I would like help learning

[MrReptilian]

While i know the basics about networking, i would like to learn more, but from a reliable source, so any pointers would be very appreciated.

 

If its free material, even better

[Windows7ge]

Really the best way you can learn about networking is get your hands on some gear and build something. When something in your setup inevitably doesn't work troubleshooting & Google will be your greatest teachers. What Google doesn't help you with you can come and ask us.

[Windows7ge]

Do you have a couple computers & ethernet cables at your disposal? I can give you a beginner project if you would like one.

[mynameisjuan]

All depends on how deep you want to get into networking.

 

 For a high level over view 

 

it’s a good series to start on. 

 

For hands on Packet Tracer. There is no other better learning tool for beginners. It walks you through step by step in a packet/frames life and shows you the decision tree the routers/switches make

[Turtle Rig]

1 hour ago, MrReptilian said:

While i know the basics about networking, i would like to learn more, but from a reliable source, so any pointers would be very appreciated.

 

If its free material, even better

Just learn about TCP/IP the protocol used for getting online and what not.

[WWicket]

Play with a packet analyzer: Download Wireshark and nmap; Read the wireshark user guide and fyodor's nmap book (all free). 

 

Go through a Network+ or CCNA course (lots of free ones), if needed, and then play with a virtual network lab: GNS3

 

If you really want to get deep into it, I'd recommend reading TCP/IP Illustrated (R. Stevens), Internetworking with TCP/IP (D. Comer), and Interconnections (R. Perlman) (should all be able to be found used for cheap... version doesn't really matter). Then jump into Giac and Cisco white papers.

[mynameisjuan]

11 minutes ago, WWicket said:

Play with a packet analyzer: Download Wireshark and nmap; Read the wireshark user guide and fyodor's nmap book (all free). 

Wireshark is not something you just jump into and its highly advised against throwing someone new into it

[WWicket]

1 minute ago, mynameisjuan said:

Wireshark is not something you just jump into and its highly advised against throwing someone new into it

He says he knows basics and doing packet analysis is the best way to learn about protocols. Especially for anyone with a background in programming, packet analysis is better starting point than network architecture. 

[Windows7ge]

18 minutes ago, WWicket said:

Play with a packet analyzer: Download Wireshark and nmap; Read the wireshark user guide and fyodor's nmap book (all free).

4 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

Wireshark is not something you just jump into and its highly advised against throwing someone new into it

People who attend my college have actually been prosecuted for using those types of tools on the network. Really something you shouldn't give to someone who doesn't know what it is or what it can do.

[mynameisjuan]

1 minute ago, WWicket said:

doing packet analysis is the best way to learn about protocols

Sure, at a deeper level. 

4 minutes ago, WWicket said:

Especially for anyone with a background in programming, packet analysis is better starting point than network architecture. 

I dont get what you are trying to get at? What does programming do for you that changes your starting point?

 

People who tend to say "i know the basics" dont realize how little they know. This gets worse as you are learning. Start with the basics, book or video course. Dont start with packet captures.

[WWicket]

Just now, Windows7ge said:

People who attend my college have actually been prosecuted for using those types of tools on the network. Really something you shouldn't give to someone who doesn't know what it is or what it can do.

" Read the wireshark user guide and fyodor's nmap book (all free)." If he reads the books, he will know what it is and what it does. The nmap book has a very detailed legal section. Nmap should only be used on private networks. Wireshark is passive... I've never heard of anyone being 'prosecuted for running wireshark at a college.' It shouldn't even be detectable........

[mynameisjuan]

5 minutes ago, Windows7ge said:

People who attend my college have actually been prosecuted for using those types of tools on the network. Really something you shouldn't give to someone who doesn't know what it is or what it can do.

Wireshark is used in production, its a valid tool and you cant do anything with it, as in an action. It just shows you packets on the wire. You can however use it to capture handshakes or listen to SIP calls but you would have to be MIM to do that. Wireshark with typical broadcast/unknown unicast is almost useless. 

[Windows7ge]

1 minute ago, WWicket said:

" Read the wireshark user guide and fyodor's nmap book (all free)." If he reads the books, he will know what it is and what it does. The nmap book has a very detailed legal section. Nmap should only be used on private networks. Wireshark is passive... I've never heard of anyone being 'prosecuted for running wireshark at a college.' It shouldn't even be detectable........

To my understanding what Wireshark does is put your NIC into Promiscuous Mode which is a dead giveaway on the network that the computer is doing something it shouldn't be.

[Windows7ge]

2 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

Wireshark is used in production, its a valid tool and you cant do anything with it, as in an action. It just shows you packets on the wire. You can however use it to capture handshakes or listen to SIP calls but you would have to be MIM to do that. Wireshark with typical broadcast/unknown unicast is almost useless. 

There's no doubt to me it's just my college being very anal but hey rules are rules a lot of places don't like you sniffing a network even if its by a tool that can't really influence the network.

[WWicket]

2 minutes ago, Windows7ge said:

To my understanding what Wireshark does is put your NIC into Promiscuous Mode which is a dead giveaway on the network that the computer is doing something it shouldn't be.

There are tools for detecting that an attached device is in promiscuous mode, but at most it would raise some curiosity from your IT security dept. It is unlikely to even do that. 

[WWicket]

32 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

 

I dont get what you are trying to get at? What does programming do for you that changes your starting point?

Hex encoding wouldn't be ¿scary? / you'd be familiar with a lot of the encapsulated data and concepts, like checksums, flags, http request structures etc. depending on the type of traffic you are looking at/ you'd be used to referencing technical documentation/ you'd be used manipulating data sets and could jump straight into things that make packet analysis more fun like scapy and pandas-dataframes... what part of Wireshark/packet analysis do you think would be confusing?  

 

PS: By 'have a background in programming' I meant 'has professional experience in full stack development and some education in computer sciences', not 'learned some css to mess with their myspace page at some point.' 

[Windows7ge]

13 minutes ago, WWicket said:

There are tools for detecting that an attached device is in promiscuous mode, but at most it would raise some curiosity from your IT security dept. It is unlikely to even do that. 

Fair enough, but depending on how much experience he has exactly and where it is he wants to start I still don't think packet analysis is a great place to start. I can say after about 6~7 years of working with many different scopes and sub-categories of networking I'll look at some captured network data and still only understand 50% of it. Throw someone who knows the basics of networking in there and I think you're not getting their feet wet you're shoving them into the deep-end of a pool.

 

It may actually be ideal here to have him follow the OSI model, If he's comfortable with hardware already start him at Layer 2 Data-Link, after that have him dabble in Layer 3/4.

[mynameisjuan]

24 minutes ago, WWicket said:

Hex encoding wouldn't be ¿scary? / you'd be familiar with a lot of the encapsulated data and concepts, like checksums, flags, http request structures etc. depending on the type of traffic you are looking at/ you'd be used to referencing technical documentation/ you'd be used manipulating data sets and could jump straight into things that make packet analysis more fun like pandas dataframes... what part of Wireshark/packet analysis do you think would be confusing?

You dont need to know programming to look at flags and checksums, I could argue that is provides no benefit if the learning process for networking.

 

The part about Wireshark being confusing is you told the OP to jump right into them. You need to know what you are looking at. I know other engineers that cannot read a capture. 

[WWicket]

9 minutes ago, Windows7ge said:

 

It may actually be ideal here to have him follow the OSI model, If he's comfortable with hardware already start him at Layer 2 Data-Link, after that have him dabble in Layer 3/4.

I guess mostly it depends on why he wants to learn about networking. I deal with protocols a lot more than hardware or network design, so I might be biased. 

[WWicket]

2 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

The part about Wireshark being confusing is you told the OP to jump right into them. You need to know what you are looking at. I know other engineers that cannot read a capture. 

And I don't know anyone that does low level programming that would be confused by a capture, so I guess that makes my point. 

[Windows7ge]

3 minutes ago, WWicket said:

I guess mostly it depends on why he wants to learn about networking. I deal with protocols a lot more than hardware or network design, so I might be biased. 

I deal a lot more with hardware & network design so I'm biased too  but hey the more we go back and forth the more he'll have to research.

3 minutes ago, WWicket said:

And I don't know anyone that does low level programming that would be confused by a capture, so I guess that makes my point. 

Did he tell you that because he didn't tell us. We're in the dark here if that's the case.

[WWicket]

5 minutes ago, Windows7ge said:

Did he tell you that because he didn't tell us. We're in the dark here if that's the case.

Lol. No, I know nothing about him, beyond that he said he knew the basics of networking already (which to me, would mean at least has some exposure to the OSI model, most common hardware, subnetting, basic configuration, and common protocols). 

Comments about programming where in response to juan not understanding why I thought a background in programming would make approaching packet analysis easier.

[mynameisjuan]

11 minutes ago, WWicket said:

And I don't know anyone that does low level programming that would be confused by a capture, so I guess that makes my point. 

So if you know programming, you could just look at a PCAP and look at a BGP update message and its NLRI VPNv4 contents and you just know what it is?

 

Hmmmm...didnt know you just acquire that knowledge. Wiresharks are not hard to look at, point is the information is completely useless without knowing what you are looking at.

 

Quote

 beyond that he said he knew the basics of networking already (which to me, would mean at least has some exposure to the OSI model, most common hardware, subnetting, basic configuration, and common protocols).

Again, when people say they know there basics, it doesnt include any of that. 

[WWicket]

Just now, mynameisjuan said:

So if you know programming, you could just look at a PCAP and look at a BGP update message and its NLRI VPNv4 contents and you just know what it is?

 

Hmmmm...didnt know you just acquire that knowledge. Wiresharks are not hard to look at, point is the information is completely useless without knowing what you are looking at.

You could look at a pcap and look up documentation and make sense of it. And if you start up a packet capture on a home computer and do some browsing, you aren't going to be getting a lot of BGP traffic. If you knew programming you'd focus in on the parts that made sense first, like the http traffic....

[Windows7ge]

5 minutes ago, WWicket said:

Lol. No, I know nothing about him, beyond that he said he knew the basics of networking already (which to me, would mean at least has some exposure to the OSI model, most common hardware, subnetting, basic configuration, and common protocols). 

Comments about programming where in response to juan not understanding why I thought a background in programming would make approaching packet analysis easier.

I've only ever dipped my toes in programming. Writing a program that generates random passwords in C# for me was my biggest accomplishment but I do see how some fundamental aspects of programming can help with reading packet data. Hex values, base 16, binary, some other things I probably still don't know...