Observations of Instructor Led Training with Real Hardware

TechNow has heard many students talk about virtualized/remote training that TechNow Does Not Do.  While training our most recent offering of PA-215: Palo Alto Networks Firewall Essentials FastTrack a student told his story of how he endend up in our course.  His story we have heard for other technologies like Cisco, VMware, BlueCoat and other products.

A large percentage of training is moving to the virtualized/remote lab environments.  Students are asked to use some variant of remote access software and remote into the training company's lab environment. Our student in our Palo Alto Networks Firewall course informed us that he went to a very costly offering of that course from the vendor and was not able to perform any labs.  There were either network connectivity issues, or issues with the remote access software, or other problems.  The whole training experience was very frustrating and not productive.

We keep our labs open to students if they would like after hours, or before hours access.  Repeatedly going through a lab engrains that knowledge for later recall.  Touching hardware is so critical in understanding the problems that arise when a cable comes loose, or a cable gets plugged in the wrong port.  There are other scenarios such as just pulling the power cable, or turning off a power strip, or accidently overwriting a configuration.  These disaster scenarious requires hands-on physical access to hardware.  Preventing and recovering from disasters is what it's all about, and that requires hands-on, instructor led, real hardware.

P-245: Programming with PERL

 

Course Overview:

This course teaches students how to use the powerful PERL programming language, focusing on hands-on labs to promote retention & challenge students to apply their skills to new situations. PERL is a flexible, easy to use language suitable for many tasks such as system administration, web applications & database integration. System administrators, web programmers & database administrators will benefit from mastering this powerful programming language. This course reviews & builds on the information presented in PL-115: Fundamentals of Computer Programming.

Attendees to P-245: Programming with PERL will receive TechNow approved course materials and expert instruction.

Dates/Locations:

No Events

Course Duration: 5 days

Course Objectives:

  • Introduction
  • Scalar Data
  • Lists & Arrays
  • Subroutines
  • Input & Output
  • Hashes
  • In the World of Regular Expressions
  • Matching with Regular Expressions
  • Processing Text with Regular Expressions
  • More Control Structures
  • File Tests
  • Directory Operations
  • Strings & Sorting
  • Process Management
  • PERL Modules
  • Some Advanced PERL Techniques

Prerequisites:

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PA-212: Palo Alto Networks Firewall Configure Extended Features (EDU-205)

  

 

Course Overview: PA-212: Palo Alto Networks Firewall Configure Extended Features (EDU-205) Training Class is a two-day course that teaches students to configure and manage the entire line of Palo Alto Networks next-generation firewalls. Students also will be instructed on the basics of implementing and managing GlobalProtect™ and active/ active high availability. Students will gain an in-depth knowledge of how to optimize their visibility and control of applications, users, and content.  This course prepares the student for Palo Alto Networks Certified Network Security Engineer (PCNSE).  Through hands-on training, students learn high end skills of how to integrate Palo Alto next-generation firewalls into their network infrastructure.  This is not a virtualized theoretical course.  This is hands-on, real world instruction, directly relevant to the DoD and Commercial implementations of Palo Alto Networks next-generation firewalls.

Each student is issued a physical Palo Alto firewall and a Cisco layer 3 switch at their desk.  Real hardware per student for real experience and real skill development.  TechNow provides a very comprehensive client infrastructure that includes Windows, Linux, and multiple packet sniffer agents.

This course sets up the foundation for the three day course PA-243: Palo Alto Networks Firewall Debug and Troubleshoot (EDU-311). The instructor for this course has been a lead in Unix kernel development to implement firewall and intrusion detection technologies.  Additionally, the instructor has taught several security appliance products and carries several SANS, ISC2, ISACA, Cisco, Unix, and Windows certifications.  Attendees to the PA-212: Palo Alto Networks Firewall Configure Extended Features (EDU-205) Training Course will receive TechNow approved course materials and expert instruction.

 

Dates/Locations:

No Events

Duration: 2 days

Course Objectives:   Students attending this foundational-level training course will gain an in-depth knowledge of how to configure and manage their Palo Alto Networks firewall.  Students also will be instructed on the basics of implementing and managing GlobalProtect™ and active/ active high availability. Students will gain an in-depth knowledge of how to optimize their visibility and control of applications, users, and content.

Day 1

  • Module 0 – Introduction & Overview
  • Mod 1: Advanced Interface
    • Configuration
    • Advanced NAT
    • Policy-Based
    • Forwarding
    • Routing Protocols (OSPF)
  • Mod 2: App-ID™ –
    • Custom Applications
    • Defining New Application Signatures
    • Application Override
  • Mod 3: Advanced Content-ID™
    • Custom Threat Signatures
    • Data Filtering
    • DoS Protection
    • Botnet Report
  • Mod 4: Advanced User-ID™
    • Terminal Server Agent
    • Captive Portal
    • XML API

Day 2

  • Mod 5: Quality of Service
    • Configuring Quality of Service
  • Mod 6: GlobalProtect™
    • Implementation of GlobalProtect
    • Install and Configure Portal, Gateway, and Agents
  • Mod 7: Monitoring and Reporting
    • Log Forwarding
    • SNMP
    • Reporting
  • Mod 8: Active/Active High Availability
    • Configuring Active/Active HA

 

Prerequisites:

This course is in no way associated with Palo Alto Networks, Inc.

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TN-215: Shell Programming

Course Overview:

This intensive hands-on class teaches students to develop customized UNIX™ commands, read & write Bourne, Korn & Bash Shell scripts & automate critical server functions.  The course includes extensive lab exercises, including hands-on development & debugging of shell scripts, which will give students the ability to be more efficient and productive in less time. The focus of the course will be the Bash shell.

Attendees to TN-215: Shell Programming will receive TechNow approved course materials and expert instruction.

Dates/Locations:

Date/Time Event
03/23/2026 - 03/27/2026
08:00 -16:00 		TN-215: Shell Programming
TechNow, Inc, San Antonio TX
06/22/2026 - 06/26/2026
08:00 -16:00 		TN-215: Shell Programming
TechNow, Inc, San Antonio TX
09/14/2026 - 09/18/2026
08:00 -16:00 		TN-215: Shell Programming
TechNow, Inc, San Antonio TX

Duration: 5 days

Course Objectives:

  • Shell Review
  • Shell Interpretation of Quotes & Backslash
  • The Bash Shell
  • Shell’s combined with UNIX utilities
  • Programming Basics
  • Data Constructs
  • Programming Looping
  • Your Environment
  • More on Parameters
  • Advanced Shell Programming

Prerequisites:

Comments

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User: hnzarate

Instructor comments: Very knowledgeable.

Facilities comments: This hotel needs better water.

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