F5 201 Study Guide

Front 1

What general information should you have to open a support ticket with F5

Back 1

1. Full description of the issue

2. A description of the impact the issue is having on your site.

3. The hours that you are available to work on the issue and any alternative contacts that can work on the issue

4. Remote access information, if possible

Front 2

What informatino should you collect when opening a support ticket with f5?

Back 2

1. qkview or tech.out file

2. Log files

3. Packet Traces

4. UCS Archive

5. Core Files

Front 3

What is the qkview utility?

Back 3

An executable program that generates machine-readable (XML_ diagnostic data from the BIG-IP or Enterprise Manager System.

This automatically generates 5 mb of log files and includes them with qkview in a tar output

Front 4

Command to run to collect all the log files?

Back 4

tar -czpf /var/tmp/logfiles.tar.gz /var/log/*

Front 5

What are core files?

Back 5

Core files contain the contents of the system memory at the time a crash occurred.

Front 6

Where are core files located?

Back 6

/var/savecore directory (9.0 - 9.2.5)

/var/core (9.3 and later)

Front 7

Sev1 Sum

Back 7

1 hour response time

Software/hardware is preventing the execution of critical business activities. Device will not power up or is not passing traffic

Front 8

Sev2 Sum

Back 8

1 hour response time

Software/hardware conditions on your f5 device are preventing or significantly impairing high-level commerce or business activities

Front 9

Sev3 Sum

Back 9

4 hour response time

Software/hardawre conditions on your f5 device are creating degradation of service or functionality in normal business or commerce activities

Front 10

Sev4 Sum

Back 10

24 hours response time

Questions regarding configurations, troubleshooting non critical issues, or requests for product functionality that is not part of the current product feature set

Front 11

Sev1 keywords

Back 11

preventing the execution of critical business activities

Front 12

Sev2 keywords

Back 12

preventing or significantly impairing high-level commerce or business activities

Front 13

Sev3 keywords

Back 13

degradation of service or functionality in normal business or commerce activites

Front 14

Sev4 keywords

Back 14

questions, troubleshooting non-critical issues, or questions for product functionality

Front 15

What is a quantitative observation??

Back 15

observations that can be precisely measured

(taking an extra 20 seconds per connections_

Front 16

What is a qualitative observation?

Back 16

Observations that have more to do with characteristics of what is being observed

(seems to be taking longer to connect than it did this morning)

Front 17

What is included in a full description of the issue?

Back 17

1. The symptoms

2. Approximate time the issue first occured

3. Number of times it occured

4. Error output provided by the system

5. Steps to reproduce the issue

6. Any changes you made before it occured

7. Any steps you made to resolve the issue

Front 18

What is the network summary?

Back 18

WebUi utility that shows a summary of local traffic objects, as well as a visual map of the virtual servers, pool, and pool members on the BIG-IP system

Front 19

The network map summary displays data for what object types?

Back 19

1. Virtual Servers

2. Pools

3. Pool Members

4. Nodes

5. iRules

Front 20

If you configure a pool, but no VS references that pool, will it show in the network map?

Back 20

No.

Front 21

Green circle indicator means...

Back 21

The objects are enabled and available (able to receive traffic)

Front 22

Orange triangle indicator means...

Back 22

The objects are enabled but are currently unavailable. However, the object might become available later, with no user action required. Example would be a VS whose connection limit has been exceeded.

Front 23

Red diamond indicator means...

Back 23

The objects are enabled but offline because an associated object has marked the object as unavailable. To change the status so that the object can receive traffic, you must actively enable the object.

Front 24

Black circle indicator means...

Back 24

The virtual server or virtual address is operational but set to Disabled. To resume normal operation, you must manually enable the virtual server or virtual address.

Front 25

Blue square indicator means...

Back 25

The status of the objects is unknown

Front 26

What is the network map?

Back 26

A webUI map that presents a visaul hierarchy of the names and status of virtual servers, pools, pool members, nodes, and iRules defined on the system.

Tries to show all objects in context, starting with the virtual server at the top.

Front 27

What is a virtual server?

Back 27

A traffic management object on the BIG-IP system that is represented by an IP address and a service.

Front 28

To summarize, a virtual server can do the following:

Back 28

1. Distribute client requests across multiple servers to balance server load

2. Apply various behavioral settings to a specific type of traffic

3. Enable persistence for a specific type of traffic

4. Direct traffic according to user-written iRules

Front 29

What is a pool?

Back 29

A load balancing pool is a logical set of devices, such as web servers, that you group together to receive and process traffic.

Front 30

What is a pool members?

Back 30

A logical object that represents a physical node (server), on the network.

Front 31

What is a node?

Back 31

A logical object on the BIG-IP LTM system that identifies the IP address of a physical resource on the network.

Front 32

What is the difference between a node and a pool member?

Back 32

A node is designated by the devices IP address only (10.10.10.10), while designation of a pool member includes an IP address and a server (10.10.10.10:80)

Front 33

What is the difference between health monitors of a node and of a pool members?

Back 33

A health monitor for a pool member reports the status of a service running on the device, whereas a health monitor associated with a node reports the status of the device itself.

Front 34

What is the main Dashaboard screen and what does it display?

Back 34

The main Dashboard screen is of the system overview. This screen displays a graphical representation of CPU and Memory utiliation, Connections and Throughput of the system.

Front 35

What is Analytics?

Back 35

Analytics is a module on the BIG-IP system that lets you analyze performance of web applications.

Front 36

What is Analytics also refered to as?

Back 36

Application Visibility and Reporting

Front 37

What are some things that Analytics shows?

Back 37

- Transactions per second

- Server and Client Latency

- Request and Response throughput

- Sessions

Front 38

What all can you view metrics for with Analytics?

Back 38

- Applications

- Virtual Servers

- Pool Members

- URLs

- Specific Countries

- Application Traffic

Front 39

What is an Analytics profile?

Back 39

A set of definitions that determine the circumstances under which the system gathers, logs, notifies, and graphically displays information regarding traffic to an application

Front 40

In the Analytics profile, you customize what? (4)

Back 40

1. What statistics to collect

2. Where to collect data (locally, remotely, both)

3. Whether to capture traffic itself

4. Whether to send notifications

Front 41

What ways can you restoring configuration data? (4)

Back 41

1. Configuration Utility

2. CLI using tmsh

3. On replacement RMA

4. Running later software version

Front 42

How to restart the system in the configuration utility?

Back 42

System -> Configuration -> Reboot

Front 43

Command to load configuration from CLI?

Back 43

tmsh load /sys ucs <path/to/ucs>

Front 44

What command would you run to verify that the new or replaced secure shell (SSH) keys from the UCS file are synchronized between the BIG-IP system and the Switch Card Control Processor?

Back 44

keyswap.sh sccp

Front 45

When is the UCS archive actually restored when done on the same device it was taken?

Back 45

After a reboot of the device

Front 46

What is an alternative way to reactivate the BIG-IP system after a UCS restore done on a different device?

Back 46

Replace the /config/bigip.license file with the original file.

If you don't you simply re-license the system.

Front 47

According to the Study Guide, when should to create a UCS?

Back 47

Prior to the change and after the change for both active and stand-by systems

Front 48

What are some common operation tasks you can automate with the Enterprise Manager? (5)

Back 48

- Configuration

- Certificate management

- Software Updates

- Node Management

- Policy control

Front 49

What is a rotating archive?

Back 49

Archives that are created and saved on a schedule

Front 50

What does the EM compare when it created a rotating archive?

Back 50

It compares the most recently stored UCS archive file to the current configuration on the device at the specified interval. If there are any difference, EM stores a copy of the current configuration. If there are not, it does not store an additional copy (Read: extra space)

Front 51

By default, the EM stores up to how many rotating archives?

Back 51

Up to 10 rotating archives each, for itself and every managed device.

Front 52

What is a pinning archive?

Back 52

EM created an archive of a specific UCS for a device. Pinned archives are stored until you delete them

Front 53

Path to create a scheduled archive on the EM?

Back 53

Enterprise Management -> Tasks -> Schedules -> Archive Collection -> Create

Front 54

Where will you a see a task failure on the EM?

Back 54

In the 'Task List'

Front 55

Red Flag (EM Device Certificates)

Back 55

Indicates that the certificate has expired. When the client systems require this certificate for authentication, the client receives an expired certificate warning

Front 56

Yellow Flag (EM Device Certificates)

Back 56

Indicates that a certificate will expire in 30 days or less. The certificate is still valid, but you should take action to prevent certificate expiration

Front 57

Green Flag (EM Device Certificates)

Back 57

Indicates that a certificate is valid and will remain valid for at least 30 more days

Front 58

What does the cpcfg command allow you to do?

Back 58

Copy a configuration from a specified source boot location to a specified target boot location.

Front 59

What are 3 common issues that can be impactful to an environment when doing software upgrades?

Back 59

1 Known issues with the release

2. iRule compatibility

3. Older version configurations migrating forwards successfully

Front 60

What happens when you set a node or pool to Disabled?

Back 60

The node or pool member continues to process persistent and active connections. It can accept new connections only if the connections belong to an existing persistence session.

Front 61

What happens when you set a node or pool to Forced Offline?

Back 61

The node or pool members allows existing connections to time out, but no new connections are allowed.

Front 62

What is an example case for disabling a member?

Back 62

If the administrator needs to make changes, such as configuration maintenance to a server, that is the resource of a pool, but wants to gracefully allow users to finish what they are doing.

Front 63

What is an example case for forcing down a member?

Back 63

If the administrator needs to take a resource out of a pool immediately due to a critical misconfiguration or system error that is impacting business.

Front 64

If a virtual server is using persistence and the administrator sets the pool to 'Disabled,' what will happen?

Back 64

The persistence record will be honored until it expires. Thus the administrator could disable a pool member and that member can still receive new connection from the existing persisted clients.

Front 65

If a virtual server is using persistence and the administrator sets the pool to 'Forced Offline,' what will happen?

Back 65

The virtual service will not allow any new connections to the pool member even if persistence is configured on the virtual server.

Front 66

What can an administrator do if he needs to stop all connections immediately from a pool resource without any completion of the current connection?

Back 66

Remove the pool member from the pool will kill all connections immediately. This is not recommended for day-to-day maintenance but is an option for emergencies.

Front 67

What is Port-Lockdown?

Back 67

A BIG-IP security feature that allows you to specify particular protocols and services from which the self-IP address defined on the BIG-IP system can accept traffic.

Front 68

What are the Port-Lockdown settings? (4)

Back 68

- Allow Default

- Allow All

- Allow Custom

- Allow None

-Allow Customer (Include Default)

Front 69

Port-Lockdown Allow Default port are? (11)

Back 69

- OSPF

- TCP 4353 iQuery

- UDP 4353 iQuer

- 443 HTTPS

- TCP 161 SNMP

- UDP 161 SNMP

- 22 SSH

- TCP 53 DNS

- UDP 53 DNS

- 520 RIP

- 1026 Network Failover

Front 70

What is the default Port-Lockdown setting?

Back 70

Version 10.x - Allow default

Version 11.x - None

Front 71

Command to modify Port-Lockdown settings from tmsh?

Back 71

modify /net self <self-ip> allow-server <option>

Front 72

What are Packet Filters?

Back 72

Packet filters enforce an access policy on incoming traffic. They apply to incoming traffic only. The primary purpose of a packet filter rule is to define the criteria that you want the BIG-IP system to use when filtering packets.

Front 73

Example criteria that you can specify in a packet filter are? (3)

Back 73

- Source IP

- Destination IP

- Destination port

Front 74

What are the possible values for the order of packet filters? (4)

Back 74

- First

- Last

- After

Front 75

What are the possible Packet Filter Actions? (4)

Back 75

- Accept

-Discard

- Reject (sends rejection packet)

- Continue (acknowledge packet for logging or statistical purposed)

Front 76

What is PAM technology?

Back 76

PAM (Pluggable Authentication Module) allows you to choose from a number of different authentication and authorization schemes to use to authenticate or authorize network traffic.

Front 77

Where does the BIG-IP system normally route remote authentication traffic?

Back 77

Through a Traffic Management Microkernel (TMM) switch interface, rather than through the management interface. That is, VLAN and Self-IP address.

Front 78

What are the BIG-IP Authentication Modules? (7)

Back 78

- LDAP

- RADIUS

- TACACS+

- SSL client Certificate LDAP

- Online Certificate Status Protocol

- Certificate Revocation List Distribution Point

- Kerberos Delegation

Front 79

What two sources does BIG-IP use to resolve host names?

Back 79

- host files (first)

- DNS (second)

Front 80

Steps to configure DNS in Configuration Utility

Back 80

System -> Configuration _> Device -> DNS -> DNS Lookup Server List