This course gives network administrators, network operators, and network engineers a functional understanding of the BIG-IP system as it is commonly deployed in an application delivery network. The course introduces students to the BIG-IP system, its configuration objects, how it processes traffic, and how typical administrative and operational activities are performed. The course includes lecture, hands-on labs, interactive demonstrations, and discussions.

Default admin/root accounts passwords are now expired by default on new installations. A discussion on this change of behavior is now available, and labs have been updated accordingly.

The Cookie persistence section and labs are no longer included in this course. This content has been moved to the Configuring LTM curriculum.

A new chapter, Configuring and Managing a High Availability Environment (formerly in the Configuring LTM class) is now included in this course.

The iRules chapter has been removed from this course.

Course Objectives
•Describe the role of the BIG-IP system as a full proxy device in an application delivery network
•Set up, start/restart/stop, license, and provision the BIG-IP system out-of-the-box
•Create a basic network configuration on the BIG-IP system including VLANs and self IPs
•Use the Configuration utility and TMSH to manage BIG-IP resources such as virtual servers, pools, pool members, nodes, profiles, and monitors
•Create, restore from, and manage BIG-IP archives
•View resource status, availability, and statistical information and use this information to determine how the BIG-IP system is currently processing traffic
•Use profiles to manipulate the way the BIG-IP system processes traffic through a virtual server
•Perform basic troubleshooting and problem determination activities including using the iHealth diagnostic tool
•Support, and view traffic flow using TCPDUMP
•Understand and manage user roles and partitions
•Configure and manage a sync-failover device group with more than two members
•Configure stateful failover using connection mirroring and persistence mirroring

This course is intended for network administrators, operators, and engineers responsible for managing the normal day-to-day operation and administration of a BIG-IP application delivery network. This course presents the prerequisite knowledge for many other of F5’s BIG-IP instructor-led training courses.

There are no required F5 prerequisites for this course. The following free web-based training courses, although optional, will be very helpful for any student with limited BIG-IP administration and configuration experience. These courses are available at F5 University:

Getting Started with BIG-IP web-based training
Getting Started with BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) web-based training
The following general network technology knowledge and experience are recommended before attending any F5 Global Training Services instructor-led course:

OSI model encapsulation
Routing and switching
Ethernet and ARP
TCP/IP concepts
IP addressing and subnetting
NAT and private IP addressing
Default gateway
Network firewalls
LAN vs. WAN

More information - F5 Webpage under "Education"

• Getting started with the BIG-IP system
• Traffic processing with BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM)
• Using TMSH (TMOS Shell) command line interface
• Using NATs and SNATs
• Monitoring application health and managing object status
• Modifying traffic behavior with profiles, including SSL offload and re-encryption
• Modifying traffic behavior with persistence, including source address affinity and cookie persistence
• Troubleshooting the BIG-IP system, including logging (local, high-speed, and legacy remote logging), and using TCPDUMP
• User roles and administrative partitions
• vCMP concepts
• Configuring high availability (including active/standby and connection and persistence mirroring)