Overcoming Challenges with SPAN and TAP limitations

About a week ago I taught an IPS class. It’s one of my favorite classes to teach. One of the topics that I cover is how to configure a SPAN port. For those of you unfamiliar with what a SPAN session is, let me explain. Essentially a SPAN or Switchport Analyzer Port is designed to copy the traffic from one port to another. I’ve linked you to a detailed document on the Cisco Web Site for your to read more about SPAN.

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Is the Security Appliance Going Virtual?

A few short weeks ago I had the privilege of attending Gestalt ITs Networking Tech Field Day. It became apparent very quickly that the topic of interest to all the vendors was that of Data Center Virtualization. Each vendor that we visited showed off their high end equipment and gave technical presentations on them. You could quickly get a feel for the fact that they all position themselves to take on Cisco. So upon returning from the event I began to look at some of the data center designs that Cisco Makes available.

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Opportunity to Ask The Vendor

Next week, September 16-17 in San Jose, Ca, I will have an opportunity to visit with a number of vendors as I participate in the Networking Tech Field Day. I'd like to open up the opportunity for my readers to ask any questions they may have related to the following companies, their technology, and perhaps how it relates to your Cisco lives.

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Cisco Announces Wireless Vulnerabilities

Just when I decided to dedicate more time to blogging about Cisco Wireless and other Cisco related areas but didn't have anything to blog about Cisco has brought me the answer. The answer to my blogging dilemma lies in Document ID: 112062.

This document is a Cisco Security Advisory that details seven different vulnerabilities that are said to be independant of each other. The vulnerabilities include:

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Return from Hiatus With Cool Resources

It's been some time since I've posted here at Network World, and the be completely honest, I wouldn't know where to begin with a post on Wireless Networking. In fact, sometimes, in this business, our focus shifts to other areas. In the months of late I have totally shifted focus from wireless back to security. In fact I havent even touched a WLC or a WCS in about a year. That doesn't mean I dont follow what's going on in wireless, it just means that I have changed the way I focus on the various streams of information that flood into my inbox.

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Are you Vulnerable?

Is your network Vulnerable? If you are running 4.x and 5.x WLC software you may be. Ask yourself, "Did I follow Cisco Best Practices?" If you didn't you may be sorry. A recent issue with OTAP has been widely discussed in online forums, blogs, and such. You may be familiar, but, If you don't understand OTAP (Over the Air Provisioning) visit the following site to get you up to speed:

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LWAPP's Split Mac Design

One of the key concepts of LWAPP is the concept of split MAC. Recently I was asked if there was a document that described this concept. The answer is yes, but it gives me an opportunity to share a bit about it here since its a concept that the CCNA Wireless covers.

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Cisco Defends the CCNP Wireless Announcement

A few days back I posted an article about a Cisco Learning Partner that released the CCNP Wireless Courses to the public before Cisco Announced them. In defense of that I received an email from a Cisco Program Manager thats stated:

Your article is totally wrong and you should check your facts. Cisco announced the CCNP Wireless Track in December 2008 at Barcelona.

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Cisco Announces CCNP Wireless..Maybe.

It appears that Cisco Announced the CCNP Wireless on the Cisco Learning Network. One thing however, is that the link simply takes you to the Featured Learning Partner Pages. I still can't find any course descriptions. I'm sure they will be there soon!

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CCNP Wireless Curriculum Announced by a CLSP- but not Cisco.

Some of you may find this interesting, and some of you may have already seen this mentioned on the Cisco Learning Network. Apparently Fastlane, a Cisco Learning Solutions Partner, has announced the courses in the CCNP Wireless before Cisco has gotten around to doing this. In fact, it appears they are already selling the class before other training partners are able to sell the class. Sounds like a great deal for Fastlane.

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5 great links for CCNA Wireless Candidates

Every now and then I pop over to the Cisco Learning Network (CLN) and review the discussions in the CCNA Wireless area. When I started learning Cisco technologies we didn't have anything like this. Its a great resource and if you haven't started using it I recommend you do.

Anyhow, here are a few links to some great resources for your CCNA Wireless studies, via the Cisco Learning Network (mostly).

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• A Quick Learning Module on 802.11n

IT still proves to be a hot job market.

This week I am teaching a class in the Ascolta Bellevue office. Some of them have asked me what areas of expertise are hot right now. While I can personally say that Wireless and Security has done well for me there are some other areas that you might me interested in.

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DSSS tidbits.

Before I get started with this post I want to apologize to the readers here for taking so long to get a post up. Over the last few weeks I have been ramping up for the CCIE Security Lab exam which I took and passed on Friday, March 13, 2009. At last I can spend some more of my time in the Cisco Learning Network and here on this blog helping CCNA Wireless candidates prepare for the IUWNE exam.

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Are Wireless Certifications Right For You?

It's been a little quiet here on my blog front but thats because I am preparing for an exam on Friday. You know, the kind you have to travel the San Jose or RTP for? Anyhow I ran across a post by Sanjay Mehta on the CLN. For those of you who don't know Sanjay, he works behind the scenes on a number of Cisco Wireless Certifications. Read his blog post "Are You a Wireless Expert? Get Recognition with CCIE Wireless!"

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What's in a name, and what's in a certification track?

As I was reading the "Informal" announcement of the new CCNP Wireless I got to thinking that this is just another area where Cisco, for the time being, is being consistently inconsistent. I joke around about that because it comes up a lot in the classes I teach. Use the "no" command in this instance versus the "clear" command that you used in the last. At any rate, looking at the Professional Level Certifications you'll notice the CCNP, CCSP, CCVP, CCIP, and presumably (based on the announcement) a new CCNP Wireless.

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CCNP Wireless Announced

I wanted to get this out there as soon as possible! In a tweet from @learningatcisco the CCNP wireless was announced today. The tweet pointed to a post on a blog, so it's not official from Cisco as far as I can tell, but I know its been in development and I know it's due around September!

Story via http://www.twitter.com/learningatcisco via http://www.echannelline.com/usa/story.cfm?item=24260

CCNA Wireless Home Lab: What should I buy?

In this post I’ve been asked to discuss what equipment you could use to perform CCNA Wireless lab exercises. The following list will allow you to perform all the tasks discussed in the CCNA Wireless outline with only a few exceptions:

2106 Controller
1250 AP or 1130 or 1131 or 1140 (depends on what you can spend.)
526 Controller (optional)
521 AP (optional)
Windows 2000 Server with WCS installed (optional- but I would try to get my hands on it)
Cisco Secure ACS (Download the trial if you have to just to get familiar)

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CCNA Wireless Technical Presentation Video

As Promised, here is the posted video content from the webinar last week that details the technical content of the CCNA Wireless, minus the sample chapter. I have to get permissions before posting the sample chapter so if that happens, I will post it in another video containing just the sample chapter.

In addition to the video I also promised CCNA Wireless lab gear recommendations. I will post that shortly so stay tuned!

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EIRP in a nutshell

Todays topic comes from a sample question that I came across in one of the “Study” questions on the Cisco Learning Network. The question asked how to How do you calculate EIRP?

I realized that the last post pretty much covered it, but I failed to explain, or even define, EIRP along with dBm and dBi. So here goes.

EIRP stands for Effective Isotropic Radiated Power. This is something that you would use to figure out if a radio solution is within the values allowed by local regulatory bodies such as the FCC or ETSI.

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Summing up RF math (no pun intended)

If you attended the free Webinar on Wednesday I told everyone that I would answer the question posed in my last post, and I will. But, based on some of the comments I think a little more explanation is needed. Forgive me for my typo’s, but here it is:

The question asks;

"Suppose I have an Access-Point that is capable of 50-mW of output power. This AP is connected to a cable that has 3 dB of loss, then to an antenna with of 6 dB of gain. How would you figure out the actual power radiated?"

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