Just loving it.

I just loved working the difficulty level 7 plus labs, last night i was working on lab 7. I didnt get to finish it and have one question on RIP and the OSPF section left. I have now added in OSPF to the daily tasks that i work on.  I also am liking the fact that my arsenal of notes is getting larger.  I seem to question the task on the first RIP question about dont advertise any other interfaces. Its a bit vague since the question to me meant all the routers/switches, but it turned out that it was only meant for a specific few. I posted a question about this on IEOC.com & am waiting for a response.

I did have some difficulty with some of the questions on the lab, but overall i am glad to see that. I am looking forward to the remaining labs. Well for now i plan on completing lab 7 tonight. Will post the outcome tomorrow.

Rescheduled my lab date.

I named this post accordingly since dropping the date for Oct 30th was a huge step for me to take.  I had to sit there and think it through, and i feel that the decision was right. I had logged in last night, and the date that i wanted in December ( Dec 4th ) was snapped up within 30 minutes. I dont know what the circumstances were for that date to be released so soon but i know this much, i am glad that i got it. I chose Dec 4th since my family is going to be out of town come November, and that will give me ample time to prepare.  My other reason for rescheduling the lab date is my desire to have a session with cyscoexpert.com My goal is that after i sit with cyscoexpert, i should have a very good idea of where i am on taking the lab. I had initially chosen the Oct 30th date to set a deadline for myself. Now in hindsight, i do see my self getting better,  along with noticing weakpoints that need work done. Well that sums up what i did this morning.  I plan on preparing on my weak points as indicated by cyscoexpert once i return from their class, my goal is to take the lab this year.  Come late November, it will be either session two with CE or a trip to SJ for the lab. I am hoping and am going to work towards the SJ trip.

Last night wasnt only spent in chasing down a new lab date, i tackled lab 6 and was happy in doing so. I was very much looking forward to a difficulty level higher then 6, and well i got it with this lab. I did make some mistakes on the PPP section, and i totally f%$%^ed up the rip task. I had the solution in my mind, but what i ended up doing is placing the wrong octet in place. Instead of going with 1.0.0.0 i didnt think it through and dropped a 0.0.0.0 in its place. Those who have this workbook, well you know what the solution turned out to be.  Looking back at the solution, i knew i had the answer, but i just didnt think it through. Overall i felt good about the lab, minus the few mistakes in made.

Signing off for now, lab 7 is on the horizon, plus some touching up on my OSPF skills. I feel its time for me to incorporate OSPF in to my daily studies.  I am really beginning to like OSPF, and am looking forward to working on it going forward.

Update to my broadcast option post.

I received a reply back from petr at IE. He not only sent me an email but also posted in on the IEOC forum.

I am going to post it verbatim from petr. See below. Also going to add this to my ongoing list of CCIE notes.

Basically, you need the broadcast keyword in the following cases:

1) You need to run a control or management plane protocol across NBMA network and is uses multicast/broadcasts. Usually this the case with EIGRP, RIP, OSPF broadcast/p2mp networks. If you are explicitly told not to use broadcasts with FR mappings, use static neighbors for RIP/EIGRP and non-broadcast network type for OSPF.

2) You need to delilver multicast across the NBMA cloud (you need the broadcast for either pseudobroadcast solution or PIM neighbor to come up)

3) You are asked to tune some feature related to brodcasting, e.g. Frame-Relay brodcast queue.

As you can see, brodcast keyword is basically needed either for control plane traffic or some specific feature. If you are not explicitly told anything about broadcast mappings, review if any of the above applies to your scenario and configure appropriately.

To use or not use the broadcast option.

I started working on Vol 2 lab 6 tonight. Got through some of the tasks, didnt finish it up and am calling it a night. Overall i am getting faster at configuring, but now one thing is bugging me. I seem to be missing the point on when to configure the broadcast command. I know when the obvious statement is given requesting that multicas traffic is sent across the circuit, then the answer is to configure broadcast. Now i dont feel comfortable in posting the question from IE vol 2 lab 6 here, but for those folks who have it on hand, my question is if i configured broadcast across the board, would i still get the points for the question.  I posted about this on IEOC forum and am waiting to see what reply i get back. I went and scoured the doc cd about broadcast and it points me to the command portion of the cd.  Not much happening there on explaining the command, i didnt get that aha moment after reading the explanation.  I am beginning to wonder, am i getting overly concerned about this option. I know when the task asks not to use it and when to use it, but when the question doesnt ask either, then i sometimes end up screwing it up.

Ok thats my ramble for this Sunday evening. Hoping to hear something back on that. My main concern other then knowing when to use the option, is do i still get the points for the question. I guess i will find out when i do some mock labs.

Sunday lovely sunday.

So one last sunday to work before i get my freedom again. I worked out a deal with one of my coworkers to work Sunday so he can go to church, and in return he works on Saturdays. So far so good, i am holding on to the weekend days i worked for my trip to San Jose for the lab.

Ok now back to the task at hand and thats the daily study routine. I havent posted in a couple of days, there is a reason for that which i will discuss in a bit.  My lab work is going along just fine, i am now able to complete one lab on a daily basis, keeping in mind the technologies that i am only working on ( see previous post ).  So far i have completed up till lab 5. Tonight i plan on working lab 6. I have been dying to get to the higher labs ever since i got started and have finally reached them. I am looking forward to working on this lab and the remaining ones.

Well as i mentioned earlier i havent posted in a couple of days for a reason.  This past weekend i found out that someone i had met a while back recently passed their Security lab.  I found that the newly minted CCIE had visited with Cyscoexpert. Thus i decided to fire up mozilla and check out their website.  After looking at what they provided, i felt that this was a good approach to teach based on the individual students strenghts/weaknesses.  I placed a call to cyscoexpert and had a long conversation with Narem who was very gracious in discussing with me where i was at, and why i wanted to pursue the CCIE certification. Narem recommended that i visit with them for a week to see where i was technically with my skills.  Well i have been contemplating this now for the past couple of days, which is the reason for me laying low on the blogs scene. I thought about it long enough ( a couple of days ) and decided that i am going to take a one week session with cyscoexpert. I know what my weaknesses are, and yes i am working on them daily.  But i would like to engage someone else to see where i am at, and provide me with guidance.  I fired of an email to Narem asking if we could arrange a time in October, i feel that will give me ample time to work my hand at the technologies, while not letting me look like a complete novice when i show up for my session with them.  Now based on what i hear back from cyscoexpert, i might delay my lab date a few weeks or a month, depending on what their thoughts are about my skillset.

Well that sums up where i am at. Still working on the labs. I cant wait to knock out Vol 2 and then get started on Vol 3.  I have given myself till the end of this month to be well versed with FR, Eigrp & Rip and i feel my progress is going good.  Next month i plan on incorporating ospf for 2 weeks straight with redux of all the previously mentioned technologies.  Once done with Ospf,  the beast BGP will be added as well.  This is my layered approach and seems to be working out just fine for me.

Well time to get back to work. 

Moving on quite nicely.

So i didnt blog for the past couple of days, well just been a bit busy, and also i have decided to blog about what i did the night before on the following day.

The past couple of days i worked on IE Lab 2 -3. I have noticed that building consistency with focusing on a few specific topics is helping me with speed, & insight on how to narrow down what configuration options can/cannot be configured for a solution.  It used to be when i first started, an hour or more might be spent pouring over the doc cd and cisco.com itself for an answer. Now i have come to the point where i focus simply just on the doc cd unless i get completely stumped. I see that as a sign of progress as well as being able to manuever around the doc cd with much ease. Whomever said practice makes perfect sure was right.

So lessons learned last night. ( alert some of this stuff might be too easy for some of the gurus out there ). You can manipulate the no frame-relay inverse-arp by creating a sub interface and dropping the dlci in there, as long as you dont use it, then its good to go. Just an alternate method for not using the no frame-relay inverse-arp command. But i would prefer to do the forementioned command since its faster to type out then creating a sub interface. If i get a task that i question myself on then via the doc cd find if more then one solution applies.

Taking notes. I am really bad at this but what i have done is force myself to make notes in the google calender on a daily basis on what i need to visit/revisit after going through a lab. Some of the notes make sense to only me, not because English is my second language but more on the manner that i write them in. I hope that made sense. I have started along with my alias list a how to configure list as well. Its more of a list on how many ways can you configure the task on a question. ( I will post said list once i have compiled enough information ) This idea btw was taken from Antonie Hennings blog.

Well folks overall my decision to narrow down my studying/labbing on a few technologies at a time is paying off. I am going through the technologies/protocols ( FR, Eigrp, Rip & PPP ) fairly fast, completing one lab each day. As you can see i added in PPP also since my speed with the other three is picking up. Next month i plan on adding in ospf and then moving on to Bgp. In the past it was i was going through all of the fore mentioned and Ospf/Bgp which was taking me around 2-3 days to complete. I wasnt learning as much since i had stretched myself thin.

Building consistency.

Last night i completed lab 1. I did run across some trouble with task 3.7. I can do the redistribution but i cant see the routes on R1 or R2. I was very close on my redistribution solution before i looked at the solution, the answer was to redistribute the interfaces which i did, the only difference was my metrics were not the same. But even after i followed the solution to a T, the routes did not come across on R2 & R1. I left it at that after doing some initial troubleshooting since my goal is now to knock out one lab each day mainly focusing on eigrp, rip & FR. I know i didnt have this problem the last time i did this same lab, so i am wondering what i did wrong. I plan on going back on the weekend and labbing up the ones that i got stuck on. I felt that as long as i knew the how to provide the solution, that was part of the task completed, but i am not happy with why the routes didnt get sent out.

Ok so no big gotchas from last night.

Items that i am getting better with are:

My speed.

My method for focusing on the topology and asking myself what problems/traps i can visualize.

Reading re-reading each task before i start configuring. I have caught myself several times just going at the terminal and have made mistakes before, so thats getting better.

Creating aliases in notepad is also becoming second nature, especially the ones that i like to use the most. I will post them later on down the road once i have my most tried and true ones nailed down.

Ok, its time for me to get back to the daily grind now, going to work on lab 2 tonight.

Got boinked by K values last night.

I didnt have the energy to post last night so here goes…… I spent last night working on Lab 5. What i have decided to do as of yesterday is to go back over all the Frame Relay, RIP & EIGRP labs that i can from now till July 31st. I feel that i have been making some simple mistakes, and need to step back and hone some skills that by now i thought were good. I noticed that as i complete a certain technology and move away from it, rustiness on that technology kicks in. Old age, maybe, working for a non Cisco company definitely has a lot to do with it. Thus my goal for the next two weeks is to crush FR, RIP & EIGRP. So thats the game plan there for now. I completed lab 5 last night ( IEBW ), actually i only worked the fore mentioned technologies, made a mistake on the Kvalues, i knew what was wanted for the command but i didnt think through on how to configure the solution. Overall i did well, the questions asked were not tough at all, accept for the K value and well i know where i am with K values. I need to revisit this aspect. Luckily i have my Cisco Networking Academy account that i can access and look at a through breakdown of the K5 values. I highly recommend getting one and using it, the pictures work wonders for me.

I know this might have been better said at the beginning, but anyone reading this can get the gist of what i am doing & that is I am drilling the core stuff so it becomes second nature for me. I have roughly 3 plus months before i go for the lab. I dont feel any pressure at this time, but i know once October rolls around then its going to be wreaking havoc on my mind. Last night i went back over to ardenpackeers website and grabbed his study method. Thanks Arden, if there is any copyright infringement on my part then i apologize to you. I had been using the process on checking my work solely through the doc cd. MY proficiency on using the doc cd is getting better. I still dont like getting broked links ( yes i misspelled that on purpose ) but oh you live with what you get.

http://www.internetworkexpert.com/ is running their $99 special on their mock labs. Kudos to cciepursuit for posting about that. As soon as i saw that, a couple of lab dates were purchased in my name. I though best to set my dates for the end of August ( 31st ) & September 6th since both those days fall on a weekend. I plan on giving myself a week in between both tries to see where i am at. I havent used IEBW mock labs before but have heard some rave reviews, i will probably purchase a few more dates before their special runs out, but for now i would like to see how i fare with their labs. I feel that late September i will be going at the CCIE Assessor labs.

Ok well thats for it now. I think i did enough writing for the day, time to get back to work. I need to crunch out some serious labs tonight and tomorrow during the day. Saturday night, one of my ( i used to refer to her as a spinster ) cousin is getting engaged so i will be occupied with that. But i know where my mind will be and its with Dynamips and the IEBW workbook. Hmm, i think once i pass the lab a poem will need to be written for their work. Guys dont blush, its all in good fun. Lastly congrats to Antonie who passed his CCIE R/S, congrats to you my friend.

The lil things.

I was reading over ardenpackeers blog about mental stamina. Thats something i know i need to work on. I eluded to this in previous post that after a few hours i get fatigued. I am hoping to have this problem cornered in a month or so. I see myself getting better, just need to remind myself not to get cocky when i see a question, since thats when i make mistakes and either over/under think the question through.

I went back to look at blog from the man who got his CCIE in 3 months. I liked what i saw there about his securecrt comments he had. What i am doing now is running securecrt on my laptop so i can get used to it. I know its lil stuff, but isnt it the lil stuff that can crush you in the lab? I know it is, just a few short minutes ago, yours truly ended up not configuring broadcast on a frame relay map and then there i was ripping and rebuilding the config, checking my shut/no shut, double checking my dynamips config thinking WTF. And then once i looked at the solution, it turned out to be one of those DUH moments. Note to self, read my earlier comment about under/over thinking .

My speed is getting better, but thats secondary to learning the technology inside out. Its the little stuff that just kills me. Well some big stuff like redistribution also doesnt help but thats a hurdle that i know i need to spend time reading and practicing. I know this is a very weak point of mine. A few of the monsters that i need to overcome are bgp, switching, Qos and multicasting.

Its almost midnight now thus i am going to call it a day. I know its time to stop when my eyelids get heavy, no reason conning myself to keep going. It just makes the quality of studying go wimpy wimpy. Anyone remember those commercials from back in the day .

Lessons learned.

I am sitting at home going over the remnants of IEBW VOL 2 Lab 3, almost done with the bgp portion of it. As i go over these labs again, i find that i can question myself on what the solution will be. I do get stuck at times contemplating which solution if more then one applies ( at least to me ) that i should go with. One problem that i have noticed is that i pigeonhole myself in spending too much time on a task and then begin to question my solution. Btw sometimes my sanity comes in to question also, and for that i go outside and take a walk.

Lessons learned so far: Dont overlook the small stuff, i have made some mistakes not configuring no sync & even skipped router-bgp id on some routers by accident. I know these type of small mistakes can cost a lot down the road. I also noticed that as i go along my threshold for configuring for several hours at one sitting is getting better. A couple of weeks ago i extended my weekends by taking Mondays off, what i learned from that experience is that there is so much time i can spend studying before the quality of retaining the material starts to falter. Biggest lesson through all this studying is that i cant stop labbing and going over the doc cd/cisco.com material. The more i practice well you know the better i get.