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Hank Preston

Principal Engineer

Learning and Certifications

Hank started his career in network engineering like many, by cracking open a CCNA book and learning all about subnetting, the OSI model, and CLI interfaces. He fell in love with the deceptive simplicity and elegance of network communication and TCP/IP and dove in head first. His journey was one that included many network designs (and debates about designs), miles of copper/fiber cables, late night change windows, and even later night troubleshooting calls (it’s always the network… even when it isn’t :-). Along the way he picked up certifications in routing/switching, wireless, and security, culminating with earning CCIE #38336 in February 2013 and later becoming the first Cisco DevNet Expert #20220001. After spending a couple of years exploring the world of “Cloud”, “DevOps” and “Applications”, the talk of SDN, automation and programmability caught his ears, and he decided it was past time to return to networking full time. Hank's day job is putting NetDevOps theory into practice as the Principal Engineer for Learning and Certifications at Cisco. Helping engineer and operate the platform used by engineers around the world to learn the skills to be better engineers when they operate their own platforms. It's kinda circular and meta.

Articles

October 28, 2024

1

LEARNING

Exploring AAA and TACACS Configuration with Cisco Modeling Labs

9 min read

Explore AAA, an essential topic found on many Cisco Certification exams. Go from concept to configuration with Hank's step-by-step guide, complete with downloadable CML topologies to suit your learning needs.

September 12, 2024

112

LEARNING

CCNA: The foundation that built my IT career (can be yours, too)

6 min read

It's safe to say that I absolutely LOVE the CCNA certification.  It continues to change the lives of engineers worldwide, and I'm excited to be helping new engineers earn their CCNA certifications.

June 27, 2024

2

LEARNING

An Artificially Intelligent Peer Reviewer Arrives

6 min read

How should network engineers be thinking about and using AI right now, and what to could they expect for the future? Here, we focus on one surprising use case that I found to be a bit exciting: Using AI to peer review your work. Buckle up, and let's check it out.

October 13, 2023

LEARNING

Up, Up, and Away to the Clouds:
Cisco Multicloud Specialist Certifications

6 min read

Get up to speed on the latest multi-cloud certifications, professional-level specializations, and new Cisco U Learning Paths. Then sign up for instructor-lead training courses that help candidates learn all they need about these exciting cloud use cases to pass these new exams. 

July 28, 2023

5

LEARNING

A Technical Look at IPSEC VPN Tunnel Creation

16 min read

Explore the IPSEC VPN tunnel creation process, including "Phase 1" and "Phase 2," how Security Associations are impacted when ACLs identify "interesting traffic," and even the packets involved in the communications.

May 25, 2023

81

LEARNING

Influencing Forwarding Behavior with Policy Based Routing

4 min read

Learn how to configure policy-based routing to influence forwarding behavior in this step-by-step overview with Hank Preston, Principal Automation Engineer.

October 31, 2022

90

LEARNING

Be on Guard This Spooking Spanning Tree Season

10 min read

Take the scare out of spanning tree with a strong foundation in practical network design and configuration practices. You never know when it might come back to haunt you, just like in Hank's spooky story.

September 20, 2022

93

LEARNING

Exploring Default Docker Networking
Part 2

17 min read

In the second installment of the default Docker networking series, Principal Engineer Hank Preston continues his exploration into layer 3 (network), shining the light on how container network traffic is routed, NATed, and filtered.

June 27, 2023

32

LEARNING

Exploring Default Docker Networking
Part 1

18 min read

Learn Docker networking starting with the three options every network engineer should know. Principal Engineer Hank Preston provides a step-by-step walkthrough of the default Docker bridge network environment in Linux, Docker container networking, and much more.