topic RE: Cisco chap starting on his Extreme journey in ExtremeSwitching (EXOS/Switch Engine)

Cisco chap starting on his Extreme journey

gonzoessex — Thu, 09 May 2019 20:42:00 GMT

Hello all,

I'm a Cisco chap with a CCNP in Routing and Switching (x2) and CCNA in Wireless, but a network guy at heart regardless of the vendor.

I may be joining a team who mainly use Extreme and I need to get some hands on training and have a few questions from you pros.

I've managed to get a switch (EXOS) working in GNS3 to have a play and the version is on 30.1.x.x and 22.6.x.x I have managed to trunk the Extreme switch to a Cisco one and ping across.

I need some Extreme router practice, are these available in GNS3?
I think the switches use EXOS, what do the routers use?
Can you recommend an tutorial/labs sites or videos?
I want to get the ECNA (CCNA equiv), do I need to take their course or can I self study and take the exam?
The language from Cisco to Extreme is very different at the moment and tips on how you converted over?

Anything else you can add will be really appreciated and take some stress off me 🙂

Thanks

RE: Cisco chap starting on his Extreme journey

Tomasz — Thu, 09 May 2019 21:24:00 GMT

Hello gonzoessex,

Nice to hear and welcome!

If you mean routing by general, it's on either EXOS or VSP or ERS or VDX or SLX products, if you mean strictly routers ('ExtremeRouting'), those are two SLX devices right now. I've heard about virtual SLX but didn't use that yet.
SLX routers use SLX OS, you might wish to bookmark this page for any HW/SW documentation: https://www.extremenetworks.com/support/documentation/
Do you have some exact list of features or scenarios you want to try out? Regarding EXOS, the User Guide itself is a nice tutorial on how do things work and how to configure them, I've also seen @Martin Flammia's blog that helped me once: http://www.extremenetworks.guru/. You can also try to ask your regional reseller/distributor/Extreme representatives to seek for any workshops and demos hosted by them.
Basic knowledge you can earn on your own (with docs and community support). If you want to get certified with EXOS, I'd recommend ECS - Campus EXOS Switching & Routing instead. At the moment most of ECNA content is within that ECS class (you can compare agendas here: https://www.extremenetworks.com/education/courses/). It should possible to do self-study and take the exam theoretically, you might also ask learn@extremenetworks.com to make sure. I'm not confident about buying the course materials off the training, it would rather be agenda-based list of takeaways.
Waiting for others' approaches to be posted, IMO there is often no way for strict translation line by line, rather could be block by block (sometimes few commands in Cisco can be a single command in EXOS and vice versa). There used to be a "Legacy CLI" that was a Cisco CLI shell, but it was pretty limited at a time. I believe EXOS is pretty straightforward, no worries. Any questions you got, just reach us out here!

Hope that helps,
Tomasz

RE: Cisco chap starting on his Extreme journey

EtherMAN — Thu, 09 May 2019 22:19:00 GMT

I have converted many Cisco techs and NOC employees over to EXOS through the years and here are some of my observations.

First EXOS very standardized and their cli is more single line driven and not a tree. Tab is your friend.

On the EXOS platform the layer 3 routing functions are a bit tricky to get used to the differences and lack some router features you have grown to love/hate if you have been using bigger core type Cisco routers and have routers everywhere as is the Cisco way.

Forget about trying to make everything routed. Their strength is layer 2 and building big fat fast layer 2 connections between switches so spend some time understanding how to build layer two networks using switches with more centralized core routers.

Stay active on the HUB as you grow... We will guide you and help you along your journey. Down load the proof and concepts guide and spend some time looking at the examples and capabilities of EXOS.

Much simpler images for upgrades and configuration management having two separate buckets for each so you have built in roll back at image and configuration level.

Good luck and welcome

RE: Cisco chap starting on his Extreme journey

gonzoessex — Thu, 09 May 2019 23:22:00 GMT

Thanks guys.

I will start of slow and go from there, L2 does seem to be their strength. GNS3 is great now as I can play with EXOS.

So is EXOS used for just the switches and SLX for routers?
Like Cisco can EXOS (switches?) be used as routers to learn L3?
IS SLX available in GNS3 to learn?
How did you learn, was it by buying some kit or GNS3?

Thanks

RE: Cisco chap starting on his Extreme journey

gonzoessex — Thu, 09 May 2019 23:25:00 GMT

I forgot - so you don't need to take one of their course to take the exam like VMware do? I self studied Cisco and bought the exams myself and passed. My own pace.....

RE: Cisco chap starting on his Extreme journey

EtherMAN — Thu, 09 May 2019 23:31:00 GMT

yes
yes fully supports all standard routing protocols.
dont think so yet Have limited use of SLX ...
Been purple since 1998  so took a 5 day boot camp about 18 years ago and the rest has been learned along the way. We do an online course for all new hires and have the take the ECNA test and cert before they can get more than user level access... https://www.extremenetworks.com/education/certifications/extreme-certified-network-associate/
After doing this cert and you want more or want to specialize there are some resources for that but to be truthful make friends with your SE as they can be a great resource to bonce things off of.
This forum is the best in the industry IMO.. If you give us the details and what you are struggling with someone will respond with tips and a solution.

RE: Cisco chap starting on his Extreme journey

gonzoessex — Fri, 10 May 2019 00:35:00 GMT

Thanks so is it best to concentrate on the EXOS first before the SLX? Plus it helps it's in GNS3.
To learn SLX to many buy a an old Extreme router?
Does the ECNA concentrate on both (EXOS & SLX)?

TIme for me to hit those links and read up.

I have to resit my CCPN this yeah as it expires, so need to get that out the way first then it leave a nice window open for me to study the Extreme.

Thanks

RE: Cisco chap starting on his Extreme journey

Tomasz — Fri, 10 May 2019 03:11:00 GMT

Ad. 1. Nope, briefly said:

EXOS - flagship switching/routing solution (could be called L3 switches), works for campus, datacenter, core, pure L2 or L3 networks... but all depends on features and applications you need. If you take a look at the EXOS User Guide or Feature License Requirements or EXOS Datasheet (https://kapost-files-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/kapost/55ba7c9e07003d9aab000394/studio/content/57dbfb2f330db0dec00000b4/published/extremexos-r-data-sheet.pdf) you will see how much is there. For L3 you have all you might need in many scenarios (OSPF, static routing, BGP, PIM, VRRP etc.). However, there is no NAT so far, and buffers are rather small (so less room for rate shaping) compared to SLX switches and routers that can have up to 6 GB buffers! If you were a reseller, you would have to think what are the customer requirements and based on that propose him topology and boxes. From Extreme's strategy, EXOS is dedicated mostly for campus deployments (traditional 2-3-4-tier hierarchical designs, rings...), yet having EVB/VEPA/DirectAttach feature that prevents vSwitches from switching, so there is full inter-VM communication seen and controllable by the physical switch. Besides... heterogenous stacking, telemetry, Policy, Python scripting/processes, three types of APIs, CLEARFlow, virtual routers and VRFs...
VSP - ex-Avaya awesomeness, Extreme now posesses the best implementation (as from the very roots) of IEEE 802.3aq Shortest Path Bridging (and extensions that hopefully will become a part of the standard in the future) fabrics that is a pure gamechanger. I'd love if you guys who are more Cisco-fluent could comment on L3-everywhere approach (with hassle of spanning the broadcasting domains, multicast routing and failover times for critical network-wide services) and compare it to L2-everywhere approach that is doable with SPB. Spanning Tree is not a challenge today (many networks should not even need STP for typical hierarchical network - just LACP and ELRP). Besides, it also supports traditional L3 features, but I'd use them rather for interoperation with non-SPB parts of the network. VSPs are also meant for the campus deployments but suit in the DCs as well, they have nice feature useful there called DVR;
ERS - ex-Avaya switches meant for access, but still, I see OSPF, PIM, just no BGP. ERS and VSPs mainly have MACsec where EXOS just started with an adapter and X465 which supports MACsec on all ports natively;
VDX - ex-Brocade switches dedicated to data centers; really nice, with TRILL-based approach to fabric networks, some pros and cons compared to SPB but don't treat those two as an ultimate solutions for every customer possible. They also got flexible configuration ports (Ethernet/Fibre Channel) and IP-fabric for L3 leaf-spine fabric networks;
SLX - ex-Brocade switches and routers dedicated to data centers, with extremely high level of automation (EXOS and VSPs are going to that point pretty nice over time), huge buffers, auxilliary applications that came along during the acquisition, and KVM environment to install VMs for no-delay-impacted analytics. SLX 9850 is of 230Tbps capacity BTW, that's a big boy. If I found just a chassis of that one, I could pay most of my mortgage 
All the above can fit in many scenarios, and for example EXOS was and still can be successful at service provider and transport networks, SLX is also not meant only for some DC-room and so on... Just to harness the amount of nice technology Extreme has they decided to specify some use-cases and verticals that the solutions are best suited for; what is nice, they do implement functionalities between platforms. That's why X465 now has also KVM environment like SLX does;
There are also some CER/CES/MLX boxes but never saw any campaign with these.

If you want to be well-suited for your job it would be good if you knew what platform do they use. EXOS and SLX are two different worlds when it comes to CLI (BTW SLX and VDX is very similar to Cisco). But if you started the topic with mentioning EXOS I believe you should not worry about SLX right now.
ECNA - EXOS Fundamentals and ECS - Campus EXOS Switching & Routing are pure EXOS classes. There is also separate ECS class for SLX.

Eh... sorry for a bit long post. Not long enough to fully and precisely elaborate on the topic but... Yeah, EXOS can act as a router.

Hope that helps,
Tomasz

RE: Cisco chap starting on his Extreme journey

gonzoessex — Fri, 10 May 2019 03:18:00 GMT

Wow thanks, I will re-read this again with a nice cup of tea, plus put in my Onenotes.