It's been a long time since I started my journey and a long time since I put anything up on my blog. I have no excuses for taking my time. I have been working on the CCIE all this time but in slow motion, I have designed and built several large and many small Networks, I've trained up some 30 or more people, passed my CCIE written, got the CCDA and CCDP in double quick time, been boarding lots, been climbing lots, had fun with my 17 year old son, have changed job three times, have a great GF to play with, I stopped for a while and started again, I mess around with other things, I have to solve lots of issues with using Dynamips, solve issues with my Rack and generally have Datacoms coming out of my ears at work, home and pleasure. No excuses, it's hard getting a CCIE however you look at it.
In this post I'm going to try and put up a lot of my hard-won Dynamips knowledge with special attention to the following:
- Topologies to work from for WB Vol I
- An automated Applescript for opening all the Terminal tabs needed to use Dynamips
- Configurations and solutions to many problems within Dynamips
This is a link to a public folder on Google Drive (GD). Please try it and let me know issues, success, details etc.
You'll access two folders and a file. The Vol I and Vol II folders are how I've structured the Dynamips environment on my Mac. If you maintain this and copy it to yours the .net file will point to it from the Desktop. You may have to modify other details to point everything to the correct location and, of course, you'll have to add your own binaries but here are the ones I use:
c3725-adventerprisek9-mz.124-15_T13_unZ.BIN
c3725-advipservicesk9-mz.124-25d.UnZ.BIN
Noting that you have to UNZIP them before Dynamips will function.
The file is an Applescript to open 13 tabs in a single window, name them to the respective device, open up the local host port and show ip interfaces brief at initiation. Don't worry too much about the secondary functions of showing ip interfaces etc. as I didn't put a time delay in to allow the Dynamips VM to boot up but if you allow Dynamips to run for a couple of minutes first it'll all work well.
You can however use the script to open Terminal quickly any time you want because I've not put that delay in.
To run the script just put it on your desktop and open it, then hit the run button. To make sure it works when you don't have Terminal open it activates Terminal twice so just close the secondary window if one appears.
OK, back to the Dynamips work:
- I have and am using INE's CCIE R&S WBs and Dynamips topologies. The .cfg files have come from a SED script I wrote to fit the Dynamips topology with 3725s with EtherSwitch modules.
- Inside the folder you'll find startup configurations for each of the 20 labs. It is important to delete all the 'working' configuration VMs before loading a new lab configuration - they are stored in the 'working' folder. Then, copy the 13 .cfg files to the 'Initial Configs' folder and start GNS3 with the .net file. Finally, you must ensure the respective VLANs are added to the switches, check the VTP statuses are as-per the configs originally given by INE.
- Once running, check you have the connectivity needed - Frame Relay maps need to match the DLCIs and turn off keepalives if you're going back-to-back, check BB links and other LANs.
- With L3 interfaces on the switch modules you may have issues with the adjacencies. If so, create VLANs to connect them and SVI the switch ends.
- With Routing adjacencies set the hello and dead intervals to 20 and 200 where you have them flapping.
- Other information on solutions to common issues can be found in the text file I use to mark which Lab I'm working on: "Currently Using Lab X initial configurations.txt"
- Remember that Dynamips is a tool and isn't perfect.
- Also remember that Dynamips is AWESOME for people like me who have need for study instantly at random intervals in random places :)
Thanks,
Alan
