Leap Day 2016

This year is a leap year.  We get a .25 day every year and every 4 years, we add it to February.  Im sure you remember is school being taught that the Earth revolves around the sun in 365.25 days a year. Today is that day for the last few years.

Pic Of The Week: Morning Wake-Up

Home Projects: More Stablizing Floores

I've mentioned before that I don't like going underneath this 1935 house we are fixing up. But under our bathroom floor, it's quite a mess.

So this is the result of neglect.  And right above this area I'm at is a slab of concrete. Now I'm not happy about getting under this, but especially in such a tight space. But I have to make sure this floor is stable, and I really don't have any choice but to get in there and put a temporary beam underneath so I can get all this fixed. This was not one of my better days on this house.

Quote For The Day: 11

"I believe God is managing affairs and doesn't need any advice from me.  With God in charge, I believe everything will work out for the best in the end.  So what is there to worry about?"  -- Henry Ford

Classful vs Classless Routing

Im going to make this short.  Classful routing updates ARE NOT sent with the subnet mask.  Classless routing updates ARE sent with the subnet mask.
You want classless routing updates..

Cisco R&S: Finding A FEX With The "Locator-led Fex" Command

One of the things I like about writing this blog is that sometimes I get folks to educate me with their experience.  If you post a comment on this blog, I'm going to read it for sure.  And I always appreciate other people's experiences.
I got this helpful command from a guy who commented on a post I had about finding a FEX in a N5K.  He said you could make the "ID" LED light up on a FEX by typing in the following command:
N5K# locator-led fex 100

As I walked down to where that FEX was located, sure enough, the "ID" LED was blinking bright blue.  Whoever it was that gave me that bit of info, its much appreciated.

Now This Is Embarrassing

Well, I guess I should be embarrassed.  I double posted on me doing insulation.  My apologies.  I'll put up a replacement.

ShoreTel Voice: Troubleshooting "No Service" On An IP Phone

You know, this phone you see in the picture below works sometimes, and sometimes it doesn't.  In this case, a faulty RJ45 plug was to blame.  You could move the cable in and out slightly and it would disconnect the copper on the inside of the plug from the cable.  You can imaging why the customer would be a little baffled by this.  Ill replace the plug when I go out there again.

Sunday Thought: A Father's Love

I've been thinking a lot about a father's love for his kids. I know that I love my daughter and would do anything for her, plain and simple. My wife and I brought her into this world, and she is ours (with God's hand in that). No matter what she does in this life, I love her very much.  That will never change.
Now, isn't that how God sees those who believe in Him and trust in his plan of salvation? Doesn't He love us that same way and more? We belong to Him. He set out a plan and followed though to completion the way to bring us back to Him. That means the work is already done through what Jesus did for us at the cross. We just have to accept that free gift to us.

Pic Of The Week: New Data Center Equipment

Quote For The Day: 10

"God never ends anything on a negative; God always ends on a positive." -- Edwin Louis Cole

Cisco R&S: Finding The Associated FEX You Are Looking At

Sometimes when I walk into a data center that I am barely familiar with, it can be difficult to find what FEX goes with what N5K/N7K.  If no one is with me when I'm trying to figure this out, one of the things I do is just look at the serial number on the FEX itself.  Then, I go to the NxK I think it could be on, and run the 'show fex' command.  If you notice at the far right column, it shows you the serial of the FEX.  I then align it up with the FEX number in the config.
N5K-1# sh fex
  FEX         FEX           FEX                       FEX
Number    Description      State            Model            Serial
------------------------------------------------------------------------
110        FEX0110                Online    N2K-C2232PP-10GE   SSI17410AAA
111        FEX0111                Online   N2K-C2248TP-E-1GE   SSI17340BBB
112        FEX0112                Online    N2K-C2232PP-10GE   SSI17320CCC
131        FEX0131                Online   N2K-C2248TP-E-1GE   SSI17340DDD
141  NX-4_Backup_FEX-1                Online    N2K-C2232PP-10GE   SSI17300EEE
142  NX-4_Backup_FEX-2                Online   N2K-C2248TP-E-1GE   SSI17340FFF
143        FEX0143                Online   N2K-C2248TP-E-1GE   SSI17340GGG
144        FEX0144                Online    N2K-C2232PP-10GE   SSI18420HHH
151  NX-5_Backup_FEX-1                Online    N2K-C2232PP-10GE   SSI17320III
152  NX-5_Backup_FEX-2                Online   N2K-C2248TP-E-1GE   SSI17300JJJ
153        FEX0153                Online    N2K-C2232PP-10GE   SSI18420KKK
161  NX-6_Backup_FEX-1                Online   N2K-C2248TP-E-1GE   SSI17340LLL
171  NX-7_Backup_FEX-1                Online   N2K-C2248TP-E-1GE   SSI17340MMM
181  NX-8_Backup_FEX-1                Online   N2K-C2248TP-E-1GE   SSI17340NNN
182  NX-8_Backup_FEX-2                Online    N2K-C2232PP-10GE   SSI17320OOO
183  NX-8_Backup_FEX-183                Online    N2K-C2232PP-10GE   SSI1732PPP
0
N5K-1#

Definitely Alabama: Two Really Great State Mottos

I can really appreciate two state mottos in particular:
First and my favorite, New Hampshire: "Live free or die"
Second, Alabama:  "We dare to defend our rights"

Other Technical: Pinging With Different Packet Sizes

Sometimes its important to do a quick test to verify jumbo frames are able to pass through the network path you need it to.  If you are the network guy, and a server guy comes to you saying they are having problems with jumbo frames, YOU need to be able to test the network yourself to see if it works.  You can change the size of the packet with a ping to verify this.
Here is a normal ping:
C:\Users\switch>ping 10.10.10.10

Pinging 10.10.10.10 with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 10.10.10.10: bytes=32 time=20ms TTL=55
Reply from 10.10.10.10: bytes=32 time=34ms TTL=55
Reply from 10.10.10.10: bytes=32 time=25ms TTL=55
Reply from 10.10.10.10: bytes=32 time=29ms TTL=55

Ping statistics for 10.10.10.10:
    Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 20ms, Maximum = 34ms, Average = 27ms

Now, here is a ping using a larger size for jumbo frame testing:

C:\Users\switch>ping -l 9000 10.10.10.10

Pinging 10.10.10.10 with 9000 bytes of data:

Reply from 10.10.10.10: bytes=9000 time=23ms TTL=55

Reply from 10.10.10.10: bytes=9000 time=39ms TTL=55

Reply from 10.10.10.10: bytes=9000 time=24ms TTL=55

Reply from 10.10.10.10: bytes=9000 time=24ms TTL=55

Ping statistics for 10.10.10.10:

    Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),

Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:

    Minimum = 23ms, Maximum = 39ms, Average = 27ms

Check Point R77 To Cisco ASA Conversion Tool

If you are looking for the Check Point to Cisco ASA conversion tool for R77, Check Point doesnt make it easy to determine where its at.  To me, their website acts like it doesnt exist.  I did find this link below that says R71 and above works for R77.  It was the "and above" that you dont see anywhere else in their documentation.
https://supportcenter.checkpoint.com/supportcenter/portal?eventSubmit_doGoviewsolutiondetails=&solutionid=sk30765

Pic Of The Week: The State Of Birmingham

Below is my pic of the week. Someone decided they wanted my power meter at the old 1935 house. If you don't know much about Birmingham, this is about what you should expect.

Cisco Vulnerability I Learned Of While Reading Another Blog

Brad posts some good stuff on his blog @showconfig.net . He brought this to his reader's attention (me being one of them). Very important to know: http://www.showconfig.net/cisco-security-advisory-ike-vulnerability-in-asa-code-critical/

Home Projects: Insulation

This is an itchy job.  Either way, this old house needs some insulation on the perimeter.

HP/Aruba Switch Comparison With Brocade

HP purchased Aruba on May 19th, 2015.  They seem to have a new switching product line out now since the merger and an engineer from HP came in to talk to me (and a few other engineers) about their switching products, because we sell Aruba wireless.  I wont go into the details, but I was not impressed with that visit.
I don't mind asking hard questions to people.  The more questions I asked, the more I realized how unprepared HP was in this visit.  I guess if you don't have a strong product, its hard to be confident about what you are trying to get people to buy. I'm good with the Aruba wireless, but I'm not good with the Aruba/HP switch line.  So, as I will normally do, I did the investigation myself of their products and what the apples to apples product comparison really is.

HP/Aruba recommends the following:
HP 2920s and 3800s they say are for the IDF (access switches)
HP 5400r acts as a distribution switch or a core switch.

When you spec the 5400r up against its "apples to apples" comparison, it doesnt compare.
The low end 5400r:
forwarding rate of 571.4Mpps
switch fabric speed of 1.015 Bbps

The low end ICX 7750:
forwarding rate of 1.44 Bpps
switch fabric speed of 1.92 Tbps

The Brocade ICX 6650 (this shouldn't be a comparison):
forwarding rate of 1.190 Bpps

I can tell you I wont be presenting HP/Aruba to my customers.

Quote For The Day: 9

"Oh I wish I was in the land of cotton.  Old times there are not forgotten."  -- Elvis Presley

Brocade VDX6740: Copy Config To Remote FTP Site

I'm looking forward to getting more and more into the Brocade VDX line.  I went onsite the other day and was making some changes to a customer's pair of VDX 6740s.

So before I leave every site, I take a backup of the config.  So on the VDX, I FTP'ed the config over with the following command: "copy running-config ftp://[username]:[password]@[ip of ftp server]"

Sunday Thought: Guilty By Association

Great song by the Newsboys. Guilty

Pic Of The Week: Water Works

Home Projects: Making Use Of Extra Wood

I had done some "sistering" of some joists that needed some extra reinforcement on that old 1935 house we are fixing up. I needed a certain size wood to do this, but I didn't have any. But I did have some that were a little too wide. So to make use of this wood that was lying around, I just cut it myself to size and took it on over for the job. Saves money and gets the job done.

Quote For The Day: 8

"Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can."

-- Arthur Ashe

Windows Server 2012: How To Add Telnet Client In Command Prompt

Its pretty simple and it works well.  Go to a command prompt and type in  the following:
pkgmgr /iu:"TelnetClient"

Wait for the command prompt to come back and wait a minute or so.

Definately Alabama: Taurus TCP .380 Recoil

Here is the Taurus .380 TCP recoil.  I mostly like this pistol.  Very accurate and very concealable.  See the link for the video.
https://youtu.be/5wgFnVwvCU4

From 10 yards out.