September 2025 LiveStream Notes
By Tom Carpenter On 09/22/2025
Notes for the September 2025 LiveStream.
Watch the LiveStream on Youtube here.
1. Using LLMs Day-to-Day as a Network Professional
Practical Uses
- Drafting configs (Cisco IOS, Juniper, Arista, AWS CLI).
- Creating your process to include LLMs, not to replace you as the admin
- Translating vendor documentation into step-by-step instructions.
- Making documentation relevant to your organization.
- Creating a RAG so you can template more effectively
- Ability to personalize to each department
- Automating repetitive tasks: regex for logs, parsing show commands.
- Is sending all your information to the Cisco DNA center our best bet, or can we do this on a budget? What would our baseline look like?
- Writing "explain like I'm 5" versions for junior team training.
- Getting complex information from your senior admins so they can focus on more complex tasks
Benefits
- Faster troubleshooting (summarizing logs, error messages).
- Telemetry logs can filter noise out
- More opportunities to attempt new processes
- Documentation support (generate topology diagrams, markdown).
- Agents that can work alongside and adjust in real time
- Do not need to be an expert at diagramming software
- Scenario testing (mock interview questions, practice labs).
- Skill up yourself and your team on new technology and procedures
Cautions
- Hallucinations: LLMs may invent commands or configs.
- LLMs are trained to never admit that they don't know but to guess
- Security: Never paste proprietary configs or sensitive IPs.
- Dependence: Still need to validate against official docs.
Resources
1. Config Generation / Translating Requirements → Device Configs
https://dejankosticgithub.github.io/documents/publications/netconfeval-conext24.pdf
https://research.redhat.com/blog/article/can-llms-facilitate-network-configuration/
2. Troubleshooting / Diagnostics / Interpreting Output & Logs
https://blog.apnic.net/2025/04/16/level-up-your-network-engineering-skills-with-llms/
https://blog.christianposta.com/ai/a-gentle-introduction-to-llms-for-platform-engineers/
3. Documentation / Simplifying & Summarizing Configs
https://networklessons.com/cisco/ccna-200-301/ai-and-ml-in-networking
https://networkphil.com/2024/10/29/beginners-guide-for-using-large-language-models-in-network-operations/
4. Research / Surveys of Broad Use Cases
https://arxiv.org/abs/2311.17474
https://arxiv.org/html/2404.12901v1
2. Gaps in Education
What traditional education misses:
- Real-world troubleshooting (packet captures, outages, system configuration).
- Labing
- Git repos
- Portfolio building to future-proof your career.
- Documentation discipline (nobody teaches Visio/Markdown well).
- Practicing, documenting and refining your processes as you learn
- Rule of 3: go all the way through, review, and refine. Make it work, make it right, and make it fast.
- Vendor diversity (school teaches Cisco, reality is multi-vendor).
- How do we get to the core principles of engineering while mixing with vendors?
- How do we curate proper baseline tech principles
- Business context: Aligning tech with ROI.
- Everyone gets silo'd but if you can think in a change cost time value equating to dollars and cents, from a business standpoint, it will have greater impact on learning.
Skills learned on the job:
- Reading RFCs and vendor-specific quirks.
- Soft skills: breaking bad news, writing emails non-techs understand.
- Security mindset: logs, SIEM, incident response.
Why it matters:
- Hiring managers value problem-solvers more than textbook memorization.
- Certifications often fill gaps (Certs vs college degree).
Resources
Understanding the Digital Divide
"The digital divide in education is the gap between those with sufficient knowledge of and access to technology and those without, according to the ACT Center for Equity in Learning. To examine the divide requires looking at who can connect to what and how they do so. For example, a student who has multiple laptops in their home and has access to high-speed broadband likely will have better educational success than someone who has one computer to share with their entire family and only has dial-up internet access."
Use of Technology in Education: How is it Bridging the Educational Gap?
"Artificial Intelligence is redefining education with its ability to create highly personalized learning experiences. AI-driven systems analyze data from students' interactions with educational content, identifying their strengths and areas for improvement."
How universities are responding to the tech skills gap
"grounded in a way that we're still teaching the fundamentals because we want to educate students that are going to be high-caliber employees 20 to 30 years from now, and not just two years from now. That's our mission."
3. Fun Certification Ideas
Industry needs comic relief:
- CBNB (Certified Bad News Breaker) → delivering outage updates.
- CCG (Certified Confusion Generator) → endless acronyms in meetings.
- CWWSP (Certified Work Without Sleep Professional) → 2am maintenance windows.
- CMEC (Certified Meme Engineer in Cybersecurity) → can only communicate with memes in Slack.
- CGA (Certified Google Artist) → Use real-time drawing applications to engage and maintain people's attention
Resources
4. News Rundown
1. WiFi signals can measure heart rate — no wearables needed (UC Santa Cruz)
https://news.ucsc.edu/2025/09/pulse-fi-wifi-heart-rate
High-Level Summary:
Researchers at UC Santa Cruz created "Pulse-Fi," a system that uses standard WiFi signals and low-cost devices (ESP32, Raspberry Pi) to measure human heart rate with high accuracy, no wearables required.
Why It Matters:
For everyday engineers, this highlights non-traditional uses of WiFi beyond connectivity. It raises questions around spectrum use, privacy, and the expanding role of wireless in healthcare and IoT. CWNP pros may see use cases cross into medical, smart home, or safety certifications.
Actionable Takeaway:
Stay aware of research projects that could influence regulatory or customer concerns. Be prepared to explain WiFi's role in non-connectivity applications — both opportunities and risks — when talking to clients or leadership.
2. Cisco's Lower Prices Drive Wi-Fi 7 Surge (Dell'Oro Group)
High-Level Summary:
Cisco's decision to lower prices on WiFi 7 APs has fueled ~16% YoY growth in enterprise WLAN, especially in North America. Vendors like Ubiquiti and CommScope are also growing fast.
Why It Matters:
For practitioners, this means WiFi 7 adoption may happen faster than expected. Network pros will face mixed environments (WiFi 6E + WiFi 7) and increased demand for AI-enhanced features and cloud-managed platforms. This can influence CWNP exams that emphasize new standards and management approaches.
Actionable Takeaway:
Brush up on WiFi 7 features, AI-driven WLAN management, and cloud vs on-prem trade-offs. Expect real-world projects to blend generations, so interoperability testing and troubleshooting will be critical skills.
3. New Dangers on Public Wi-Fi
High-Level Summary:
A new wave of exploits targets public WiFi hotspots that lack modern protections, reminding us of the persistent risks in open wireless networks.
Why It Matters:
CWNP professionals often advise on WLAN security. This reinforces the importance of WPA3, client isolation, and secure onboarding practices. It also frames public WiFi as a reputational risk for organizations offering "guest WiFi" without robust controls.
Actionable Takeaway:
Audit any public or guest WiFi you manage. Push for WPA3 where possible, enforce secure transport (VPN, 802.1X), and educate end users. For certifications, tie this back to wireless security domains (CWSP).
4. Indoor Mid-Band Sharing: Neutral-Host vs WiFi vs Cellular (arXiv study)
High-Level Summary:
A study compared indoor performance of neutral-host networks (shared spectrum like CBRS), macro cellular, and WiFi 6. Neutral-host deployments offered stronger coverage with fewer devices, but WiFi still had advantages in throughput and flexibility.
Why It Matters:
For engineers, this shows how spectrum sharing and neutral-host solutions could disrupt traditional WiFi-only indoor strategies. CWNP professionals will need to consider hybrid environments where WiFi coexists with CBRS or private LTE/5G.
Actionable Takeaway:
Stay current on CBRS and neutral-host models. If you're in enterprise design roles, start learning how to evaluate hybrid deployments. For CWDP/CWIDP candidates, expect design scenarios that go beyond WiFi alone.
Blog Disclaimer: The opinions expressed within these blog posts are solely the author’s and do not reflect the opinions and beliefs of the Certitrek, CWNP or its affiliates.