Topic outline
General
This content is under construction. I am in the process of rewriting a large amount of the material, and unfortunately, this is towards the back of the to-do list.
It is mostly empty, and you shouldn't try to do it.
Sorry for the inconvenience!
- Dennis
Visit https://www.hoppersroppers.org/help.html to learn how to donate to support the site, as well as information on sponsorships and how to partner with us.
Course Description
This course will teach you the base knowledge required to become a networking stud and will guide you through a variety of networking challenges. You will do a bunch of packet capture problems, some packet crafting, and a few other miscellaneous networking shenanigans.
This course is designed to teach you a great deal about networking, mostly through practical application. We will spend a little time going over the fundamentals, but most of the time will be wrapping our head around what it looks like going over the wire. If you want an academic view into the protocols and how packets bop around, read TCP./IP Illustrated. This course is for rolling up your sleeves and getting your hands dirty.
Welcome to the show!
- Dennis
Alright so I haven't made the course yet, so you should just do this in the mean time. This pseudo-course is built in the style of Roppers, and has our characteristic lack of polish! When you have questions, ask in Slack!
Watch this fun intro video. I really like this series. It's all pretty good. Don't get distracted.
Once you are done with that video, watch the CyberAces Networking videos and do whatever demos they tell you to do. Take time to pause the video anytime you don't understand something, and when they introduce commands, play around with them for a while. These videos might be 12 minutes long, but should take you at least 30 minutes.
Watch Section 2: Networking. My Linux stuff is better than their Section 1 so you can skip that.
Once you have worked through all those videos, move on to reading and doing.
First, go to this section of my networking course and learn how to be good at Networking. This mostly comes down to reading the RFCs (you'll learn to love them), opening up the actual packets in Wireshark, and understanding that there is nothing magic in Networking. Everything does exactly what it is supposed to do, it is just very hard to get an intuitive understanding without looking at the packets.
Then, because I haven't made the rest of the course yet, back to external resources!!!!
This Digital Ocean guide is probably the best single short resource on the topic. Read it, when you don't understand something, google it, read other resources until it makes sense, then start again from the top.
This Commotion resource is pretty good, once you finish Digital Ocean read this in the same way, taking your time. As you do things, check them out in Wireshark and learn how to do them.
https://commotionwireless.net/docs/cck/networking/learn-networking-basics/
I'll make the actual course in the next few months, but for now, this is probably the best way to actually learn it.
Finally, this resource is way way more complicated. Read this: Specifically, 1.1-1.4, 1.9, https://intronetworks.cs.luc.edu/current/html/intro.html
Again, take your time to understand, and ask questions when you find them.
Once you have finished all these things, start playing around with building your own Networking things. Do all the things in here on localhost and see what happens.
Check out Python sockets (this is a decent guide: https://realpython.com/python-sockets/)
Check out Python webservers and hosting files on localhost.
Learn all the basic Linux networking commands, ensuring we are still looking at everything in Wireshark: https://itsfoss.com/basic-linux-networking-commands/
Then you can probably learn everything else as you go, as long as you trust Wireshark, your resources, and physics, in that order.
Follow-On Resources:
My favorite resource to actually understand sockets is https://beej.us/guide/bgnet/.
If you want to do some CTF challenges, check out these bad boys and girls.
https://academy.hoppersroppers.org/mod/page/view.php?id=2054