More Troubleshooting Focus

The blog has been a little quiet lately but I have still been playing with routers in the background.  As part of the Micronics Training Bootcamp I attended back in May, some of the Cisco 360 assessment lab material was included, basically it had some Mock Labs that at least for the configuration portion was pretty much on par as what the actual lab itself presented.  At the time, the troubleshooting material was very similar as to what you find with other vendors, not bad at all but based on the same physical topology as the configuration components.

Netmasterclass who I believe developed a lot of the Cisco 360 material, have recently reworked the way they provide the troubleshooting environment, and it is now based on Cisco IOU just like the real lab, as this is a virtual environment it is mean to span about 30 devices - I'm uncertain as to whether switches are included in the topology, however I think having to deal with such a large environment will be a good thing.  There is quite a rich level of instrumentation and feedback from the Cisco 360 labs, so it should be quite helpful in pinpointing weak points.  I have just signed up for a Troubleshooting and mentoring package which includes the lab and a group mentoring session that should help unveil common issues that others may be encountering as well.  Due to the timezone differences, it means it will be a 3am session in the middle of the week for me which is a little annoying; however I will be making every attempt to be there regardless (hopefully I wont be too fragile at work the next day)

I have my next lab attempt scheduled for December, hopefully this will assist me in getting over the line.