The day-to-day tasks of Cisco network engineers are in the midst of a major industry shift. Specifically, we’re moving away from traditional command line interface (CLI) commands, and moving towards having programs do the work for us. The industry term for this new environment is Software Defined Networking (SDN). Cisco’s SDN product suite is called ACI. As an example, we could write a program to talk with a Cisco APIC controller, which could then send out commands to multiple Cisco devices (e.g. routers and switches).

This change is going to require Cisco engineers to become proficient in programming, and the most common programming language for SDN is the Python programming language. Unfortunately, the challenge of learning a new programming language can be a bit daunting even to seasoned engineers.

Fortunately, this video will break the FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt) surrounding Python. Specifically, in this video, you’ll learn:

• How to download Python for your computer
• How to enter commands using the Interactive Interpreter
• Python data types (including: Integer, Floating Point, String, Boolean, and List)
• Python functions (including: Type, Print, Len, Append, and Input)
• How to perform conditional actions with the IF and ELSE commands
• How to create loops using the FOR command
• How to create and execute a Python program 

Enjoy the video!

Kevin Wallace, CCIEx2 (R/S and Collaboration) #7945