Longtime since I blogged...The reason being the subject itself...hectic work and plans for personal growth, kept me kinda busy these days.
Networks has always interested me and so have been those certifications since college days. It was in Jan 07 that I finished my CCNA paper. The initial euphoria had made me think, I'll read CCNP for a month, practice for a month and become a Cisco Certified Network Professional in about 2 months. Thats when I skimmed through CCNP Syllabus, was aghast to discover that CCNP like CCNA is not just a single paper but its a set of 4 papers. Started off preparing with BSCI which is the common paper for CCNP, CCIP, CCVP and other professional level certifications. This subject is like our first year engineering wherin you get to read all different branches. Here it forms the base for all different certifications as it includes an introduction of all Interiro Gateway Protocals (IGP) and Exterior Gateway Protocols (EGP). Got hold of a book by some specific cisco author and began my preparation. The book started with the basics of each protocol and gave an indepth explanation of the different configurations, outputs and explanation for the same. Was so happy with this book that I never cared to have a look at other BSCI books and went for the exam in about 6 months. Flunked the first time.Only at the exam did i realise that I had reffered a book which was outdated and had some important chapters which were added offlate,missing. DHCP, IPv6, Multicast as I remember. Flunking was pretty dissapointing as I had slogged like the way I used to back in my college days. But yes, the fact also remains that BSCI syllabus is vast compared to any of the professional level papers.
Browsed a lot, used to read a lot of blogs related to success stories and also learned to use IOU, dynamips meanwhile. Decided I'll read cisco student guides to get a better understang of the concepts. And also got to know these were the syllabus followed in network academies. By referring to latest student guides I was atleast sure that I'm not missing out any topics with respect to the examination. At this point had to change my team. This is when I realised CCIP would be more appropriate for my responsibilities at work than CCNP. Started working on a project related to QoS broadband related areas. So decided to take up QoS certification first.Finished it and went back to BSCI (didnot change the book though :)). Got hold of those extra chapters I had missed and prepared well and passed BSCI in my second attempt. Then it was the time when confusion cropped wether BGP next or MPLS. Started with MPLS as it sounded the hott technology.Mid way through realised you needed good understanding of BGP to understand MPLS well. Eventhough BSCI had introduced to BGP topics,I didnot remember much about BGP as it was 6 months since I took the exam. So started preparing BGP in parallel, felt pretty interesting and finished studying most part of it. Speaking to seniors realised it was better to take a combined paper of BGP+MPLS. So prepared for both the exams and took a combined paper. Finished it by end of july 08. So it needed 1 1/2 years of weekend slogging to finish of my CCIP. Hope I'll constantly implement the concepts I've learnt at work and see to it that I'll develop more knowlegde in the ever expanding cisco technologies. But should accept, CCIP gave a good base for understanding basic concepts of multiple cisco technologies.
What next? Well have some non-technical plans in mind. Meanwhile thinking of giving some break and setting up a home PC with all latest configurations and high RAM to run dynamips and practice most of the concepts learnt all these days. This would make some serious sense if I decide on preparing for CCIE in near future. Works been really hectic from the last 8 months. Feeling a sense of satisfaction that I could pull of my professional certification inspite of hectic schedules. Much more happier that I finally found a topic and some time to pen down a blog here.:)
Networks has always interested me and so have been those certifications since college days. It was in Jan 07 that I finished my CCNA paper. The initial euphoria had made me think, I'll read CCNP for a month, practice for a month and become a Cisco Certified Network Professional in about 2 months. Thats when I skimmed through CCNP Syllabus, was aghast to discover that CCNP like CCNA is not just a single paper but its a set of 4 papers. Started off preparing with BSCI which is the common paper for CCNP, CCIP, CCVP and other professional level certifications. This subject is like our first year engineering wherin you get to read all different branches. Here it forms the base for all different certifications as it includes an introduction of all Interiro Gateway Protocals (IGP) and Exterior Gateway Protocols (EGP). Got hold of a book by some specific cisco author and began my preparation. The book started with the basics of each protocol and gave an indepth explanation of the different configurations, outputs and explanation for the same. Was so happy with this book that I never cared to have a look at other BSCI books and went for the exam in about 6 months. Flunked the first time.Only at the exam did i realise that I had reffered a book which was outdated and had some important chapters which were added offlate,missing. DHCP, IPv6, Multicast as I remember. Flunking was pretty dissapointing as I had slogged like the way I used to back in my college days. But yes, the fact also remains that BSCI syllabus is vast compared to any of the professional level papers.
Browsed a lot, used to read a lot of blogs related to success stories and also learned to use IOU, dynamips meanwhile. Decided I'll read cisco student guides to get a better understang of the concepts. And also got to know these were the syllabus followed in network academies. By referring to latest student guides I was atleast sure that I'm not missing out any topics with respect to the examination. At this point had to change my team. This is when I realised CCIP would be more appropriate for my responsibilities at work than CCNP. Started working on a project related to QoS broadband related areas. So decided to take up QoS certification first.Finished it and went back to BSCI (didnot change the book though :)). Got hold of those extra chapters I had missed and prepared well and passed BSCI in my second attempt. Then it was the time when confusion cropped wether BGP next or MPLS. Started with MPLS as it sounded the hott technology.Mid way through realised you needed good understanding of BGP to understand MPLS well. Eventhough BSCI had introduced to BGP topics,I didnot remember much about BGP as it was 6 months since I took the exam. So started preparing BGP in parallel, felt pretty interesting and finished studying most part of it. Speaking to seniors realised it was better to take a combined paper of BGP+MPLS. So prepared for both the exams and took a combined paper. Finished it by end of july 08. So it needed 1 1/2 years of weekend slogging to finish of my CCIP. Hope I'll constantly implement the concepts I've learnt at work and see to it that I'll develop more knowlegde in the ever expanding cisco technologies. But should accept, CCIP gave a good base for understanding basic concepts of multiple cisco technologies.
What next? Well have some non-technical plans in mind. Meanwhile thinking of giving some break and setting up a home PC with all latest configurations and high RAM to run dynamips and practice most of the concepts learnt all these days. This would make some serious sense if I decide on preparing for CCIE in near future. Works been really hectic from the last 8 months. Feeling a sense of satisfaction that I could pull of my professional certification inspite of hectic schedules. Much more happier that I finally found a topic and some time to pen down a blog here.:)
