best practices?

when you are implementing a technology such as stp, etherchannel,  etc. there are often standardized approaches for this implementation, and then there are many different approaches...

what works is oftentimes the best within the circumstances of the implementation...

you know the old saw; there is the right way, the wrong way and cisco's way...

i prefer to set the interface as a trunk first in case i want to whack the channel... but this is a lab, not real world... understand the circumstances under which you configure, and configure according to those circumstances...

states and modes follow...


asw2#sh run int fa0/5
Building configuration...

Current configuration : 57 bytes
!
interface FastEthernet0/5
 speed 100
 duplex full
end

asw2(config)#int f0/5
asw2(config-if)#channel-g 1 mode on
asw2(config-if)#do sh run int f0/5
Building configuration...

Current configuration : 82 bytes
!
interface FastEthernet0/5
 speed 100
 duplex full
 channel-group 1 mode on
end

asw2(config-if)#no channel-g 1 mode on
asw2(config-if)#do sh run int f0/5
Building configuration...

Current configuration : 57 bytes
!
interface FastEthernet0/5
 speed 100
 duplex full
end

asw2(config-if)#sw mode trunk
asw2(config-if)#do sh run int f0/5
Building configuration...

Current configuration : 80 bytes
!
interface FastEthernet0/5
 switchport mode trunk
 speed 100
 duplex full
end

asw2(config-if)#no sw mode trunk
asw2(config-if)#do sh run int f0/5
Building configuration...

Current configuration : 57 bytes
!
interface FastEthernet0/5
 speed 100
 duplex full
end

asw2(config-if)#channel-g 1 mode on
asw2(config-if)#do sh int f0/5 trunk

Port        Mode         Encapsulation  Status        Native vlan
Fa0/5       desirable    802.1q         not-trunking  1

http://insearchofthecert.blogspot.com/search/label/etherchannel