From: Darby Weaver (darbyweaver@yahoo.com)
Date: Sat Jun 10 2006 - 14:45:47 ART
Petr,
Again my compliments and congratulations.
You have indeed been an asset to Groupstudy and to
myself as well.
Your positive attitude, your willingness to try to
help on any issue or technology and your attitude in
general.
Some people come to Groupstudy it seems only to flame
others...
You came to Groupstudy and put out those fires...
You've done well for yourself and many will benefit
from your answers to people's questions, simple or
hard, yuor insightful checklist, and now from your
positive feedback.
I suspect you will have very little problems in your
career and your future endeavors.
Heartfelt Congratulations, and Thank you for all of
the emails we have exchanged.
I had the feeling you were just going to the lab to
get your number.
:)
Darby Weaver
--- Petr Lapukhov <petrsoft@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hello group,
>
> As I quickly mentioned, I passed my lab on June 8 in
> Brussels :)
>
> It was much easier than I thought it would be.
> Actually, it took
> me only 3 hours to complete the lab...
>
> But now, how many hours did it take for me to
> prepare? :)
>
> To be honest, I started my lab studies on spring
> 2005. At that
> moment, I already had about 5 year of networking
> experience,
> and held CCNP/CCDP certificates. My first "wave" of
> studies
> begun with NMC's DoIT. Back in days, I planned to
> take lab on
> Fall 2005, but that plan did not work ;)
>
> After four months of intensive studies, I decided to
> cancel my lab,
> due to some personal problems :) So I took a break,
> and shifted my
> target to Spring-Summer 2006. At that moment I had a
> much better
> understanding of core R&S topics.
>
> At the same time, I realized how many things I were
> missing :)
> DoIT's approach is a kind of "kickstart", that makes
> someone feel
> frustration, facing complex topics from very
> beginning :)
>
> So then I spet Sep-Dec 2005 working on some CQS
> exams,
> and other regular things, thus having a four months
> break of
> my CCIE studies.
>
> My second "wave" begun on Jan 2006, with DoIT2. I
> scheduled my
> lab on Jun 8, and reworked every lab from DoIT2.
> That time I got a
> much better feeling. Tasks, that seemed to be
> complex, become
> much more familiar and easy to understand. I also
> made a habit to
> work with DocCD on regular basis, memorizing it's
> structure and
> building navigation skills.
>
> At that time I got very solid undestanding of core
> topics, and felt more
> cofident working with 12.2T/12.3T features. DoIT is
> especially
> focused on all that new features :)
>
> Up to April 2006, I finished with DoIT2, and started
> to look for
> some different learning sources.
>
> Fortunately and specially thanks to Brian Dennis, I
> got a chance to
> work with IE's products. That really changed my
> vision of "lab reality".
>
> First, IE's approach is incremental and well
> structured, not single-shot.
> That makes it very attractive for beginners.
> Secondly, IE has lab structure
> really close to real thing, thanks to backone
> routers. And finally, tasks
> formatting and logic is quite different from DoIT's,
> and score points system
>
> is really useful.
>
> (BTW, both DoIT and IE labs are 3-5 times more
> harder than real thing :)
>
> Unfortunately, I had no time to begin from the
> "bottom" again, so
> I decided to spend my time just on IEWB-RS
> Vol1/Vol2. That was
> really nice learning experience, which helped me to
> close undestanding
> gaps, as well as to get even more hands-on
> experience. I finished
> my preparations with IE's Core Labs, to cement my
> fundametal skills.
>
> After that, I decided to take CheckIT lab, pursuing
> few goals. First,
> I wanted to test my latest "IE experince" with
> "independent" tool.
> Secondly, I wanted to know, how much of "NMC-like"
> stuff I still
> remember :) And finally, CheckIT has automatic
> grading system
> which would like to see in action. Of course, it was
> also important
> to test my time-management skills, as well as to
> feel "pressure".
>
> I passed CheckIT Lab13 with score 95, and finally
> felt myself
> confident. CheckIT lab was really hard, and it was a
> real fun to
> pass it :)
>
> Okay, then I had that last week before my travel
> date :)
> I spent it on IE's Core and Vol 1 labs, as well as
> DocCD practice.
>
> The rest part is simple. I came to Brussels, and had
> two days of
> beer-sessions with my friends ;)) That Belgian beer
> really helped
> me to relax :) Okay, not so fun part was that I also
> got some sunburns,
> wandering over water-channels :)
>
> I came to lab on June 8 completely relaxed (almost
> careless :)
> We had Tom from RTP as our proctor, and I must say
> he was
> very helpful, answering my numerous questions. Our
> lab
> begun at 8:00, and I was finished at 11:00.
> Remaining time I spent
> on coffee drinking, as well as doing countless
> verifications :) I
> hope I did'nt piss that guy left to me, hitting my
> keyboard
> at really insane rate :)
>
> I got my result next morning, and should say that I
> had almost
> no worry if I will pass or not. I dont know why,
> maybe I already
> got too much impressions from my visit :)
>
> To summarize my experience, I can say a few things.
> First, don't
> be nervous or afraid of real lab. It is simple. If
> you worked hard
> with workbooks, and really studied in well planned
> manner, you
> should have no problems at all. Just don't hurry too
> much to
> get your number :)
>
> Secondly, for me, the most funny part were
> preparations itself.
> I really enjoyed working through numerous tasks (i
> guess my wife
> did not :) And the most fun part was communications
> with really
> interesting people over this list :) Thank you guys,
> it's the best
> thing I got from my studies - a lot of people, whom,
> hopefully,
> I could help a little bit.
>
> I guess it's time for me to take some rest, and go
> farther that
> way, together with all you folks around :)
>
> HTH
> Petr
>
>
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