Posted by: Anonymous Coward
on April 07, 2004 03:45 AM
I first took my RHCE in 1999 for Red Hat 6 (score: 98%). I most recently took my RHCE for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3.0 (score: 100%). The scores aren't to show off, they're to illustrate my following points.
The RHCE is not a mystical black box of training. Every single piece of exam content is covered in the Red Hat Manuals, User Guides, Customization Guides, and Reference Guides. All of these are available on Red Hat's documentation links on their website, in a variety of formats (PDF, HTML, tarball, etc). If you take the 1 week class and not just the test, they cover probably 50% of the material all the way in class, while 25% of the material is referred to but you'll need to look it up to really see how some of the options work, and 25% is assumed as already being something you're able to do (the items listed as Pre-reqs, or otherwise included in the Red Hat Systems Admin classes).
You can't walk into the 1 week course with little to no Red Hat Linux experience and pass the RHCE. It is not a "Here is the class content with all the info; I'll stamp my foot when something is going to be on the test" type of environment. The week of work is "Here is a review of many of the things Red Hat Enterprise Linux can do; you will need to do your homework or have already gained experience with this to pass the test".
In my opinion, the materials Red Hat makes available are among the best in the industry. Simply having up-to-date reference and customization guides is more than many other distros can do. These guides are what many people really need to look at before attending the RHCE tests, yet many fail to have done so. I have seen folks show up who've never installed a box from scratch and seen surprised when they're expected to do something as mundane as setup NFS shares, create an authentication system using NIS, or deploy filesystems for users w/ autofs. These are the same folks with the Exam Cram book under one arm who didn't bring a laptop to study the day's lessons back in their hotel room.
Bluntly, if you prepare for the tests as Red Hat recommends, and come to the week of training with the mindset of "Take advantage of the resources they make available, and use my own initiative to followup on any pieces of information I was uncomfortable with" you will pass. If you expect to waltz in without having made sure you understand the material, you will fail.
*I have not and do not work for Red Hat; It's simply one of the best distro's out there, IMHO, as regards testing and certifications. I also use and deploy Gentoo, Debian, Mandrake, Slackware, and various other distros as the situation requires. This is not a flame on the author, who opbviously has a good understanding of much of the material, as the RHCT is nothing to laugh at. The article points out many of these same opinions, especially as regards Red Hat's listing of the topics of the exam.*
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(as posted on LWN, where I saw the link)
Posted by: Anonymous Coward on April 07, 2004 03:45 AMThe RHCE is not a mystical black box of training. Every single piece of exam content is covered in the Red Hat Manuals, User Guides, Customization Guides, and Reference Guides. All of these are available on Red Hat's documentation links on their website, in a variety of formats (PDF, HTML, tarball, etc). If you take the 1 week class and not just the test, they cover probably 50% of the material all the way in class, while 25% of the material is referred to but you'll need to look it up to really see how some of the options work, and 25% is assumed as already being something you're able to do (the items listed as Pre-reqs, or otherwise included in the Red Hat Systems Admin classes).
You can't walk into the 1 week course with little to no Red Hat Linux experience and pass the RHCE. It is not a "Here is the class content with all the info; I'll stamp my foot when something is going to be on the test" type of environment. The week of work is "Here is a review of many of the things Red Hat Enterprise Linux can do; you will need to do your homework or have already gained experience with this to pass the test".
In my opinion, the materials Red Hat makes available are among the best in the industry. Simply having up-to-date reference and customization guides is more than many other distros can do. These guides are what many people really need to look at before attending the RHCE tests, yet many fail to have done so. I have seen folks show up who've never installed a box from scratch and seen surprised when they're expected to do something as mundane as setup NFS shares, create an authentication system using NIS, or deploy filesystems for users w/ autofs. These are the same folks with the Exam Cram book under one arm who didn't bring a laptop to study the day's lessons back in their hotel room.
Bluntly, if you prepare for the tests as Red Hat recommends, and come to the week of training with the mindset of "Take advantage of the resources they make available, and use my own initiative to followup on any pieces of information I was uncomfortable with" you will pass. If you expect to waltz in without having made sure you understand the material, you will fail.
*I have not and do not work for Red Hat; It's simply one of the best distro's out there, IMHO, as regards testing and certifications. I also use and deploy Gentoo, Debian, Mandrake, Slackware, and various other distros as the situation requires. This is not a flame on the author, who opbviously has a good understanding of much of the material, as the RHCT is nothing to laugh at. The article points out many of these same opinions, especially as regards Red Hat's listing of the topics of the exam.*
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