On Wed, 30 Jun 2010 12:18:24 -0400, Greg Whynott <greg.whyn...@oicr.on.ca>
wrote:
I like cisco, but i think the HP way is more logical and less prone to
error. A previous poster gave an excelent example, i burnt myself not
adding the "add" to a trunk config on our cisco switches. i went over
the magical number (and I've no idea why you need to use another
argument when you pass some threshold, it seems redundant and silly) of
vlans and took out about 7 departments till I realized what I had
done. thankfully you only need to do this once to learn.
Education is education. If you don't know what you're doing (and paying
attention), you eventually will do something stupid and break the whole
internet. Every manufacturer has their own specific brand of brain
damage. In the Cisco world, there are 3 modes... add vlans, remove vlans,
and *specify* vlans. Leaving out a word changes the entire meaning.
Typos are just as simple (even more simple) on an HP. There's no
add/remove mode for vlan port membership. You specify the entire list
every time. Migrating port vlan assignments gets messy fast. (that's when
people reach for IE to click a few checkboxes.)
Personally, I prefer a bit of both. I like the HP method of keeping VLAN
configuration in one section. However, I'll give that up every time for
Cisco's much simpler means of managing vlan port membership. (at least on
anything supporting interface ranges :-))
the trunking is more logical on HP config wise too, there is a line in
the config which shows all the members and trunk type, on one line.
On the other hand, looking at the interface configuration, there's zero
indication it's a member of a trunk. Cisco shows that in the interface
config, and will immediately yell at you it you "unbalance" the
port-group/etherchannel -- you shouldn't mess with the member interfaces
directly once added to a port-group.
not being able to issue commands while in config mode (without the 'do')
is annoying as hell too..
This is a safety measure to keep your mind on the road. A typo in config
mode can make a seriously royal mess.
... that woudl be the second issue, the lack of consistency between
devices. cisco owns that one.
No they don't. Which version of IOS are you running? Oh, right, that
switch doesn't run IOS, it runs CatOS? Wait a min, that's a 1900... it
uses a menu interface.
I have three Cisco switches right here that are radically different. In
fact, the 2948G-L3 confused a CCIE for several weeks. :-) Until I told him
stop thinking "switch" and config it like a 48 port router. (and sadly, it
doesn't support interface ranges. :-()
--Ricky
