CCIE R&S Journal: I Want To Be The Best

Hello!

I have found there are very few blogs and less journals out there about CCIE's. Until I found this site. I am looking for like minded people to help me keep my eye on the prize.

My Goal: ATTEMPT THE LAB IN 10 MONTHS

My Study Plan: I am following EXACTLY what INE is asking of me. Preparing for the lab and by proxy be prepared for the written. Study for 4 hours on weekdays and 6 hours on weekends. I plan to read the books semi-outlined by INE, in that I will read probably 2 hours a day, until I've run out of books and then I will use the rest of the time to lab. So once I run out of books I will do 4 full hours of labbing. I would like to extend this to 6 hours a weekday and 6 hours each weekend day. While I am concerned about burn out, I've been in this situation before during my full time work and full time college days, so its at least familiar to me.

My Life: I work from home currently working on all JUNIPER all day every day. I've been in the field of network security with Cisco ASA for 2-3 years and have been in the R&S world with CISCO, specifically their newer command line platform as well as their IOS XE/XR type stuff. Working on Nexus for about 1-2 years. I currently work in my new job on all JUNIPER gear which makes studying a little more annoying, but nonetheless not horrible. Since I work from home I can study before and after my shift fairly quickly and easily.

Concerns: One of the main things I've noticed from stories is that the CCIE becomes longer then you expect, not due to your lack of wanting to study, but due to life stepping in the way. I am hoping that I can do my first attempt in 10 months confidently. I am also concerned if I am attacking this the right way, 4 hours a day, is that too little? Is that too much? Is 6 hours too much? I guess everyone is different.

Current Status: I am currently at the STP marker on the INE track. Doing Lab's in VIRL I've noticed unfortunate inconsistencies with how port-channels and STP works on that software so I may do rack rentals going forward.

Are there any tips? I will be updating daily (including today) to keep me honest with my goals. Is my goal of 10 months insane? Is it possible? I've seen some who've taken years on it, but I believe that is more due to life getting in the way and more important stuff to do then study hours a day on a cert.

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Comments

gorebrush wrote: »

To quote Bruce Lee: -

To spend time is to pass it in a specified manner. To waste time is to expend it thoughtlessly or carelessly. We all have time to either spend or waste and it is our decision what to do with it. But once passed, it is gone forever.

Yep, makes a lot of sense. I spent my entire twenties (I turn 30 in a few weeks) studying and working hard so I can later have a pretty chill life. It was worth it.

DAY 46

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.

THINGS I DID:

- Read Part of BGP Configuration Guide - 2 hours
- Watched INE Videos - 2 hours
Routing Protocol Convergence Optimization Overview
Routing Protocol Failure Detection
Bidirectional Forwarding Detection (BFD)
Routing Protocol Event Propagation Optimization

Total Time: 4 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

Sometimes you gotta realize you're not paying attention. I felt today was a lot better with my focus.

Quickly about to jump into IPv6.

I am doing some Boson exams here and there, just dabbling, like 10 questions here and there. I get about 6 out of 10 right right now, which to me is a good sign that something is sticking to the walls.

DAY 47: Bring on the pain

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.

THINGS I DID:

- Finished BGP Configuration Guide - 3 hours
- Watched INE Videos - 3 hours
EIGRP IP FRR & OSPF LFA
IPv6 Addressing Overview
IPv6 Routing Overview
IPv6 over DMVPN

Total Time: 6 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

What will forever be known as "A Bad Move" I've decided to try out doing 6 hours a day, daily. So basically matching my weekends with 6 hours. I made this decision to see A) If I can do it

To help me stop being distracted and C) To hopefully expedite the CCIE.

Now the last one is a bit of a "maybe" considering that I believe one can only learn and soak in so much in a day. But I also believe putting in more hours period will get me where I want to be faster. Ultimately I wanted to take my first attempt in 10 months. Which puts that at about June 2016. Ultimately it would be great if I could maybe attempt that sooner, perhaps in March. That is only 6 months total.

I have seen people write that it can be done and has been. Probably by people with more experience then myself.

This will also of course be VERY dependent on whether they keep the same retake policy come January, if they decide to do the exponential backoff, I too will back off and probably do it in June rather then sooner. I personally don't like the back off, I understand the spirit of why they put that policy in place. But in my opinion, most fail the first, and from what I've read the majority fail the 2nd and even 3rd attempt! So the big issue I have with that is, when you're studying for the lab you have to be "ON POINT" so to speak 24/7/365 with your studies. I can only imagine how more on point I'll have to be once I get close to there. So having to be "on point" for 90 days if I were to fail the test a few times would just make me lose my mind and my interest, to be frank.

I truly wish there was a way for them to weed out dumpers that didn't involve exponential back off. But, it is what it is. Either way, lets see if I can keep this 6 hours a day of self hate up for long

.

To go into

A little more, I found that with 4 hours on weekdays, I still had about 3-6 hours of time to do.... whatever. Whether it be video games or... usually video games. I would end up wasting those hours away doing that, relaxing. Which mind you is important, but I felt I could squeeze in more time here and not get distracted "looking at the clock" so to speak. I need to be in it, focused on my studies, not wondering when I can boot up The Witcher 3.

Reading your last reply reminds me of the difficulty I too have studying. I have a 4 hour commute daily and also a new 10 week old son so I have started to think a lot more about how critical time management is (for both family, work and study time), as well as the study technique itself as I have been out of school and structured study for some time. I also find it very difficult to concentrate for long periods of time on topics I am unfamiliar and possibly not so interested in.

My goals are an IE and maybe a Masters degree (by distance learning), but at the moment I am looking at trying to refine my study techniques and information retention skills.

I first learned about the SQ3R technique from one of Petr Lapukhov's blogs on INE (How to study for your CCIE) and since then I have been researching this as well as the best ways to take in and retain information, by using active reading and spaced repetitions for information retention. I am slowly building a plan/technique for how I am going to approach future study.

I also came across this youtube video by Marty Lobdell - Study Less Study Smart from Pierce College, which takes a different approach to study/note taking which basically advocates taking very short breaks in between each 30mins of study and gradually working up to longer periods eg: 1-2 hours (or longer) between breaks to keep up your concentration. This apparently helps concentration and stops the "fade out" fatigue where you actually stop concentrating and retaining the info. There are also a lot of other great tips for studying mentioned here too (he also mentions SQ3R technique).

I guess it depends what you want to get out of the certification/degree, for me, when I finally complete the certification my goal is to be able to retain (as working knowledge) at least 80% of the material, which seems is a pretty hard thing to do, especially when you don't work on said technology all day every day. As I am a knowledge worker (like most or all of us) I understand that learning is a career long prospect so my goal is to put good habits in place now that I can use for the rest of my career.

I'm not sure how or if some of these approaches can help in your situation (or even mine) but they might be worth looking into. I am still working on how to best put this into practice since it is a very different way of looking at studying as compared to when I was in school (take notes, memorise, cram, take exam, move on etc) but I do think long term (at least for me) developing different, easier or more efficient ways to retain information is valuable.

Thank you for those links. Yeah I think I will make my work a bit more efficient. I am really just going for a "brute force" attack on myself which may not be super efficient. It's worked in the past for me, for say like college, but this is worse then college. I may need to switch things up.

I don't have any kids yet, but that may change very soon. I am in a unique situation where I work from home, so I am trying to take the most that I can out of it while its still here.

DAY 48

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.

THINGS I DID:

- Finished BGP Configuration Reference - 1 hours
- Watched INE Videos - 2 hours
EIGRPv6
OSPFv3
IPv6 BGP
- Read IPv6 Fundamentals - 2 hours
- Boson Exam - 1 hours

Total Time: 6 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

I am putting this in late, but I did study yesterday. 6 hours because I hate myself.

I found myself to be much more focused, somehow adding time may have done it or just me kicking myself in the butt or something. But I find myself less likely to "hurry through" the content because I am trying to get to something like video games. We shall see.

Dude your commitment is seriously an inspiration... I feel like I have a similar "want to be the best" mentality and am going to commit to doing something like this pretty soon for my CCNA RS.

If you'd like help on explaining concepts, hit me up on private message I can add you on skype.

It is a serious commitment that I am only able to do due to my circumstance. It's not a perfect method though, its very "brute force" without anything like flash cards (I keep forgetting) or science to it. So it may not be a smart way to study.

I added you to friends but I don't have sufficient privileges to PM you. Well my skype name is "naturesinin" if you want to add me! I have a strong passion for networking and love talking about it

.

About your study method, you're effectively putting in 32 hours per week to study. In my opinion the best way to get better / master something is all about time commitment. Sure there might be more effective ways to study than your method.. but the only way you'll know for certain is by trying them out! Honestly if you think about it... "brute force" always ends up working... sure you may spend some extra time... but it ensures success

.

Hah, very true. It's actually 42 hours (7 times 6). Oh man, it is literally a second job at this point. I will add you on skype. I go on vacation in 10 days, seeing another country, but I will still try to sneak in 4 hours a day at least.

DAY 49

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.

THINGS I DID:

- Watched INE Videos - 1 hours
Multicast Overview
- Read IPv6 Fundamentals - 5 hours

Total Time: 6 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

I totally studied yesterday, but needed to update today before I forgot

. Which means tonight when I update it'll be day 50.

I am feeling more confident as I go. I wasn't feeling too confident after BGP and seeing all that is left. But I think when I'm done of this first pass it'll just be repetition after that.

Yesterday I didn't get good reading in, even though it says 5 hours... I kept getting distracted. Very frustrating.

Oh okay I thought you were still doing the 4x5 and 6x2 method! That sounds exciting... I would put away the studies if it were me (only if visiting less than 2 weeks though). It's nice to detach for a little while, as long as it doesn't hinder your ability to continue the same amount of studying once you arrive home.

Yeah well... I apparently hate myself. Oh btw I am in San Antonio. I noticed you're in Austin.

DAY 50

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.

THINGS I DID:

- Did IPv6 INE Labs - 4.5 hours
IPv6 Link-Local Addressing
IPv6 Unique Local Addressing
IPv6 Global Aggregatable Addressing
IPv6 EUI-64 Addressing
IPv6 Auto-Configuration
RIPng
RIPng over NBMA
RIPng Summarization
RIPng Prefix Filtering
RIPng Metric Manipulation
RIPng Default Routing
EIGRPv6
EIGRPv6 Summarization
EIGRPv6 Prefix Filtering
EIGRPv6 Metric Manipulation
EIGRPv6 Default Routing
OSPFv3
OSPFv3 over NBMA
OSPFv3 Virtual Links
OSPFv3 Summarization
IPv6 Redistribution
- Read IPv6 Fundamentals - 1.5 hours <-- Tentative

Total Time: 6 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

Did 4.5 hours of labs and actually could have done those labs in maybe 3 but I kept distracting myself. Either way the IPv6 labs were super easy and I am really not concerned with IPv6 anymore. I think the only thing that could trip me up are the differences of Neighbor Discovery and the differences between IPv4 and IPv6 specifically on how it relates to the lab. For instance a neighbor could maybe not come up due to an ACL blocking ND or something.

Cool stuff. Also its Day 50 so that is cool. Going to a Halloween party and then I'll update this post with what I tentively should be doing, which is completing that IPv6 book. Then its on to Multicast.

DAY 51

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.

THINGS I DID:

- Watched INE Videos on Multicast - 4 hours

- Read Multicast Routing TCP/IP II - 2 hours

Total Time: 6 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

I find myself coming to the realization that the reason why doing 6 hours a day is working better then 4 is because I am less distracted. To put that into context, when I was doing 4 hours on weekdays, I was always thinking in the back of my head "When this is over I am going to play X video game". So I wanted to rush through the content/time and took my focus out of the way.

This may be a worse move. But I am coming to the thought that, I should just not do anything but study if I have the free time for it. Now, we'll see how this plays out this week. But the premise is, and this is REALLY hard for me because Fallout 4 is coming out next week, I need to devote every minute I have to this. If I don't then I will keep getting distracted. It is really something that I am reflexive with, I tend to take the easy way out.

So all and all, I will just study, sleep, eat, work and study again. I've never had burn out before or what I believe to be burn out, but I suppose this will test that capacity. The video games will be there after the CCIE. What is more true, they will be better. But you only get one shot like I have, one situation I have to put your all into something like this. So I should really go for it.

I discussed this with my study buddy tonight and after watching Rob Riker's pass video and him passing the CCIE, I feel like doing this will A) Get me the CCIE faster

Make me more competent faster. I am hoping by doing this, I can take the CCIE in March. Which is a dramatic change from the original plan.

Anyway... here goes, one small step for man, one giant leap into insanity.

DAY 52

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.
- Auto-RP (Also known as "How do magnets work?")

THINGS I DID:

- Finished INE Videos on Multicast - 3 hours

- Read Multicast Routing TCP/IP II - 3 hours

Total Time: 6 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

Multicast seems to be the easiest thing in the CCIE.... when its working. I never even used Multicast or seen it used in production. But all this (*,G) and (S,G) stuff I now understand. I took the TSHOOT class for the CCIE a few weeks back and they had a bunch of multicast problems. Glad its not a foreign concept once reviewed.

At the end of this month I am going to schedule for my written I think. We'll see...

DAY 53

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.
- Auto-RP (Also known as "How do magnets work?")

THINGS I DID:

- Finished INE Videos on Multicast - 1 hours

- Did INE Labs for Multicast - 2 hours

- Finished Read Multicast Routing TCP/IP II - 3 hours

- Did some Boson exam questions - .5 hours

Total Time: 6.5 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

Guess I am going to do a multicast labathon tomorrow to get all the INE labs done. Not sure if I should read another book on multicast or leave it be... hmmm.

DAY 54: A Streak Ruined

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.
- Auto-RP (Also known as "How do magnets work?")

THINGS I DID:

- Did INE Labs for Multicast - 3 hours

Total Time: 3 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

As you can see, I didn't get 6 or more hours today and I am super upset about it. It's 4AM and I've been on a phone with a customer for nearly 24 hours dealing with a problem. It is very frustrating, I mean I know you can't keep up a streak like this, but man I wanted to keep it going...

Anyway, I guess the bright side is I will have done more time this week then any of my past weeks. And I may try to do quite a bit more time tomorrow, but since its so late I don't know if that would be a great idea for retention. Freaking work man.

EDIT: OH ALSO! I spent tokens on 6 hours of labs today and only used 2-3 hours worth! Not a big deal I guess I bought a crap load in a sale... but still! Urrggh!

DAY 55

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.
- Auto-RP (Also known as "How do magnets work?")

THINGS I DID:

- Did INE Labs for Multicast - 6.5 hours
Auto-RP - Multiple Candidate RPs
Auto-RP - Filtering Candidate RPs
Auto-RP Listener
Auto-RP and RP/MA Placement
Filtering Auto-RP Messages
Multicast Boundary
PIM Bootstrap Router
BSR - Multiple RP Candidates
Filtering BSR Messages
Stub Multicast Routing & IGMP Helper
IGMP Filtering
IGMP Timers
Multicast Helper Map
Bidirectional PIM
Source Specific Multicast
Multicast BGP Extension
MSDP
Anycast RP
Catalyst IGMP Snooping
Catalyst Multicast VLAN Registration
Catalyst IGMP Profiles

Total Time: 6.5 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)
- Multicast Routing

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

I'm finding Multicast to be the most difficult subject to wrap my head around. Initially it was straight forward, but throwing in different variations, Auto-RP and all the options.... its certainly a new Weak Area for me.... I'll have to come back and give it another pass...

Tomorrow I will go through the config guide/config reference and then continue on to DMVPN's. I figure I will need to come back and give Multicast and all IGP's + BGP another pass anyway.

DAY 56

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.
- Auto-RP (Also known as "How do magnets work?")

THINGS I DID:

- Did INE Labs for DMVPN- 1 hours
DMVPN with no IPSec

- Did INE Videos - 3.5

- Read Multicast SRDN document - 1

- Discussed CCIE topics with study mate - .5

Total Time: 6 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)
- Multicast Routing

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

I hate you multicast. You made me leave you with a bad taste in my mouth, but I can't stop thinking about you. Why don't you write?

....In all seriousness, I purchased the out of print book off Amazon for a fair price that Brian mentioned was great for it. I don't think I will be done of Multicast any time soon. In fact, I plan on doing a "2nd pass" on the labs and I decided, at least for now, that I will run through them all and mark down the ones I still have trouble with and then rinse and repeat until I know both the "Why would I use this?", the logic of the protocol and its process and finally how to configure it perfectly, then I will move on to the foundation labs.

I think I posted this already, but I am shooting for the written in December which is much, much sooner then I had planned. But I feel in December... and we'll see how I feel then, but I feel in December I will be like... maybe 4 months out from the lab attempt?

Crap, that would be great. As much as I am in a groove and I no longer miss basic human interaction or fun, I do remember missing it.

I also think though, if I stop now. Or if I stop at ANY time before finally finishing, I will never forgive myself in my career. I know me, I will never live it down that I could have, quite literally, acquired my big dream in my career. To be a lofty CCIE.

Nothing will stop me!

DAY 57

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.
- Auto-RP (Also known as "How do magnets work?")

THINGS I DID:

- Did INE Labs for DMVPN- 1 hours
DMVPN Phase 1 OSPF

- Did INE Videos - 2.5

- Read DMVPN Docs - 2

Total Time: 5.5 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)
- Multicast Routing

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

Its so much easier when you have experience with a technology... no experience with DMVPN, but its super simple. I have a lot of experience with IPSec VPN tunnels though so it is coming easy on that front.

Is the multicast book you bought called Interdomain multicast routing? If so, it's an incredible book and probably goes over more than enough of what you need to know for the written and lab. The lab is unlikely to be too heavy on multicast IMO...

It is actually the other one Brian said was out of print, though I do have safari so I may... or may not read the one you mentioned. It all depends how comfortable I become with the protocol after my 2nd pass on labs and reading this book.

http://www.amazon.com/Developing-IP-Multicast-Networks-I/dp/1578700779/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1446856890&sr=8-1&keywords=developing+ip+multicast+networks

I see the light at the end of the tunnel for my first pass through all the material. I'm feeling pretty confident on giving the CCIE Written a good go

DAY 58

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.
- Auto-RP (Also known as "How do magnets work?")

THINGS I DID:

- Did INE Labs for DMVPN- 2.25 hours
IPsec VPNs with Crypto Maps
GRE over IPsec with Crypto Maps
GRE over IPsec with Crypto Profiles
IPsec Virtual Tunnel Interfaces (VTIs)
DMVPN without IPsec
DMVPN with IPsec

- Did INE Videos - 5
IPsec VPN Configuration with Crypto Maps
IPsec Verification & Troubleshooting
GRE over IPsec
IPsec Virtual Tunnel Interfaces (VTI)
IPsec over DMVPN

Total Time: 7.25 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)
- Multicast Routing

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

IPSec on a router is new to me, worked on it quite a bit on an ASA. Interesting to learn that they pretty much use crypto maps which looking back makes a lot of sense. I hit some blocks on DMVPN/IPSec but nothing too bad. First two labs didn't go well, but 3rd/4th etc went a lot better from repetition.

DAY 59

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.
- Auto-RP (Also known as "How do magnets work?")

THINGS I DID:

- Did INE Labs for DMVPN- 2.25 hours
All DMVPN labs (except you know... the vrf one)

- Did INE Videos - 3
Started the MPLS videos

Total Time: 5.25 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)
- Multicast Routing

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

One hour less tonight, that is okay. I hit it hard yesterday. Almost to 60!

DAY 60

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.
- Auto-RP (Also known as "How do magnets work?")

THINGS I DID:

- Did INE Videos - 3

Total Time: 3 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)
- Multicast Routing

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

Next 4-5 days are going to be pretty "weak" (4-5 hours max a day, even on weekends), going on vacation to Mexico for nearly a week so I imagine there won't be much time for me to read/study. I will definitely still try to hit 4 hours, but as you can see today it may not happen. Oh well... this is where the "life" part of the study plan comes in and tries to block.

DAY 61: Traveling Sucks

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.
- Auto-RP (Also known as "How do magnets work?")

THINGS I DID:

- Read Multicast book - 1 hours

Total Time: 1 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)
- Multicast Routing

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

Lowest time of study since I started. By the time I got to studying I was up for nearly 48 hours. I physically couldn't stay awake... needless to say it sucked.

=========================================================

DAY 62

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.
- Auto-RP (Also known as "How do magnets work?")

THINGS I DID:

- Did INE MPLS Videos - 5 hours

Total Time: 5 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)
- Multicast Routing

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

Even though I am in Mexico, I need to make up for yesterday. Here goes nothing! Sucks I can't really lab while here.

DAY 63

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.
- Auto-RP (Also known as "How do magnets work?")

THINGS I DID:

- Read Multicast book - 3 hours

Total Time: 3 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)
- Multicast Routing

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

===========================================================================

DAY 64

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.
- Auto-RP (Also known as "How do magnets work?")

THINGS I DID:

- Read Multicast book - 3 hours

Total Time: 3 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)
- Multicast Routing

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

===========================================================================

DAY 65

REVIEW NEEDED AFTER TODAY AND PAST DAY:
-Lab ERSPAN
-Variance and Unequal Cost Load Balancing Documentation <-- Test out the traffic-shared balanced command.
- Practice aggregate routes/advertise-maps and communities - BGP
- Practice Regex AS-PATH access-lists
- Practice conditional static routing again.
- Auto-RP (Also known as "How do magnets work?")

THINGS I DID:

- Read Multicast book - 1 hours
- Watched INE MPLS Videos - 2 hours

Total Time: 3 hours

WEAK AREAS:
- ODR - WTF is this. Need review/videos.
- Route-maps / IP SLA - Need practice/labbing
- prefix-list/wild card masks - Need practice/labbing
- Reading Comprehension of Objectives - FOCUS!
- Need more lab time on LSA lookups (recursive LSA lookup logic)
- Multicast Routing

QUESTIONS/CONFUSION/CONCERNS:
- None

FINAL THOUGHTS:

Well, I am back home and I need to play catch up so to speak. Maybe I can squeeze more then 6 hours a day this week and do just that. I am nearing the end of the "first pass" and I can really say that I am feeling pretty prepared for the Written and seeing the beginning of the end for the lab. But I guess until I do the lab I won't actually know for sure.

I really like the format you have adopted for updating your thread. If you don't mind, I'd like to do the same. I have a similar goal to you now - passing the Security lab in 10 months. The writing is now on the wall for me at work, so I need to get on and get 2nd lab nailed and out the way.

Oh for sure man. Yeah I actually haven't updated the REVIEW part in like... forever... however when I am done of my first pass (Hopefully next week) I plan to go through all those, then do a 2nd pass labs only, then tackle the foundations/tshoot/etc labs in INE... then.. assess how much rinse and repeat and on what I need.

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