UGH! BIND DNS is killing me!!! It WILL NOT work with a 64 bit version of Windows Server 2008.
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GOOD NEWS! As long as we can properly simulate an MPLS network we don’t have to scrap our original plan. That is such a relief. Al and I will be spending the next 2-3 weeks focusing on learning the IOS commands for BGR and IS-IS protocols.
I have to figure out what happened with BIND today. It was running perfectly and then I shut Server 2008 down and *poof* no more BIND. Not only is it no longer the default DNS, I can’t even start the service anymore. I think I’ll just start from scratch and completely reinstall BIND.
Al, Tom, Trisha and I stayed late at class last night and got 90% of our hardware and pricing figured out. Say what you want to about Dell computers, but their website is freaking brilliant for our purposes. Select your computers/servers, configure them with what you need and then click print! It gives you a breakdown of what you selected and a price. Simple! There will be a few additional items that we will need to add as we progress with our design, but for now that is under control.
I’ll make my plea once more. If you read this and know of any sources/blogs/websites with good tutorials on how to set up an MPLS network, please share them with me in the comments.
That’s it for now.
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In my last post I was pretty discouraged and I believe I described our project as “hosed”. I may have been a little premature with that assessment.
Al, who was just as discouraged as I was, had a brainstorm and started searching for simulators that can handle MPLS. He came across one called GNS3. It’s an open source simulator that allows you to load an IOS .bin file to the router in the simulator. This allows you to give the router a modern enough OS to be able to configue it for MPLS. It comes in both Linux and Windows flavors and not knowing which would work better we decided to try to load both. I fired up VMware on my laptop and loaded my Fedora 11 machine and he grabbed his laptop with 64 bit Windows Vista on it. We both went to SourceForge and downloaded the program and set out to get it working. After a brief 3.5 hours of extreme frustration I decided to shut down my Fedora virtual machine and try to install it on my laptop’s 64 bit Windows 7 OS. A brief hour and a half later I finally had success! The simulator FINALLY worked! Al had one little box checked that was preventing him from getting it to work on his computer (isn’t that always the way). So we both loaded up a .bin file of IOS version 12 or newer and tried to configure a router. IT WORKED! I think that Al and I may have burned out a few of Google’s servers figuring that out tonight. Now we just need to figure out how to configure an MPLS network. Hahahahaha (imagine the Joker laughing here).
I’m happy that we should now be able to stick with our original plan. I’m also a little intimidated by the prospect of having to learn all of the new command line stuff in the next few weeks. But I’m no longer discouraged about this project.
To infinity and beyond…
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Our project just got flushed today! We’ve been planning, with the encouragement of our instructor I might add, to build our Capstone project around an MPLS network. However, the routers available to us at ITT-Tech are older than the MPLS technology so we can’t configure them for our needs. I also learned that Packet Tracer 5.2 STILL doesn’t support MPLS so we can’t even build the MPLS network in a virtual environment. What this all boils down to is WE CAN’T SHOW A DEMONSTRATION OF A MODERN NETWORK ARCHITECTURE AT A NATIONALLY ACCREDITED TECHNICAL SCHOOL WITH A COMPUTER NETWORKING DEGREE PROGRAM. HOW PATHETIC!!!
Now, 4 weeks into this project, we have to start over with our network design. It seems that the best we can do is demonstrate a VPN as long as we bring in our own computers. Yes folks, the wonderful “suits” at ITT-Tech don’t see the need to give us a few computers in each lab that are configured with 2 NIC CARDS. AND, they don’t allow us to open the existing computers up and install a second NIC card because we will VOID THE WARRANTY!!! So, for the privilege of paying them $40k+ I get to work on outdated equipment, demonstrate decade old technology, and I am still forced to bring my own personal equipment from home in order to properly demonstrate this decade old “secure” network technology. Oh, yeah, and the computers in the labs the CNS students use are only 32 bit.
I know next to nothing about setting up a VPN so I’m seriously stressing out. We have to research the technology and implementation of a VPN, come up with an IP scheme, and figure out what equipment and pricing will be for this. My group now has to scramble to get anything put together in time.
Wish me luck…lots and lots of it.
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The problem with my site was actually caused by upgrading to a newer version of WordPress and not loading all of the files into the correct directory. I thought the cosmic forces thing sounded cooler though.
Back in business.
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It’s official…Microsoft Server 2008 R2 and Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 sp1 DO NOT play well together. After almost 2 hours of trying to install Exchange 2007, I finally gave up. I downloaded Exchange Server 2010 and PRESTO…no problems! It installed with no errors on the first try! As you can imagine I was thrilled and disgusted all at the same time. So, we will be using Exchange 2010 for certain.
BIND DNS may be the most widely used DNS server on the planet, but like all things open source it has NO GUI, numerous little “quirks”, and no decent documentation. I installed BIND, configured it, started it and was able to verify it was working. Then I shut down VMWare and my computer and went to bed. When I came back this afternoon to work on it some more, BIND was not working. I tried to start it manually…no luck. I tried to reload it…no joy. AAAARRRGGGH! Time to fire up the primary resource for the open source community, Google, and figure out what is going wrong. I found numerous blogs about this problem, but none of the solutions seem to work. I think that when I shut down the server last night it installed an update. According to a few of the posts I’ve read, those automatic updates from Microsoft have a habit of blowing out BIND DNS and reloading Microsoft’s DNS (shocking that Microsoft would do something like that *said dripping with sarcasm*). But, after shutting down Microsoft’s DNS, rebooting and shutting down Microsoft’s DNS again, and finally shouting and swearing at my monitor I still can’t start BIND. If you heard a hollow thudding sound earlier today it was just the sound of my head repeatedly banging against my desk. I’m thinking that I’m just going to reinstall BIND from scratch RIGHT AFTER I DISABLE THE AUTOMATIC UPDATES FROM MICRO$OFT!!
I learned a lot of good stuff about an MPLS network over the weekend. Now I’m not sure that we can do it at the school. It seems that we don’t have routers at the school that can be configured for MPLS. They want a live demo, not a simulated one, but when the equipment is older than the current technology out there (ex., not a single 64 bit PC in the building except the student’s laptops), they may need to loosen up the rules just a touch. When I see my instructor this week I’m going to ask if we can do our demo through Packet Tracer. Does anyone know if MPLS can be configured in Packet Tracer? If the answer is yes, does anyone know how? 
My next task is to turn Fedora 11 into our web server and integrate it into our network. I feel many hours spent with SAMBA, SWAT and/or Webmin coming on.
Other than all of the problems caused by Microsoft’s brilliant (again, *sarcasm*) software, I’m feeling good about the progress we are making. Al was here today working on the IP address scheme and finishing up the documentation that needs to be turned in. Tomorrow Al, Trish and I will be meeting up at the school for a few hours to finish up the stuff that’s due later this week. Also, we will be getting Tom back now that his medical woes seem to be coming to an end. That will be fantastic! Things are moving along.
More to come…
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We have decided to use Microsoft Server 2008 R2 for our servers. We were going to use Exchange Server 2007 but I’m having MAJOR issues getting it to install. I’m not sure if its a compatibility issue with Server 08 R2 or if it’s a problem with VMWare 7. I’m going to try to install Exchange Server 2010 and see if that goes a little smoother. We may be switching to Server 2010. Also, to make one of the instructors happy, we have decided to configure BIND DNS instead of Microsoft’s DDNS. We may even get crazy and make our web server Linux based and make the sample webpage using Fedora 11 and WordPress. I enjoyed working with Linux and spent half my time in class helping everyone else so it looks like I get to go a few more rounds with SAMBA. WOOHOO!!
Again, wish me luck (I’m seriously going to need all I can get).
**Update**
I created a new page just for the posts about this Capstone project. All future updates will be there.
**ANOTHER UPDATE**
I can’t post directly to a new page. It seems all but one page in a blog are static. So I have created a category called Capstone and deleted the page called Capstone. If you wish to follow along with my progress please click that category. Sorry for the confusion, but I’m a newbie at this.
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I am entering into my final quarter of the Associates Degree program at ITT-Tech. In the final quarter all students take a class called Capstone. This class is a 12 week long project that forces you to use all of the knowledge and skills you have learned during your time at the school. Since I’m a Computer Networking Systems student my project is all about building a big, nasty network.
We were handed a 35 page document that is actually a mock-RFP. It details the requirements of a fictitious company’s new network needs and includes building layouts and existing hardware. We are supposed to use this information to create a network solution that meets their needs and present it to the clients (in this case the clients are the school’s instructors and any other students who want to come). In this particular project we are responding to a request from 5 doctors that have formed a new partnership and are trying to update their own internal LANs and also link all 5 locations in to a single WAN. Seems easy, right? NOT EVEN KINDA in reality!
My group decided to go with an MPLS design for connecting the 5 locations. This seems to be the most secure and robust way of handling their data sharing needs while maintaining HIPAA compliance. This type of network is something that was mentioned to us but never really taught. So, we are trying to learn how to build and deploy an MPLS network from scratch in the next few weeks. We realize that the ISP typically configures this type of network for the client, but we still have to know how it works, give IP/subnet schemes for it and demo it in our presentation. We have racks of Cisco routers and switches at the school to configure this on, but we have no idea what the IOS commands are to configure this type of network. So, I’m grabbing my laptop this weekend, heading to Barnes & Noble to look for books on the topic, and then sitting in their cafe (I’m a poor student that can’t afford to buy these books). I’ll fire up Packet Tracer to see if I can stumble my way through it on the simulator before spending hours in the school’s labs in a tangle of ethernet and rollover cables trying to figure it out on the live routers. We also have to configure all of the Servers, MS Exchange, DNS, etc., and produce a working demo of what their network will look/behave like. Twelve weeks seemed like a lot of time but in reality it’s not nearly enough.
I have a fantastic group for this project. Al, Tom and Trisha are probably the the most dedicated and capable students in my graduating class (besides myself, of course). I have no doubt that we will put together a solid solution and a strong presentation. I just hope we don’t have to drop the MPLS idea.
I’m putting out a call for help from all of you wonderful people in internet land. If you have any knowledge or resources that you can share or point me to about configuring this type of network, please post in the comments. Any help will be greatly appreciated! I’ll post updates as I stumble through this project
Wish me luck!
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Yes, I’m Back. Sorry to have been away for so long.
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Fall is my favorite time of the year. The weather begins to cool off and the humidity (for those of us on the east coast) becomes a non-factor. You wake up to the crisp air in the morning and see nature’s amazing display of color as the trees begin to drop their leaves. Halloween decorations slowly start to appear and bright orange pumpkins are showing up everywhere. Kids are getting excited about what costume they are going to wear. Their parents are groaning and rolling their eyes because of the elaborate and EXPENSIVE costumes their kids finally decide on. The days are getting progressively shorter and the nights are getting gradually colder. Soon, Thanksgiving will be here and all of the yummy but not-so-healthy foods will be tempting you again. Maybe you’ll be fortunate (or maybe not so fortunate) and have plans with family for Thanksgiving. Whatever your traditions or plans are, I hope you enjoy this time of year as much as I do.
Yeah…I love the Fall!
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