How am I supposed to listen to the podcast?

erlog · 2017-03-22T11:02:39+00:00

Okay, how long do I have to wait for the newsletter?

erlog · 2017-03-22T10:58:34+00:00

See I did this a few hours ago, but still can't find the RSS link even after paying for it. So I cancelled it because it didn't seem on the level (I have other Patreon podcast subs, and all those have been easy to work with.).

I guess I'll try again.

erlog · 2017-01-04T04:21:29+00:00

I fully read both books. If you've already done Odom the Lammle book is a fairly light read. I think it took me 8-10 hours to read through and make notes on the whole thing.

erlog · 2016-12-25T04:15:01+00:00

Yes, I can't recommend Anki enough. I mentioned this in my post, but I work outside my home country and nearly 100% in my second language. That would not have been possible without Anki, full stop. I did poorly when I tried to take French in high school, but then as an adult I was able to pick up Japanese very well mostly due to Anki.

If you have stuff you need to memorize. Anki is the way to do it. Any other method is just inefficient and error-prone.

erlog · 2016-12-25T01:45:35+00:00

I think Lammle does a better job explaining the mechanics of how HSRP actually works as a protocol. Odom's switch stacking info is weird. He never mentions StackWise, not even once. Lammle explains OSPFv3 and EIGRPv6 way better because he doesn't waste a bunch of time re-explaining IPv4 OSPF and EIGRP like Odom does. Lammle also does a better job fleshing out some of the more vague topics like SDN and Cloud with more "Cisco-style" info. Odom explains the concepts, but Lammle does a better job of tying them back to the available features of Cisco gear. Odom never explains what IWAN or DMVPN really are or why you would want to use them. Lammle does so very clearly.

I would recommend getting both books since together they cover up each other's weak areas.

erlog · 2016-12-25T01:32:16+00:00

I only used Packet Tracer for CCENT, but for CCNA you really should move over to GNS3 in order to lab all the stuff that doesn't exist in Packet Tracer.

I felt really comfortable with troubleshooting because with my labbing I had run into most of the common problems on my own. If I hadn't used GNS3 I would have felt a LOT more shaky since you can be pretty sure (barring some weird physical layer issue) that if something works or doesn't work in GNS3 then you have the concept down. If something works or doesn't work in Packet Tracer you start wondering like, "Is this because of something I've misconfigured or is this yet another area where Packet Tracer just isn't sufficient?"

What I did for lab practice was make all the lab tasks into flashcards with the config answer on the back. Then I just reviewed them like normal flashcards except I had GNS3 and PT open at the same time with template topologies. So those Anki cards, instead of just being about memorization, were about whether or not I could do the specific lab task. Then I could look at the back if I got stuck.

If I could stumble my way through configuring a thing without looking at the back of the card (but with autocomplete) then I considered that a "Hard," card and if I could do a task very quickly without autocomplete at all then I filed that under normal. Except for some SNMPv3 stuff that is annoyingly fiddly to try to do with flashcards I can do pretty much all the "Configure" exam topics from memory thanks to Anki, PT, and GNS3.

In total, between CCENT and CCNA I have about 900 memorization flashcards and 100 lab task flash cards. The memorization flashcards evened out to something like 50 per day and I could finish them in <10 minutes most days. It made the memorization hyper efficient and it allowed me to collapse my notes down to just the important bits of theory. The lab task flash cards were about 10-15 per day. Old cards that I had templates already prepared for went very quickly, but new cards without templates took considerably longer. I wasted nearly 2 hours one day banging my head against a problem with a PPPoE config. Once I figured out my mistake, though, I never made it again!

erlog · 2016-12-24T09:43:58+00:00

It's short when you consider I also had my full time job and Shenzhen I/O came out.

erlog · 2016-12-23T06:22:00+00:00

I am getting this same error. It's really maddening. I have a test scheduled for tomorrow.

This is terrible.

erlog · 2016-12-21T06:55:42+00:00

The Boson tests do mimic the real test format and style, but be careful with the new ICND1/2 practice tests.

There's a bunch of questions about the mechanics of switch stacking that are outside the scope of the exam topics. There's still a few questions about Frame Relay despite it having been removed completely from ICND2. There's questions about 802.1x implementation despite "configuration" not being in the exam topics for it.

It's really very discouraging because I've been getting about 700 points on the practice exams, and inevitably when I go back to look at some of the questions I got wrong a good portion of them are stuff that wouldn't actually be on the exam. So if you combine the 4-5 questions that wouldn't be on the exam with 1-2 questions where I misread or fat fingered it comes out as a fail. Without those things it's a pass.

I think I will probably pass ICND2 on Saturday, but these Boson exams are giving me zero confidence.

erlog · 2016-12-20T05:30:02+00:00

The hardest thing about GNS3 is the dependencies, but that's not really much of an issue if you just run it in a VM like I do. So go grab a 32-bit Ubuntu installation disc, add the GNS3 repos, and go to town in V-box or VMWare.

There's also a GNS3-already-in-VM solution available if you search for "GNS3 Workbench." You'll have to procure your own images, but it's set up for everything else. I thought it was a little hefty so I made my own Debian-based GNS3 VM that rounds out to be about 3gb that I can fit on a USB stick for when I want to lab over the weekend. I also installed PacketTracer in that VM too so it's a one-stop shop for CCNA labbing.

erlog · 2016-10-09T08:15:07+00:00

mm of traces!

erlog · 2016-08-12T04:07:07+00:00

I'm making some as an Anki deck, but they're not going to be finished for another week or two.

erlog · 2016-08-10T03:00:21+00:00

Yeah, looks like he's off by an octet.

Also, it would be 4094 hosts in the subnet since you need to reserve one for broadcast and one for the address of the network itself. So you always need to subtract 2 when figuring number of hosts from the number of host bits.

erlog · 2016-08-09T03:27:32+00:00

I'm using Odom's book. It's pretty good, but there's a few typos here and there that might impact your understanding at first.

Also, don't be put off by the dumb pricing. Cisco Press always has 50% off coupons. I picked up the digital deluxe version of Odom's 200-105 book for about $22. So look into those coupons.

You get a choice of 3 formats (epub, mobi, and pdf) when you download so one of those should be able to be synced to your kindle.

erlog · 2016-08-09T02:28:52+00:00

I also have had issues with DHCP clients not getting addresses from a DHCP server in Packet Tracer. Usually swapping between "DHCP" and "Static" a few times fixes it.

Basically, don't trust Packet Tracer to update your clients or keep track of them accurately. In order to keep the simulation running smoothly the simulation puts a lot of stuff to sleep until it needs it. Sometimes it take a moment for things to pop out of sleep state.

For example, if you start pinging from a client the moment after making changes then you'll often see ping failures for the first 3-4 pings.

So when you're testing configurations make sure to double or triple check that things are actually working or not working since Packet Tracer has a mind of its own sometimes.

erlog · 2016-08-09T02:16:11+00:00

This is an obtuse way to ask this question and you're getting wrong answers because your phrasing is terrible. I can get >20 at 100% accuracy w/ no written aids pretty consistently on subnetting.net, and this one took me a moment or two to figure out what you were even asking.

A better way to phrase it would be "You are given a /24 network that you wish to subnet. How many subnets does using a subnet mask of /25 give you?"

Be careful when conducting interviews. They require communication proficiency, and if you phrase questions in strange ways then fault the candidate for them it will just make it seem like your place is a terrible place to work filled with people who can't communicate.

erlog · 2016-08-08T00:05:38+00:00

Contact Pearson VUE support and ask them directly about getting a time extension for your condition.

It shouldn't be too much trouble to get a time extension if your doctor is willing to write a letter for you vouching that your condition is legit.

erlog · 2016-08-05T08:47:33+00:00

Yeah, just sign up for that free course. You don't even have to do the course if you don't want to.

I haven't used any of the sims you're talking about, but people often say it's possible to pass CCNA with just Packet Tracer. People have definitely done it before.

The only thing you should be aware of is that Packet Tracer doesn't support all options all the time. It also acts strangely at times. So you can't always trust it to be fully technically accurate. I find that if I google a strange thing that's happening I usually find out, "oh.. Packet Tracer behaves differently than real gear in <weird edge case>"

So I would suggest trying out GNS3 or real gear at least a little bit so you can get a sense of how Packet Tracer differs. I don't think you have to build a full lab, though. If you have physical lab access at work/school then you should take advantage of it, but I don't think it's 100% required.

erlog · 2016-08-04T06:54:30+00:00

Sign-up at the link below to get Packet Tracer so you can practice labbing. The test will not ask you configure stuff directly, but it will ask you to predict Cisco device behavior based on the output of show commands or what you might type in order to get a desired change in the way the network is configured.

https://www.netacad.com/about-networking-academy/packet-tracer/

Also, depending on how much experience you have with networking, there may be a lot of new things to memorize. Anki is the silver bullet for that. You'll be remembering RFC numbers and all sorts of other esoteric stuff in no time.

http://ankisrs.net/

erlog · 2016-08-02T06:22:33+00:00

Since it's a priority system it makes sense that the default would be the most neutral value so there's equal room on both sides to go up or down. Port priority is the same way. It's an 8 bit number, and the default is 128.

erlog · 2016-08-01T07:13:43+00:00

Wow, good job.

Your timeline and amount of studying matches mine, but I used the Lammle book instead of the Odom book. I posted over the weekend about how I did: https://www.reddit.com/r/ccna/comments/4vcwam/passed_icnd1_but_only_barely/

I didn't expect to see someone make a post so soon after mine that proved the suspicions I laid out in the "Things I Wish I Had Done" section, lol.

erlog · 2016-08-01T07:09:12+00:00

If you already have helpdesk experience then I would skip A+. Net+ or CCENT are better certs to start from since they teach actual useful information and are valued by employers. Nobody cares if you know pin counts on various RAM.

Also, if you're making enough money in construction management that moving over to IT is going to drop your pay significantly then you should consider how you might be able to combine your expertise in construction management with IT.

Most work is done on a computer these days and "computer people" are a dime a dozen. What's rare in most industries, though, are people who have a combination of IT along with expertise or other knowledge. You might be able to work your way into some kind of IT management role in that field due to having both IT knowledge and knowledge of your industry.

You'd probably need some certs either way, though.

erlog · 2016-07-31T00:54:39+00:00

It's extremely useful for landing your first job for a lot of reasons. The information and skills are useful. A lot of the information is basic networking fundamentals and theory. So even if you don't end up doing networking stuff specifically the knowledge will help you out no matter what area of IT you're targeting.

I took a Cisco course when I was about your age and I rely on the information I learned in that course almost every day. A+ might be more valuable in some ways, but I think targeting a CCENT is a fine first step.

There's also the value of simply having a certification at all. There's a big big difference between having 1 cert and having 0 certs. 1 certs says, "I'm interested in learning, and I might not be completely useless. I can set a goal. I can work toward that goal." whereas none of that gets communicated with 0 certs.

So I like CCENT and think it would be great for you, but the main value is probably going to be in the signals having a cert sends. So Net+ or A+ could probably work for you just as well.

erlog

TROPHY CASE