Technical Workshops
AfNOG workshops offer advanced training to operators of existing African Internet Service Providers (ISPs) who are participants in the process of developing and enhancing a national Internet with regional and international connectivity.
Each workshop builds upon the experiences of the
previous ones, and those prior to AfNOG conducted by ISOC
under what was called INET held during 1993-2000 period at
various locations around the world.
View a report (in French and English) on the AfNOG 2002 Training Programs and how they helped to develop Africa's Internet infrastructure: [PDF]
Specific Goal Of The Technical Workshop
The goals of the workshop are:
- To train a critical mass of trainers and professionals in network infrastructure and services to be able to support an extension of Internet-related activities within the African countries represented.
- To identify and share individual and institutional contacts as well as information sources that will assist the process of national development, using international Internet connections.
- To build robust professional linkages between all participants in the programs so that the mentor-student and colleague-colleague relationships formed during the workshop and conferences will remain strong and of continuing usefulness well beyond the workshop and conference.
- To increase the level of co-operation among existing projects and activities for establishing public data networks in Africa.
- To train people and groups of people who will return to their country and region and who will teach others what they have learned at the workshop.
Workshop Structure And Program
An intensive instructor led program is
conducted for the workshops, usually composed of 4 (four) instructional tracks.
Participants are expected to attend only one of the three instructional tracks presented in English, and one in French, since the tracks run concurrently.
All participants engage in extensive hands-on training, setting up and managing prototype infrastructure and services.
The course descriptions below include for each instructional track:
- Who should attend this course.
- What you need to know to enter this course and benefit from it (Prerequisites).
- What you will learn in this course (Subjects).
Track SI-E: Scalable Network Infrastructure
Overall objective: After attending this track, students will be able to configure and operate large scale networks connected to the Internet.
Who should attend: Technical staff who are now operating a wide area TCP/IP network, likely with international and/or multi-provider connectivity. Those who will be involved in the establishment and/or operation of a basic national network infrastructure in the country.
Prerequisites: Experience using TCP/IP-based networking technologies..
Training is hands-on in a well-equipped computer laboratory over a five-day period.
The topics are expected to include:
- Basic routing
- IS-IS routing
- BGP routing
- Management of router configuration
- NOC (Network Operations Centre)
- Exchange points between networks
- Security
Track SS-E: Scalable Internet Services
Overall objective: After attending this track, students will be able to
build large-scale, resilient service platforms to support very large
customer bases.
Who should attend: technical staff who are now providing Internet Services to a regional/national organisation or in a service provider environment, with a growing user base.
Prerequisites: Extensive experience with installing and administering some version of Unix/Linux, installing software packages, extracting information from 'man' pages, creating configuration files etc. Those who are not fully comfortable with Unix would most likely find track E0 more appropriate.
Training is hands-on in a well-equipped computer laboratory, making use of practical exercises to apply the techniques learned.
The topics are expected to include:
- Scalability pitfalls
- Approaches to clustering and resilience
- Design and scaling of a web cache (Squid)
- The Domain Name System
- Operation of Internet mail
- Configuration of an MTA (Exim)
- Design of a large-scale mail cluster
- Database backends
- Cryptographic techniques and applications (ssh, ssl, certificates)
- Server performance optimisation and monitoring; configuration management.
- Securing and monitoring large-scale servers and services
Applicants should indicate clearly what version(s) of Unix/Linux they currently administer.
Track CT-E: CERT Training
Overall Objective: After attending this track, students (CERT staff) handling technical operations will be able to understand the basic operation of CERT and information security topics.
Who should attend: The course is ideal for technical security staff of governments,
regulators, law enforcement, academia and Internet industry.
Prerequisites: articipants must have basic technical background about the Internet technology such as network, protocols, operating systems, server,programming, database and so on. Additionally, Participants should have basic understanding of information security and recent cyber threats. This course include hands-on training, so participants have to bring their own laptop to do exercises.
Topics are expected to include:
- Overview of Internet Security
- Incident Analysis Basics – Log Analysis
- Technical Overview of Information Security
- Security Tools for CSIRT
- Information Gathering and Analysis
- Publishing Technical Documents
- How to conduct Technical Training of Information Security
- Introduction to Malware Analysis
Track NM-E: Network Monitoring and Management
Overall Objective: After attending this track, students will be able to configure and operate larger scale backbones.
Who should attend: Technical staff who are now operating a wide
area TCP/IP network, likely with international and/or multi-provider
connectivity. Those who will be involved in the establishment
and/or operation of a basic national network infrastructure
in the country.
Prerequisites: experience using TCP/IP-based networking technologies.
Topics are expected to include:
- Basic routing
- OSPF routing
- BGP routing (limited)
- Management of router configuration
- NOC (Network Operation Center)
- Exchange points between networks
- Network Security
Track NM-F: Infrastructure Reseaux IP (Atelier SI-E en Français)
INFRASTRUCTURE RESEAUX focalisé sur la mise en place et l'exploitation de réseaux utilisant routeurs et switchs, dimensionnés pour supporter de larges sites interconnectés.
- Base des reseaux IP
- Bases de configuration des routeurs Cisco
- Routage statique (utilisation d'Unix et de Routeur Cisco)
- OSPF
- Architecture d'un reseau redondant
- BGP
- NOC services et application
- Securite Reseau
Track AR-E: Advanced Routing
Overall Objective: After attending this track, students will be able to configure and operate large scale networks that make up the Internet.
Who should attend: Technical staff who are now building or operating a wide area service provider network or Internet Exchange point, with international and/or multi provider connectivity. Participants are required to bring laptops.
Prerequisites: Successful completion of a previous AfNOG Scalable Infrastructure Workshop or similar training. Alternatively, participants must demonstrate acceptable knowledge of or their experience with a router configuration language. Experience of interior routing protocols such as OSPF or ISIS is also necessary, and participants must have used BGP. Some user level Unix experience would be advantageous.
Topics are expected to include:
- Introduction to the ISIS Routing protocol
- Introduction to IPv6
- BGP refresher, including attributes, policies, communities and best practices
- BGP scaling techniques, including Route Reflectors and peer-groups
- Techniques and strategies for multihoming using BGP
- Introduction to peering and Internet Exchange Points
- Best practices for Internet operations
On-Line application forms / Les formulaires de candidature
AfNOG Meetings
The on-line application system is available here.
Les formulaires de candidature en ligne est disponible ici.