serial, sometimes telecom) (8-1 7-2 6-3 5-4 4-5 3-6 2-7 1-8) Orange(C) == EIA-568b cross-over cable (ethernet xover) Orange(F) == Multimode Fiber Yellow(F) == Singlemode Fiber White == Clear (inside VPN concentrator network) Black == Crypt (Outside VPN concentrator network) Blue == Publicly accessible networks Red == Backend (usually OOB management) networks Pink == KVM (KVM switch <-> Dongle) Occasionally I encounter needs for greater specificity, but, these usually do most of what I need. I'm sure others use entirely different choices. Owen
I don't know of any hard standard in use anywhere. I've generally taken to the following:
Green == low-bandwidth straigh-through Telephone, T1, Serial, etc. Purple == Roll Cables (almost always serial, sometimes telecom) (8-1 7-2 6-3 5-4 4-5 3-6 2-7 1-8) Orange(C) == EIA-568b cross-over cable (ethernet xover) Orange(F) == Multimode Fiber Yellow(F) == Singlemode Fiber White == Clear (inside VPN concentrator network) Black == Crypt (Outside VPN concentrator network) Blue == Publicly accessible networks Red == Backend (usually OOB management) networks Pink == KVM (KVM switch <-> Dongle)
Occasionally I encounter needs for greater specificity, but, these usually do most of what I need.
Oh. That was the other thing I was going to say. Reserving some colors for "special purposes" is a good idea. ... JG -- Joe Greco - sol.net Network Services - Milwaukee, WI - http://www.sol.net "We call it the 'one bite at the apple' rule. Give me one chance [and] then I won't contact you again." - Direct Marketing Ass'n position on e-mail spam(CNN) With 24 million small businesses in the US alone, that's way too many apples.
JoeSox wrote:
Hello Newbie here (hopefully I have the correct list),
I was just wondering if anyone knows of a website with recommended colors for cables for a new datacenter? I have written some things down but I don't want to get stuck saying 'darn, I wish I would have bought this color for this type, now I am stuck'. What standard color to use if voice and data on same interface etc. Thanks.
Hmm. I've always done blue for "safe" or "internal" connections, red for machines on the DMZ or outside.
Perhaps Blue for internal data, Yellow for internal voice, Green for data/voice?
Don't know if there's a website on this, but you can definitely read about it in Tom Limoncelli's The Practice of System and Network Administration book.
What you do is largely going to be dependent on what your situation is. "Data center" is exceedingly vague. An ISP, with telco and data, customer colo and internal network circuits, is going to have very different needs than some company that's running a data processing network behind a firewall and gateway to the Internet along with some minor telco circuits to serve the local user population. Standardizing colors is very helpful, but keep a mind towards not getting excessively complex unless the situation warrants it. One of the most important aspects to color coding is that you're trying to avoid connecting things that might be bad. In most environments, then, you might want to have a "behind the firewall" color and a "DMZ" color. However, consider too that you might have a "management network" color, a "telco data circuit" color, a "KVM-over-cat5-cable" color, a "Yost or Cisco standard Serial" (http://www.sol.net/serial-guide/) color, etc. Those latter are exceedingly useful because you can sometimes toast equipment if you're plugging in something with a very wrong signal type. I happen to like orange for cross-connects, because it resembles multimode fiber (which is what most of our xc's are). Beyond that, mostly you can develop your own thing. We use green for serial console. Yellow might be KVM or might be telecom. There are some standards docs that provide guidance, but I'm not sure that it matters. In the old days, we used to color crossover cables differently too. Thank heavens that all the old non-auto-MDI/MDIX stuff is slowly going away. ... JG -- Joe Greco - sol.net Network Services - Milwaukee, WI - http://www.sol.net "We call it the 'one bite at the apple' rule. Give me one chance [and] then I won't contact you again." - Direct Marketing Ass'n position on e-mail spam(CNN) With 24 million small businesses in the US alone, that's way too many apples.
Once upon a time, plenum-rated cable only seemed to come in white or blue, so I tried to use white consistently. Always helps to visually identify the correct usage for POPs in existing buildings. And, I've a tendency to use black for "internal network management" (unable to be seen off LAN/VPN). Easy to tell staff "don't touch", and to visually ensure going to the correct switch ports. Yellow was pretty common for crossover cables, but now-a-days it's all auto-sensing anyway.
On Mon, 16 Jun 2008, Glenn Sieb wrote:
JoeSox wrote:
Hello Newbie here (hopefully I have the correct list),
I was just wondering if anyone knows of a website with recommended colors for cables for a new datacenter? I have written some things down but I don't want to get stuck saying 'darn, I wish I would have bought this color for this type, now I am stuck'. What standard color to use if voice and data on same interface etc. Thanks.
Hmm. I've always done blue for "safe" or "internal" connections, red for machines on the DMZ or outside.
Perhaps Blue for internal data, Yellow for internal voice, Green for data/voice?
Don't know if there's a website on this, but you can definitely read about it in Tom Limoncelli's The Practice of System and Network Administration book.
Others responded with what colour goes for what. Me? I learned that these colour conventions change drastically from one place to another. Other than which interface or network you may be using, there is the issues of "sensitive"/secret network and white/public network. In one organization red was for the sensitive private network, and in another red meant "danger Will Robinson", public unsafe network. In yet another red was for grounded power. Use what works for you. Warning about colours with a funny anecdote: In a more secure network I ran security for, networks were literally separated and colour coded cables were enforced. One day a cable needed to be replaced but we ran out of the said colour. The engineer was so scared of what the then security director (before my time) would say that he didn't fix the network for .. some time... until someone smacked him on the back of the head (the security director). To be fair the the engineer, he was really concerned about security. Security-minded networks have their own silly downsides. :) Use what is comfortable and/or necessary, no more. Gadi.
I'll save the bandwidth and reply to everyone in one email :P Lots of good replies, gave me lots of ideas and confirmed my planning already. I like the idea of reserving some colors and the serial numbers idea. Some people seem were wishing I provided more details so my 'datacenter' basically has a D3 and has a bunch of T1s MPLS and some tunnels running. Got some different VLANs and upper management would like to seperate cable color by device type but I would rather do it by VLAN. We are running VOIP and some workstation are running data thru the phone to the patchpanel to the switch. Got two Juniper firewalls clustered, not sure how to color code those but I'm sure I'll figure it out. I reserve for SPAWAR and have inspected a bunch of Navy networks, luckily I don't have THAT much crypto to worry about. Maybe I'll create a webpage on what I came up with! Thanks again for all the replies. -- Thank You, Joe
On Mon, 16 Jun 2008 20:32:15 -0500 (CDT) Gadi Evron <ge@linuxbox.org> wrote:
In one organization red was for the sensitive private network, and in another red meant "danger Will Robinson", public unsafe network. In yet another red was for grounded power.
Right. The universal convention in NSA-type crypto gear is red==cleartext, black==ciphertext. Designs have to provide proper "red/black separation". But when Bill Cheswick and I put in the Bell Labs firewall in the early 1990s, we used red cables for the dangerous outside net. --Steve Bellovin, http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~smb
Oppinions vary. There really is no standard. Most important is picking something meaningful to you. Here, I use: yellow general ethernet green serial connection blue long distance ethernet (ie, going to another row) black crossover red T1s, etc white permenant drops to cabinets, lashed down and brown cat3 for POTs lines Some people use like dark blue for the first ethernet connection to a machine and light blue for the second connection. It really just depends on what you want to accomplish. Just pick something tha tworks for you and stick with it. On Mon, Jun 16, 2008 at 06:41:22PM -0400, Glenn Sieb wrote:
JoeSox wrote:
Hello Newbie here (hopefully I have the correct list),
I was just wondering if anyone knows of a website with recommended colors for cables for a new datacenter? I have written some things down but I don't want to get stuck saying 'darn, I wish I would have bought this color for this type, now I am stuck'. What standard color to use if voice and data on same interface etc. Thanks.
Hmm. I've always done blue for "safe" or "internal" connections, red for machines on the DMZ or outside.
Perhaps Blue for internal data, Yellow for internal voice, Green for data/voice?
Don't know if there's a website on this, but you can definitely read about it in Tom Limoncelli's The Practice of System and Network Administration book.
Best, --Glenn
-- ...destination is merely a byproduct of the journey --Eric Hansen
--- Wayne Bouchard web@typo.org Network Dude http://www.typo.org/~web/
Hello Newbie here (hopefully I have the correct list),
I was just wondering if anyone knows of a website with recommended colors for cables for a new datacenter? I have written some things down but I don't want to get stuck saying 'darn, I wish I would have bought this color for this type, now I am stuck'. What standard color to use if voice and data on same interface etc. Thanks.
Hi, We solved the problem of remembering what color was for what by getting our suppliers to use clear jackets on the wiring. That way we see whats actually going over the copper and can tell that way. It costs us more, we do have a bit of an issue putting plugs on it, but in the long run its definitely worth it. Otherwise, our old system was : Black - Infrastructure/critical Green - Colocation/Customer White - KVM Blue - X-connect (Later changed to Orange when we went full fiber) Yellow- Someone threw a spare patch cord up and didn't custom create/ cut it and if I find them I'm gonna create/cut them something! White+Red spot or stripe - The junior guy was cutting KVM cables again, expect a health benefit claim later in the day. We also used the ID zip ties on each end if it was an X-over with "X-over" written on it. All plugs had boots too. Tuc/TBOH (Insert ;) as needed... ;) )
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 JoeSox wrote:
Hello Newbie here (hopefully I have the correct list),
Not based on any standard, but here is a schema I have used many times: White -- user workstations Black -- telephones Green -- guest users (direct Internet connection) Purple -- RJ11 data cables (modem, faxes, etc.) Yellow -- "never change" network infrastructure (inter-device, servers, printers, etc.) Orange -- serial console cable Red -- telco T1s Blue -- network infrastructure inter-device crossover Jon - -- Jon R. Kibler Chief Technical Officer Advanced Systems Engineering Technology, Inc. Charleston, SC USA o: 843-849-8214 c: 843-224-2494 s: 843-564-4224 My PGP Fingerprint is: BAA2 1F2C 5543 5D25 4636 A392 515C 5045 CF39 4253 -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.8 (Darwin) Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org iEYEARECAAYFAkhW8LwACgkQUVxQRc85QlOlmACggOnLnU7JTcSkHZH8CVlhM9ca u+4AmwRqunjI7kxRqu9VrPkdfbjIQfym =i/38 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- ================================================== Filtered by: TRUSTEM.COM's Email Filtering Service http://www.trustem.com/ No Spam. No Viruses. Just Good Clean Email.
David Coulson wrote:
Jon Kibler wrote:
Not based on any standard, but here is a schema I have used many times: <snip>
Where I used to work - ISP. All of the above - Yellow. Where I work now - Enterprise. All of the above - Grey.
LOL, simplicity via obscurity at its finest ;) Colour coding works great, and it's easy to follow. Then there is that issue that pops up where *that* cable over there will work! Steve
Steve Bertrand wrote:
LOL, simplicity via obscurity at its finest ;)
Colour coding works great, and it's easy to follow. Then there is that issue that pops up where *that* cable over there will work!
90% of our movable cable patches (aka stuff that is not hard wired into a patch panel) are less than three feet long and are totally enclosed within individual racks (e.g. server to top of rack switch, switch to patch panel, other side of patch panel to core) - Each end of the cable is labeled, so it's pretty easy to trace it. I care more about cable management when you have something like a 6513 with a bunch of 48 port Ethernet blades. Not figured out a way to deal with that which doesn't look like complete crap - Doesn't matter what color they are. The vertical 7600s/6509-VE models are nice, but of course, we don't have those :) David
David Coulson wrote:
Steve Bertrand wrote:
LOL, simplicity via obscurity at its finest ;)
Colour coding works great, and it's easy to follow. Then there is that issue that pops up where *that* cable over there will work!
90% of our movable cable patches (aka stuff that is not hard wired into a patch panel) are less than three feet long and are totally enclosed within individual racks (e.g. server to top of rack switch, switch to patch panel, other side of patch panel to core) - Each end of the cable is labeled, so it's pretty easy to trace it.
Labeling is good. As I've tried to follow the pace of this thread, I appreciate where someone else stated that (paraphrased) "males essentially have a problem with identifying colours". I personally am relatively colour blind (mostly red-orange are the same, as is black-green).
I care more about cable management when you have something like a 6513 with a bunch of 48 port Ethernet blades. Not figured out a way to deal with that which doesn't look like complete crap - Doesn't matter what color they are. The vertical 7600s/6509-VE models are nice, but of course, we don't have those :)
A very good friend of mine who is relatively quite older than I, used to run what we (I) would call now the 'IT' department in the Butterfield Bank of Bermuda way back years ago (relative), showed me pictures of closets which had numerous hundreds of Token Ring MAU connectors, attached to cabling dozens of feet long stretched down a corridor 100' at least after an effort to 'untangle' the typical 'this needs to be patched *to this floor*'. I will forever remember those pictures, and forever know that no matter how badly labeled/coloured an Ethernet infrastructure environment is, it can never be as bad as having several hundreds of cables as thick as my baby finger, all the same colour, entangled in a mess worse than anything I've seen. I would like to know ANYONE who has a policy strict enough, and enforces it so as to have even an almost perfect cabling infrastructure...is there such a thing? God bless CATx cable, especially when it terminates within the same area that it originates from ;) Steve
On Tue, Jun 17, 2008 at 01:03:32AM -0400, Steve Bertrand wrote:
I would like to know ANYONE who has a policy strict enough, and enforces it so as to have even an almost perfect cabling infrastructure...is there such a thing?
ValPak, Largo FL. Their datacenter is new, $3.6M in a new completely automated $200M building, and it's *gorgeous*. Thanks to APC for organizing a (sales) tour about 3 months ago; I love facility porn. Cheers, -- jra -- Jay R. Ashworth Baylink jra@baylink.com Designer The Things I Think RFC 2100 Ashworth & Associates http://baylink.pitas.com '87 e24 St Petersburg FL USA http://photo.imageinc.us +1 727 647 1274 Those who cast the vote decide nothing. Those who count the vote decide everything. -- (Joseph Stalin)
Jay R. Ashworth wrote:
On Tue, Jun 17, 2008 at 01:03:32AM -0400, Steve Bertrand wrote:
I would like to know ANYONE who has a policy strict enough, and enforces it so as to have even an almost perfect cabling infrastructure...is there such a thing?
ValPak, Largo FL.
Their datacenter is new, $3.6M in a new completely automated $200M building, and it's *gorgeous*. Thanks to APC for organizing a (sales) tour about 3 months ago; I love facility porn.
LOL ;) ...facility porn... Steve
On Tue, 17 Jun 2008, Jay R. Ashworth wrote:
On Tue, Jun 17, 2008 at 01:03:32AM -0400, Steve Bertrand wrote:
I would like to know ANYONE who has a policy strict enough, and enforces it so as to have even an almost perfect cabling infrastructure...is there such a thing?
ValPak, Largo FL.
Their datacenter is new, $3.6M in a new completely automated $200M building, and it's *gorgeous*. Thanks to APC for organizing a (sales) tour about 3 months ago; I love facility porn.
I was in a data center for a large bank here in Pittsburgh a few years ago, and they definitely went the extra mile to keep their cable plant neatly organized and properly dressed, and they continued to maintain that after the building was turned up. That's the real test. I've seen lots of data centers and colo facilities that looked great for the grand opening and started turning into rat's nests as the move/add/change tickets started coming in :( jms
On 17 Jun 2008, at 11:25, Justin M. Streiner wrote:
I was in a data center for a large bank here in Pittsburgh a few years ago, and they definitely went the extra mile to keep their cable plant neatly organized and properly dressed, and they continued to maintain that after the building was turned up.
A boutique hosting company of my acquaintance once decided that cable management within racks was rather important -- they had the rather pragmatic opinion that setting things up right to start with was not enough, and that they also needed a conscious plan to keep things tidy as the cabinets filled up that did not rely on techs following rules or being diligent. The initial cable install for the pre-provisioned servers was done with much planning and documentation by people who did data cabling for a living, and was correspondingly tidy. The cables were all blue. Any change that was required after that was installed using a red cable. Once per week the data cabling people would return, within a posted window, and replace the temporary red patch cables with cut-to-length, tested, blue cables which were run according to the larger cabling strategy, and rigourously documented. This approach had the advantage that the cabinets always looked pristine and the documentation was always current (modulo a few red cables), regardless of what changes had happened since the original install, and regardless of who had made those changes. The theory was that bringing in dedicated cabling contractors to do audits once per week was cheaper in the grand scheme of things than dealing with the implications of messy cabling. There was an additional advantage that any potential customer who was shown the suite was overwhelmed with the pristine neatness of it, and felt immediately comfortable with the idea of emptying their own appallingly messy and undocumented machine room into such a place. Joe
On Tue, Jun 17, 2008 at 01:28:38PM -0400, Joe Abley wrote:
The initial cable install for the pre-provisioned servers was done with much planning and documentation by people who did data cabling for a living, and was correspondingly tidy. The cables were all blue. Any change that was required after that was installed using a red cable.
Once per week the data cabling people would return, within a posted window, and replace the temporary red patch cables with cut-to-length, tested, blue cables which were run according to the larger cabling strategy, and rigourously documented.
Ah yes, the 'purple wire' technique. I forget which book it's mentioned in, but it had to do with really old wire-wrapped computer boards. If you had to put in such a 'hack' wire, you did it in purple so it would stand out. Cheers, -- jra -- Jay R. Ashworth Baylink jra@baylink.com Designer The Things I Think RFC 2100 Ashworth & Associates http://baylink.pitas.com '87 e24 St Petersburg FL USA http://photo.imageinc.us +1 727 647 1274 Those who cast the vote decide nothing. Those who count the vote decide everything. -- (Joseph Stalin)
On Tue, 17 Jun 2008, Jay R. Ashworth wrote:
On Tue, Jun 17, 2008 at 01:03:32AM -0400, Steve Bertrand wrote:
I would like to know ANYONE who has a policy strict enough, and enforces it so as to have even an almost perfect cabling infrastructure...is there such a thing?
ValPak, Largo FL.
Their datacenter is new, $3.6M in a new completely automated $200M building, and it's *gorgeous*. Thanks to APC for organizing a (sales) tour about 3 months ago; I love facility porn.
I was in a data center for a large bank here in Pittsburgh a few years ago, and they definitely went the extra mile to keep their cable plant neatly organized and properly dressed, and they continued to maintain that after the building was turned up.
That's the real test. I've seen lots of data centers and colo facilities that looked great for the grand opening and started turning into rat's nests as the move/add/change tickets started coming in :(
jms
I opened a ~100k square ft DC in 2001, and it is still immaculate (i'm not with the company any longer btw), for one very simple reason... Its someones job. All the guy does is run cables, if anyone brings in their own cable, it gets immediately unplugged and cut in half (not kidding, its happened). All cables are labelled at each end, with hostname/patch panel/switch-m-p info, so at any point you can reference the run. When you make it someones job, they can take pride in it. If you have a guy who has 10 other things to do, being tidy will end up low on the list... The mucky mucks toured the Data Center and were very impressed, then they asked the facility manager how long they spent cleaning up. The answer was simple, "It always looks like this." My advice to anyone with a large facility. Hire someone who does good work, pay them well, and give them your confidence to do the right thing. Don't depend on NE's, or SA's to keep it tidy, because honestly, there will come a time when they have bigger fish to fry. Steve
JoeSox wrote:
Hello Newbie here (hopefully I have the correct list),
I was just wondering if anyone knows of a website with recommended colors for cables for a new datacenter? I have written some things down but I don't want to get stuck saying 'darn, I wish I would have bought this color for this type, now I am stuck'. What standard color to use if voice and data on same interface etc. Thanks.
As you can see, by and large, people assign colors to functions. What color to what function varies like the wind. Unlike a previous employer whose colo-manager person insisted on using colors to represent cable lengths (Doh!), color -> function mapping seems pretty universal. About 7% of the male population in the US has red-green colorblindness, so keep that in mind. Simpler schemes trump more complex ones (as do most things in networking) and makes cable-purchasing/stocking less of an issue. --Peter
On Mon, 16 Jun 2008 17:09:42 -0700 Peter Wohlers <pedro@whack.org> wrote:
About 7% of the male population in the US has red-green colorblindness, so keep that in mind.
At least in my son's case, bright colors -- like the typical red and green cables -- are easily distinguishable. Pastels are more of a problem. But for proper cabling, see http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000I1X6PM -- and make sure you read the comments... --Steve Bellovin, http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~smb
I am seriously old school--"patch cords" for me conjure (in addition to the modern views) 4-wire patches and coax patches (some of which were called "hairpins"). To me far more important that color is tags, one on each end if it is more that a foot long. The tags should have a short (two or three word) description, the authority for the patch (person's name or position, order number, or trouble ticket number) and where the _other_ end of the patch is, followed by where _this_ is. (For short cords "this" will cover both ends, probably. Why "this end"? Make a mistake and pull the wrong one out of a mostly clear jack-field sometime. Clarity will occur. -- Requiescas in pace o email Two identifying characteristics of System Administrators: Ex turpi causa non oritur actio Infallibility, and the ability to learn from their mistakes. Eppure si rinfresca ICBM Targeting Information: http://tinyurl.com/4sqczs
To me far more important that color is tags, one on each end if it is more that a foot long.
The tags should have a short (two or three word) description, the authority for the patch (person's name or position, order number, or trouble ticket number) and where the _other_ end of the patch is, followed by where _this_ is. (For short cords "this" will cover both ends, probably.
Why "this end"? Make a mistake and pull the wrong one out of a mostly clear jack-field sometime. Clarity will occur.
Ha, I don't see many other people who do that. So is the labeling device of choice still the Dymo Rhino stuff? Preferences for/against heat shrink vs other methods? Always fun to see what others are doing. ... JG -- Joe Greco - sol.net Network Services - Milwaukee, WI - http://www.sol.net "We call it the 'one bite at the apple' rule. Give me one chance [and] then I won't contact you again." - Direct Marketing Ass'n position on e-mail spam(CNN) With 24 million small businesses in the US alone, that's way too many apples.
On Jun 16, 2008, at 8:59 PM, Joe Greco wrote:
So is the labeling device of choice still the Dymo Rhino stuff? Preferences for/against heat shrink vs other methods? Always fun to see what others are doing.
Brady TLS2200. There is no substitute. Self-laminating multiline labels you simply wrap around the cable to form a sleeve. No heat-shrink required, just print, peel and stick. Cheers, D
On Jun 16, 2008, at 5:59 PM, Joe Greco wrote:
To me far more important that color is tags, one on each end if it is more that a foot long.
The tags should have a short (two or three word) description, the authority for the patch (person's name or position, order number, or trouble ticket number) and where the _other_ end of the patch is, followed by where _this_ is. (For short cords "this" will cover both ends, probably.
Why "this end"? Make a mistake and pull the wrong one out of a mostly clear jack-field sometime. Clarity will occur.
Ha, I don't see many other people who do that.
So is the labeling device of choice still the Dymo Rhino stuff? Preferences for/against heat shrink vs other methods? Always fun to see what others are doing.
I'm very fond of the Brady with the self-laminating wrap-around vinyl labels. Owen
Steven M. Bellovin wrote:
On Mon, 16 Jun 2008 17:09:42 -0700 Peter Wohlers <pedro@whack.org> wrote:
About 7% of the male population in the US has red-green colorblindness, so keep that in mind.
At least in my son's case, bright colors -- like the typical red and green cables -- are easily distinguishable. Pastels are more of a problem.
More than 50% of males are color challenged, even when they aren't color blind. I have noted that orange and red cables near each other can easily be confused, as can blues and greens that are too similar in hue. However...
But for proper cabling, see http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000I1X6PM -- and make sure you read the comments...
*That* link requires a put-down-your-coffee warning. Most notable is the number of stars in the rating, which goes hand in hand with the comments. Thank you. I still have tears in my eyes. -- In April 1951, Galaxy published C.M. Kornbluth's "The Marching Morons". The intervening years have proven Kornbluth right. --Valdis Kletnieks
But for proper cabling, see http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000I1X6PM -- and make sure you read the comments...
*That* link requires a put-down-your-coffee warning. Most notable is the number of stars in the rating, which goes hand in hand with the comments. Thank you. I still have tears in my eyes.
And it's all relative. One of the comments was: "You can get the exact same connection from a $5 digital cable." And I found myself thinking, "at that price, even that's a rip-off." But that's bulk wholesale pricing I'm thinking of, I guess, or make it yourself. Speaking of cables and veering off towards cable-making, I was wondering what people thought of the so-called "EZ RJ45" stuff. One of the hazards of doing long-term cut-to-length wiring is that if a crimp really goes wrong, you might mess up your artistic work or need to re-cut a new cable. Even having done as many cables as I've done, I occasionally have one go bad. The EZ stuff looks like an interesting compromise, does anyone with a few thousand crimps worth of experience with it have any comments? ... JG -- Joe Greco - sol.net Network Services - Milwaukee, WI - http://www.sol.net "We call it the 'one bite at the apple' rule. Give me one chance [and] then I won't contact you again." - Direct Marketing Ass'n position on e-mail spam(CNN) With 24 million small businesses in the US alone, that's way too many apples.
Joe Greco wrote:
Speaking of cables and veering off towards cable-making, I was wondering what people thought of the so-called "EZ RJ45" stuff. One of the hazards of doing long-term cut-to-length wiring is that if a crimp really goes wrong, you might mess up your artistic work or need to re-cut a new cable. Even having done as many cables as I've done, I occasionally have one go bad. The EZ stuff looks like an interesting compromise, does anyone with a few thousand crimps worth of experience with it have any comments?
They make a crimper specifically for it, which cuts of the ends. I haven't done a few thousand ends with it but it does make it slightly easier to maintain the twist further into the the plug because you can pull it until snug. I crimp infrequently enough that I occasionally don't get a spec cable when using conventional connectors.
... JG
They make a crimper specifically for it, which cuts of the ends. I haven't done a few thousand ends with it but it does make it slightly easier to maintain the twist further into the the plug because you can pull it until snug.
Yeah, I am reluctant to go retooling for that crimper. I had idly ordered some of the crimps one day, just to get a better look, thinking I might be able to get away with a two-step "crimp and then use-a-flush-cutter" on it. Not practical. Bah. So my initial impression is that it might help with the annoyance of having to massage the cable when one of the conductors isn't quite working out, but the need to straighten a greater length of each conductor is completely at odds with my cable-making style, where I'm an old fashioned pinch-n-wiggle straightening all eight conductors at the same time, which is only good for maybe 1/2" of straightening, which DOES not work for these silly things. Other than completely ruining my day with respect to that, I was relatively impressed with the quality of Cat6 cable I was able to throw together, and that the twist could be pulled until snug, as you noted. It also looks like it would be good for avoiding the usual problems you run into with new people who can't for the life of them make a crimp where the jacket doesn't pull out of the crimp at the first brief glance the cable experiences. I was less impressed that the boots are only available for Cat6. Interesting, though. ... JG -- Joe Greco - sol.net Network Services - Milwaukee, WI - http://www.sol.net "We call it the 'one bite at the apple' rule. Give me one chance [and] then I won't contact you again." - Direct Marketing Ass'n position on e-mail spam(CNN) With 24 million small businesses in the US alone, that's way too many apples.
Joe Greco wrote:
They make a crimper specifically for it, which cuts of the ends. I haven't done a few thousand ends with it but it does make it slightly easier to maintain the twist further into the the plug because you can pull it until snug.
Yeah, I am reluctant to go retooling for that crimper. I had idly ordered some of the crimps one day, just to get a better look, thinking I might be able to get away with a two-step "crimp and then use-a-flush-cutter" on it. Not practical. Bah.
I've had good success (when forced to use those heads) with pulling til snug, cutting with a flush cutter, then backing off ever so slightly so the ends aren't hanging out in short-land. I use the same tools the same number of times as I do for other heads, but I pick them up in a difference sequence, so there's no gain without the custom crimper. I avoid them if at all possible though, and carry plenty of "preferred" heads to any project where I might want them. pt
On Mon, 16 Jun 2008, Joel Jaeggli wrote:
Joe Greco wrote:
Speaking of cables and veering off towards cable-making, I was wondering what people thought of the so-called "EZ RJ45" stuff. One of the hazards of doing long-term cut-to-length wiring is that if a crimp really goes wrong, you might mess up your artistic work or need to re-cut a new cable. Even having done as many cables as I've done, I occasionally have one go bad. The EZ stuff looks like an interesting compromise, does anyone with a few thousand crimps worth of experience with it have any comments?
They make a crimper specifically for it, which cuts of the ends. I haven't done a few thousand ends with it but it does make it slightly easier to maintain the twist further into the the plug because you can pull it until snug.
I crimp infrequently enough that I occasionally don't get a spec cable when using conventional connectors.
I find this interesting - as lately i've found that keeping a supply of various lengths of commercially-manufactured leads of appropriate colours, etc, has been a better long term solution than home-made leads. Perhaps I just suck at crimping cables, but I prefer to use commercially made (and tested) leads. The drawback, of course, is when you run out of the right length and wind up using longer cables, which in turn makes cable management a bit of a mess... The key of course is Discipline - use the right cable, run the right path... ala 'do it once, do it right'. I've had cause in the past to take down entire cabinets for a matter of hours while all cabling is mapped, removed and re-fitted (using newer cables / of the right colour / of the right length / actually _using_ cable management bars). [Such outages are often a good opportunity to replace switch equipment with newer gear. I assume we're all OK with electronically tagging ports with useful descriptions too??) One labelling option I've seen used: http://www.kableflags.com.au/ Another is of course, Dymo - but after a few years these can look tatty (if they don't fall off entirely)... Mark.
I find this interesting - as lately i've found that keeping a supply of various lengths of commercially-manufactured leads of appropriate colours, etc, has been a better long term solution than home-made leads. Perhaps I just suck at crimping cables, but I prefer to use commercially made (and tested) leads.
The drawback, of course, is when you run out of the right length and wind up using longer cables, which in turn makes cable management a bit of a mess...
Maybe we just wire in more tight places, but I find that it's somewhat difficult to deal with more than about three excess inches when doing in-frame wiring. I don't want to have to deal with excess. It is (maybe was? haven't looked in several years) difficult to find someplace that will manufacture quality Cat6 molded cords in arbitrary lengths in relatively small quantities. There's a million places that will be happy to custom-make you Cat6 crimped or crimped+booted cables, but if I wanted that, I could hire a monkey to make them for us at a cheaper price. If I'm going manufactured prefab, I want molded. Given that, and given that the shop (where we could maintain significant stock) is not always convenient (for ex., equipment in Ashburn, shop in Milwaukee) the easier solution has typically been to keep a few 1000' spools and make cables to exact length as needed. ... JG -- Joe Greco - sol.net Network Services - Milwaukee, WI - http://www.sol.net "We call it the 'one bite at the apple' rule. Give me one chance [and] then I won't contact you again." - Direct Marketing Ass'n position on e-mail spam(CNN) With 24 million small businesses in the US alone, that's way too many apples.
On Mon, Jun 16, 2008 at 10:26:41PM -0500, Joe Greco wrote:
Maybe we just wire in more tight places, but I find that it's somewhat difficult to deal with more than about three excess inches when doing in-frame wiring. I don't want to have to deal with excess.
Perhaps it's because my wiring background, such as it is, runs more to video than networking... but doesn't *anyone* put service loops in anything anymore? Cheers, -- jra -- Jay R. Ashworth Baylink jra@baylink.com Designer The Things I Think RFC 2100 Ashworth & Associates http://baylink.pitas.com '87 e24 St Petersburg FL USA http://photo.imageinc.us +1 727 647 1274 Those who cast the vote decide nothing. Those who count the vote decide everything. -- (Joseph Stalin)
There's a standard; ANSI/TIA/EIA 606A http://www.flexcomm.com/library/606aguide.pdf Page 23
On Mon, Jun 16, 2008 at 9:07 PM, George Imburgia <nanog@armorfirewall.com> wrote:
There's a standard;
ANSI/TIA/EIA 606A
http://www.flexcomm.com/library/606aguide.pdf
Page 23
Informative and what I was looking for.. -- Thank You, Joe
George Imburgia wrote:
There's a standard; ANSI/TIA/EIA 606A http://www.flexcomm.com/library/606aguide.pdf
Here in Australia there's no standard for colours of data communications patch cables. But there are some non-data communications standards for fixed cable colours. In particular, fire system sensors must use red; the use of cream is reserved for telephony; and fixed electrical cables must be white. To minimise error I avoid those colours for patch cables (ie, non-fixed cables). This is prudent anyway, as under the Wiring Rules simply tying down a patch lead with a cable tie is enough to turn it into a fixed cable. I've found that it's more important to have a ready supply of cable lengths (say 0.5m increments) and labels than to have colours. That avoids a mess developing in the first place that might need colour coding to sort out. We use blue, simply because it's the most readily available colour. The only cable which really needs a special colour is one which doesn't connect all eight pins in sequence. To avoid stocking many lengths of cross-over cables, we use a 0.6m crossover cable and a Cat6 joiner. We colour these pink -- it's noticeable and Real Men sysadmins don't steal them. A useful tool is a audio cable tracer. When disconnecting a PC you attach the signal injector. You then use the other half of the tool to identify the cable (it buzzes when near). This allows the patch cables to be pulled with certainty rather than left in the rack just in case it attached to some other host and you fear causing an unplanned outage. Also I've found that many cabling messes occur because the installer had no alternative. There was simply no cableway that wasn't congested. For high-density routers I've found that about 1/3rd of the rack is given over to cable patch panels and ring runs. About two racks in ten (ie, one optical, one UTP) need to be given over to just inter-rack patching and I'd encourage a specialist-built patch rack for that purpose. A rack full of PCs requires about 0.8m of available tray down the side of the rack to tie down the patch leads and other cables. Again, that huge amount of tray isn't usually provided, can't be added afterwards, and the installer has no choice but to do poor work if there's nothing to tie cables to. We ban non-fixed cabling between our racks, which means that patch cables only run within a rack. This simplifies things considerably. Fortunately, we've got the fiber density to racks to justify that design. I've noticed a considerable fall in the price of pre-assembled optical patch panels, so it's well worth looking at the prices even at low densities of cables to see if they fallen enough to make a fixed cabling system worthwhile. It's not like alternative -- those gutters used to pull optical patch leads between racks -- are cheap so I've expect the prices to cross at some stage in the next few years. Cheers, glen
On 20/06/2008, at 4:19 AM, Glen Turner wrote:
A useful tool is a audio cable tracer. When disconnecting a PC you attach the signal injector. You then use the other half of the tool to identify the cable (it buzzes when near). This allows the patch cables to be pulled with certainty rather than left in the rack just in case it attached to some other host and you fear causing an unplanned outage.
You whack on one of these things when there's still active gear on the end? -- Nathan Ward
This one is plenty safe to stick on a live cable, plus it works a whole lot better than the old analog ones: http://www.flukenetworks.com/fnet/en-us/products/IntelliTone+Toner+and+Probe... -- Tim On Thu, Jun 19, 2008 at 7:50 PM, Nathan Ward <nanog@daork.net> wrote:
On 20/06/2008, at 4:19 AM, Glen Turner wrote:
A useful tool is a audio cable tracer. When disconnecting a PC you attach the signal injector. You then use the other half of the tool to identify the cable (it buzzes when near). This allows the patch cables to be pulled with certainty rather than left in the rack just in case it attached to some other host and you fear causing an unplanned outage.
You whack on one of these things when there's still active gear on the end?
-- Nathan Ward
On Mon, Jun 16, 2008 at 10:26:41PM -0500, Joe Greco wrote:
Maybe we just wire in more tight places, but I find that it's somewhat difficult to deal with more than about three excess inches when doing in-frame wiring. I don't want to have to deal with excess.
Perhaps it's because my wiring background, such as it is, runs more to video than networking...
but doesn't *anyone* put service loops in anything anymore?
Assuming you're using "service loops" in the sense of allowing enough cable to allow a server to slide out while running... usually in copper building wiring, the term loosely refers to excess cable or whathaveyou stuffed back into the conduit/cavity/box to allow for the fixture to be pulled out and worked on. When you've got a dense rack (think something like 30 1U servers, with a minimum of 4 x Cat5/6/etc to each one), "service loops" are a great way to significantly reduce your airflow. Think about how far you have to pull a server out... is anything significantly less than 30" deep these days? That means a lot of wire to store. When it isn't mission critical that downtime be minimized to the second, it changes the perspective on whether or not you need to be able to pull equipment while having it still running. So, if you really need the capability, an alternate method for providing "service loops" is to simply swap out cables. You disconnect the precut, swap in a nice long cable. Pull out your server. You lose connectivity for a moment or two, but don't need to make arrangements for extra feet of cable per each 1U. Each situation will have tradeoffs. Pick appropriately, as always. ... JG -- Joe Greco - sol.net Network Services - Milwaukee, WI - http://www.sol.net "We call it the 'one bite at the apple' rule. Give me one chance [and] then I won't contact you again." - Direct Marketing Ass'n position on e-mail spam(CNN) With 24 million small businesses in the US alone, that's way too many apples.
On Mon, Jun 16, 2008 at 11:27:43PM -0500, Joe Greco wrote: [ quoting me ]
but doesn't *anyone* put service loops in anything anymore?
Assuming you're using "service loops" in the sense of allowing enough cable to allow a server to slide out while running... usually in copper building wiring, the term loosely refers to excess cable or whathaveyou stuffed back into the conduit/cavity/box to allow for the fixture to be pulled out and worked on.
When you've got a dense rack (think something like 30 1U servers, with a minimum of 4 x Cat5/6/etc to each one), "service loops" are a great way to significantly reduce your airflow. Think about how far you have to pull a server out... is anything significantly less than 30" deep these days? That means a lot of wire to store. When it isn't mission critical that downtime be minimized to the second, it changes the perspective on whether or not you need to be able to pull equipment while having it still running.
True. And I'm Mr Just Unplug It For A Second To Move The Cable, too.
Each situation will have tradeoffs. Pick appropriately, as always.
Excellent reminder. Cheers, -- jra -- Jay R. Ashworth jra@baylink.com Designer +-Internetworking------+---------+ RFC 2100 Ashworth & Associates | Best Practices Wiki | | '87 e24 St Petersburg FL USA +-http://bestpractices.wikia.com-+ +1 727 647 1274 If you can read this... thank a system administrator. Or two. --me
Peter Wohlers wrote:
As you can see, by and large, people assign colors to functions. What color to what function varies like the wind. Unlike a previous employer whose colo-manager person insisted on using colors to represent cable lengths (Doh!), color -> function mapping seems pretty universal.
I used to do that too... Until I stood behind a rack trying to figure out which of the 70 or so gray wires from the switch was the one going to the box I was having the problem with. Then I bought as many different colors as I could find, and mixed things up a bit. Matthew Kaufman
Course it can still get a little rough. In our noc we have a well working standard. Blue == IPKVM Black == Internal Data VLAN Red == WAN VLAN Green == Client managed device Yellow == Client device (we manage) White == to Desktop (or phone) Pink == iSCSI Orange == SAN fiber Sadly we don't have any white and red (as someone else pointed out. Poor new tech with no fingers) -----Original Message----- From: Matthew Kaufman [mailto:matthew@eeph.com] Sent: Monday, June 16, 2008 8:24 PM To: Peter Wohlers Cc: nanog@nanog.org Subject: Re: Cable Colors Peter Wohlers wrote:
As you can see, by and large, people assign colors to functions. What color to what function varies like the wind. Unlike a previous employer whose colo-manager person insisted on using colors to represent cable lengths (Doh!), color -> function mapping seems pretty universal.
I used to do that too... Until I stood behind a rack trying to figure out which of the 70 or so gray wires from the switch was the one going to the box I was having the problem with. Then I bought as many different colors as I could find, and mixed things up a bit. Matthew Kaufman
On Mon, Jun 16, 2008 at 6:32 PM, JoeSox <joesox@gmail.com> wrote:
I was just wondering if anyone knows of a website with recommended colors for cables for a new datacenter? I have written some things down but I don't want to get stuck saying 'darn, I wish I would have bought this color for this type, now I am stuck'. What standard color to use if voice and data on same interface etc. Thanks.
Joe, Some tricks I've picked up for colorizing patch cables... Your mileage may vary. For any given cable you can control three different colors: 1. The color of the cable. 2. The color of the strain-relief boot. 3. The color of the electrical tape you wrap around the cable at each end (the same at both ends) as a quick visual ID of which endpoints are the same cable. Also, *IF* your switching matrix is straightforward, consider getting 48-port 1U "virtual chassis" switches instead of a big switch. Then interleave those switches with the 48-port patch panels on the rack and use 1' cables from the switch to the panel. It makes it oh-so-easy to trace which cable goes where and which cables are the exceptions (hint: exceptions are the only cables longer than 1'!) You get bonus points for not having to touch the cables while tracing (since that's how you knock loose other cables while hunting for the current problem). I've never had much luck attaching labels to cables. Even when the labels stay on they're impossible to quickly tell apart. Regards, Bill Herrin -- William D. Herrin ................ herrin@dirtside.com bill@herrin.us 3005 Crane Dr. ...................... Web: <http://bill.herrin.us/> Falls Church, VA 22042-3004
Hi Joe:
Hello Newbie here (hopefully I have the correct list),
I was just wondering if anyone knows of a website with recommended colors for cables for a new datacenter? I have written some things down but I don't want to get stuck saying 'darn, I wish I would have bought this color for this type, now I am stuck'. What standard color to use if voice and data on same interface etc. Thanks. -- Thank You, Joe
I have found that it's better not to standardize on wire color because someone will always use the wrong color in a pinch if it will solve an immediate problem. Instead, come up with a labeling system that clearly defines the physical source and destination of the wire. Mike
i guess thats what having a good data center manager is all about - being prepared and keeping things uniform and to a standard they define... On Mon, Jun 16, 2008 at 10:15 PM, Michael Smith <mksmith@adhost.com> wrote:
Hi Joe:
Hello Newbie here (hopefully I have the correct list),
I was just wondering if anyone knows of a website with recommended colors for cables for a new datacenter? I have written some things down but I don't want to get stuck saying 'darn, I wish I would have bought this color for this type, now I am stuck'. What standard color to use if voice and data on same interface etc.
Thanks.
-- Thank You, Joe
I have found that it's better not to standardize on wire color because someone will always use the wrong color in a pinch if it will solve an immediate problem. Instead, come up with a labeling system that clearly defines the physical source and destination of the wire.
Mike
And not having to worry about a color-blind tech. :-) Mike From: Christian Koch <christian@broknrobot.com> Date: Mon, 16 Jun 2008 22:20:59 -0400 To: Michael Smith <mksmith@adhost.com> Cc: JoeSox <joesox@gmail.com>, <nanog@nanog.org> Subject: Re: Cable Colors i guess thats what having a good data center manager is all about - being prepared and keeping things uniform and to a standard they define... On Mon, Jun 16, 2008 at 10:15 PM, Michael Smith <mksmith@adhost.com> wrote:
Hi Joe:
Hello Newbie here (hopefully I have the correct list),
I was just wondering if anyone knows of a website with recommended colors for cables for a new datacenter? I have written some things down but I don't want to get stuck saying 'darn, I wish I would have bought this color for this type, now I am stuck'. What standard color to use if voice and data on same interface etc. Thanks. -- Thank You, Joe
I have found that it's better not to standardize on wire color because someone will always use the wrong color in a pinch if it will solve an immediate problem. Instead, come up with a labeling system that clearly defines the physical source and destination of the wire.
Mike
On Jun 16, 2008, at 7:15 PM, Michael Smith wrote:
Hi Joe:
Hello Newbie here (hopefully I have the correct list),
I was just wondering if anyone knows of a website with recommended colors for cables for a new datacenter? I have written some things down but I don't want to get stuck saying 'darn, I wish I would have bought this color for this type, now I am stuck'. What standard color to use if voice and data on same interface etc. Thanks. -- Thank You, Joe
I have found that it's better not to standardize on wire color because someone will always use the wrong color in a pinch if it will solve an immediate problem. Instead, come up with a labeling system that clearly defines the physical source and destination of the wire.
Mike
Indeed, we solve the former problem using the latter solution. If someone uses the wrong color, we require them to do the following: 1. Do NOT install the cable into the cable management. Leave it hanging. 2. Use labels to label the intended color of the cable at each end and at 2' increments along the length of the cable if it is more than 3.5 feet long. Owen
-----Original Message----- From: JoeSox [mailto:joesox@gmail.com] Sent: Monday, June 16, 2008 3:32 PM To: nanog@nanog.org Subject: Cable Colors
Hello Newbie here (hopefully I have the correct list),
I was just wondering if anyone knows of a website with recommended colors for cables for a new datacenter? I have written some things down but I don't want to get stuck saying 'darn, I wish I would have bought this color for this type, now I am stuck'. What standard color to use if voice and data on same interface etc. Thanks. -- Thank You, Joe
We use this cable for our UDP applications: http://www.amazon.com/Denon-AKDL1-Dedicated-Link-Cable/dp/B000I1X6PM . The fluoropolymer coating makes sure we don't drop any packets onto the floor. At least that's what the salesman told me. And we don't need to color-code them, they just kind of glow from their own awesomeness. Mike Donahue WATG
participants (38)
-
Blake Pfankuch -
Christian Koch -
David Coulson -
Derek J. Balling -
Gadi Evron -
George Imburgia -
Glen Turner -
Glenn Sieb -
Jay R. Ashworth -
Joe Abley -
Joe Greco -
Joel Jaeggli -
JoeSox -
Jon Kibler -
Justin M. Streiner -
Laurence F. Sheldon, Jr. -
Lynda -
Mark Foster -
Matthew Kaufman -
Michael Smith -
Mike Donahue -
Nathan Ward -
Owen DeLong -
Pete Templin -
Peter Wohlers -
Randy Bush -
Scott Hebert -
Shaun Ewing -
Soren Telfer -
Steve Bertrand -
Steve Dalberg -
Steven M. Bellovin -
telmnstr＠757.org -
Tim Jackson -
Tuc at T-B-O-H -
Wayne E. Bouchard -
William Allen Simpson -
William Herrin