To summarise my 2024 experience I want to start by highlighting the dynamism and the ability to learn something new that the year had to offer. This sounds quite the cliché but the truth remains there were a lot of growth and development opportunities. So more to the middle of my submission in the beginning there were few events and experiences that shaped my career and personal life, and in terms of lessons acquired, we are set to have a great year ahead in 2025. As you can see from the “featured image” it has never been easier to generate images thanks to AI. It also has never been easier to generate lots and lots of text without actually saying anything – so my recap took a bit longer as this was not written by ChatGPT but by lazy old uncle Christian himself 😉

Starting in April, I turned my attention on OSPF (Open Shortest Path First) the single most important routing protocol in the design and functioning of a network and a HUGE topic in the Blueprint for the JNCIE-ENT. Understanding the different LSA-Types and the possibilities with Areas (although 99.9999% of all enterprises would happily work with a single backbone-area (area 0) thanks to mondern CPUs) was something that took me a while – but it was worth it 🙂

The most productive month was September, beginning with a Juniper webinar using the EVE-NG platform. I always enjoy giving these webinars as they help so many people like yourself out there to get into the wonderful world of multivendor labbing – and thanks to a whole team, the Juniper devices are all supported 🙂 In the same month, Junier launched the WiFi7 AP and I engaged in the the appreciation of Wi-Fi 7 and its collaboration with Juniper Mist. Everything points to these technologies being the next major wave in wireless internet connectivity with a range of new use cases and although most companies still deploy Wifi6 (not even 6E) it’s nice to know, that the next generation of wifi is already waiting 😉

As the year unfolded it was in October when I took another step toward attainment of the JNCIE-ENT certification. This attempt had its own set of challenges, but it was definitely a goal worth pursuing and increased my resolve to be successful. Sharing these experiences has served the purpose of encouraging other people struggling in their own certification conquests, stressing the role of determination and constancy of effort, which eventually leads to success. When this attempt failed I was honestly at a point where I personally asked myself “Is it really worth it?” Huge Thanks to Ethan from Packetpushers and the Juniper COmmunity for all the nice messages in both social and the private chats to encourage me to keep pushing and to never give up. It was thanks to all of you that I was able to find the needed mental strength to register for another attempt.

In November, I concentrated on two issues that I considered very important. One was comprehensive study of Filter-Based Forwarding (FBF) in Junos, which is a very useful approach in the implementation of policy based routing. This technical deepening took my appreciate of complex traffic engineering to another level and created an avenue for other people to appreciate these concepts. Second, and most importantly, was a concern about ensuring ethical practices within the certification community. I dealt with the problem of ‘dumpers’ by calling attention to the need for students to really learn without compromising the polished standard of our profession, encouraging integrity and quality. Taking a shortcut in the realm of certification is soething that I will never accept – not only is it highly shady and unethical, it’s also a slap in the face of all those folks out there who rightfully struggled and finally passed thanks to dedication, passion and the love for our profession. We should never ever tolerate “cheaters” – neither in games, not in certification nor in real-life!

In December I successfully completed the course “New Leadership” that was organized by the German Chamber of Commerce (IHK). It marked a change in my working perspective, as I was beginning to take in more leadership roles alongside putting technical skills into practice. Sharing my knowledge with others was always very important to me (and a huge factor when choosing my current employer). Getting from a technical role into a leadership role was a huge step for my career (at least it feels like it to me) and I’m extremely blessed that my employer had the trust and the possibility so that I coul’d pursue this path. It was always important for me to go from technician to leader because during my career I witnessed so many bad leadership examples of people who didn’t understand WHAT they were managing – that’s why I took the technical part first and now I’m ready to tackle the leadership-career-path 😉 On another note, in December, MIST Campus Fabrics were also integrated with the virtual JunOS switch, a development that provides new opportunities for vLabs and proof-of-concept setups. These developments mark a continuous process of changing the networking technology and the trend in the industry moving towards automation and virtualization concepts.It also enables us to fully setup and test a campus fabric.

Going into 2025, I want to further strenghten my never ending quest to consume knowledge, deepen the understanding of my role, continue on my path towards the “all E” (JNCIE-DC is next) and also help others shine. So many people have reached out to me during this year asking me for guidance and about it being “worth” to pursue a Juniper Cert now that juniper has been acquired and I hope that my JNCIE-ENT clearly shows how I see the aquisition – nothing has changed 🙂 Any JNCIE – CCIE – HCIE – basically any E is never a “waste” or “unwirthy” – the knowledge will always be yours, that journey towards your own E is what makes it so special. We have such a wonderful networkign community – let’s not see the world in black and white but in a thousany grey tones (boy that was philosophical…) 😀 😉

With all that – Happy new year to all of you! May 2025 bring you success, health and lots and lots of joy 🙂

Christian