From: Capt.Spock (capt.spock@gmail.com)
Date: Fri Dec 17 2004 - 11:03:48 GMT-3
Congrats! Curious to know why u say "Don't even do the labs, just
study the diagrams. from Cisco Press lab book (Duggan et al)" .
On Thu, 16 Dec 2004 19:51:19 -0800, McLaughlin, Jeffery
<JMcLaughlin@sfchronicle.com> wrote:
> I passed my first attempt over a month ago at San Jose, #14023. I wasn't in
> the mood to do a write-up until now...
>
> I haven't posted to this group because I never felt had anything to say. But
> I've been reading Groupstudy since the days of Token Ring switching, and to
> all whose posts helped me, I can only say thanks.
>
> Now, what you want to know... How was the lab? Overall, it was tough, but
> doable.
>
> I'd been using Internetwork Expert's labs, and I heard that the real thing is
> a lot easier. To my suprise, I found it to be about an 8 in terms of IE's
> labs. Maybe a 7. It was quite hard. That should should warn you to be very,
> very prepared. When I first read the test, I saw a number of things I hadn't
> seen before, as well as some questions where I initially wasn't sure what they
> wanted me to do. This is why it is so, so important to know the theory. After
> my initial panic, I dug in and figured out the answers pretty quickly. I
> finished with two hours to spare, and then went back and pinged everything
> from every router, fixed a bunch of mistakes. I don't use TCL scripts; my
> theory is why waste your time debugging a script when you should be debugging
> your lab? It takes only about 15 mintues to ping everything. Anyhow, I left
> five minutes early.
>
> The wording on some tasks was confusing. In one case, two requirements were
> apparently contradictory. The proctor helped me to sort it out ultimately.
> Don't be afraid to ask them questions, and don't waste an hour trying to
> figure out a poorly worded question. Talk to them right away.
>
> When I got back to the hotel, I thought I failed. 20 minutes after the test
> ended, I got an email telling me to go to Cisco's web site. My friend who
> passed in April waited 4 hours, so I thought I was dead. What almost killed me
> was that you have to put your written test date and score in to get your
> results, and I didn't know mine! I knew it was in April, so I started guessing
> at dates until I hit it. I almost passed out during those five minutes, I'll
> tell you. If you're traveling to the test site, BRING YOUR WRITTEN SCORE
> REPORT WITH YOU!!!
>
> OK, my advice on passing. First, know your theory. I started studying theory
> in January, when I started studying for the written. I approached the written
> like a research project, poring through every book I could get my hands on.
> Read non-Cisco books first: Comer and/or Stevens' books on TCP/IP, Perlman's
> "Interconnections", John Moy's book on OSPF, John Stewart's book on BGP,
> Huitema's protocols book. I then re-enforced the concepts with extensive lab
> work, dreaming up my own scenarios to test the technologies and protocols.
>
> After I passed the written, I began a six-month lab prep program. I went
> through a different technology each week, both reading theory and
> experimenting in the lab. Big topics, like BGP, I spent more time on. I did
> all of the examples in Doyle's books. As I worked, I took notes. In addition
> to general notes, I made flash cards of obscure commands, and made a list of
> "gotcha" items--things that had tripped me up or that I tended to forget to
> do.
>
> With two months to go, and a solid background and understanding of the
> technologies, I dove into sample labs. I settled on Internetwork Expert's labs
> as the best, after doing a few from another major vendor. The other vendor's
> labs just threw the kitchen sink into every lab to make them "tough," but they
> were not carefully thought out. I strongly recommend Internetwork Expert.
> Well-designed labs not only expose you to some of the "tricks" you need to
> remember for the test, but they should also deepen your understanding of how
> complex technologies interact. There were two or three things on the test I
> hadn't seen before, and I only solved these problems because I understood the
> protocols well enough to think through the difficulty. The IE labs were
> crucial in this preparation. My only <minor> complaint about them is that
> their solutions guide is distributed in encrypted PDF format, and I had a lot
> of problems getting the Authentica software to work. I'd also recommend buying
> the Cisco Press lab book (Duggan et al.) Don't even do the labs, just study
> the diagrams. They're a lot closer to the real thing than IE's diagrams. I got
> tripped up in the lab because I kept misreading the notation on the diagrams.
>
> I did one or two labs a week, and did not time myself, although I did limit my
> documentation to the CD. After I finished a lab I would VERY carefully grade
> myself and document my errors. I re-read my ever-growing "lab errors" doc
> every night. This limited the chances of my repeating a mistake, and was one
> of the keys to my success. Be sure to be honest with yourself about your
> capabilities. I mean, I've run into people who are on their third attempt and
> still don't know the difference between MED and LOCAL_PREF. You have to be
> your own harshest critic, constantly admitting your failures to yourself in
> order to correct them.
>
> A month before my test I took the Internetwork Expert Java-based mock-lab
> class. I do recommend it, but only if you are well prepared. They will find
> and fill the gaps in your knowledge, but if your gaps are chasms, they won't
> be able to help. The four labs I did for this class were the only timed labs
> I did, and I used the class to develop my time-management skills.
>
> As you start doing labs, you will discover many technologies that you don't
> know well, or maybe never even heard of. It can be intimidating, but don't
> waste your time learning the nuances of Mobile IP or server load balancing
> with IOS. Just focus on the core: switching, NBMA and its oddities, routing
> protocols, multicast, QoS. There are too many other IOS features out there to
> learn all of them. If you know the Doc CD, you can deal with those in the
> lab. One thing that I did that helped with this was to make a list with the
> names of weird features I didn't know how to configure, and a one or two
> sentence description. I memorized this the week before the lab. That way, if
> I came across one of these features, I would know its name, which is critical
> for finding it on the doc cd. E.g., it's hard to find "a feature that
> verifies incoming packets are coming in on the interface that they would
> normally be routed out of;" it's easy to find "Unicast RPF" on the CD,
> right?
>
> A parting thought: I see CCIE's selling their racks on eBay after they pass,
> but now that I have it that's the last thing I'd do. I'm keeping my rack and
> plunging into IPv6 and MPLS; after all, aren't CCIE's supposed to know
> everything?
>
> Jeff McLaughlin
> CCIE #14023
>
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