CCNP 2010 updates

Bluetorch

Anyone see this yet? Find Answers

Since its coming from Cisco's certification & communities support site I would say its pretty official. Also most stuff was just posted last thursday/friday.

Looks like everyone only has until the end of July 2010 to finish CCNP with ONT and ISCW or else have to take the new TSHOOT. Plus side is the new exams will be increased to 120min in length. BSCI and BCMSN are still in the clear to be used along with TSHOOT past July 2010.

mikej412

Bluetorch wrote: »

Anyone see this yet?

Yeah -- looks like they are getting their support ducks in a row before they do the official announcement.

This Counting previous exams for Certification seems to cover all the options for mix 'n match.

It does look like the ISCW and ONT exams are an evolutionary dead end -- get 'em both by July 31 2010 or do TSHOOT instead.

ColbyG

Well that's good, it looks like they're moving a lot of the ONT and ISCW stuff into the new exams. I didn't see anything about QoS, but hopefully it's in there somewhere. I'm dying to see the blueprints.

yuriz43

I think the ISCW contains a lot of important information. You could get rid of the DSL/Cable modem and IPS junk, but the MPLS topics and IPSEC are great to know! IPSEC especially, since most businesses will use a VPN technology of some shape or form.

Forsaken_GA

yuriz43 wrote: »

I think the ISCW contains a lot of important information. You could get rid of the DSL/Cable modem and IPS junk, but the MPLS topics and IPSEC are great to know! IPSEC especially, since most businesses will use a VPN technology of some shape or form.

They need to excise some topics from the CCNP (voice and wireless are good candidates) since there are other pro level certs that handle them and the amount of coverage provided by the CCNP is basic to the point of being not helpful. I'm all for cross-pollination when it comes to training, but that training needs to be meaningful.

And they need to expand on others. MPLS is a very good subject to expand on, since it's become quite prolific. Like others, I'm very interested in seeing the new blueprints.

Kaminsky

Forsaken_GA wrote: »

Like others, I'm very interested in seeing the new blueprints.

Is there any indication of when ? End of January is annoyingly vague.

mikej412

Kaminsky wrote: »

Is there any indication of when ? End of January is annoyingly vague.

If an announcement hasn't been made before 25 January, 2010 -- then I'd guess they're going to make the Official Announcement(s) at Networkers at Cisco Live! (January 25-28, 2010 in Barcelona).

dynamik

How much notice do they typically give before retiring exams? It seems like they're getting a bit close to June if they're still going to use that as a cut-off. I seem to remember them giving more than six months notice.

mikej412

dynamik wrote: »

How much notice do they typically give before retiring exams?

Usually 5-6 months. Cisco Network Academy students will probably get more time beyond that.

qplayed

mikej412 wrote: »

Usually 5-6 months. Cisco Network Academy students will probably get more time beyond that.

Would it help if I took an Academy class?

billscott92787

mikej412 wrote: »

If an announcement hasn't been made before 25 January, 2010 -- then I'd guess they're going to make the Official Announcement(s) at Networkers at Cisco Live! (January 25-28, 2010 in Barcelona).

What a coincidence Mike Maybe they will make the announcement on that date, the day I take the BSCI :0 If they make the announcement in January, then I'm assuming the end of June would be the cut off. I heard a rumor somewhere the cut off was going to be July. So maybe they will wait until the last day of the month to announce it. I guess we will see soon

mikej412

qplayed wrote: »

Would it help if I took an Academy class?

You'd have to get into those ISCW/ONT courses now -- or hope that your local academy was offering them at least one more time before retiring them.

The first "leaks" about the CCNP changes were some docs talking about the Academy course changes -- so you'd have to go back to those to get a hint about what may be officially announced about the Academy course availability. I got the impression that the Academy was going to shift "faster" than they had in the past -- and was going to books, rather than the web based courseware. But nothing is official until the official announcements are made.

captobvious

mikej412 wrote: »

But nothing is official until the official announcements are made.

Yogi Berra couldn't have said it any better!

chrisone

I see a lot of people mentioning that they are going to take the BSCI and BCMSN before the changes and then take the troubleshoot exam after the changes.

Not sure if anyone has thought about this, but what if after you finish your BSCI and BCMSN and then the changes happen. The changes now show that your BSCI and BCMSN updated exam blueprint now show QOS,Wifi,voice,GRE, and IPSEC blended into the two exams. Like someone had mention on here before, its possible the new BSCI and BCMSN are updated to blend the ISCW and ONT into both exams.

So now your stuck with rereading things and studying the topics because on the troubleshooting exam there is troubleshooting of wifi,qos,voice,gre,ipsec?

What if the statements and testing rules say you can only take troubleshooting exam if you pass the current updated BSCI / BCMSN exams and older BSCI/BCMSN exams must follow the ONT and ISCW exams for CCNP?

just a thought, what do you guys think? Just think about the CCSP track, when it changed they said either take the new CCNA Security or if you want to go the old route and use your CCNA you have to take the SND exam still.

suffah

chrisone wrote: »

I see a lot of people mentioning that they are going to take the BSCI and BCMSN before the changes and then take the troubleshoot exam after the changes.

Not sure if anyone has thought about this, but what if after you finish your BSCI and BCMSN and then the changes happen. The changes now show that your BSCI and BCMSN updated exam blueprint now show QOS,Wifi,voice,GRE, and IPSEC blended into the two exams. Like someone had mention on here before, its possible the new BSCI and BCMSN are updated to blend the ISCW and ONT into both exams.

So now your stuck with rereading things and studying the topics because on the troubleshooting exam there is troubleshooting of wifi,qos,voice,gre,ipsec?

What if the statements and testing rules say you can only take troubleshooting exam if you pass the current updated BSCI / BCMSN exams and older BSCI/BCMSN exams must follow the ONT and ISCW exams for CCNP?

just a thought, what do you guys think? Just think about the CCSP track, when it changed they said either take the new CCNA Security or if you want to go the old route and use your CCNA you have to take the SND exam still.

I'm one of those that will probably jump to Troubleshooting. Here's my take on it. It would probably take me 3 months to study for the ONT and then another 3 months for the ISCW. If the new TSHOOT exam is going to cover the same material, I'll just spend the same 6 months or whatever learning whatever technologies they want covered. I doubt they'll create two paths - one for BSCI/BCMSN candidates and one for ROUTE/SWITCH candidates.

Again, we'll see when they finally reveal the new blueprint, but I'm not worried either way. Somewhere down the line I *know* I'm going to have to learn this stuff - exam or not - for the real world/work.

aldous

chrisone wrote: »

I see a lot of people mentioning that they are going to take the BSCI and BCMSN before the changes and then take the troubleshoot exam after the changes.

Not sure if anyone has thought about this, but what if after you finish your BSCI and BCMSN and then the changes happen. The changes now show that your BSCI and BCMSN updated exam blueprint now show QOS,Wifi,voice,GRE, and IPSEC blended into the two exams. Like someone had mention on here before, its possible the new BSCI and BCMSN are updated to blend the ISCW and ONT into both exams.

So now your stuck with rereading things and studying the topics because on the troubleshooting exam there is troubleshooting of wifi,qos,voice,gre,ipsec?

What if the statements and testing rules say you can only take troubleshooting exam if you pass the current updated BSCI / BCMSN exams and older BSCI/BCMSN exams must follow the ONT and ISCW exams for CCNP?

just a thought, what do you guys think? Just think about the CCSP track, when it changed they said either take the new CCNA Security or if you want to go the old route and use your CCNA you have to take the SND exam still.

the guide released to academys says that bsci and bcmsn can be used in place of switch and route so they are fine to take with just tshoot.

from this i think it can be inferred that switch and route wont be massivly diffrent. my uni is a cisco academy and our lecturer said (unofficially) that frame - relay stuff is being dropped and iirc that is-is is going from route but dont quote me on that.

given that they are allowing bsci/bcsmn but completly chucking ont and iscw i'd say that its unlikly they'd merge them after all if they merged those 2 into route and switch they'd be huge but bsci/bcsmn would be the same size. my bet they chopped ont to move it all to CCVP and iscw to CCSP, TSHOOT will be things like route redistribution and stuff (again lecturer mentioned its going to be like before the bsci/bcsmn/ont/iscw change as they had a troubleshoot module then iirc)

the cisco TSHOOT books been pushed back it was supposed to be out dec but still isn't and bryants site is mentioning ccnp changes in july 2010, just have to wait n see i guess

Forsaken_GA

aldous wrote: »

the guide released to academys says that bsci and bcmsn can be used in place of switch and route so they are fine to take with just tshoot.

from this i think it can be inferred that switch and route wont be massivly diffrent. my uni is a cisco academy and our lecturer said (unofficially) that frame - relay stuff is being dropped and iirc that is-is is going from route but dont quote me on that.

given that they are allowing bsci/bcsmn but completly chucking ont and iscw i'd say that its unlikly they'd merge them after all if they merged those 2 into route and switch they'd be huge but bsci/bcsmn would be the same size. my bet they chopped ont to move it all to CCVP and iscw to CCSP, TSHOOT will be things like route redistribution and stuff (again lecturer mentioned its going to be like before the bsci/bcsmn/ont/iscw change as they had a troubleshoot module then iirc)

the cisco TSHOOT books been pushed back it was supposed to be out dec but still isn't and bryants site is mentioning ccnp changes in july 2010, just have to wait n see i guess

I doubt they'd actually axe ONT entirely, I could see pulling the voice and wireless stuff, since that's covered with other professional level certs, but I can't see them getting rid of QoS from the CCNP entirely, as that does play a part on the CCIE R&S track. I also doubt things like route redistribution will be leaving the routing exam. And yeah, there was a troubleshooting exam prior to the current set of CCNP exams, but it also had a Remote Access test as well, so this paring down to three exams means some material is definitely going to get cut. It wouldn't surprise me to see the security stuff from ISCW gone as well, since the CCSP should cover it better.

All told, it'll be interesting to see the new blueprints.

qplayed

mikej412 wrote: »

You'd have to get into those ISCW/ONT courses now -- or hope that your local academy was offering them at least one more time before retiring them.

The first "leaks" about the CCNP changes were some docs talking about the Academy course changes -- so you'd have to go back to those to get a hint about what may be officially announced about the Academy course availability. I got the impression that the Academy was going to shift "faster" than they had in the past -- and was going to books, rather than the web based courseware. But nothing is official until the official announcements are made.

I'm going to sign up then:D my local Acad is still offering ISCW/ONT I just need ISCW

ColbyG

Pulling QoS from the NP track would be ridiculous. Yanking VPNs is (slightly) less ridiculous, but I really hope they don't do it. These are things that a network engineer needs to know at least a little about.

chrisone

I agree with you guys, i honestly can see wireless and voip being removed but its hard to say that qos will be completely removed. If you remove the voip and wireless your removing, not only the ont, but a huge chuck of study material on the current BCMSN. I can see the BCMSN book being a very thin book after stripping it from any wireless, security, voip stuff. Whats left? VLANS, VTP, STP, RSTP, HRSP/VRRP/GLBP. Thats it? thats like 300 pgs for BCMSN lol QOS is most likely staying and probably splitting up between both the routing and switching exams. Mmmm perhaps GRE and IPSEC will be on the routing exam as well. I just cant seem to come to terms that a CCNP doesnt know how to build or troubleshoot GRE or IPSEC tunnels. that doesnt make sense to me or to the credible history of a CCNP certified engineer.

I guess we will have to wait at least 2 more week! i dont even know why i am so worried about this when i already have my ccnp llol

Forsaken_GA

ColbyNA wrote: »

Pulling QoS from the NP track would be ridiculous. Yanking VPNs is (slightly) less ridiculous, but I really hope they don't do it. These are things that a network engineer needs to know at least a little about.

I agree that cross pollination between the professional level certs is a good thing, to a degree, but I'd rather they do it via exams, rather than sprinkling bits and pieces into the current track. I'd like to see more of some exams being used for multiple tracks (ala BSCI). For example, I think it'd be a good idea to require SNRS as part of the CCNP, rather than the paltry security coverage that ISCW currently provides.

It all depends on what their vision for the CCNP is. CCNP used to be the jack of all trades, then they started cutting it up into different specializations, much the same way that the CCIE R&S track was the jack of all trades until it started specializing. If their goal is for the CCNP to just be a straight routing and switching line, then yeah, wireless and voice need to go away, and honestly, so does IPSEC. It's a security issue, not really a core requirement for routing and switching.

I'd like to see Frame Relay become extinct and the CCNP offer more coverage of things like MPLS and Metro-E (though it seems that the CCNP is more LAN focused, and the CCIP is the professional level cert that's more WAN focused). Actually, the lack of coverage for anything but Frame Relay and local Ethernet mediums is one of my main complaints with Cisco, I had to take a crash course in Metro-E and DWDM at my current job to be anything close to effective. Working with fiber and working with copper are two very different things, as I'm sure others here can attest.

Kaminsky

I can see TSHOOT becoming a real pig of an exam that many fail on.

Forsaken_GA

Kaminsky wrote: »

I can see TSHOOT becoming a real pig of an exam that many fail on.

I honestly hope it's a troubleshooting exam and not just a 'this is the exam we decided to toss all the other crap into, and oh yeah, there's a little bit of troubleshooting too....' exam. Even though I'd probably never bother taking the exam, I'd sure be interested in the training material because it might actually teach me something I didn't already know.

I hope for the former, but suspect the latter, since troubleshooting isn't something that you can really teach... either your mind works like that, or it don't.

I suspect for a very large number of folks, troubleshooting consists of 'google the error message'

Kaminsky

Forsaken_GA wrote: »

I'd like to see Frame Relay become extinct and the CCNP offer more coverage of things like MPLS and Metro-E (though it seems that the CCNP is more LAN focused, and the CCIP is the professional level cert that's more WAN focused). Actually, the lack of coverage for anything but Frame Relay and local Ethernet mediums is one of my main complaints with Cisco, I had to take a crash course in Metro-E and DWDM at my current job to be anything close to effective. Working with fiber and working with copper are two very different things, as I'm sure others here can attest.

Over here in the UK, I'm putting in more and more circuits that are basically carrier vlans over the carrier's wan every month. New Leased and low end serial circuits are finally starting to thin out. They are not even using receiving routers in the comms rooms (took me a while to get my head around this) but patching the wan link staight out of the comms rooms and off into the client's tech hall cabinets and straight into a switchport as it is already Ethernet when it comes in across the wan. In the last year, I have seen a big move to this type of wan circuit. I can see a time coming where it's all a vlan and you can pretty much ignore the wan part of link altogether.

ColbyG

Kaminsky wrote: »

I can see a time coming where it's all a vlan and you can pretty much ignore the wan part of link altogether.

I shudder at the thought of this.

Kaminsky

ColbyNA wrote: »

I shudder at the thought of this.

Me too... I gotta find a new job 'n quick before my dc comms job becomes just a patch panel monkey role !

Forsaken_GA

Kaminsky wrote: »

Over here in the UK, I'm putting in more and more circuits that are basically carrier vlans over the carrier's wan every month. New Leased and low end serial circuits are finally starting to thin out.

Yup. I know in Atlanta, some providers will not be renewing Frame Relay circuits when the contract is up on them. Our data center used to be in downtown Atlanta at the carrier hotel on Marietta Street, so all of our links were straight 10g or 1gig fiber circuits to our providers, all connected through the MMA on the 2nd floor, along with a few Gig-E copper drops for some peering arrangements. When we moved our facility about 20 miles outside of the city, we leased a couple rings of dark fiber, and now we push all our traffic via DWDM from our new facility back to our core routers in downtown atlanta. From the equipments point of view, it all just looks like an ethernet link. In these regards, my CCNP training did absolutely zilch to prepare me for the medium in which I'm actually working. Fighting with the DWDM vendor, as well as the telco we're leasing the fiber from to get the power budget on the links to where we wanted them was both, a nightmare and an enlightening learning experience (I want an OTDR. I don't care how expensive they are, they're a fun toy!)

gorebrush

I think I've misread this thread entirely.

Does this mean that the current BSCI+BCMSN holders basically have until June to sit ISCW and ONT.

After June, current BSCI and BCMSN holders wont have to sit them again, but just to TSHOOT instead?

dynamik

gorebrush wrote: »

After June, current BSCI and BCMSN holders wont have to sit them again, but just to TSHOOT instead?

That's the way it reads.

gorebrush

Hmmmm

Thanks for clearing that one up