CCNP Service Provider certification

Certifications
1

Hello, everyone.

I recently switched jobs and was hired to work under an ISP/Telco company. I noticed that I don’t quite understand all the ISP technologies, even those that I’ve studied about.

The thing is, seeing the theory and labbing it is just fine but seeing it implemented in the real world and even mixed with other technologies is where I get a little confused.

For example, I spent a decent amount of time understanding and covering MPLS L3 VPNs. Turns out that they run some sort of L2 VPN and also ATOM or whatever the name is. There is also Metro Ethernet included any many other things that I didn’t fully cover during my studies.

For this reason, I wanted to pursue the CCNP Service Provider certification (SPCOR plus SPRI) to gain a better understanding of all these technologies and learn how and why they are implemented.

What do you think about this? Is this an okay approach? I generally wanted to pursue some other Cisco certs so I don’t mind personally.

What’s troubling me a little is the overall coverage of the material. There are many new technologies that I’ve never heard about - segment routing, traffic engineering (policies, automated, PCE) and so on although the OCG books, NW, and CBT (including cisco documents and a looot of googling) should be able to cover most of these.

If I encounter a question that I won’t understand regarding a technology that Rene didn’t cover, is it okay for me to ask about it here?

That’s all, thank you :slight_smile:

David

2

Hello David!

Thanks for keeping us posted on your current progress and career status. First of all, congratulations on your new job, it’s a great area to be in to learn and grow!

The fact that you see tech that you are unfamiliar with, even though you’ve gone through the content for the CCNP certification, simply shows how much more tech there is in our field as network engineers. Labs, studies, and certifications usually showcase technologies individually in order to learn and understand them. This is very different from the real world, where they are often used in combination, at much larger scales, and are often a result of layered implementation over the years by different network engineers, adding and modifying the design over time.

There are countless different ways to implement each technology, and in combination with other technologies, and this reality is only learned through experience. I gained experience when I had the good fortune to be put in charge of a municipality’s metropolitan area fiber optic network (MAN), along with the network administration of 12 interconnected buildings via this MAN. No lab or certification study helped me understand everything from the start. But the key was that my certification studies and my hours of labbing put me in a position to learn and understand quickly through experience.

I think you’re in the same position here as well. You’re in a great place because you can quickly understand the tech, the method of implementation, and the interaction of these technologies because you understand their underlying operation and theory. Now is the time to expand your experience, a fundamental part of a network engineer’s skillset.

I think pursuing the CCNP Service Provider certification is an excellent choice since you’ll be experiencing these technologies firsthand. I think getting the fundamental theory and understanding from the certification process, while seeing them in action in the real world, will be an excellent learning experience.

A large part of working in the real world is doing a loooot of reading, as you put it. Cisco documentation is an excellent source for learning as information is needed in your day to day.

Yes absolutely, we look forward to continuing our discussions in the forum!

I wish you success in everything you do!

I hope this has been helpful!

Laz

3

Hello Laz.

Thank you very much for the advice, I appreciate it! I do have some questions regarding the exam topics. I was planning to start with SPRI as its somewhat similar to ENARSI and includes topics that I am familiar with.

  1. 1.2 Troubleshoot OSPF multiarea operations (IPv4 and IPv6)

    • 1.2.a Route advertisement

    • 1.2.b Summarization

  2. 1.3 Troubleshoot IS-IS multilevel operations (IPv4 and IPv6)

    • 1.3.a Route advertisement

    • 1.3.b Summarization

Considering that the deeper you go with the CCNPs, the less resources there are (for ex: there isn’t even an OCG for SPRI), I need to know what specifically do I have to know for this exam.

In the topics above, the exam wants me to be able to troubleshoot multiarea operations. However, does it only want the ones mentioned below it (advertisement and summarization) or also more?

Same with IS-IS, how do you understand these exam topics?

Also, do you have any personal recommendations for what kind of resources to use? NW will definitely help with unicast routing and multicast so those sections are mostly off fortunately!

However, there is still a lot of MPLS (which NW fortunately covers too!) and segment routing. I was looking for alternative resources and found the SPCOR OCG to be sufficient for SPRI too. From your personal experience, do you know any other resources?

Thank you!
David

4

Hello David

When you see exam topics listed in the blueprint with sub-bullets like this, the sub-items are examples, not an exhaustive list. However, they indicate the primary focus areas Cisco wants to emphasize.

For OSPF troubleshooting, while route advertisement and summarization are explicitly mentioned, you should be prepared for all related competencies such as LSA types (1,2,3,4,5,7), inter-area routing, ABR behavior, NSSA/Stub areas, area range commands, external route summarization, bit boundaries, as well as additional multiarea concepts such as virtual links, area types (standard, stub, totally stubby, NSSA, totally NSSA), LSA filtering, path selection across areas, ABR/ASBR operations, cost manipulation across areas and so on.

As you suggested in a recent post you responded to, Cisco doesn’t limit the content of the exams to the specific topics, but often overflows into other related technologies and topics as well.

Similarly, for IS-IS, you would need to know route advertisement and summarization, but additional multilevel concepts that you should cover include attached bit behavior, L1/L2/L1L2 router types, metric styles (narrow and wide) LSP flooding and adjacency formation, route leaking between levels, and overload bit.

Again, these are concepts you should be familiar with if you have performed several labs in both OSPF and IS-IS. So really what is being tested is your overall understanding of the protocols, but with a focus on the listed concepts.

As for resources, maybe @ReneMolenaar would be in a better position to respond for the specific exam and content. I’ll let him know to take a look at this thread when he gets a chance. But NWL does have some content which is helpful. Beyond that, ING as well as Cisco certified content is usually the way to go. But I’ll let Rene elaborate on that…

I hope this has been helpful!

Laz