Codex.org

As I stated earlier, the first 3 days of the Red Hat rapid track training went by in a blur. The amount of information covered was more than I believe a lot of people could absorb in the short time frame. There were a number of people at the training claiming that they were going to fail the certification exam at the end of the week.

Day 4.

The first half of the day was spent finishing the course material. In a strange twist, the stuff that we covered on the last day was some of the easiest items that we had covered all week. During the training I was able to pull out my laptop and answer a few emails that needed seeing to. While the material covered in the last day did not seem that important it is where I spent the second half of the day that made all the difference.

The course material contains a number of hands on labs. These labs are actually very well written, and actually require you to learn something if you want to be able to complete them. The catch is this. If you cannot complete the labs quickly without looking for how to do them in the notes of your book, then you are probably not ready for the exam, or will run out of time. This was the feel that I was getting, so during part of the morning session, I spent my time going back over the material that we had covered which was new to me. Could I have skipped this? Maybe. Did it help? Definitely.

The second half of the day I spent going over a review lab. This lab has you configure a system utilizing a number of the skills that you learned throughout the week. For the most part I was able to go through the lab of working with firewalls, LVMs, apache, and such without having to refer to the training material. However, I was not fast at it, and it took me 3 to 3.5 hours to complete. Not a good sign when the time that you have during the RHCE (Red Hat Certified Engineer) exam is shorter than this. The review was good though, and I felt that I had a good grasp of the material.

In addition to this, as I was checking my work against the guide in the back, I saw that they had additional work you could do if you wanted more practice. This seemed like a good idea, and I stayed longer to ensure that I could accomplish all of these goals as well.

Day 5.

Exam Day.

The RHCE exam consists of two parts. The first part is the RHCSA (Red Hat Certified System Administrator) and the second half is the RHCE. In order to obtain the RHCE you must first pass the RHCSA exam. Once you have passed both, then you have your RHCE.

In order to take the exam you must sign a non-disclosure agreement. Because of this, I am not able to go into any detail of the exam. I believe it is OK if I say that there is no multiple choice section. The entire exam is a practical exam. You must be able to do the work if you want to get either of the certifications.

You do not receive your results instantaneously. It is a shame, but it is also understandable. Red Hat states you should have them within 72 business hours. I received my results the following Saturday.

Overall thoughts.

Was the class worth it? Yes. There is enough stuff that you may not do on a daily basis to warrant taking the class.

Could you pass the RHCE exam without it? Yes, if you can do everything listed on the objectives provided by Red Hat then you should be fine. (If you can do them fast)

Did I pass? Yes, I passed both the RHCSA and RHCE exams.