From: Vijay Ramcharan (vramcharan@thedeal.com)
Date: Fri Jul 01 2005 - 09:35:53 GMT-3
A few people have asked for the roadmap I used to pass the lab. I've
listed it as best as I can remember below. Most of it is generally
known anyway.
====LONG POST BELOW====
From where I started last year to get to the point of finishing one of
the Internetwork Expert practice labs rated at difficulty 7/10 or
higher, in a reasonable amount of time (<12 hours, including bathroom
breaks, vending machine trips, fiddling with Windows Media Player,
picking up from the day before etc), takes a lot of research and
practice.
I was only able to complete a full lab in 10 hours or so, within this
past month or thereabouts. I refrained from looking at the answer guide
until I thoroughly researched a particular problem.
That was the most effective approach for me as research helped to widen
my scope of knowledge. It's also extremely frustrating when sometimes
you're not sure what you're looking for.
The recommended reading list of books, along with the various guides on
CCO, Groupstudy and lab time with a fixed schedule, EVERYDAY, were
instrumental in helping me prepare.
BTW, I did not know the exact path (click here, then click there etc) to
all the different areas on the doc CD. I used keyword searches
extensively. This meant that I had to be as specific when searching and
I had to know what to weed out in the search results. I had to be able
to scan a doc page within a few seconds and determine if it applied to
my question or not. If you choose this route, use the minus symbol to
exclude pages from your search results. E.g. univercd vlan filter c3550
-fallback returns results that don't include fallback (fallback
bridging) but include univercd and the other keywords. You can use
multiple '-keywords' separated by spaces to narrow your results even
more. There are probably even better ways to search but this worked for
me.
Since last December if I remember correctly, I was studying every
weekday. I changed that strategy around February I think, to include
Saturday and Sunday. It's really tough at the beginning because I was
basically starting from almost nothing. With perseverance though,
you'll begin to gain ground faster and faster.
Study time in the initial months was usually split as 75%
reading/research, 25% lab time. This became more of a 50/50 arrangement
later and in the last couple of months it was about 20% reading/research
and 80% lab time. It's a natural progression I think.
In the beginning, I sometimes spent 3 or more study sessions trying to
get through a single lab question that I just couldn't get working.
Tweaking, removing, trying different approaches etc. Sometimes, it took
me 2 weeks just to finish one lab. Personally, I think the beginning
hurdles pose the biggest problems. They can either strengthen your
resolve or break you.
My rack time was usually 4-5 hours per day, more on the weekend. I did
not study at home at all, even though my rack was remotely accessible.
It was all done at my workplace, after hours. I also went in on
weekends. I found that being at home was not conducive to studying. I
tried to get in a good 6 hours of sleep every night. It doesn't help if
you study until the wee hours one day and you're tired the next. I
didn't have much of a personal life. If you have family, you have to
arrange your absence from them appropriately.
The labs I used, in chronological order, were:
All In One Guides - Hutnik, Satterlee
CCIE Warm Up Labs, Vol 1 - IPExpert
CCIE Practical Studies Vol 1. - Cisco Press, Solie
CCIE Warm Up Labs, Vol 2 - IPExpert
CCIE Practical Studies Vol 2 - Cisco Press, Solie
Cisco Press CCIE Lab Guide - Cisco Press
Internetwork Expert R&S Labs Vol 1, Ver 2 - InternetworkExpert.com
Internetwork Expert R&S Labs Vol 2 - InternetworkExpert.com
With the exception of the introductory labs in the All in One guides and
the labs in IEWB Vol2 of which I only completed the first 2, all the
others were completed with varying degrees of success when compared to
the solutions.
I can honestly say that the labs in IEWB Vol 2 are quite difficult. I
wouldn't recommend trying them until you're fully prepared with the
first IE workbook. If I had to complete one from start to finish in 8
hours, I'm quite sure that I would have a tough time getting it done.
I don't mean to say the other labs out there from IPExpert and NMC etc,
are not good. I just choose the IE labs because they were within the
constraints of my budget at the time. If I hadn't passed, I would have
purchased the other workbooks.
Be honest with yourself and don't cheat by looking at the answers until
you've exhausted all avenues of research. Try to complete the entire
lab before going through the solution guide.
Keep a notebook and write down what you learn after solving a
particularly thorny problem. It's almost guaranteed that you'll run
into it again and you don't always remember how you solved it the last
time. There were more than a few instances when I wished I had written
something down. Note important facts and subtle nuances between
commands. What's important for you may not be important for someone
else. That's why you must keep your own notes.
I know I used mine as a general review the morning before my real lab,
to keep difficult concepts in the foreground.
Lastly, don't approach the lab expecting to fail. Approach it as if you
will pass. Confidence plays a big role in avoiding fatal second-guess
configs. I did not do much second-guessing. I went through possible
solutions in my mind and chose what seemed the most appropriate. So
choose your solutions carefully and go for it. I know that after I left
the lab, I had many doubts but what's important is that I didn't have
those doubts (maybe because I didn't have the time) during the lab.
I hope this post was of some help and encouragement.
Vijay Ramcharan
CCIE# 14824, CCDP, MCSE
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