Cisco Blog

More CCNA Voice Information

Cisco has just launched a new learning site that has great info about all the new certifications. Click here to check it out.

One of the documents they posted to the site is excellent. It's the CCNA Voice prep session from the Networker's conference. If you want to get a good idea of the question types, topics, etc, download this document.

Training in an Alternate Universe

So...I'm sitting in the Cisco keynote speech featuring Padmasree Warrior (Cisco's new CIO) who is talking about the power of collaboration in the world. She was mentioning things like Twitter, vLogs, and Second Life...suddenly, a brilliant idea hits me: training in Second Life?!? Is it possible?

Okay, I admit, up until now, I thought Second Life was going to lead us into the Matrix...where everyone lived in and was controlled by machines. I steered clear of it. But, now I'm thinking - is it possible to deliver live, interactive classes through Second Life? Help me out here second-lifers...Here's my idea...

Build a "virtual classroom" in second life where "virtual students" can come and see a whiteboard, ask questions, watch live demos on Cisco gear, maybe even do labs themselves? Is it possible? What would it take to make it happen?

This could be really cool...

New CCNA Certifications: The Cat is Out of the Bag!

Finally, on Tuesday afternoon, Cisco announced the new CCNA-level certifications...and they are (drum roll please):

CCNA Security
CCNA Voice
CCNA Wireless

I'm actually creating the CCNA Voice Official Exam Certification Guide for Cisco Press as we speak. I've got to tell you - this certification is awesome. It completely fills a much needed gap of knowledge that's needed before you get into the CCVP program. I can't speak for the Security & Wireless certs, but in the CCNA Voice, you'll be learning:

VoIP & Legacy System Integration
CallManager Express setup
Unity Express setup
Basic QoS, Dial-Peers, and other technical nuances

Having this foundation before someone gets into a CCVP will be awesome. Yesterday afternoon, Cisco Press conducted a "podcast video interview" with me about the cert. I'll post the link as soon as it's available. I was actually interviewed by none other than Jeff Doyle (the TCP/IP routing genus) - I'm honored! Anyhow, I'm finally free to talk about this stuff, which is relieving. I'm sure I'll talk plenty about it in my 4:00pm session today at Networkers.

UPDATE: It looks like the Routing and Switching CCNA (the original) will be the prerequisite for all the other CCNA specialties.

UPDATEx2: CCVP and CCSP will now require CCNA Voice and CCNA Security as official prerequisites as of June 2009.

Here's more information, if you're interested:

Official Cisco Press Announcement

Cisco's CCNA Voice Preparation Course

A Cisco Tip Repository

Cisco has converted their "Reader TIPS" from the TAC newsletter into a WIKI. Plenty of cool stuff here:

http://supportwiki.cisco.com/ViewWiki/index.php/Tech_Insights:Homepage

My New Favorite IOS Command

I know I mentioned this command in passing a few posts ago, but this command has become so valuable to me, it needs its own post. It's the show run | section command. This allows you to define any "major heading" from the IOS configuration and it will filter the running configuration down to just those sections. This is very similar to how the ASA "show run" command works.

For example, I'm working on a book focused around CallManager Express (CME) right now. In CME, you create "ephones" which represent the IP Phones on your network. If I wanted to see the configuration for all my ephones, I can just type:

CME_Voice#show run | s ephone
max-ephones 24
ephone-dn 1
number 1000
ephone-dn 2 dual-line
number 1001
ephone-dn 3 dual-line
number 1003
ephone-dn 10 dual-line
number 1010
huntstop channel
ephone-dn 11
number 1010
preference 1
ephone 1
device-security-mode none
mac-address 0014.1C48.E71A
button 1:10
ephone 2
device-security-mode none
mac-address 0019.D122.DCF3
button 1:11
ephone 3
device-security-mode none
mac-address 0014.A89E.F845
button 1:1 2:2 3:3
ephone 4
device-security-mode none

(FYI - "s" is short for "section") As you can see, this shows all the sections of running-config that start with "ephone", which is all my ephones and ephone-dns (their directory numbers). Gotta love it!

Cisco Networkers is Here Again!

It's that time of year again. Starting June 23rd, Cisco Networkers kicks off in Orlando, FL...okay...who's idea was it to move this to the East coast... (ugh...3 hours earlier wake up time...)

This should be a week of technology fun - some of the sessions are a little dry, but have great information. I'll be teaching a couple CCVP certification prep sessions, so stop on by and say hello if you happen to be roaming the halls! Here's my session info:

CCVP Prep: Cisco IP Telephony Essentials, Tuesday 8:00am (Yes, that'd be 5:00am my time...I'm begging for pity on this time thing...)
CCVP Prep: Cisco IP Telephony Essentials, Wednesday, 4:00pm

I'm just excited to hear that the Blue Man Group will be performing this year along with Barenaked Ladies (who came up with that name anyway???) for the "Cisco Event".

Anyone up for karaoke on "If I had a million dollars"?

Cisco Command Reference

Handy tip from Cisco TAC - if you've ever wanted to generate a command guide for your router, you can use the show parser dump command. Just type show parser dump <mode> where <mode> is the config mode of the router you'd like to see. For example:

CAT3550#show parser dump interface
Mode Name :interface

0 exit
0 help
15 description
15 switchport access vlan Number
15 switchport access vlan dynamic
15 switchport host
15 switchport mode access
15 switchport mode trunk
15 switchport mode dynamic auto
15 switchport mode dynamic desirable
15 switchport mode dot1q-tunnel
15 switchport trunk allowed vlan add
15 switchport trunk allowed vlan remove
15 switchport trunk allowed vlan except
15 switchport trunk allowed vlan all
15 switchport trunk allowed vlan none
15 switchport trunk allowed vlan
15 switchport trunk encapsulation isl
15 switchport trunk encapsulation dot1q
15 switchport trunk encapsulation negotiate
...

Generates a list of all commands from interface configuration mode. You can even see all the sub-commands and syntax description by typing show parser dump <mode> extend.

Budget Wireless Sniffer

Just found this wireless sniffer from Canary Wireless. Looks like a pretty nice, cheap alternative to me carrying my laptop around trying to figure out what wireless channels are in use when deploying a wireless network.

UPDATE: Even better!!! http://www.thinkgeek.com/tshirts/illuminated/991e/. TShirts reach a whole new level.

GNS3 Dream Fulfilled

Lo and behold - my GNS3 Lab Dream has been mostly fulfilled! As I was blogging on Network World, one of the readers posted this link:

http://7200emu.hacki.at/

It's a massive GNS3 support/lab forum where many people have created lab topologies for existing books/scenarios out on the market! Much less work than creating labs manually (my initial idea). I've redirected GNS3Labs.com to this site - great stuff!

Okay...I have to admit...I'm a little bummed this is already out there. It feels a little like I jumped out of my chair saying, "wouldn't it be great if there was a device that could excite water molecules to cause friction and heat up food?!?!" Ehhh... I'm sure I'll get over it - I'm really excited to see this site in play!

UPDATE: In surfing through the site, they even have a .NET file for the CCIE topology I created for CBTNuggets! Awesome!

Okay...I can admit when I'm wrong...

SecureCRT is incredible... Last week, my PuttyCM software crashed again. In a moment of frustration, I pulled out my credit card and paid the $139.00 for SecureCRT 6.0 with 3 years of maintenance. It's a little like the flu shot...you feel stupid paying money for it and it really hurts, but you're glad you did it when it's all over.

How did I ever live without this anti-idle feature before?!?

Ah geez...side note - I just went to the Putty CM website and saw they now have Alpha version 0.7.0 out that fixes many of the bugs I previously complained about. I can't believe I've just wasted $139.00 on SecureCRT now.

...I'm such a schizophrenic flake...

Geez...I thought I was bad...

I was doing some looking around at Internetwork Expert and came across some of Scott Morris' material (which looks really good from the samples!). Being naturally curious, I googled his name and found a Network World article describing his home lab...Now THAT is nice! Insane...but NICE!

What's funnier was that in reading more of his biography, he used to run a BBS system I regularly used (The Assassin's Guild). Ha! Small world.

To All the Students I've Loved Before

Just a quick note to everyone. Now that I've launched the CiscoBlog Forums, I've seen plenty of posts just saying hi, or thanks, or any number of things directed at or to me personally. First off, thanks for all the kind words! Second, please don't be offended if I don't reply - I can barely keep up with my email much less forum/blog posts...thanks!

GNS3, The Initial Lab

Alright...this took a little more time than I had hoped, but my initial GNS3 lab is done. I designed this initial lab to test through most of the Cisco CCENT concepts. I'm planning on posting this on the Network World blog I'm running this month tomorrow, but figured I'd post it here first. The GNS3 topology is using a 2600 series router / image (I figured many people could get ahold of one of these images either via a SmartNet contract or Ebay). The exact image I used is c2600-i-mz.123-26.bin.

The lab itself isn't as pretty as I'd like, but I primarily wanted to get something out there with a template to create other labs. I borrowed heavily from the style of labs that Interface Technical Training (aka Mike Storm) uses for this, which I've found to be very effective.

Let me know if you find any glaring errors or have suggestions for the template / look and feel.

The GNS3 Lab Topology is here: http://www.ciscoblog.com/docstore/CCENT.net (Right-click and do a Save As File)
The Lab itself is here: http://www.ciscoblog.com/docstore/GNS3Lab1.pdf

***UPDATE: It seems the lab topology only opens on OS X. Let me see if I can get the Windows version working...

***UPDATE2: The topology works on Windows (doesn't look as pretty as OS X) as long as you're running GNS 0.5 and have loaded an IOS image for a 2620-2621 router.

My next steps are to build out the gns3labs.com site and make a repository for these labs. Ehhhh...where do I get all this time? Honestly, I do most of this while my students in class are working on labs themselves :o).

I LOVE THESE THINGS!!!

Do these 800 series routers just keep getting cooler or what?!? This one (Cisco 881) can even connect to a G3 cellular data network to use as a WAN link. I checked my reseller prices - it's about $450.00. Sweet!

All it's missing is an LCD display screen on the front. Now THAT would be hot! I have no idea what it would say...not sure I'd even care - I just want an LCD display screen.

NOTE: Correction G3 = 3G...dyslexia strikes again...

It's CCNA Month at Network World!

I mentioned a couple posts ago that I've been drafted to blog at Network World's Cisco Subnet for the month of May. Since Network World is promoting my new CCNA Practice Questions (Third Edition) book, I figured I would make my Network World blog dedicated to strategies to pass the CCNA exam. If you're interested, come on over.

PS - my CiscoBlog postings may be a little light in May. Talk about being spread as thin as butter...

PPS - The CiscoBlog Forum is rockin'! Thanks so much for those who have already started posting and replying!!! Killer.