Got my own IPv6 address 2019::E

blog | Mar 10, 2019

Preparation

Experience required?

After passing the exam I could say that the list of materials above is not quite enough to prepare because some questions I just knew from my last experience with Cisco certifications.

How long it takes to prepare?

I took one week vacation and read as much as I can, played with virtual environments, attended boot camp.

Testing environment

This is the most interesting piece.

First of all, Cumulus decided to work with Proctoru.com for certifications. Ok, I went to test if my Linux workstation is able to deal with Proctoru requirements.

Unfortunately, Linux is not supported by Proctoru.

I decided to use VirtualBox with Windows 7 as a guest. Shared my webcam, microphone, etc. The test was green. I fully trusted that it’s done and I can easily wait for an exam date.

Exam date came. I filled all the necessary data like passport details, pictures, etc. But in the last stage, I got an error that please disable “VirtualBox integrated camera”. Wait. What?

Contacted support. They said that’s not allowed to use VirtualBox at all. Well done Proctoru.com, well done.

I called my co-worker to ask if he could borrow a laptop with OSX. Ok, I got my new laptop which is fully supported now.

I’m sitting in our meeting room alone. Supervisor asked me to show the room around, put the phone in front of my laptop. That’s fine. Later on, she said that this place is not private and not allowed by the institution. Damn it, I had to move to another place.

I rushed to our other office where actually we have silent boxes.

Again, did the same procedure and eventually, another supervisor said - it’s not a private place. What the hell is this? I asked where should I go? Can I take an exam inside the car? She said - yes because the car is a private space. No problem, I ran to my car, did the same procedures.

Surprise surprise? Wonder what she said to me? This is NOT a private space, move to private space! I won’t say what I said to them (angry). I asked to figure out and look at chat history because the previous supervisor told me to move to the car. It was misunderstanding from their point of view. I rescheduled the exam already the third time.

I decided to go to my home where I don’t live there yet (under construction). This is the private space according to them. Ok, sweaty, warm and angry I started my exam adventure.

Difficulty

One guy from Cumulus said that the exam is really not so easy, but I took the risks and tried to pass it immediately without learning more around.

For me personally, it wasn’t hard. I would say due to my past and current networking experience.

The most difficult part was that I was quite stressed due to the truly stupid examination process.

Compare with CCNP?

Comparing with Cisco exams, especially with CCNP this looks harder because you have to know more, not only command line commands and theory. CCNOP includes command line, theory, Linux and automation chapters.

Another advantage while the exam’s program is young is that there are no braindumps to peck and go. I’m sure there will someone leak questions for this exam as well. That’s why I decided to pass it before instead of cheating.

Was it worth?

I think it was worth. I’m not going to continue with Cisco certification anymore because white-box networking is the future. Even better, you can always spot the problem and try to figure out it yourself instead of just filling an issue. And for extra Brownie points maybe contribute to upstream?