Going back to school while working full time - Cisco

-

Background

I signed up for Cisco 1 and 2 this Fall semester. I just finished Cisco 2. David Durkee the instructor offered to teach the Tri-C team during Midwest CCDC. He barged into our room and said something like "hey you guys need help! Tri-C isn't too far away from Lakeland Community College. You should take some classes with me! I know my stuff". It's not everyday a networking professor barges into the room and offers to teach you. I couldn't pass this offer up. Also note: We left our very knowledgeable Cisco/Windows/Linux team-member Mohammad Ali in Cleveland. Our router and switch would have been better protected with his insight. We had no Network Admin during the competition.

Area

Lakeland Community College is far away. Its located on the East side of Cleveland in Kirkland. I live in Brunswick. It takes 35 minutes to get there from work and one hour to get home. The area is very nice! I used to live in Willoughby when I was a little kid. It was nice to see it again. A mall, Starbucks, Core Eatery, and other stuff is located close to Lakeland. They have an entire road filled with stores. Lakeland is a beautiful campus too. The course cost $389 and for the content taught, the price is well worth it.

Likes

In Cisco 1 we used real equipment and did labs. Cisco 1 with Durkee is what I've always wanted my networking courses to be like. Practical, hands-on, difficult, and a lot of work. Since Durkee knows I'm mostly there for CCDC, he will randomly throw out some security tips for the class.

Cisco 2 is better than Cisco 1. We had a lab almost everyday. We had a lab on top of a take-home lab on top of a 'do it for fun' lab. I've already memorized the commands because I've done what feels like 25+ labs already. Speaking of Cisco 2, I have to study Cisco 2 again over break. There was that much information!

Dislikes

The first three classes in Cisco 1 are slow. You'll go through things like "With an internet connection, you can talk to people online"! Christian (student) and I complained that we wanted to do a lab. After we got back from a 10-minute break Durkee said "Ok you guys want to do a lab! Fine we can do a lab! Watch me everyone! *Types in 50 new commands*. After chapter 1 and 2 the class got better each time. My only complaint is the first few classes start off too easy. I had everything under control in Cisco 1 but in Cisco 2 is where things get more interesting.

Why do Cisco? Aren't you a software engineer?

It's exciting to be a beginner again. My network skills lag far behind my software side. I haven't logged into a router or switch before Durkee's class. I have an interest in Networking and want to pass my CCNA. I heard having a network background is a good thing for the security field too. Soo.. why not? I feel like an Avatar when I practice and hone different skillsets.

Topics I've learned

Vlans,
Trunks,
Static and Dynamic Routing,
Routing Protocols like RIP and OSPF
Switch-port security
Vty and Console Lines
Setting up DHCP
NAT (although I need to go over this again)
Serial ports you have to set a clock rate on. DCE and DHE.
Subinterfaces and Router on a Stick

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Palo Alto for GNS3 CCDC Tutorial

-
Image
Opening Hello fellow CCDC Competitors! Struggling to get a Palo-Alto VM? I know how you can get one! Email me at ASzampiasSWD@gmail.com. I'll tell you the steps to get a PA-VM for GNS3. Why am I giving this info to you? Wouldn't it make sense to hog the info to myself? Wouldn't my team have an advantage? There are have and have not universities when it comes to PaloAltos. I fell into the "have not" group. Our college didn't have access to PA-VMs and still doesn't. Even if PA Cybersecurity Academy is free, there is too much red tape. I can't change the outcome. I can only come up with this one solution. Another reason is Tri-C is a tryout team. I think its pretty unfair as a potential Firewall Admin I'm the only one with access. No one can challenge me unless they spend 2K for a PA-VM. It becomes a rich-person only position. I have a leftover PA-VM from 2018 I promised not to share. I couldn't share that with my challengers. But I f...
Read more

Trace Labs Global Missing Persons CTF V

-
Image
Trace Labs CTF V TraceLabs hosted the Global Missing Persons CTF V event on July 11, 2020. My team //synergy got 64th place out of 190 teams. Introduction This was my first Trace Labs CTF. I captained a team. The good thing about being a captain is you can control who is on the team. My rules were: Must have sock puppet accounts ready. Must have a VPN. Writing out this is a competitive team where we work the entire 6 hours. I was worried about a future team member spamming submissions and disqualifying the team. I thought my requirements would eliminate people who weren't serious. The team hit 4 members Friday evening pretty quickly. Notes My laptop was too slow for this event. My virtual machine froze and I had to restart. Restarting means I have to login to my accounts again. I'll use my desktop next time. The team used Slack and Trello. Our strategy was to research a person and rotate every hour. This strategy broke after 1 rotation. Some missin...
Read more

Release of CCDC ISE Manager Website

-
Image
I worked on the ISE (Inject Scoring Engine) website from 2017 to 2019. I made it to encourage teams to follow a merit-based, open admission tryout format. I identified a problem and made a solution for it. Problem: Call for Merit and Fairness on CCDC Rosters Solution: Github Project Solution: How to run a Team After Tri-C was finished with 2017 Midwest Wildcards I used httrack to grap the Inject PDF files. I didn't grap just the files, but the entire front-end code of the website. If you created the HTML and CSS of the original ISE website, tell me your name so I can give you credit! My goal was to make an almost-replica of the original. The database and back-end code is all guessing by me. I used a LAMP stack because I believe the original website is built on that. I did some fingerprinting and found the "ccdcadmin1" website was hosted on Apache and PHP. If you notice any bugs or errors let me know. If you want a feature added let me know. I will be working ...
Read more