Hi, I am currently enrolled in a school working towards my associates, and have almost completed the courses. I also recently got a job as an intern at a fortune 100 company. To say i was unprepared was an understatement. I intern in the Network "connection" department, meaning we are responsible for the rj-45 that plugs into the NIC, to where ends at the destination. I work with managed vendors for our routers, and we also manage our own routers domestically, and have around 3000 routers we manage, and around 2000 more that are managed by various services globally. And that is just routers, we have sites that have as many as 4 chassis switches, plus ap's, and other devices.
What i worked with in school was Microsoft products, Server, AD, Vmware, Xchange etc. When i started my job, I also had just started my Cisco training. I have finished the courses now, but still find myself out of touch with alot of the technology. I never worked with stuff like Firewalls, Bluecoats, Loadbalancers, VPN's, LTE backups, VOIP, and switches from Cisco 300 to huge chassis switches. We even use software like Infoblox, Airwave, Spectrum to name just a few.
I have tried to find and gobble up as much info as i can on these topics, but find it difficult to get into meat and potatoes of this varying tech. Granted I am only going on to earn my associates degree, but how do people find the time to learn this stuff while going to school and working.
I hear my teammates talking and man they talk about nexus this, and brocade that, and just so much stuff that is clearly over my head. To be honest it makes me wonder if i am in the right field as i seem to know nothing about any of this stuff. I understand that schools do not have access to a lot of this stuff, but man I feel like i am just behind the curve sometimes. I have learned more there in a few months then i did in school, but I still feel so far behind. Is this stuff covered in the 4 year degree's? Or is this just something you have to be exposed to, to really learn this stuff?
If anyone knows good places to get the info for this stuff, I have no issues reading, and learning, and yes i go to the manufacturer sites, and look at manuals, but seriously they can be 2000 pages. That would be great if i at-least understood what some of this stuff did, and how it works. I have been looking for white papers on the various tech, and even just googeling networking forums, so that i can do what i am doing here.
Did any of you feel this way when you first started out?
What i worked with in school was Microsoft products, Server, AD, Vmware, Xchange etc. When i started my job, I also had just started my Cisco training. I have finished the courses now, but still find myself out of touch with alot of the technology. I never worked with stuff like Firewalls, Bluecoats, Loadbalancers, VPN's, LTE backups, VOIP, and switches from Cisco 300 to huge chassis switches. We even use software like Infoblox, Airwave, Spectrum to name just a few.
I have tried to find and gobble up as much info as i can on these topics, but find it difficult to get into meat and potatoes of this varying tech. Granted I am only going on to earn my associates degree, but how do people find the time to learn this stuff while going to school and working.
I hear my teammates talking and man they talk about nexus this, and brocade that, and just so much stuff that is clearly over my head. To be honest it makes me wonder if i am in the right field as i seem to know nothing about any of this stuff. I understand that schools do not have access to a lot of this stuff, but man I feel like i am just behind the curve sometimes. I have learned more there in a few months then i did in school, but I still feel so far behind. Is this stuff covered in the 4 year degree's? Or is this just something you have to be exposed to, to really learn this stuff?
If anyone knows good places to get the info for this stuff, I have no issues reading, and learning, and yes i go to the manufacturer sites, and look at manuals, but seriously they can be 2000 pages. That would be great if i at-least understood what some of this stuff did, and how it works. I have been looking for white papers on the various tech, and even just googeling networking forums, so that i can do what i am doing here.
Did any of you feel this way when you first started out?
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