The adventure so far...

I did it!!!

WOOHOO!!!... I passed the 2nd Cisco CCNA exam and now, once again, have my Cisco CCNA certification.  I say "once again" because I previously held the cert from 2004-2007; yes, 10 years ago.  Having taken the exam back then, I can definitely say that it was MUCH HARDER this time around.  Back then there was only the "one-exam" option and I crammed pretty heavily, but then when I took it I passed with flying colors and couldn't believe how easy it was.  Fast-forward to October of 2012... again I took the "one-exam" option and failed it miserably... didn't even finish it in time.  Clearly, things had changed.  I put going after the cert on hold till I had finished my undergrad and, upon finding it very difficult to find a job, decided to revisit the cert in it's current "2-exam" form ICND1 100-101 & ICND2 200-101 (you can still take a unified exam if you prefer, however).

I wanted to start this blog off on the right foot so after a little bit of celebration I've started this blog with the desire to:

1. showcase my newly acquired skills
2. share my study methods
3. point out some shortfalls of the materials I used and how I made up for them
4. showcase all the great CCNA learning resources on the web
5. build my LinkedIn presence with cross-posting to Cisco-related LinkedIn groups

In a nutshell, I'd like to document/journal what it took to get here (looking back) thereby hopefully helping others on the same path and then chronicle the next phase/s of job-hunt and continued study for the next level of certification: the CCNP.  Life is a journey and an adventure... thus the title of this blog "Cisco Adventure."

Again, revisiting the topic of the "increased difficulty" of the CCNA exams; there is just way more content that is covered.  It almost seems like the CCNA today is what the CCNP was back then. 

Case in point: below I've posted a video of one such topic that is covered in the Cisco Press ICND2 book that I used in my studies; please forgive some of my comments during the recording regarding the neighbors becoming fully-adjacent; I recorded this a couple weeks ago and I think it was late when I did... anyway, I mention that once the variance is changed the new neighbors will eventually become "fully-adjacent", but that's not the case: fully-adjacent only happens with OSPF and adjusting a variance value (which is what this video is about) only happens with EIGRP.  This was a concept I had a hard time wrapping my brain around until I actually tried it on a test network.  Hopefully you find it useful.  Please feel free to leave comments below.