The Good Guys Wear Blue.

Paul Browning had just released what many are calling ‘The must read book of 2008.’

It is called The Good Guys Wear Blue and is a story about the 12 years he worked as a police officer in the UK. Famous Coventry author and BAFTA award winner Geoff Thompon said ‘What a shock..what a revelation. I love this book..’

During his time in the police he dealt with hundreds of violent criminals and was the victim of bullying by one of his supervisors. Luckily for Paul, he met a caring psychotherapist who helped him overcome his low self worth and eventually, after 12 years, find the courage to leave a job he no longer loved.

Just click on the above book title to see the page.

Are There Any Jobs Out There?

I just had an e-mail from a member of the site who passed his CCNA and was looking for work. Sachin had some limited IT experience and was trying to get a break into IT.

After listening to my podcast he realised that he could be doing a lot more to get in front of IT managers who were looking for enthusiastic people.

He is now working at a large data centre who are expanding their Cisco network.

Sachin says:

‘I made it a daily routine to fire off my CV to at least 30 companies a day….I definitely could have done more in my search for an IT job, especially after having heard your conference call. However it paid off.’

I am going to see if I can record a conversation with Sachin because it goes to prove that with enough determination you can land a good job in IT.

As well as the CCNA and CCENT exams we have just added a routing exam. If you want to brush up on CCNA level routing questions then hop over to the below url.

http://www.howtonetwork.net/public/491.cfm

Pix Video – Basic Pix Setup

Don’t panic. It isn’t a CCNA topic (yet) but I am guessing that a good working knowledge of how to set up and configure a pix is a requirement for most network engineers.

We will be adding pix videos over the next few weeks and are happy to take requests.

The first video is a very basic out of the box initial pix setup.

http://www.howtonetwork.net/members/500.cfm

Coming to America

We are looking at running a Cisco CCNA boot camp in the USA later this year. The course will probably be held in New York. If it goes well we will be moving out to run courses all over the USA as well as training up Cisco trainers to deliver our content.

If you think you may be interested in attending please drop us an e-mail. There will be no commitment at the moment. I just want to get a rough idea of numbers and the level of interest.

help@howtonetwork.net

Cisco Trainers Required

I am expanding Networks Inc. Ltd, my Cisco training company and training up other instructors. The pilot course for Cardiff filled in 10 days and one of my former students has undergone part 1 of his instructor training.

I am looking to expand out to other areas in the UK and then to the USA. What I am looking for is people who want to run their own training business on the side running approx 10 Cisco CCNA weekend courses per year. Basically you keep your day job and if/when the Cisco weekends overtake your monthly income you can choose to quit your job (like I did).

The training is being offered as part of a licence which means you will run the courses as your own business with sales and admin support from Networks Inc. Ltd. You will be your own boss but have marketing and business support from us.

We are hosting a presentation day on Sat 5th April at the Hilton Hotel in Milton Keynes from 12-1. If you want more details please visit the below link and register. We can then have a chat on the phone to see if you are suitable.

I am looking for 5 people only so please only apply if you are serious about running your own business, have a good attitude, are hard working and willing to learn. Please don’t contact me direct about this. Fill in the form below. One again, this is NOT a job offer but a chance for you to start up your own part time business.

You don’t need to be a CCNA (yet) and full training will be provided. You MUST LIVE IN THE UK or Northern Ireland.

http://www.networksinc.co.uk/Cisco_Training_Licence.htm

CCNA Training

We are expanding all over the UK at the moment with dates
in Milton Keynes, Cardiff and London available. We will
be adding Reading shortly as well.

If you fancy coming along for a weekend of routing and
switching fun then click on the below link:

http://www.networksinc.co.uk/CCNA_boot_camp.htm

 

Are You Ready for the CCNA Exam?

It can be a very dejecting experience to fail the CCNA exam.
Especially if you feel you have put in a lot of study time
and have given it your best shot.

With a strict study schedule involving daily labs, theory
and practise exams then you are giving yourself the best
chance possible. The only reason we fail is the exam is
due to lack of preparation.

The below CCNA prep test will ask you if you have covered
all the necessary areas listed on Ciscos CCNA exam syllabus.

You would need to be able to answer ‘correct’ to each
question in order to be ready for the exam. Bear in mind
that the CCNA has about a 50% pass rate so it is still
considered to be a tough exam by all in the IT industry.

Click here for the quiz. You will need to unzip it.

IINS – Implementing Cisco IOS Network Security

The IINS exam is designed to help network engineers learn
how to secure a branch office from network attacks. You will
have to secure the router using SDM and CLI router security
features.

Subjects will include:

Setting a robust network security policy.
Configure site-to-site VPN.
Configure intrusion prevention system.
Configure LAN based security.
Configure IOS zone based firewall features.
Configuring AAA.
Router lockdown.

and much more….

Cisco don’t even have this information on their web site
at the moment but some Cisco approved training companies
are already advertising the course.

This is really exciting news if you are CCNA or close to
CCNA level. The IINS will be a very marketable qualification
to posess once companies realise the value of the cert.

I have heard that voice and wirless foundation certs are
also in the pipeline.

Of course we will be adding IINS to howtonetwork.net as
soon as we know more.

A Day in the Life of a CCNA.

My name is Daniel and I work for an ISP based near to London.

I left school with a few qualifications but wasn’t sure what I wanted to do. I have always been interested in IT and was always repairing friends computers or helping them if they couldn’t get their printers working. I also worked out how to help install their broadband routers.

I started on a degree in IT but I found that it was mostly theory based and would be of little use if I wanted to be a network engineer. A friend on the course told me about the Cisco CCNA so I did some research and found Paul Brownings Networks Inc. Cisco training site.

I had no budget for a course but then I found the online CCNA training sitewww.howtonetowork.net so I joined that.

I studied for about 2 hours per day for 6 weeks and passed the CCNA first time. For hands on practise I used some second hand routers and switches I bought from ebay.

Once I passed my CCNA I started job hunting. I applied for five jobs per day mostly viawww.monster.co.uk or via www.jobserve.com. Most companies ignored me and I had a few interviews which came to nothing.

Eventually I was called for an interview with my current company who are a medium sized ISP based outside of London. They were impressed that I had studied for the CCNA in my own time. The interview was about TCP/IP and subnetting which I knew well from the www.howtonetwork.net website. I was also asked about basic routing and troubleshooting and I got most of the answers right because they are all CCNA topics.

I was given the job and work as part of the network support team. Here is my typical day:

0830 – start work. I have my cup of tea on my desk and I check the queue for tickets logged by customers. My job is to try to resolve problems before they are passed to team 2.

0845 – first ticket. A customer is trying to put an IP address on a router. I e-mail them over a walkthrough guide I wrote while I had some free time. There are some pictures and clear instructions so they should be fine using that.

0900 – another ticket. A customers server backups are failing. I call them and speak to the server team. I ask them where they are sending the backups and they tell me it is IP address 10.10.10.7. I ask them if the server has a route to that address and they confirm it does. I then ask which device uses the address 10.10.10.7 and am told that it is reached via a network switch. We check the switch and the interface on it is down. Somehow the duplex settings on the switch have been set to 10mpbs half duplex when it should be 100mpbs full.

0930 – no tickets at the moment so I use the time to clear my e-mail inbox and then read up on wireless security because we are taking on support contracts for that soon.

1000 – another ticket comes in. A customer is trying to apply IP address 192.168.1.63 255.255.255.224 to a router but it isn’t working. I work it out on paper and that is the broadcast address so it will never work. I tell them to use 192.168.1.62 if that is free. I’m glad I learned the easy way to subnet.

1130 – team meeting about changes to support systems and new procedures. There is a space on team 2 so I think I am going to apply for it. I have a good chance because I am the only CCNA qualified engineer on team 1.

1230 – Lunchtime. I have a sandwich in the canteen and then study for 45 mins. I want to take my CCNP next so I read up on OSPF.

1330 – it has been busy. I have to call a customer who is installing a new router but their serial interface will not come up. They know a bit about routers but still can’t resolve the issue.

We start at layer 1 so I ask him to check that a cable is plugged in with the ‘show controllers’ command on the router. It shows there is a DTE cable connected. I then ask them to check layer 2 which is the encapsulation on the interface. He has HDLC but when he checks the paperwork from us it does say he needs to set it to PPP. Once he does that the interface comes up and it works fine.

1400 – more tea and another ticket. A customer has lost the password to get into enable mode on their router. They have a 1760 model so I check on Google and find the password reset procedure. They have to reload the router and use the break keys to get into Rommon mode.

It takes a while but we get back into it and change the password for him. I suppose he could have found the answer himself if he had looked but there you go.

1450 – team 2 are all in a meeting when an urgent case comes in. A customers router has gone down and it is business affecting. I take the ticket and try to fix it before calling the team out of their meeting.

When I speak to the customer I found that the router isn’t actually down but it reloaded and now they cannot access e-mail or the internet. I ask them to read out the running config to me since they can’t e-mail it. It all sounds fairly standard until they get to the access list. It reads

permit tcp any any eq domain permit tcp any host 172.1.2.77 eq ftp permit tcp any any eq https

I can see that for some reason they are not allowing www or smtp. I think that the access list must have been working but they never saved it to the startup config so when it reloaded those commands went missing. I talk them through adding the missing lines and after we test it everything seems to be working fine.

1610 – wrap up on a few old tickets to make sure the customers are okay for me to close the ticket off. One final cup of tea and then I leave for home.

The good thing is that you can always ask for help if you get stuck. Most of the answers are on google or on the howtonetwork web site or in one of my Cisco books. We stock a lot here at work and they are there to be used.

 

Why Some People Never Pass Their CCNA

I think some people don’t actually realise how hard it is
to pass the CCNA, even if you are already in the IT
industry.

As a ballpark figure, I would say that you need to study
for about 2 hours per day for about 4-6 weeks if you want
to pass your CCNA. I have seen people do it in less time
than that but that seems to be about the average.

If you skip study days or do less than 2 hours per day
then of course it may take longer. If you take on extra
projects at work or go on a holiday then you are going
to have to study for several more weeks.

I suggest that, when you decide to pass the CCNA or
CCENT exam (and I mean seriously decide as opposed to
saying ‘I will give it a shot’) that you clear your
diary for the next 6 weeks of holidays or any major
life events such as moving house, redecorating etc.

I have had a large number of former students contact
me up to 2 years after the attended my CCNA weekend
boot camp telling me that they got distracted after
the course and now they have to learn all the new
material as well as refresh what they learned previously.

It is sad to hear but no surprise. Those students I see
pass the exam in 4-6 weeks are the ones who are prepared
to dedicate time and effort into self improvement. You
don’t hear them repeating the tired old excuses including
the all time greats:

1. But i’ve been busy
2. Work projects have taken all my time
3. My wife/kids/dog/cat won’t let me
4. I went on holiday (err..for 2 years)
5. I was ill (it must have caused amnesia)
6. I got married

and so on…

As a CCNA you will be paid more than most other IT
engineers. The price is to put aside about 6 weeks of your
life and put 1 hour in each morning and 1 hour each evening.
That is it. If there is any secret it is consistency. You
don’t need previous experience and you don’t need to be
that clever, lord knows i’m not.

Decide now if you are going to be serious about your CCNA
studies. If it is a bad time for you then put it aside
until you have a clear mind and a clear diary.

I am telling you this, not to sound negative but because
I want you to pass and not take years in the process.

All the best

Paul