Review: CCNP Practical Studies: Switching



CCIE Security Exam Certification Guide, Second Ed.

Reviewer Name: Glenn Bradley, Senior Network Engineer

Reviewer Certifications: CCDA, CCNA, CCNP

Rating: *** out of *****

In praise of self-study

In today’s business world of ever-leaner budgets, training for employees continues to get (or may have even taken the final) hit. Many individuals do not have the money or even the time for the one-week training sessions that we love so much. Our counter attack? Sel- study.

Those of you on the security certification track will find this book a worthy tool. But beware of the numerous errors the editors let slip by. Remember the primary focus of this book is preparing for the written exam. That being said, I’ll add that the text also provides a well-written chapter dedicated to a real life look at the practical exam. On the inclusion of this material I have mixed views that I will discuss later.

Like most Cisco Press products, the book is laid out in a logical progression of the subjects with each area being given good coverage. If only they’d been a little more careful about some of the typos. I am a big fan of the “Do I Know This Already?” quiz given at the beginning of the chapters. For many of us well into our study paths, plowing through already known material can be tedious if we’re under a deadline. The pre-chapter quizzes in this book were well-written and gave good coverage of the subject to be studied. This format helps the reader determine if the chapter should be skimmed over for review or requires serious study.

Any given text can contain material that is a positive for some readers and a negative for others. Chapter 8 (the practical lab section) has the unique honor of being a bit of both. The book targets the written exam 350-018 but includes over 100 pages of practical lab studies. I take an entirely different study approach to written tests compared to practical exams so the need for this material here depends on the reader and his or her study approach.

However, chapter 8 is a wonderful example of the “real world” inside the practical lab environment. I would have preferred the solutions to be in an appendix as opposed to being mixed in with each task as it occurred. This would free me from having to cover the answer with a piece of paper to keep myself from “accidentally” glancing at the adjoining page and having my solution end up amazingly like the given answer.

I have a personal preference in our industry of ‘alphabet soup’ acronyms. An acronym should be fully stated at least the first time it appears in any text. For example; “blah, blah the MAC (Media Access Control) address blah, blah”. In addition to this practice I like to see an appendix at the back listing all acronyms used in a given text.

In a nutshell

I found the book very readable and rarely dry which is refreshing in a technical volume. The tables and examples were well laid out; not five pages away from the text referring to them as will sometimes happen. The shaded ‘NOTE’ sections throughout the chapters provide valuable clarification of the text.

The explanations of security protocols (always a challenge) were well conveyed at the depth they went to. Just by the nature of the beast the requirement for heavy acronym use would benefit here from an appendix/glossary for the more recent visitors to the world of data security.

I give the book 3 out of 5 and would go to 4 out of 5 if the price was cut in half. When you pay full-pop for a technical document you expect good editing and proofreading, not the need to figure out what the author is trying to say. The audience would include those on the road to their CCIE Security written exam, as well as those seeking light reference material and those who want to brush up on current skills.

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