Networking¶

VPCs, subnets, routing, hybrid connectivity, DNS, load balancing, multi-cloud networking. Networking is the layer everyone forgets until something doesn't connect.

flowchart LR
  U[Internet users] --> CDN[CDN / edge]
  CDN --> LB[Global / regional load balancer]
  LB --> VPC[VPC / VNet:<br/>subnets, route tables, security groups]
  VPC --> APP[App tier]
  APP --> DB[(Private DB)]
  ONP[On-prem] -. VPN / Direct Connect / ExpressRoute / Interconnect .-> VPC
  DNS[DNS:<br/>Route 53 / Cloud DNS / Azure DNS] -.- CDN
  DNS -.- LB

Learn¶

• VPC explained - private network basics, CIDR, subnets, route tables
• DNS explained - resolution, records, recursion, caching
• TLS and HTTPS - what TLS actually does
• CDN explained - edge caching, origin shielding
• Regions and availability zones - the geography of cloud

Compare¶

• Networking services - VPC, peering, transit, load balancers across clouds

Reference¶

• Hybrid connectivity - VPN, Direct Connect, ExpressRoute, Interconnect
• Multi-cloud networking - cross-cloud private connectivity
• DNS deep dive - delegation, GeoDNS, latency-based routing
• Load balancing deep dive - L4 vs L7, health checks, session affinity
• Architecture pattern: Hybrid cloud connectivity

Build¶

• Deploy a 3-tier app - VPC, subnets, ALB end-to-end
• Kubernetes cluster setup - cluster networking, CNI

Certify¶

Foundational - AWS Cloud Practitioner - Azure AZ-900

Associate - AWS Solutions Architect Associate (SAA-C03) - Azure Administrator (AZ-104) - Azure Network Engineer (AZ-700) - GCP Cloud Engineer

Cisco / vendor-specific - Cisco CCNA (200-301) - foundational networking, routing, switching - Cisco CCNP Enterprise (350-401) - CompTIA Network+

Professional / Specialty - AWS Solutions Architect Professional (SAP-C02) - AWS Advanced Networking Specialty (ANS-C01) - GCP Cloud Network Engineer - NVIDIA Networking Professional - data center fabric for AI workloads

Service mesh and ingress - Istio Certified Associate (ICA) - HashiCorp Consul Associate

Roadmap¶

Networking deep-dive paths live in the Cloud Engineer roadmap and the Solutions Architect roadmap.