Following the live Microsoft web meeting on June 19 2007 Rob Linsky announced further news on the Windows Server 2008 Certification track

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NOTE: This is early information, exam content names and numbers are subject to change. To view a recording of this meeting: CLICK HERE

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Server 2008 MCTS Certifications

The Professional Series certifications are designed to cover job related skills and provide a reliable indicator of on-the-job performance
Several Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist (MCTS) exams have already been released, but these are the first which have been provisionally announced on the Windows Server 2008 track

• 70-640 – MCTS: Configuring Windows Server 2008 Active Directory

• 70-642 – MCTS: Configuring Windows Server 2008 Network Infrastructure

• 70-643 – MCTS: Configuring Windows Server 2008 Application Platforms. (This will cover Internet Information Services (IIS 7) and Microsoft Virtual Server)

All three of these exams will EACH earn the MCTS certification and are scheduled to be available 30 days after Windows Server 2008 goes Release to Manufacture (RTM).

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Cisco announced yesterday that it will release a new version of its Cisco Certified Network Associate (CCNA) certification on 1 August. 2007.

A brand new entry-level certification, the Cisco Certified Entry Networking Technician (CCENT) will also be released

Jeanne Dunn, Senior Director of Learning for Cisco said “the content for the new CCNA will focus on a much broader range of technologies these will be very systems-based to include wireless and security.”

The new CCNA will unfortunately be more expensive, but will still be available in several formats:

Two exams:

• ICND1 640-822 CCNA Part 1 – This exam will also earn the new entry level certification CCENT

• ICND2 640-816 CCNA Part 2

or

one composite exam:

• CCNA 640-802 CCNA Composite

The old exams 640-821, 640-811 and 640-801 will still be available until 6 November 2007.

According to a Cisco spokesperson, candidates who choose to go the two-exam route will be able to “mix and match” between the current and new exams until the older ones expire

For further details on the CCNA track CLICK HERE

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The Cisco Certified Entry Networking Technician (CCENT) certification is a new qualification which acts as the first step towards achieving the recognised CCNA certification

The CCENT is for those who install, operate and troubleshoot a small enterprise branch network, including basic network security. And validates the skills required for entry-level network support positions..

One exam is required:

• Interconnecting Cisco Networking Devices Part 1 (ICND1) – exam 640-822

 

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NOTE: Exam 640-822 is scheduled for release on 1 August 2007.

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This is the second level of Microsoft’s new certification track covering relevant job related skills including design, project management, operations management, and planning

The Professional Series certifications are designed to provide a reliable indicator of on-the-job performance and will be retired when mainstream product support for the particular technology expires

An example of this certification is:

• The IT Professional: Enterprise Support Technician

Exam 70-622 Pro: Microsoft Desktop Support – ENTERPRISE for IT professionals who work in an enterprise environment with experience of deploying Windows Vista, managing security and troubleshooting network-related issues with Windows Vista.

Other MCITP certifications are available, visit the Microsoft web site for further details

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NOTE: See our News article dated 28 June 2007 on the proposed new Windows Server 2008 MCITP track

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This article is the third in a series of three which has been written for those who are, or may one day be responsible for designing an IP network.

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Sit back, take a deep breath and prepare for another of my techie articles, this time on how to configure Variable Length Subnet Masking (VLSM).

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VLSM’s are used to reduce the number of wanted IP Addresses in each subnet, allow for more subnets and avoid having to obtain another registered IP Address.Again the best way I have found to explain VLSM’s is to run through an example configuration

Example

Your company’s network has been assigned a Class A registered address of: 98.0.0.0 from this you need to create:

• Six subnets of 2000000 Hosts
• Thirty subnets of 64000 Hosts
• Fourteen subnets of 4000 Hosts

The default Class A subnet mask is 255.0.0.0, represented as / 8.

The best way to approach this is to work in stages calculating the different subnet requirements

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This article is the second in a series of three which has been written for those who are, or may one day be responsible for designing an IP network.

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Sit back, take a deep breath and prepare for another of my techie articles, this time on Super-netting, also known as Route Summarization or Route Aggregation

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Introduction

The larger the network the bigger the routing table, in large internet-works, hundreds, or even thousands, of network addresses can exist, this will result in each Router taking longer to process information and route packets.

Super-netting is designed to improve convergence time, increase performance and reduce the size of the routing table and the number of routes that a router has by grouping multiple networks together and representing them as a single summarized network in the routing table.

NOTE: Super-netting can only be used with classless routing protocols, these extend the standard Class A, B, or C IP addressing scheme by using a subnet mask or mask length to indicate how routers must interpret an IP network ID. Classless routing protocols include the subnet mask along with the IP address when advertising routing information.

I will admit that I love IP Addressing – sad I know, but true! The best way I have found to explain supernetting to my students is to run through an example configuration
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This article is the first in a series of three which has been written for those who are, or may one day be responsible for designing an IP network.

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Sit back, take a deep breath and prepare for one of my techie articles, this time on Sub-netting

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Introduction

IP Routing requires that each physical subnet within the Intranet (a network owned by a private organization) use’s a unique Network ID.

A large organization may have insufficient network addresses available for their needs.

IP Sub-netting creates larger numbers of smaller groups of IP Addresses called Subnets which can improve network security and increase performance by reducing the size of the broadcast domain

To sub-net, bits must be borrowed from the Host portion within a Subnet Mask.

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