Introduction

Hello everyone,

I've been reading the forums for a few weeks, but thought I should sign up and introduce myself. I've been in the IT field for quite a long time. I started working part-time for a small consulting company when I was in high school (late 80's), and have been in the industry ever since.

At my current job I'm "Systems Administrator", which in this case means I'm in charge of everything related to IT. I work for a small Credit Union, and we have 5 branches, connected via fibre WAN. All of our network equipment is Cisco (including IP phones).

I get to do a little of everything in my job, which is both a blessing and a curse. I have one employee who handles the bulk of the desktop level issues, and small server issues, but it's just the 2 of us for everything, so I have to do those sorts of things sometimes as well. I do a lot of Oracle SQL scripting and PL/SQL programming.

Our servers for the last several years have been primarily Red Hat Linux, so I got my RHCE a few years ago. I also had the opportunity to take most of the RHCA level classes. Due to a change in our banking system platform though, we are now transitioning to primarily Windows Server 2008 as our platform, so most of my RHEL knowledge won't get put to much use on a day-to-day basis anymore.

I also have to do some application programming from time to time, primarily small apps that add some additional functionality to our banking system (and launch from our banking system). This is pretty much all done with MS .NET4 C#.

Additionally, I'm responsible for all of our Cisco equipment. The WAN legs themselves our handled via contract from the telco we lease the lines from, but I'm responsible up to the routers.

The entire installation was done via contract from our telco, and there were a couple of CCIEs I had the chance to work with during the setup. We haven't had the need to make many changes, so I haven't actually had to do much with the Cisco equipment, but it's an area that I want to get much more proficient at, as I find it very interesting.

My company is quite generous with training, and have provided me with a very nice lab to work with at home. I've got:

1 x 2511
1 x 2520
3 x 1841 with WIC-2T's
1 x 2950
2 x 3550

I'm currently studying for the ICND1 exam, which I've booked for March 4th. Most of the material I have at least some level of familiarity with, and I'm very comfortable with subnetting, which I understand is the biggest single hurdle for ICND1. I've been doing some questions on subnettingquestions.com, just to verify that I do understand it well, and generally take about 10 seconds to complete them, so I'm not too concerned with that part of the exam.

I've read Odom's ICND1 book, and am currently reading Lammle's book as well. I've also signed up for access to The Training Consortium (The Training Consortium). They've got live online, interactive classes (the ICND1 class I'm going through is tought by 2 - 10year+ CCIE's). It's been very good just to get the material in a different form.

My plan for this year is to take the ICND1 next month, ICND2 early April, and then spend the rest of the year working on my CCNP. CCIE would then be my goal, assuming that I find that I'm still enjoying working with and studying Cisco.

Anyway, I've enjoyed reading through the forum, and hope to be an active member.

John Friesen

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Comments

Greenmet29

Welcome to the forums! It sounds like you've got your work cut out for you. I don't know about how everyone else feels about the CCNP, but from what i've gathered here the ccnp test isn't as time consuming as the ccna test(s). You might consider pushing the icnd2 back a few months to give you more time for the CCNA, and still go for CCNP by the end of the year.

I too, would love to become a CCIE someday.

chmorin

Greenmet29 wrote: »

Welcome to the forums! It sounds like you've got your work cut out for you. I don't know about how everyone else feels about the CCNP, but from what i've gathered here the ccnp test isn't as time consuming as the ccna test(s). You might consider pushing the icnd2 back a few months to give you more time for the CCNA, and still go for CCNP by the end of the year.

I too, would love to become a CCIE someday.

Well, the Professional level exams are much more specialized than the Associate level exams. At the professional level, most of your experience should be real world and directing an influence on your study habits.

It looks like you have a ton of work ahead of you. That is quite a scope of a situation for a single individual to support. If you love cisco, continue your passion and apply your studies to the CCNA. Once you get that point, and have not exhausted your love for Cisco, see if you want to branch out some. Look at the other associate level exams but more specialized. If your love is routing and switching, feel free to go for the CCNP. But take your time with it. I made the mistake of rushing it, with a less than professional level job environment. If you notice my certifications, all of that time was wasted because I didn't get to know my associate level of knowledge in detail enough to realize that I didn't want to study Routing, and failed my exam as a result.

Pick up the Cisco lifestyle, and take it for the long haul. You won't look back.

jdfriesen

chmorin wrote: »

It looks like you have a ton of work ahead of you. That is quite a scope of a situation for a single individual to support. If you love cisco, continue your passion and apply your studies to the CCNA. Once you get that point, and have not exhausted your love for Cisco, see if you want to branch out some. Look at the other associate level exams but more specialized. If your love is routing and switching, feel free to go for the CCNP. But take your time with it.

CCNA - Security is certainly something I will likely consider taking in between. For the past 15 years my firewalls at home have always been custom Linux firewalls, with very extensive iptables rules. A couple of the Red Hat Architect level courses I took were also security related, so that is definitely an area of interest.

I've had the chance to do a fair bit of work on the Cisco voice equipment we have here, and although I don't mind it, it wouldn't be my first choice to specialize in.

I'm not necessarily in a hurry, I just find I do well with very defined goals. If I have a plan, I have something to stick to, if I don't, life sometimes gets in the way. I have a wife and two kids under 10, so it's certainly easy after family time, etc. in the evening just to kick back and watch TV, but if I have a goal in mind, I can skip that, and do some reading or labbing.

Also, I want to take advantage of my employer being willing to pay for my choice of training, as that certainly saves dollars on my side.

Greenmet29

jdfriesen wrote: »

I'm not necessarily in a hurry, I just find I do well with very defined goals. If I have a plan, I have something to stick to, if I don't, life sometimes gets in the way. I have a wife and two kids under 10, so it's certainly easy after family time, etc. in the evening just to kick back and watch TV, but if I have a goal in mind, I can skip that, and do some reading or labbing.

Life does take lots of time sometimes... My uncle has CISSP, CISM, CISA, a Masters in Business and a Masters in Computer and Electrical Engineering. He has been one of my main sources of advice/encouragement/kicking me in the butt again and again over the years and one of the things he's told me recently is to have a study plan and make sure that your wife is on board with it, because after everything is said and done, it's about your family.

Just my 2 cents

jdfriesen

I totally agree, and realized in reading my post that "skip that" could be read to infer skipping family time, as well as TV time, and I'm definitely not advocating skipping family time!