My CCDE Journey : How I fought the final Boss - CCDE Practical Exam

The beast, the ultimate goal, the final boss, whatever you call it, the CCDE Practical exam is one of the hardest Network certification to have nowadays, 

Brief strategy (if you don't want to read all of the feedback, and want to begin your CCDE journey, here are some summarised steps for you):

1. List the CCDE Written/Practical blueprints in an Excel file, and go through each one of them, you need to master them by understanding how the technology works, why we need it, what are its strengths and limitations and finally how to implement it in high-level steps. Whichever way you decide to do this (video, reading books, Tutorials, experience.) is entirely up to you.
2. Pass the CCDE Written Exam
3. Read all feedbacks on it of all those who kindly left one, it will be helpful
4. Begin defininig your practical strategy
5. Do every scenario available/known (the complete list that I know is below) and apply your strategy to it so you can benefit/adjust when necessary. Take whichever course and CCDE training you feel fits your needs
6. Pass the CCDE Practical Exam
7. If you fail, review you weak areas and ajust your strategy then Pass the Exam again

Introduction :

Without going in-depth with the presentation of the CCDE, which I feel has been largely documented on the internet, here is a Cisco Live presentation that would be better for this:

Make sure to see those two videos also :

BRKCRT-8001 - CCDE: The Cisco Certified Design Expert (Session 1) (2014 Melbourne)

BRKCRT-8002 - CCDE: The Cisco Certified Design Expert (Session 2) (2014 Melbourne)

To make it simple : Matching the technology with the requirements and constraints = CCDE

How many times did we see a project endure consequences because the Design was bad or not defined well enough to begin with ? We all know the famous citation: Benjamin Franklin

If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail!

Preparation :

Make no mistake, CCDE cannot be taught or covered entirely by a single book or any training/boot camp course, each design would have different drivers, philosophy, as well as circumstances that would be created in its unique characteristic. 

The second thing is experience: it would be very difficult to skip that, all preparations will help you to reduce the number of years, yet, there is a minimum of experience that is required. I do remember having to answer questions which required me to go back 5 or 6 years in my memory. Also, fast reading and a quick understanding of the presented situation is critical in this exam: Cisco recommends 7+ years related experience that will be required and multiple technologies covered, from Routing and switching, Security to Data Center...I personally have years of experience in designing and debating Network architecture which helped me tremendously.

• And please, if you are not a native speaker and have problems reading or understanding technical books or presentation written in English, then, you will not have any choice here, you need to work on that, read read and read more books in English, don't let the language scare you.

First Step :

Learn the technology: many asked me to advise on resources that I used for the preparation, yes there are many that helped me, but the simplest solution here, and the same that I used for my CCIE R&S exam is to follow the Blueprint point by point until it has no secrets for you. From a design perspective, you do not need to go into configuration details, but knowing how it works, its implications and interactions with other technologies, and the steps to implement is a must. Take the blueprint, put it in an Excel file and check every technology while asking yourself if you know how it works, what are the steps to implement it, what are its strength and limitations. It took me something like 6 months to prepare for the CCDE Written exam. 

• After having failed my first CCDE attempt in 2019 (mostly because I didn't have any strategy and some personal inconvenieces adding to that, a lot of work), I somewhat left the intensive study, and with time passing, I continued to read books, watch VIDEOs and take notes especially on SP technologies.

Second Step :

CCDE goes beyond knowledge of the technology, it's more about putting it in the right place at the right time. As Russ WHITE said:

Design is about making tradeoffs. If you think you've found a design with no tradeoffs, well… Guess what? You've not looked hard enough

My advice is to train by doing every scenario that's available today, probably the most beneficial ones for me were:

○ Jeremy Filliben Scenario's - Self paced: Jeremy has some very well written scenarios, and most important were his explanations, from them, a lot of wisdom can be deduced and it was an excellent training. You will not learn the technology here, but you will learn how to think, how to make decisions, how sometimes even in the real world, questions, and clients can be subjective and even frustrating. Please do not make my mistake. In my first attempt, because of the lack of time, I didn't follow Jeremy's recommendations and have jumped on doing whichever scenario came to my mind and I have even looked at the corrections/reviews without doing it first.

○ The three Martin Duggan Scenarios: Probably the most difficult, but were very useful as a preparation. practice your strategy when going through them.

○ INE's CCDE Scenarios: I simply enjoyed the way Brian explained it, it was very beneficial for me, I watched them two times while taking notes.

There's not a lot of CCDE scenario simulations available (all those who I'm aware of are listed at the end of this feedback), do not make the mistake of beginning the scenario before mastering the technologies, it would be a loss and you wouldn't get the benefits of them, you need to train your mind and practice your strategy. You need to train yourself to connect with the scenario, imagine that you are there as a consultant, that they are asking you real questions, put some pressure there :) Deadline, production critical environment... if you train enough, you will not be "destabilized" on the day of the exam.

• There is a recommendation regarding joining a study group for CCDE, unfortunately for me, I didn't find any other motivated members. Instead, I have had the chance to do this directly in my work, having some colleagues challenge your ideas, or having myself need to challenge others designs, responding to the RPF…, it solidified my background in the field.

Notes :

At the beginning of my CCDE preparation, I began taking notes in an Excel file, which worked perfectly from the time of my CCIE R&S, but after having failed my first CCDE Practical on 2019 I moved to MS OneNote, and now I'm a big fan of it.

Taking notes, helps me to remember things and makes them stuck into my brain, which works really well when things are structured in a hierarchical way

I always feel that there is no point to read any book or watch any VIDEO without taking notes, because word passes away, but the written word endures forever :) it will be crucial for the preparation and remembering (I'm sure, we have all experienced reading or watching video and after weeks or months, we need to watch or read it again from the beginning, while taking notes, makes your memory go back to that point like an indexer and helps you not waste your time)

Strategy :

I have used a dry-erase board and marker, used them extensively. You will not only have one file to write into, but multiple ones on the exam, so my strategy was as follows:

> Organize the dry-erase board as in the below image, on the right, I have made a mindmap of the scenario that is expending over reading, and on the left, I did note any constraints and Goals (whether implicit or explicit ones) that I identified.

> Note time of beginning and the end of your lecture so you can have an approximation if you need to improve this next time

> Spend time reading documentation and taking notes, assuming that if you have all important informations on the taken notes and memory, the choices will be made faster, but also the fact that we don't need to go back to the documentation again which can result in a lot of wasted time

In the exam, I have spent 20 min reading the documentation on some difficult scenarios

> Learn to "GO BEYOND" only understanding the described situation. Do not ONLY mark problems, constraints and goals that may exists when reading the scenario, but also the solutions if you see any or additional questions to ask : This is how you get the full picture, try to see slightly into the future questiosn. For example, if they talk about merging two companies, think IP @ overlapping, if there is any, think NAT. When you see a diagram, check every SPOF, what could be done better... is it optimal...

> You don't have to note all information: For example for IP addresses: just type: #@IP subnetting --> Doc 123

> You have to manage every document arriving, adding notes to the paper. And trust me, the information keeps arriving at each question, sometimes there will be pages of information arriving for a single question. Try to look at Business Challenge/new constraint and note them during the reading, because they probably will be needed to answer some questions that are arriving

Every time you read a new question you NEED to take note on :

> What has been done

> What is the new constraint (if there is any)

> What is the Goal if there is a new one

> Don't ask for more information beyond that what you need : for example, don't ask for Netflow if you can get the information via SNMP

> If you don't understand a question, try harder: The devil is in the details sometimes

> Sometimes an answer may imply another : for example, An App that supports Multicast would use implicitly a UDP Protocol

> If something is not explicitly or implicitly noted, then don’t let your CPU work on it, DO NOT ASSUME. My problem at some moments, was that I was reading too deeply into the question.

> Take into consideration the very useful advice of Martin Duggan : 

if you feel you cannot choose easily between the presented options then you haven’t absorbed the requirements or constraints given to you, you’ll need to go back and check before you can make an informed decision

> On the Lab computer screen (you will have only one monitor, unlike CCIE), I used Bruno Wollmann strategy which is shown below :

> Look at the diagram before the questions

> When there is an Implementation Plans question, think as following :

• Find first and/or last options (if you can)
• Preserve security (for example, if you have to add some ACL filtering, put them before connecting the network)
• Follow OSI layers ordering (1 to 7)
• Before submitting answer, read the steps
• Generaly do the enhancement in last
• Perform the tasks that take the longest first (for example, any purchase order may take months)

> Remember it will be a QUERTY Keyboard (so if you are not used to it, remember that taking notes may be challenging if you are used to AZERTY, for example)

How was the exam :

• 2 Months before the Exam

I booked my second attempt in November 2020, but it was cancelled because of the Covid in France. Luckilly I was able to reschedule it for the next available date which was on the 24/02/2021. I took 3 weeks off, and focused on it entirely 8 hours per day minimum. Only practicing scenarios and learning technologies that I didn't master well enough. I tried to watch one CiscoLive Video before going to sleep on subjetcts I didn't feel confident enough in.

• 3 days before the exam

I took 3 days off before the exam as well, which let me focus on reading my notes again, and mental preparation.

• On the Exam day

Be mentally prepared for the day of the exam because it will be an exhausting day (but you may like it), so try to have a good nights sleep, just remember that If you fail you will still be able to try it again and again and stick to your strategy.

I personally didn't take any breaks between scenarios, I have also used 45 minutes of the lunch break to refresh my memory by taking notes on my weak points and going over my notes again. I didn't eat, just took some candy :)

One thing was sure, at any point in the exam I didn’t feel that I couldn’t answer a question because I didn't understand a technology and this was important part for me because it means that there is no lack of knowledge at least.

After the exam, I was just happy, far from imagining that I will pass to be honest because sometimes, after answering some questions, I knew that I made some wrong decisions (remember you can't go back to change your choice), hopefully I did pass.

Ressources :

• Books

There is three must read books I did find the most useful :

1. Definitive MPLS Network Designs
2. CCDE Study Guide - Marwan Al Shawi
3. CCDE In Depth - Orhan ERGUN

Others are :

1. End to End QoS Network Design (you don't have to read all the book cover to cover, The first part, taking about QoS Design is probably enough
2. Cisco DevNet Evolving Technologies Study Guide - Nick Russo
3. https://networklessons.com/cisco/evolving-technologies

• INE

I used INE extensively for understanding and deep diving on Routing & Switching + Service Provider technologies...

• Cisco Live

If you feel that you have to take a deep dive on any technology, just type design and the technology, I am sure that you will find what you need. I have used CL presentation (with Video when needed) to deep dive in any technology that I didn't master/understand

• Orhan ERGUN

I took the Self-Paced course from Orhan. It will be helpful to learn Network Design in general. I have also read the “CCDE In-Depth” book two times, especially before the exam to refresh my memory. I hope that Orhan will upgrade it, because I found that it was a very good resource. The Youtube Channel of Orhan is also a great source of knowledge, the discussion of use cases with other engineers can teach you a lot.

• Scenarios

All CCDE Scenarios that I'm aware of and that I did (until late 2020 at least). For every scenario that you will do, if in any doubt or you feel that you don't understand technology, then this is a hint for a weak point. Go check and deep dive into it until you master what problem it solves, how it works, and how to implement it globally.

1. Jeremy Filliben (8 scenarios)
2. Martin Duggan (3 Big scenarios)
3. INE's CCDE Scenarios (I watched all Brian's Videos two times, just excellent)
4. Orhan ERGUN
5. Marwan Al Shawi (useful for new technologies)
6. Mohamed RADWANE (was very useful specialy for Implementation Plans and new technologies)
7. CCDE study groups (are all hosted on Nick Russo Website https://njrusmc.net/jobaid/jobaid.html)

• LMNOP Scenario A full length, SP-focused scenario sure to frustrate you.
• LMNOP Answer Key The answer key to the LMNOP scenario above. Hit me on twitter with questions.
• DermaCorp Background-only scenario designed to hone your "analyze" skills.
• MELA Construction Short CCDE scenario, written by Malcolm Booden.
• Nacho Daddy Financial Another background-only scenario, written by Fareed Fakoor.

1. CCDE sample exam : This is important (but not on the content), since it gives you How will be the exam. You can find the correction here if you would like : https://www.shafagh.com/2012/08/ccde-demomystery-solved.html => It seems that Cisco CCDE Demo website if not working anymore... :(

• Blogs :

Daniel Dib : https://lostintransit.se/ : I spent hours reading Daniel's notes, they were very helpful and sometimes when I felt I didn't understand enough technology, I tried to master it (resources on the internet and books are unlimited, and google is our best friend for this)

Ivan Pepelnjak: https://www.ipspace.net/ : Ivan has some unique resources and was beneficial for me especially when I asked myself questions about choices, for example, how/when to choose between iBGP or eBGP for Clos Architecture. I took the Standard Subscription https://www.ipspace.net/ which offers webinars, downloadable videos, and hours of content.

Cisco CCDE page: https://learningnetwork.cisco.com/s/topic/0TO3i000000924WGAQ/Unleashing%20CCDE : Those are great articles to read, that will definitively help you

Some very useful CCDE Feedbacks :

IMHO, feedbacks are of tremendous help. They have helped me adjust my strategy, and avoid the "shock" of the exam, especially on the first time attempt

https://brunowollmann.com/2019/05/my-ccde-journey-part-1/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/how-i-achieved-ccde-certification-joel-desaulniers/

https://learningnetwork.cisco.com/s/blogs/a0D3i000002SKBOEA4/constructing-your-ccde-practical-exam-strategy-part-1-with-nick-russo

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/ccde-denis-zuev/

https://lostintransit.se/2016/05/21/ccde-journey-becoming-swedens-2nd-ccde/

https://www.packet-forwarding.net/2017/02/26/ccde-a-different-journey/

https://packetpushers.net/orhan-ergun-ccde-story/

https://blog.ine.com/2013/02/26/ccde-practical-2-0-review

https://netmindblog.com/2020/01/06/my-ccde-journey/

https://nulladjacency.com/2017/12/01/how-to-pass-the-ccde/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/my-ccde-journey-chintan-sutaria/

Please if you know any other, just paste the link in the comments, so it can benefit others

CCDE v3 :

As you all may know, the CCDE is upgrading, I don’t have much information about it, but hopefully, this will not change dramatically the CCDE Exam and you will still benefit from your knowledge and preparation.

Conclusion :

At my first and second attempt, every time I finished the exam, one thing was sure: I enjoyed it, whether I succeed or not, I didn't care, I knew that my skills were upgraded in some way, and it was a really exhausting pleasure to pass it. So special thanks to Cisco and the CCDE Program, you are doing an amazing job, and hopefully, CCDE certification will attract more people for the benefit of the Network community in general

I think that there are less than 600 CCDE Certified (at time of me writing this) in the world and if you have read this until this point, then you probably have the will to be CCDE Certified as well.

/Mehdi SFAR (CCDE #20210003 | CCIE #51583)