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2-Day Instructor-Led Hands-On Lab Course
Available through Web-Based Live Delivery or On-Site Delivery
Minimum 10 Students – Maximum 20 Students

What Students are Saying about This Class:

“Andrew is a great instructor. I thoroughly enjoyed the Wireshark for Data Center course. His knowledge in this area and his ability to relay tips made this course well worth the time. I hope that I have the opportunity to take another course from him.”
“It was a great overall experience! I used Wireshark but never had a formal training about it and this one really helped me learned a lot about the tool. We deal with network testing and automation at an enterprise level in the team and so having to get this type of training is very valuable in our daily tasks and troubleshooting of issues. The [Instructor] was great! Hopefully I’ll be able to avail more related training in the future. Thank you!”
“Class/Instructor is great, I can certainly apply what I’ve learned to my work.”
“Instructor presented materials professionally and complete overview of the material.”
“Overall I was very please[d] with both the content and delivery method of the course. Also, the instructor was very knowledgeable and knew his subject matter well. I’d recommend this course to others.”

Course Description

Modern data-center networks carry large volumes of business-critical traffic, and when performance or connectivity problems occur, assumptions are rarely enough. Wireshark provides network engineers, technicians, administrators, test teams, and support personnel with the packet-level evidence needed to understand what is actually happening between systems.

The Wireshark Data Center Edition combines practical Wireshark and TCP/IP analysis skills with a focused examination of data-center storage networking. Students learn how to capture, filter, visualize, and analyze network traffic while exploring Ethernet, IPv4, TCP, UDP, SCSI, iSCSI, Fibre Channel, Fibre Channel over Ethernet, and Fibre Channel transport across IP networks.

Students use a layered approach to packet analysis, beginning with the physical and Ethernet layers and progressing through IPv4 and transport-layer behavior before examining data-center-specific protocols. Particular attention is given to the relationship between TCP behavior, packet loss, retransmissions, flow control, bandwidth, latency, and storage-network performance.

This is a hands-on course. Students work directly with Wireshark, packet captures, analysis tools, protocol traces, and troubleshooting case studies to develop skills they can apply to real data-center environments.

This course helps answer questions such as:

What is Wireshark, and why is packet analysis valuable in a data-center environment?
How should Wireshark be configured and used for effective troubleshooting?
How can packet captures help identify TCP/IP and storage-network problems?
How does TCP behavior affect iSCSI and other IP-based data-center communications?
How can Wireshark expose SCSI, iSCSI, Fibre Channel, and related protocol behavior?
How can packet analysis help identify performance problems involving bandwidth, latency, packet loss, and retransmissions?
How can packet evidence be used to troubleshoot complex data-center communications?

Course Objectives

Upon successful completion of this course, students will be able to:

Develop practical, hands-on Wireshark analysis skills using the layered network protocol model:
- Analyze the layered networking model and TCP/IP protocol suite
- Analyze Layer 1 physical interfaces
- Analyze Layer 2 Ethernet communications
- Analyze Layer 3 IPv4 communications
- Analyze Layer 4 UDP and TCP communications
- Analyze and dissect data-center SCSI, iSCSI, Fibre Channel, FCoE, and Fibre Channel over IP communications
Use Wireshark to investigate and analyze network problems:
- Apply Wireshark shortcuts, filtering techniques, and profiles
- Use Wireshark capabilities more efficiently and effectively
Understand how Wireshark can assist with network security analysis and monitoring.
Identify and use the major elements, features, and functions of the Wireshark interface.
Understand how Wireshark captures, processes, displays, and analyzes packet data.
Examine the communications protocols exposed and analyzed by Wireshark.
Use Wireshark features to investigate network issues, performance conditions, and maintenance requirements.

Audience

This course is designed for networking professionals who need a practical understanding of Wireshark and packet analysis in data-center environments.

Ideal participants include:

Sales and technical marketing professionals working with Internet and data-center technologies
Operations personnel responsible for network configuration, monitoring, and support
Network design engineers who use Wireshark for troubleshooting and analysis
Technical sales professionals who need to correlate product features with actual network and protocol behavior
Technical marketing professionals who need more than a basic understanding of Wireshark
Network administrators

The course is especially valuable for network engineers, data-center technicians, storage-networking personnel, test engineers, operations teams, and support professionals who need to investigate network and application behavior using packet-level evidence.

Course Prerequisites

This course is designed for anyone who needs the skills and knowledge required to use Wireshark effectively in data-center environments.

Some previous networking and operations experience is helpful, although prior Wireshark experience is not required.

Students should attend with a laptop computer running Windows, macOS, or Linux.

When the course is delivered in a classroom where suitable computers are provided, a student laptop may not be required.

Class size is limited to 20 students.

Course Materials

Students receive a Course Student Guide and Lab Guide. Packet captures and supporting analysis exercises are also provided through the CellStream Online School.

Course Outline

Section 1: Course Introduction and Logistics

Section 2: Introduction to Wireshark®

LAB 1: Installing Wireshark®
Purpose, features, and applications of Wireshark
Wireshark user interface and toolbar functions
Status bar and Help resources
Packet capture views and packet details
LAB 2: Performing a Basic Packet Capture with Wireshark
Working with trace files
Common capture and analysis problems and tips for success
File operations and merging packet capture files
LAB 3: Saving and Loading Trace Files
Capture filters
LAB 4: Applying Wireshark Capture Filters
Display filters
LAB 5: Applying Wireshark Display Filters
Colorizing, marking, and ignoring packets
Using ring-buffer captures
Section summary

Section 4: Configuration and Command-Line Functions

Determining where Wireshark should be installed or connected in the network
Securing packet captures and captured network information
Wireshark configuration profiles
LAB 6: Creating a Custom Wireshark Profile
Name resolution
Packet reassembly
Checksum verification
TShark command-line packet analysis
tcpdump command-line packet capture
dumpcap command-line packet capture
mergecap command-line capture-file processing
Section summary

Section 5: Layer 1 – The Physical Layer

Functions of Layer 1
Transmission types: simplex, half-duplex, and full-duplex
Wireshark physical-layer analysis and common problems
LAB 7: Layer 1 Analysis
Section summary

Section 6: Layer 2 – The Data Link Layer (Ethernet)

Ethernet definitions, mechanisms, and relationship to the OSI model
Ethernet sublayers and Logical Link Control
Ethernet frame formats
MAC addressing
ARP, Inverse ARP, and Reverse ARP
LAB 8: Layer 2 Ethernet Analysis
Spanning Tree Protocol and Rapid Spanning Tree Protocol
LAB 9: Ethernet Spanning Tree Analysis
VLANs and VLAN Trunking Protocol
LAB 10: Ethernet VLAN and VTP Analysis
Section summary

Section 7: Layer 3 – The Network Layer: Internet Protocol (IP)

IPv4 protocol functions and packet format
IPv4 addressing, reserved addresses, and broadcast addresses
IP routing
IP packet fragmentation
LAB 11: IP Fragmentation Analysis
ICMP operation, packet format, and troubleshooting
LAB 12: ICMP Troubleshooting
LAB 13: Analyzing Layer 3 Errors
Section summary

Section 8: Layer 4 – The Transport Layer: TCP and UDP

TCP protocol characteristics and segment format
TCP connection states
The TCP three-way handshake
TCP sockets
TCP segmentation
LAB 14: TCP Three-Way Handshake Analysis
TCP flow control and sliding windows
Packet loss, retransmissions, and TCP slow start
The Nagle algorithm
LAB 15: TCP Sliding Window Analysis
How TCP affects iSCSI and Fibre Channel communications
UDP operation and characteristics
LAB 16: UDP Analysis
Section summary

Section 9: Data Center Protocols

Direction of data-center protocols
SCSI and iSCSI overview
- iSCSI definition and overview
- Protocol stack, architecture, and components
- LAB 17: iSCSI Lab Experiment
Fibre Channel
- Fibre Channel definition and overview
- Protocol stack, architecture, and components
- Fibre Channel transport options
- Option 1: Fibre Channel over Ethernet
- LAB 18: Fibre Channel over Ethernet Experiment
- Option 2: Fibre Channel over IP
- LAB 19: Fibre Channel over IP Experiment
- Option 3: Fibre Channel in IP
Summary and comparison of Fibre Channel transport options
Internet Storage Name Service
Common issues, key analysis points, and troubleshooting tips

Section 10: Using Wireshark® for Troubleshooting Networks

Troubleshooting planning and strategies
Using the Wireshark troubleshooting toolset
Application types and application-related problems
Network performance analysis, issues, and typical data-center problems
Bandwidth and latency
TCP performance and data-center analysis tips
LAB: Case Study #1
LAB: Case Study #2
LAB: Data Center Case Study #3
Section summary

Course Availability:

View the course calendar and browse for our schedule. It will show scheduled courses and available dates for scheduling.

CSI-HO-020-B – Explore Packet Analysis with Wireshark – Data Center Edition – 2 Day