It has been a while since my last blog entry. Since then quite a lot has happened, not least Xmas! I am once again enthralled with revision… I’m about half-way through preparing to sit the practicum test for the Novell Certified Linux Professional 10 (CLP 10) certification. It will be my first practicum, 050-697, one of Novells new hands-on practical exams. The idea is to test your ability, rather than simply your ability to memorize information from a book, a laudable idea, but I reserve judgement until ‘after’ the exam!
I’m doing this self-study as usual, I purchased a CLP 10 self-study bundle consisting of materials for the following courses:
Course 3071 – SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 Fundamentals
Course 3072 – SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 Administration
Course 3073 – SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 Advanced Administration
Not all the usual test centres are capable of running the practicum exams, so I’ll have to check that out in advance. Once I have completed the CLP I plan to go on towards a Novell CLE certification (Certified Linux Engineer).
Last year I passed the computer based exam for CompTIA’s Certified Technical Trainer (CTT+), but I still need to do the video submission (a video of me training). Well it was a good excuse to buy myself a nice digital video camera for Xmas, all I need now is the time (and volunteers) to do it. I now wish I had gone straight on and done it, I’ll have to brush up now before I tackle it. I’ve got a couple of recommended books for this purpose, that way I’m learning new things not just raking over the old. The books are:
Effective Presentation Skills by Steve Mandel
50 One-Minute Tips to Better Communication by Phillip E. Bozek.
I’m sure I’ll learn a lot…
I’ve gone mad and ordered all the parts I need to build myself quite a decent server. I’ve always maintained a small lab at home to help with self-study and simulating work. I’m now moving into the wonderful world of Xen Virtualization, doing away with 3 low spec servers (ok, low spec PC’s!) and bringing in a proper server: Dual Xeon 64-bit processors, Intel server-board, Ultra 320 RAID 5 with SCA hot-swap SCSI backplane all in a neat 4U short rack-case on a small mobile 19 inch rack. It should all be very neat compared to several boxes and a mass of cables (I won’t even need to use a KVM switch). Well I figured it was a good excuse to jump into Virtualization feet first, it’s so cool!
Well, I’ll let you know how it goes….
