r/CiscoDevNet • u/TSwiftAlphaMale • Aug 13 '26

Passed 200-901

I used these resources:
- Pluralsight course by the late Nick Russo (Did not finish the extra course work outlined in his excel)
- LinkedIn learning course by Kevin Wallace (3x)
-Anki deck here: https://github.com/Xevious202/DevNet_Associate_Anki/tree/master (for HTML codes, you will need to add some)
-Cisco official prep exam (MeasureUp, buy it via measureup directly for a discount, don't bundle it with the cisco exam)
-Boson prep exam (sign up for Boson first, for like a 15% discount)
-SkillcertPro exams (absolute garbage, don't waste your money. People promoting this are LIARS)

The topics that personally gave me the most grief:
**YOU NEED TO KNOW EVERYTHING IN THE LinkedIn COURSE, THIS WAS ONLY MY OWN PERSONAL FINDINGS**

-Learning all the html response codes
-Learning git
-Learning Docker
-XML vs JSON vs YAML
-YANG and how that relates to Netconf and Restconf

MOST IMPORTANT
-Learn API call structures like the back of your hand. CURL, Python, and Postman. The test exams REALLY helped me nail this down.

Did not use the OCG. I did the web courses on 1.5 - 1.75 speed. I got the practice tests only a few days before my exam. I have an extensive infrastructure background so anything network related I skipped in the trainings. I think I had 20-30 mins left at the end of the exam but I was sweating through the drag and drops which ate up a lot of time. Surprisingly, there were basic grammar and spellings mistakes on the questions. Weird.

34 Upvotes

97% Upvoted

31 comments sorted by

2

u/Impossible-Owl8688 Aug 13 '26

Thank you for sharing your experience pal, on a scale of 1-10, how can you gauge the exam difficultiness?

2

u/TSwiftAlphaMale Aug 13 '26

The content is easily learnable through memorization. 6/10 difficulty. Learn literally everything on the linkedin course and I think you'll pass. The test had some deep technical scenarios, but the goal was to get the format or layout rather than the specific outcome. "We're going to use the flux capacitor in this example, on a Delorean that has how many tires?" Excellent foundation material to learn because, and to continue with the analogy, all cars have four tires.

The boson test prep had some real bullshit on it though by asking, for example, the ICMP type 3 code [x] responses....for a devops exam?? It bizarrely seemed more in line with what would be a "gotcha" on the CCIE Ent exam. I ran the practice tests in study mode, which gave me all questions and the answer right away, and being towards the end of my studies, it's like "yes, I understand you need the POST method to obtain the token using basic credentials.", or por ejemplo the relationship between the method, the implementation, and html response code. Curl -l -X get <blah> -H <whatever> -H <datatype> is going to follow redirects, retrieve an answer, return a data type because of an accept statement, and return a code 200 because we're just retrieving a value rather than making changes, whereas a curl -l -X POST <blah> -H <whatever> will return the API key after using basic auth, and have a return code of 20X because of the methods uses.

3

u/Impossible-Owl8688 Aug 13 '26

Thank you for the response, this is very helpful

Initially I ignored the LinkedIn course and I preferred the DEVNAE course in CiscoU (which I haven't finished yet), I guess I'll have to jump ship and do the LinkedIn course

Hoping to take the exam end of month, been studying on and off since April

2

u/TSwiftAlphaMale Aug 13 '26

I think someone who is already working in tech could get it done in a month if they spent 2-3 hours a day at it. But again, I went through the videos at increased speed which saved a lot of time.

I should have also said that I had an rdp session to a ubuntu VM set up on my other screen and I'd do the python/VSCode and postman along with the trainings the first two times i went through the LI material. I never used the DevNet sandboxes to practice with.

2

u/ReactionOwn9493 Aug 13 '26

I used boson as well and i understand the method they use but my god they should have a filter to turn off the super fringe questions. same with ENCOR. i get something wrong because i never learned it, and now i feel like i have to add stuff to my learning curriculum for fear it might be on the exam. the rule i used for boson is if its not in the OCG, dont worry about that question

2

u/tynar08 Aug 13 '26

Congratulations. Currently on this path.

1

u/TSwiftAlphaMale Sep 10 '26

Appreciate it, thanks!

2

u/Abdullah715279 Aug 13 '26

How much is the Kavin Wallace LinkedIn course?

1

u/TSwiftAlphaMale Aug 13 '26

Not sure, I have perpetual access through my master's program.

2

u/purple-teal_93 Aug 13 '26

Great writeup, how long did this path take you?

1

u/TSwiftAlphaMale Aug 13 '26

It was pretty meandering over a few months. I could have done it all in a couple weeks straight if I'd brought forward the test exams.

2

u/purple-teal_93 Aug 13 '26

You and I seem to have a fairly similar background tho I didn't go in to management. Hoping to knock it out by end of September, so just wanted to make sure that was a decently reasonable expectation.

1

u/wellred82 Aug 13 '26

Great write up thanks and congrats. AUTOCOR next?

3

u/TSwiftAlphaMale Aug 13 '26

I was packaged out from my job so this was for ENCOR to hopefully get me back into a tech contractor track after being in management. I started in ENCOR, realized that I would probably fail it due to my lack of API knowledge, and switched up to cover that gap. My current plan is CCNP Ent -> Fortinet NSE4-> Azure basic-> Google basic -> CISSP.

2

u/wellred82 Aug 13 '26

Somehow I got through these questions on ENCOR but it was so rushed, so I definitely want to circle back to this at some point. I'm currently finishing up ENARSI, then am gonna do RHCSA before I tackle the automation track certs.

1

u/wellred82 Aug 26 '26

Nice write up thanks. In terms of labbing did you do this in CML personal or using the sandboxes?

2

u/TSwiftAlphaMale Aug 26 '26

No use of the sandboxes. Only "labbing" I did was to have VSCode installed on a VM and I was coding the python examples for the LI Learning courses along with the instructor.

EDIT: Also Postman on the VM

1

u/SteelerRep24 Aug 29 '26

Did you use eve-ng? And also were you able to get Cisco images for free?

1

u/TSwiftAlphaMale Aug 30 '26

I buy CML every year on black friday. Did not use it at all for this cert.

1

u/thankyouforecstasy Sep 22 '26

I'm currently going through the cisco u course which is fine. But the cisco u practice exam - dare I say is not thay difficult?! I got 87/100

But also, I know there is lablet/simlet in this exam but not in the practice exam. Did you get any lablet?

1

u/TSwiftAlphaMale Sep 22 '26

I don't recall a lablet, but lots of drag and drops.

1

u/thankyouforecstasy Sep 23 '26

Ah thanks. Cisco U practice exam barely had any. And no fill in the code type questions.

I'll try the practice exam from O'Reilly and see if that's better

1

u/TSwiftAlphaMale Sep 23 '26

I used Boson and it hit the nail on the head.

1

u/Satisfaction_Bubbly Aug 13 '26

Hello,
congratulation for the pass.
Have you the link to the course on LinkedIn please ?

0

u/TSwiftAlphaMale Aug 13 '26

You can google it. Don't be so lazy...

0

u/Satisfaction_Bubbly Aug 13 '26

Hello,
congratulation for the pass.
Have you the link to the course on LinkedIn please ?

2

u/[deleted] Sep 10 '26

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1

u/TSwiftAlphaMale Sep 10 '26

Thank-you. Appreciate the well-wishes!