Rack Session Maximization

LearnAsIGo

Greetings All,

Decided to post in this forum believing most of you book rack rental sessions more often than the other cisco forums on here.

I'm a little bit of a rack rental newbie, so I decided to see how the “senior class” does it.

What do you do when you're well into a 6 hour session, then get STUMPED on how to configure something to make the lab work? Time is ticking by and you're just staring at the monitor while nervously watching your hard-earned money float away.

It happened to me today. Long story short, I couldn't get a hold of my stress level, which only made it worse. Before I knew it, I've got a dining table full of open cisco books, a screen full of tabs in firefox, and a clock that just keeps smiling.

Before a lab, I like to review what I'm going to do, or ATTEMPT to do. Then I try to game it out in my mind and look for potential pitfalls.

In case people were wondering, I was attempting route filtering/summarization for OSPF.

Any advice on minimizing this phenomena? Or is it just me?

Much thanks in advance.

mikej412

LearnAsIGo wrote:

Time is ticking by and you're just staring at the monitor while nervously watching your hard-earned money float away.

You remember that you are still spending less money than someone who built a home lab. And you think about that pay raise you'll get at your current job or that starting salery at your new job once you get your number .

For Rack rental, unless you are doing an 8 hour workbook lab -- have a backup plan for if you hit a snag. Save your configs and move on to another "technology lab" or topic. Do your reasearch and checking offline and try it again next rack session.

And if you are doing a workbook lab, move on to some other part -- its good practice for if you get a "brain cramp" in the real lab.

It is good to have some hardware at home to check out the technologies... but Dynamips and Dynagen is now a good option also.

DW [banned]

Kewl.

LearnAsIGo

Thanks much. Lesson learned: Avoid trying to hammer through if ever I'm stymied. Step back and find another way in.

What both of you said are now the granite foundations for when I'm back on the rack. To be frank, It never occurred to me to try the above described (must have been the pressures of time again). I gotta stay away from the “sit-there-until-you-get-it-done” school of thought.

It sure helps to know you guys (among others) are here on this forum imparting sage advice.

<mental picture>feet shoulder width apart, arms crossed, head bowed, steel gaze</mental picture>

I've got a long way to go...

DW [banned]

Kewl

mikej412

DarbyWeaver wrote:

everyone looks like zombies or ghouls.

Now you got me thinking I should skip RTP and go back to San Jose. I had a lively bunch in San Jose -- no "walking dead" there.

But I guess I should also take into account the sunshine and fresh air and the pleasant walk to the cafeteria in San Jose vs the random lunch in a conference room at RTP.

But the flight schedules to/from O'Hare/RTP are much better -- I can easily fly home after the exam and feed the cats dinner.

I guess I'll risk the walking dead and boring lunch and early wakeup and still give RTP one try.