Understanding VLANs for CCNA

Welcome to Let's Learn VLANs for CCNA!

Included: Comes with a FREE copy of my book "On the Command Line" containing 100 of the most commonly used commands and configurations used in network engineering.

Bonus section: A brief lesson on configuring a DHCP server is included.

Prerequisites: None.

Skill level: All skill levels welcome.

What you will learn: "VLAN" stands for Virtual Local Area Network, and in this hands-on course we will configure multiple VLANs for a small network we will build in Packet Tracer.

In our scenario, we work at a company with multiple departments, each needing their own LAN. We will then configure individual VLANs for each department, along with creating a new native VLAN for network maintenance. Then we will configure inter-VLAN routing by learning how to configure sub-interfaces (a type of virtual port) so we can use the dot1q protocol to create a trunk port.

As we learn about VLAN architectures, we will also learn what a Native VLAN actually is, and how it differs from the Default VLAN which is already configured on all layer-2 switches.

Bonus lesson! We learn about Dynamic Host Control Protocol by building a DHCP server on the command line! After configuring and testing our VLANs, we will follow up by configuring a DHCP server to further test the integrity of our VLAN configurations by supplying our various devices with IP addresses leased from the DHCP server over the various VLANs. If we have done our work correctly, we should be able to supply IP addresses via inter-VLAN routing through our router's sub-interfaces over the trunk port we configured.