A good recommendation CCIE book lists

So Much Information: Part One

By Jared Scrivener on Friday, November 21, 2008 17:30

Well, those of you in the process of studying for your R&S CCIE are probably going through (or have gone through) the challenge of assimilating thousands of pages worth of information. Many of you will have seen Cisco’s reading list and considered it potentially insurmountable. How can one human brain possibly contain all that information?

Often I find that when I teach R&S boot camps, many of my students haven’t read the entire book list. In fact, I haven’t encountered any who have as of yet - and you don’t need to. What puzzles me is when I find that the same areas that students report to be weak on tend to correlate most strongly to the books that they haven’t read. To me, common sense would indicate that if you don’t know something it needs to be researched - lab time is not an appropriate method to learn why things work - just HOW they work. That’s why there are two exams to pass to achieve a CCIE, a written and a lab. Unfortunately, Cisco set a pass mark for the written exam that is far too low, that allows too many people to pass with serious knowledge gaps: this makes it difficult for students to recognize that gap until their lab ends in disaster.

What I’m going to outline here is my suggested reading list. None of these books are authored by me, but every one of them I’ve bought and read in the context of my studies. Not all of them need to be read cover to cover, but some do, so I’ll make it clear which are which. There are many reading lists that are flagged as “recommended” by the author of the list. In my opinion this leads people to believe that certain reading is optional. It isn’t. So far as I’m concerned my reading list is a *required* reading list and like all suggestions I make to students I don’t waste your time by listing books that are redundant.

So here’s my recommended strategy to assimilate information from the start of the process until the point where you start to do technology labs. You’ll note that I assume a lot of this reading is done before the written exam. For those of you who passed that based in the ridiculously easy nature of that test without fully studying, please read the books that I list anyway - you’ll thank me for it.

My reading list assumes CCNA level knowledge - if you don’t have that then read the following first and go and get your CCNA, get a year or two’s worth of experience (if you don’t have that already) then come back to your CCIE after that:

CCNA Official Exam Certification Library (CCNA Exam 640-802), 3rd Edition by Wendell Odom

From the start of your CCIE the first book to read is a general book to create a mental frame work to put your theory in. When studying, always begin by reading something that covers all the topics - don’t delve into a particular topic in detail first. This is because your brain formulates information from data based on context - so you’ll gather more information from reading the same book if you have a context to put it in.

So, book one is your overall theory book:

CCIE Routing and Switching Exam Certification Guide, 3rd Edition By Wendell Odom, Rus Healy, Naren Mehta.

This book, once finished, will give you a good overview of the topics that you’ll need to learn for your CCIE. Read it as the first book, then re-read it (as required) before your written exam.

Book two is your routing book:

Routing TCP/IP, Volume 1, 2nd Edition By Jeff Doyle, Jennifer Carroll.

This book is like the bible for the R&S CCIE student. It’s a tough read but superbly written with an elegant logical sequence. It will teach you all you need to know about the operation of your IGP routing protocols for IPv4 and IPv6. It’s also my favorite textbook of all time.

Book three is your switching book:

CCNP BCMSN Official Exam Certification Guide, 4th Edition By Dave Hucaby.

This book isn’t on the Cisco CCIE reading list, which astounds me. The Cisco list prefers “Cisco LAN Switching” but that is almost 10 years old and the information (whilst well written and detailed) is too old to be a useful reference due to massive technology improvements. This book is the latest exam certification guide for BCMSN (the CCNP switching course). Feel free to skip any topics that aren’t relevant to your lab, but ensure you read all the switching material as well as material on high availability protocols and multicast (it’ll serve as a good primer for the sixth book).

Book four and five are your BGP books:

Internet Routing Architectures, 2nd Edition by Sam Halabi

and

Routing TCP/IP, Volume II By Jeff Doyle, Jennifer DeHaven Carroll.

Sam’s book is an excellent book covering BGP in many situations. It is dated a little bit, but BGP hasn’t changed much in that time. Routing TCP/IP Vol 2 has a good BGP section too, so between them you should be able to learn most if not all of the theory you need to understand the protocol.

Book six is your multicast book:

Developing IP Multicast Networks, Volume I By Beau Williamson.

It’s unfortunate that Beau has never had the time to update this masterpiece, but read it anyway as it explains multicast better than any other book to date. Supplement it with the information from books three and five if you need to get a bit of extra information.

Book seven is your QOS book:

Cisco QOS Exam Certification Guide (IP Telephony Self-Study), 2nd Edition By Wendell Odom, Michael J. Cavanaugh.

This book (again not on the list from Cisco) is the best written QOS book that you’ll find. What it doesn’t cover (or that Wendell didn’t add to in book one) you should gather from the Cisco website 3550 and 3560 Configuration Guide QOS sections.

So that’s seven books cover-to-cover to have *expert* level knowledge. Seem fair? The only major areas I haven’t covered are WAN technologies and IPv6, but they are better covered later in your studies due to their less theoretical and more practical nature (what you need to know for the written is in book one).

Read them, go pass your written (or read them if you already passed but need more information) and move on to technology scenarios. Next week, I’ll cover the remaining supplemental books to read as I guide you through the study process leading up to your lab.

Have a good weekend.