Bridging the gap between CCIE RS and SP

We recently had a position available for a Senior Network Engineer and had a plan to filter the majority of the candidates out via a technical interview and shortlist two or three candidates for a thorough second interview. The idea on paper sounds pretty good so I set up a lab for the candidates to complete. This went through some beta testing at the office which was very interesting. During the beta testing in the office some said the lab was fair (those with a 80%+) while some complained that it was to easy (those who scored in the 60’s), ironically. The majority of the candidates who applied for the position already passed the CCIE written and was apparently preparing for the lab, therefore some harder questions were added to 1) make the lab more challenging and 2) make the lab interview a full hour long. Personally I think one hour is still a bit short for a practical interview, four hours would be ideal.

The mini lab consists of four devices. The candidates only have ‘enable’ access to one device where all the configuration is to be done. The other three devices have been fully preconfigured. In other words if the configuration is done correctly all links or neighbors will come up correctly as well. The candidates have exec access to the three preconfigured devices, but not access to change the configuration. This allow them to verify their configuration but also one or two questions required that the candidate do some show commands on the preconfigured devices to determine the missing part of the puzzle.

In a sense the lab interview was a failure due to the candidates failing miserably. I decided to mark the lab for each configuration individually as the questions built on each other. Full marks were awarded if the question was configured correctly even if it did not work due to an earlier mistake. Depending what the mistakes were the interviewee would score between 1 and 2 points out of 3 for each question. Examples: If the candidate knew what was needed to complete the configuration but had a wrong ip address they scored 1 point. If they configured a question correctly but made a typo or silly mistake they score 2 points. This made the scores look a bit better and did not punish ‘pressure’ mistakes to harshly. The objective of the interview was to determine the technical ability of the interviewee, therefore typo’s and real silly mistakes were a minor issue.

Interview Lab

Initial configs
R2
R4
Sw3
Sw2

This lab will also be good preparation for other practical interviews or even for someone in the early stages of CCIE lab preparation. What is your view? Is the lab above ccnp/ccip applying for a Senior Networking position? What would you say is a reasonable score taking into consideration the scoring method?

I will publish the Solution Guide in a follow up post.

Click here to see Cisco’s full version with map and details of who to contact.

So we had this Juniper to test for the last few months. Sadly it never went live as the Juniper guru’s could not get two instances of OSPF to run/work simultaneously. Yup, the most simplest of configurations, two OSPF instances with one or two neighbors each, it could not do. The time has come for the demo equipment to leave the country due to customs regulations on demo equipment which enters tax free if I understand correctly. Up to this point the juniper experience has been quite unimpressive.

At some point I worked through the Juniper as a second language flash presentation/course. This is definitely the place to start for anyone interested in getting some sort of basic understanding of Junos. The presentation is riddled with ‘tongue in cheeck’ statements like ‘What Junos can do what can not be done in IOS’, ‘Junos takes this to a much further extent’, ‘much greater’. After a while this becomes annoying, especially because it cant do the basics. If one looks hard and long enough at what a 13 year old CCNA knows compared to a CCIE, you might find one or two things the CCIE does not know or decided its to insignificant to memorize. This presentation is something similar or maybe I just missed the point. If you can bear the full 90 minutes I think this is definitely the place to start. This sounds very much like Linux is better than Microsoft we saw a few years back. Personally I think the exact same will happen to Junos, it will find its place in the network, while Cisco will continue to dominate the market.

No PTSD is not some weird cisco proprietary protocol. Some info on wikipedia that you already know:

Post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is an anxiety disorder that can develop after exposure to one or more terrifying events that threatened or caused grave physical harm.^[3] It is a severe and ongoing emotional reaction to an extreme psychological trauma

CCIE Candidate was the first to form the link between the CCIE lab and PTSD and called it post-traumatic test disorder. In short these words describe it best “…curl up into the fetal position and start sucking my thumb…”. It has been two months since I got the digits and only now starting to recover. I have noticed that after the lab there were two phases. The fist month was a huge high on adrenaline and the only thought on my mind was “what next? what else?”. To actually sit and not know what to do with the free time was similar to meeting an ex girlfriend you haven’t seen for a few months. Equally awkward as excited. Then the second phase arrive, you remember why you guys broke up in the first place and for some unknown reason become a bit disposed. The last month or so was hopefully the lowest point on the sine wave. I kept wondering whether all the blood, swear and tears was really worth the digits? Before the lab I wondered why it seemed that the ccie blogs seem to fade away after getting the digits. Now I know, I subconsciously block every thing related to the lab out. I still receive the groupstudy emails but the first thing I do in the morning is to delete literally 99% of it. I only read the off topic emails. This is all changing, Im blogging again, I start reading some SP related emails on groupstudy and Im genuinely interested in doing the MPLS exam of the CCIP track. There is still a mental block when I think about the other two subjects required for the CCIP cert. Not more QOS or BGP, Im not ready for them yet.

If this post seems incomplete, it will be because it is. Im having a ripple effect of the sine wave.

Currently the November 24 - 28, 2008 dates for the mobile lab have been confirmed. I am assuming that it will be in Sandton, Johannesburg. Anyone interested can email me ccie at 21500.org or get into contact with your local SE. Seats are limited so the sooner the better.

In the Cape Town area at the largest ISP in SA. Anyone interested can contact me ccie at 21500.org. Candidates will probably have a CCNP, but a lot of emphasis on technical configuration. Thus the first round of interviews are technical in the form of an hour lab. Good opportunity for someone with the skill but not the certs or someone with certs but not much working experience. In a nutshell the technical interview will consist of a rack and some questions. The solution is to be configured on the devices. The questions range from very basic to a bit advance, but its not required nor expected to score perfect on the lab.

Every now and again when I read through the blog statistics I have a good chuckle at the search phrases that refer surfers to the blog.

Some recent humorous search keywords:
getting ccie easily
pass ccie in 40 days

This reminds me of the ccie or two in 30 days. Appolgies, I could not find the original in the groupstudy archive.

Lately I’ve been very curious about Junos. It also just so happened that we got a loan M10 (End-of-life?) from Juniper to ‘test’. Somehow it was decided that the best way to test is to put it in the production network. IMO this was not a bright move as there will be no tinkering with it, but anyhow, a good chance to get some exposure to the OS while it is still new and interesting. I’ve managed to simulate a juniper router with vmware using the files available for download on the torrent sites. Searching for ‘torrent olive vmware’ is a good start. Olive is in a way very similar to dynamips. In the coming weeks I will post some newbie level posts about my findings.

Juniper Certs
Im really keen on getting one Juniper cert, just for fun. Why for fun? JNCIS-ER Juniper cant be serious either right? One good thing about the Juniper certs though is that the Professional level cert is also a practical as like the expert level exam. The written for the Professional level also recertifies the expert level exam. Thats all fun and games, but there is no-way Im getting serious e.g JNCIE-M/T (reminds me of the ugliest car ever) until they make it look professional e.g JCIE looks sweet to me, that I wont mind putting along side CCIE on a business card.

Juniper blogs
While looking for juniper blogs, I found some interesting posts by Jeff Doyle that I thought was worth a mention. The posts cover the basics, suitable for people like me who have absolutely no idea. Jeff’s posts thus far:
Navigating a JUNOS Configuration
The JUNOS Software Architecture
Adding JUNOS to Your Repertoire

Booting Junos
Before continuing I have to mention that I have no idea what Im doing, so take everything juniper related with a pinch of salt.

Strictly speaking the Junos license requires the OS to be run on a juniper device, but I have to believe that for the purpose of learning the OS, Juniper would allow the use of an Olive. The package I downloaded had all the files included as well as the multicast patch already applied. After extracting I had the vwmare files and also the vwmare workstation. Steps taken to boot the olive:
1) Install Vmware Workstation
2) Boot the Olive.vmx in the Vmware Workstation

Thats it, pretty simple compared to dynamips. I had one thing I couldnt resolve by searching on the net. After login in as ‘root’ the Os took me too a ~# prompt, I was expecting > as suggested in Jeff’s posts. With some trial and error I typed the lucky command ‘cli’. This command takes the device from unix mode to router mode or ‘operational mode’:

login: root
[]:~#
[]:~# cli
root>

Once the OS is in this ‘router mode’ or ‘operational mode’ it starts to look, feel and react more like a router and less as a unix box. At first I could not ‘commit’ any new configuration. It is necessary to first set the root password:

root> configure
[edit]
root# set system host-name home
root# commit
[edit] ’system’ Missing mandatory statement:
‘root-authentication’ error: commit failed:
(missing statements)
root# set system root-authentication plain-text-password somepass
root# commit
root@home#

The next objective is to boot a second router and get the two to talk to each other.

Congratulation Jorge, you thoroughly deserve it mate! Enjoy…

Jorge used to comment on the blog while I was in preparation mode and kept me on my toes. Im so glad my CCIE study partner from the other side of the world also made it to the top. Again, congrats

SP next Jorge?

Im all packed and ready for the trip to SP. By that I mean I have all the material needed to take me the distance, courtesy of Mike Down. Big thanks to him and IPexpert.

The shortcut straight to the SP written seems very tempting but going through all that studying for the written, it may payoff by getting the ccip cert along the way. More on the strategy later.

If the Cisco mobile lab team work their magic, SP may be available from May09 on the mobile lab. Im holding thumbs for this to happen as my only other viable lab location options are Brussels and Sao Paulo. I’d hate to go back to Brazil and Brussels is a ‘at best’ 15hour trip. It would be great to get a second star mid 09.