Certification

I finally passed the damned thing! :-)  I sat the ISCW exam today and walked away with the CCNP - woohoo!  I’m more happy that I can get back to doing what I enjoy now without having to do any more routing/switching stuff for a while.  The ISCW course focused mainly on VPN technology, ADSL, Cable and secure configuration management.  It was a bit more enjoyable than the other exams but because it’s locked into Cisco products I sometimes feel like the certification track is more like an ongoing advertisement for the vendor. 

I’m not sure what I’ll focus on now, I’ve got to keep my skills sharp and my certifications current because I’m self employed and the industry can be a bit fickle I suppose - make no mistake, hands on experience is what counts.  Whatever it is I intend to do something fun alongside it.  I really fancy doing Remote Exploits Offensive Security course although I may warm up with the BackTrack WiFu course first - the Remote Exploit team are superb -> http://www.remote-exploit.org/

It’s been a few months since I’ve done any meaty Checkpoint stuff so I may just recertify my CCSA in NGX at the same time.  Decisions decisions!  For now I’m just happy that this ones out of the way!

Ian

Learning the routing and switching stuff for CCNP has been fun ( honest :-/ ) and I’m glad I chose to do it as it’s made me more complete as far as networking goes. I’m a great believer that to be truly good at your profession you have to be proficient in any areas that it relies upon. Obviously, security products sit on top of our infrastructures so being more aware of that will help me in the future – actually, it’s helped me already as I recently had to use a 3750 as a media convertor for the IPS 4260 (fibre to copper and then from copper back to fibre) where I had to use private VLANs to get it working. I wouldn’t have been aware of that previously and therefore would have been limited in that situation if I hadn’t been aware of private VLANs and their uses.

I’m trying to not look past the ISCW exam as the CCNP isn’t over quite yet but I am looking forward to getting my head back into security full time. I’m going to do a bit of Checkpoint NGX next to bolster my checkpoint skills (I’m currently a CCSA on Checkpoint NG) and then I am going to go for the CCIE Security written exam. After QoS I am sure it will be a joy to read up on! Haha

Ian

Almost there!!

It’s been a while since my debut post so I reckon my blog is due a wee update now. The CCNP is going well so far, I’ve passed BSCI, BCMSN and ONT. I’m working my way through the ISCW coursework at present and it’s going well. My CCSP has helped a bit so far with all the VPN stuff that’s included so I’m hoping the exam will be a bit easier for this one. Out of the three exams passed, I’d have to say BSCI was the hardest, BCMSN was the easiest but that was mainly due to the fact that I enjoyed learning what I deem to be the fundamentals of networking. ONT was pretty boring to be honest and it was a struggle reading the book as it was so dry and I wasn’t all that interested in Quality of Service to be honest. So fingers crossed for me people, three down and one to go!!

I’ve ended up mainly using Cisco Press books and Jeremy Cioara’s CBT Nuggets as the Cisco Network Academy wasn’t up to much, in my opinion. The slides they provide online didn’t go into enough detail to pass the exam but instead left links to lots of Cisco technology papers at the bottom which there was far too many to read in one lifetime.

The best and most time efficient way I’ve found for studying is to watch the CBT Nuggets ( Jeremy Cioara is a legend! ) and then read the Cisco Press book afterwards while working through the NIL labs. One without the other would be less than half effective I believe. The CBT Nuggets give an excellent visual aid and help you to understand what sentences can’t explain but you really need to read the Cisco Press books to get all the details you need for the exam.

Ian

As a consultant with strong Cisco experience I need to make sure my skills and certifications are sharp.  The ultimate goal is to earn the coveted Cisco CCIE certification.  I am currently a Cisco CCSP and will, hopefully, soon be a Cisco CCNP. Once I finish the CCNP, and I will finish it despite my past procrastination, I will hopefully make a start on the CCIE track and keep record of that on here too.  My interest lies in the security field but as a freelance consultant I need to aim towards the most lucrative market so I may slip the CISSP in before the CCIE depending on my situation and work commitments.  The security market is “about to boom”… or so I’ve been told for the last five years. If only I’d chosen to follow the voice route… Ok, maybe not, voice isn’t really my bag baby.

I started my studies next in August 07 when I started to tackle the Cisco BSCI course. I’ve been using various study methods to get through the CCNP. The Cisco Network Academy was my main port of call as I signed up to the CCNP track which is being run from my local University. I’ve also be using online labs, courtesy of www.nil.si For those of you who have never used them these are excllent study aides. They provide excellent lab scenarios with pratical goals and helpful study guides. CBT Nuggets have some excellet videos that can be purchased for a reasonable amount so I’ll be using these and last but not least good old Cisco Press books, these are great for stacking up in the spare room and impressing all your friends with your knowledge of all things technical. Just hope they don’t ask you a question about what’s in them.

I’ll do my best to keep the posts in my blog frequent and I’ll try not to be toooo boring when I rabbit on about how I’m getting on. Hopefully, if you’re reading this I’ll provide you with some “what not to do’s” so that you don’t make the same mistakes that I am inevitably about to make! If I can be bothered I may even try to write a few ‘white paper’ type posts that are aimed at routing and switching. Firstly, to get me up off my ass and do a bit of research in something that will no doubt help me understand my trade. Secondly, to help whoever is reading my blog understand certain areas of the CCNP track. I often find that some authors make things easier to read than others who can often over complicate things, so hopefully if a simpleton like my good self can understand something then I may be able to put this down in a format that most of you can understand and perhaps help.

Oh, and feel free to add your comments.

Stay tuned..

Ian