In short, for those in a hurry … wooowwww I don’t have my results yet. I will have them in 10 business days starting today. Hopefully I will not need to visit the testing centre for this exam again. My heart will tremble every time I will see *VMware* in my Inbox

UPDATE 27.04.2011 I got my exam score report. PASSED. yeiiii!

Very well done VMware education – this was the most demanding exam that I’ve been through so far. Very well prepared, it’s clear that there is a lot of effort involved to prepare & to deliver it like you did.

Now, back to my exam experience.

Preparation time

I have invested about 40 hours during last 1 week and a half to prepare this exam. At the end of exam I was far from happy with what I’ve did (see bellow). Of course, this evaluation is in line with my high satisfaction standards

Will it be enough for you? Maybe more or less – depending on your knowledge and experience.

In order to have a clear picture from where I have started from, let me tell in a few words about my background:  I have more than 15 years of experience in IT field, mostly Linux/UNIX, IT architecture & design, planning, performance troubleshooting. During these years I’ve been through different roles Technical Project Manager, IT Systems Specialist, IT consultant, IT trainer and software developer in early days. Since a few years ago I am teaching several IBM classes  – *NIX (Linux & AIX), any storage system sold by IBM from entry-level to enterprise, SAN classes. I am also a VCI (VMware Certified Instructor). I have used vSphere since it was called VMware Infrastructure so a few years of experiece behind.

What have I used to prepare?

• Exam blueprint
• several VMware classes documentation – mainly ICM & Troubleshooting class
• online resources – mainly Sean Crookston’s guide, Kendrick Coleman‘s guide,Duncan Epping’s and Eric Sloof’s blogs. Thank you guys. Your efforts helped me a lot.
• official documentation (‘course )
• a lot of other resources linked from the guides above

What I have sincerely missed the most these days? A tablet. This kind of exam could be  your justification (if you need any) to buy a tablet at last

The exam. How is it? How was it for me?

If you didn’t already see the UI demo for this exam take a short peek. Now you know – this exam evaluates you only for your ability to do stuff around VMware vSphere products family. You are given a live & living remote lab where you should perform several tasks. No multiple choices, no questions asked. Just do your job on a live remote lab considering the task requirements.

Regarding my challenges during the exam:

lab  passwords In my study lab I am using several passwords and I have get used to them. This seemed to be a drawback during the exam. Even though VMware made significant efforts to make credentials easily accessible for me the home-lab routine played a more important role

time-time-time Even if I will put it 10 times in a row I will not be able to stress it enough. One might assume there is a plenty time for anything (stretching & a short nap included). WRONG. You will get around 40 task which you need to complete in around 5 minutes each. How long does it take for you now to complete one task? 30min, 1hour? Maybe you’re just going again through the documentation, reading some VMware communities post… Well, come down to earth. If you didn’t go through a specific task back at home please consider that you will have low chances to get it done when you will be required to complete it at exam time. If not prepared so well, you’ll better have some spells & magic in your backpack or reschedule your exam a few weeks later

click inside When you switch from task description to live lab you need to click inside, similar to consoles opened though vSphere Client. It took me some time to get accustomed to that

I got disconnected for about 5 minutes You get more and more pressure on your shoulders while the remaining time to complete the exam decreases. About 30 minutes before my scheduled ending time I got disconnected from remote lab. This lasted for about 5 minutes and maybe another 5 minutes to re-establish connections and everything at remote lab. Ten minutes in the last exam hour are different than 10 minutes at the begging of the exam. Very-very annoying

No nothing inside the testing room During the exam you are not allowed to bring anything inside. A scheduled break for a smoke, a snack, a glass of water you name it would have been a God sent angel for me.

Testing centre mouse & keyboard Well, when everything counts towards you being successful or not I think you have the right to be picky. Even though the monitor was great, the mouse & keyboard were somehow impacting the exam experience. During the exam I have used an old ball mouse (maybe uncleaned ), it was a challenge to point to anything. Add on top the fact that the lab is remote, it takes some time to redraw your screen. Any failure to click on something, drag&drop something could mean precious lost seconds. The keyboard was better, but awkwardly placed under the desk  because it was not enough space to push my chair backwards to slide the keyboard outside

Tips & Tricks

You will need a practice lab. That’s for sure. Even if you have a job which brings you in front of vSphere client daily I am sure you didn’t perform each and every task from the stated objectives in the blueprint.

Consider that you will not be able to google stuff around during the exam and you will not have access to your bookmarks which you may be using while at home/work. There is a huge impact in productivity when you need to know stuff by heart – for instance the difference between das.failuredetectiontime and das.failuredetectioninterval. You will not  have access to your usual sources of information.

Keep in mind that you need to have experience with both ESX & ESXi.

Even though you are warned before starting the exam I think it worth mentioning: your entire work will be evaluated only once, after the exam has ended. Take care for the steps you are performing not to affect the previous completed tasks.

You might have tasks dependencies. Task 3 not completed? Maybe you cannot perform task 25 without it.

Can you perform the same tasks from GUI and command line? Or vCLI, PowerCLI, vMA are the perfect strangers for you?

How does it ended for me?

I did not complete all tasks and I didn’t approach the last one. Once exited the exam room I was puzzled like when you step down from a montagne russe. I was hungry, thirsty and under some physical pressure which made be to hurry into a rest room

But the most important thing – I was surprised by the exam intensity and not happy at all with how well I did. Let’s hope for the best now, waiting for VMware to send me the results.

Thoughts

I think it is a very good experience for every VCP to prepare for this exam. You will for sure learn more, you will experiment things never tried into production environment. You will see it for yourself once you’ve read the objectives from the blueprint what stuff you’ve never had the chance to experiment with. For instance vCenter Heartbeat? Orchestrator?

For sure there is a significant difference in what’s required between VCP & VCAP-DCA. I see great value in owning this certification as nobody could argue your guru abilities and experience with vSphere, further more there is a different level – you will be an Advanced Professional after all.

Ca si scop nu vor fi acoperite doar PC-urile si laptop-urile devenite deja “traditionale” ci si telefoanele mobile si tabletele.

Pentru mai mult click aici.

Clientul iPad View va folosi PCoIP (PC over IP) pentru a se conecta la serverele View.

In acest nou client VMware a creat mai multe custom gestures pentru a îmbunătăți  integrarea cu desktop-ul Windows. O parte din aceste “gesturi” sunt cele de mai jos:

• Gesture to bring up iPad keyboard
• They created a virtual touchpad
• System preference settings to allow for client personalization
• A system monitor to show you about network performance

Pentru un preview al acestui client urmariti acest video YouTube.

Dupa adoptarea virtualizării pentru o eficiență dramatic îmbunătățită cu privire la costurile hardware si agilitatea aplicațiilor, pasul următor este acela de a asigura noi standarde din punct de vedere al asigurării securității pentru aplicațiile ce folosesc partajat această infrastructură hardware comună (servere, comunicații, stocare).

In același timp, există noi posibilități cu privire la a asigura diferite standarde de calitate pentru servicii (SLA) deși resursele hardware se folosesc partajat.

Vă invit sa vizitați site-ul http://www.imaginevirtuallyanything.com/ pentru mai multe informații.

O soluţie de outsourcing se diferenţiază de o soluţie “in house” prin experienţa cumulată a echipei care livrează soluţiile. Expertiza lor este vizibilă prin certificările obţinute (specialisti Cisco, Microsoft, VMWare etc)

2. Ok, imi veţi rezolva problemele. Dar ce veţi face ca ele să nu se mai repete?

O soluţie de întreţinere ar trebui să includă o modalitate de evaluare regulată a sistemelor pentru preîntâmpinarea apariţiei de probleme. Cereţi informaţii specifice despre cum realizează tehnicienii respectivi aceste evaluări.

3. Ce SLA îmi oferiţi prin contract?

Service Level Agreement-ul este un angajament prin care furnizorul se obligă ca într-un timp specificat în contract să aloce o resursă, să furnizeze un remediu temporar şi unul final la problema dumneavoastră. Prezenţa unui SLA în contract, comunicarea acestuia şi agreerea lui, toate acestea vă vor scuti de discuţii ulterioare inutile legate de diferenţele de timp dintre semnalarea problemei şi apariţia tehnicianului la sediul firmei dumneavoastră.

4. Serverele mele sunt importante pentru business-ul meu. Aveţi o soluţie de monitorizare a echipamentelor strategice? Pot avea şi eu acces la ea?

O soluţie de monitorizare nu numai că vă va salva timpul dumneavoastră pentru ca nu veţi mai fi nevoit să semnalaţi incidentul, dar va şi scădea timpul de rezolvare a incidentului; tehnicienii vor vedea defecţiunea înainte ca dumneavoastră să o semnalaţi, poate chiar să o sesizaţi. De ce să nu urmăriţi sau să fiţi înştiinţat pe mail de apariţia incidentelor, alocarea resurselor şi soluţionarea lor în timp real?

5. Care este portofoliul  firmei dumneavoastra?

Portofoliul unei firme nu numai că vă va arăta unde se situeaza aceasta ca nivel al ofertei ci şi experienţa acumulată în oferirea de soluţii complexe.

6. Ce soluţii puteţi oferi pentru a-mi scădea CapEx-ul şi OpEx-ul?

O firmă de outsourcing trebuie să ofere soluţii şi atunci când nu sunt cerute. Puţini manageri au cunoştinţele necesare pentru a şti cum îşi poti scădea cheltuielile firmei legate de IT dar de aceea contractezi un partener şi nu un furnizor, nu?  Iar un partener iţi sugerează în mod constant metode de a creşte randamentul şi profitabilitatea, mai ales în condiţiile actuale.

7. Ce soluţii de business informatizate puteţi livra?

Un partener IT trebuie să aibă noţiuni clare de business pentru a înţelege necesităţile dumneavoastră şi a balansa constant nivelul investiţiei cu cel al profitabilităţii. Astfel ar trebui nu doar să implementeze direct ci si să poată superviza implementări de soluţii de business de tip ERP, CRM.

8. Ce soluţii de securitate puteţi implementa pentru clientii dumneavoastră?

Pentru o companie de outsourcing IT ar trebui să fie clar că protejarea datelor afacerii este o necesitate stringentă. Soluţiile de securitate ar trebui să conţină pe lângă scanarea de viruşi de pe staţiile de lucru, scanarea site-urilor accesate, scanarea mail-urilor, antispam pentru mail, restricţionarea accesului la site-uri cu conţinut neproductiv, soluţii de protecţie la tentative de acces neatorizat (firewall, IDS, IPS), backup pentru servere dar şi staţii de lucru. Mai mult, o soluţie optimă nu ar trebui să genereze pentru dumneavoastră cheltuieli suplimentare contractului de întreţinere (de ex. pentru achiziţii costisitoare de licenţe).

9. Aveţi o soluţie de raportare a incidentelor?

O companie de outsourcing trebuie să pună gratuit la dispoziţia clientului o metodă electronică de raportare a incidentelor. Pe lângă a fi o metodă necostisitoare de semnalare a incidentelor, o astfel de soluţie vă va permite evaluarea timpului de răspuns şi a celui de soluţionare a problemei în cazul incidentelor şi astfel o metodă de evaluare constantă a furnizorului de servicii.

10. Ce servicii adăugate îmi puteţi oferi ataşat contractului de mentenanţă?

O companie de outsourcing trebuie să înţeleagă valoarea serviciilor adăugate pentru clientul său pentru a putea oferi sugestii în această privinţă. Cel mai usor să vă demonstreze acest lucru ar prin oferirea unui astfel de serviciu. De exemplu compania noastră oferă gratuit la orice contract de mentenanţă o implementare gratuită a unei aplicaţii CRM de monitorizare a activităţilor de vânzări.

Pornim la drum cu idealul de a crea continut cu relevanta atat pentru cei care sunt in aceeasi zona profesionala, cea a tehnologiei informatiei, cat si pentru cei care au nevoia de a se informa in legatura cu acest domeniu – manageri, factori de decizie, proprietari de afaceri.

Suntem convinsi ca putem contribui eficient la informarea in acest domeniu. Temperfield are o experienta de exceptie in domeniul tehnologiei informatiei si dorim sa o impartasim publicului.

Hai sa incepem si promitem sa ne adaptam in functie de necesitatile si dorintele cititorilor nostri pe parcurs!

Calin