Official Ubuntu Certification Poll

[ubuntu-geek]

Which of the following areas would you (or perhaps your staff) consider most important for official Ubuntu skills certification?

Please take a few seconds and cast your vote so we can help to improve Ubuntu even more :)

[TravisNewman]

I meant to click the first three, but I missed the first one.

I hadn't even heard there was going to be such a thing. Exciting!

[Stormy Eyes]

Which of the following areas would you (or perhaps your staff) consider most important for official Ubuntu skills certification?

Please take a few seconds and cast your vote so we can help to improve Ubuntu even more :)

Shouldn't desktop/office competency be a given?

[ubuntu-geek]

Shouldn't desktop/office competency be a given?
:) This is a poll from Jeff at Canonical we wanted to get feedback on the above topics.

[Stormy Eyes]

:) This is a poll from Jeff at Canonical we wanted to get feedback on the above topics.

I figured as much. I just thought for a moment, "Certification for use of GNOME and OpenOffice? Absurd. Anybody using Ubuntu should have some skill in this area."

[kvidell]

My question is: Where will this certification do me any good?

Most companies I know of are all over CentOS, RHEL and SuSE/Novell based prodcuts.
Is the idea that I can wave my badge and go "I know an alternative!" ?

I have no problem with that, I'm just wondering what the goal of this will be.
I don't know how well known this Distro is with the buisness/working world.

Is another goal to fix that and make us known?
- Kev

P.S.: I ticked the first three, incase it matters :)

[ubuntu-geek]

The goal is to get an idea from the forum community on what areas users of Ubuntu would like to get certifed on if this type of certification was available!

[kvidell]

The goal is to get an idea from the forum community on what areas users of Ubuntu would like to get certifed on if this type of certification was available!
Yes, but my question is what would a certification prove to the outside world?
I could have graduated school with some albeit very cool things on my diploma, but it would have been a lot of extra work for no results because no one but a select few who were also at my level would have known what it meant.

That's all :)

[davahmet]

Let me start off by saying that I absolutely hate certifications. If I offend anyone who signs their name with a bunch of acronyms, I apologize now, but certifications are a fairly recent addition to IT that from the start was used primarily as a marketing tool.

That being said, companies do find value in certifications because it serves as a relatively inexpensive means of employment screening and of marketing implied in-house skills. The base assumption is that a certification verifies competance, which we have all seen is not necessarily the case. To have validity, a certifcation needs to reflect the skills relevant to the product bound to the cert. Since Ubuntu is extraordinarily flexible, will an Ubuntu certification verify skills for all uses of Ubuntu? I would hope not, since that could easily dilute its perceived value.

One of the main differentiators of Ubuntu is its ease of use. That is, you do not have to be a technical genius that prefers reading in hexadecimal and orders coffee in Klingon to install and run it. Normal, everyday mortals can install, maintain and run Ubuntu with little difficulty. The target market appears to be mainly the desktop, so if we have an Ubuntu cert, it makes sense to me that validating desktop support is where we should focus.

P.S. Again, no offense intended to Cert-collectors and/or former Gentoo users that I may have served the wrong flavor of coffee.

[KiwiNZ]

I figured as much. I just thought for a moment, "Certification for use of GNOME and OpenOffice? Absurd. Anybody using Ubuntu should have some skill in this area."

True, but what is wrong with recognising the learning done and the skill level attained with certification?
After all MS have done it for years .

[XDevHald]

Let me start off by saying that I absolutely hate certifications. If I offend anyone who signs their name with a bunch of acronyms, I apologize now, but certifications are a fairly recent addition to IT that from the start was used primarily as a marketing tool.

That being said, companies do find value in certifications because it serves as a relatively inexpensive means of employment screening and of marketing implied in-house skills. The base assumption is that a certification verifies competance, which we have all seen is not necessarily the case. To have validity, a certifcation needs to reflect the skills relevant to the product bound to the cert. Since Ubuntu is extraordinarily flexible, will an Ubuntu certification verify skills for all uses of Ubuntu? I would hope not, since that could easily dilute its perceived value.

One of the main differentiators of Ubuntu is its ease of use. That is, you do not have to be a technical genius that prefers reading in hexadecimal and orders coffee in Klingon to install and run it. Normal, everyday mortals can install, maintain and run Ubuntu with little difficulty. The target market appears to be mainly the desktop, so if we have an Ubuntu cert, it makes sense to me that validating desktop support is where we should focus.

P.S. Again, no offense intended to Cert-collectors and/or former Gentoo users that I may have served the wrong flavor of coffee.


None taken, I for one would like to show my work to others, and also get credit for it even by showing my name, but nothing big really, just shows people that you can do the job, and should be given full credit for it :)


companies do find value in certifications because it serves as a relatively inexpensive means of employment screening and of marketing implied in-house skills.

Yes, most companies find that certifications, such as microsoft to be useful, due to needing high end knowledge in which they can rely on that associate of the company to take upon any development or any other tasks the job might need and they can do so by knowing where the client stands in with in his/her courses of study.

[crane]

I believe that a certification also shows determination on the holders part. Anyone can say Yep I can do that. But when you walk in and say yep I can do tha and just to prove it I went through a course and proved to a qualified trainer that I could.
If a perso is willing to do that for themselves then in the eyes of the company they would appear to be willing to give a little extra to get the job done.

Now as far as the question, I believe there is need for both.
Server systems administration, Desktop systems administration, and Development environment and tools. Would be good certs for the members of the IT department. Especially the first two.

Then Desktop and office software competency would be a good class/cert for the staff. Come on, I know some of you are IT people. I'm not myself but I help out at my wifes office from time to time and I am totally amazed at how easy these people, who work (office work, word, excell, and medical software) on their computers every day can completly screw up a computer. Some simple training would save alot of down time and increase efficiency(?sp).

Just my 2 cents1

[gruepig]

In general, I'm not much for certification. However, if you are going to go the certification route, how about something focusing on security? Hopefully that fits into all/most of the categories listed, but I thought I'd make it a bit more explicit.

[mark]

I picked the 2 "Desktop" categories which I believe fit in with Ubuntu's/Canonical's avowed goals. Since Ubuntu is not really targeted as a server OS, I would question that inclusion. The "Developer" selection is a strong possibility, but..."small steps begin large journeys".

[dougsk]

I'd certainly be interested in certification purposes if for no other reason then something at least comparable to 101/201 weeder courses seen at massive universities.

Previous posters have already mentioned the need for multiple certs and I would tentatively agree.

It used to be quite common to see heavily heterogenous environments with clear delineation between roles. For good or ill, I don't believe that is the case today or in the forseeable short-sighted future and why I would strongly recommend a vision including multiple certs. Not really for the purpose of certification in and of itself, but for the point it represents. Are you really ready to take on those guys?

Would there be a place for Ubuntu clients and then let someone else handle the big iron, maybe. You might even parlay it into the ability to take on those guys.

I wish you luck. You have my vote!

[Raven-sb]

Well speaking as someone who has just been accepted into a Dipolma of Network Engineer which includes 5 certifications as part of the course I'd have to say that I am very pro certification, esp in the Systems/Network Admin side, so I'd love to see Ubuntu offer it's own certification.

[Slapdash]

True, but what is wrong with recognising the learning done and the skill level attained with certification?
After all MS have done it for years .

I agree 100%

Just to give an example that is not IT related.

I'm a Project Manager. i dont get nearly what Certified PM's get.
I'm busy doing my Cert now after wich my sallary can jump at least 30% - 40% ( not that it would at my current emplyer- although I love working here they wont up my sallary that drastically unfortunatly )

So even if you hate them ( as I do as well - Experience counts WAAAYYY more ) the people who hire you and might not know anything about Linux or whatever and they rely on them to measure your POTENTIAL performance.

[steffen]

- Certification gets you the first contract

- Experience gets you the second contract

[Juergen]

The problem I see is that you would have to renew your cert every 1/2 year.
A 4.10 cert would of course mean nothing anymore since 5.04 is out.
What would it cost - about 200$?

A MS-cert may be more expensive, but at least it holds for some years ;-)

[robertpostill]

I'm very suprised development hasn't got more votes (I just voted for it), seems to me that Ubuntu has the chance to outshine the Red Hat/Novell crowd by not just saying someone can be qualified to install and setup Ubuntu, but that they've got a good enough grasp of the tools provided to enhance Ubuntu.

If you think about many large corporate rollouts they allways have their own apps and need help to produce those apps.

So vote for development, you know it makes sense :)

[gourou76]

Greetings

Great! Modus Operandi?

Courses + tests? Right?

Costs?

Finally the CUE (Certified Ubuntu Enginneer) (What's in a name anyway?) should be a all rounder or we will end up with 5+ different certificates.

Cheers, :)

[yanik]

Oh please, this sounds ridiculous. A Ubuntu certification. Will every distro get it's own certification? I'm passing my LPIC this summer, which is distro neutral. This is what linux need, not a certification for every distro.

[az]

Ubuntu/linux/Canonical does not need to offer certification for desktop competency. What would be useful is a certificate attesting to the competency of being able to offer desktop migration training.

That means that someone can say "I can offer you my service to help your organization migrate to a different desktop environment."

[davahmet]

Oh please, this sounds ridiculous. A Ubuntu certification. Will every distro get it's own certification? I'm passing my LPIC this summer, which is distro neutral. This is what linux need, not a certification for every distro.

Exactly. There are already too many certifications, many of which are meaningless.

I wonder what certifications Linus Torvalds, Alan Cox, Andrew Morton or RMS hold.

[sbibayoff]

I'm very suprised development hasn't got more votes (I just voted for it), seems to me that Ubuntu has the chance to outshine the Red Hat/Novell crowd by not just saying someone can be qualified to install and setup Ubuntu, but that they've got a good enough grasp of the tools provided to enhance Ubuntu.

If you think about many large corporate rollouts they allways have their own apps and need help to produce those apps.

So vote for development, you know it makes sense :)

I voted for others, with this type of cert in mind. If you are going ot have cert's, you do need a server admin cert which proves(hopefully) that you could setup and install Ubuntu for most server needs.

But also, there's a need for a customization/development cert. Reason: There are many people/comapnies that want a customized version of Ubuntu, and they want the person to do the work onsite. I know this would cut into Canonical business, but I have done a lot of work(mostly redhat) that way for many clients that did NOT want to have this done through the distrubutor.


m2c

Steve Bibayoff

[akinwale]

I personally believe Server system administration and Desktop system administration would be the two major areas of certification.

[dewey]

Desktop administration is a must, and server is pretty good too. Although personally, for a work environment, I would prefer something along the lines of gentoo for a server.

[Mike Buksas]

I'm very suprised development hasn't got more votes (I just voted for it), seems to me that Ubuntu has the chance to outshine the Red Hat/Novell crowd by not just saying someone can be qualified to install and setup Ubuntu, but that they've got a good enough grasp of the tools provided to enhance Ubuntu.

If you think about many large corporate rollouts they allways have their own apps and need help to produce those apps.

So vote for development, you know it makes sense :)

I agree. It could also work as a way of recognizing people who do software QA and package management well enough to contribute packages for offical Ubuntu releases. Getting a certification could motivate people to attain this level of proficiency.

It's clear that Ubuntu has a very active and knowledgeable user base. Encouraging this to turn this into an active and knowledgeable developer base could reap huge benefits.

Mike

[keisashankara]

The implication of a Certification is that there will be a Ubuntu study guide or study materials? Sure there is the wiki and there are other tools present, but for a person studying for a cert you need an ordered block of knowledge that covers all bases for the user.

To my humble brain, The biggest Goal of Ubuntu is to become widely distributed and used (yea there are goals leading to that, but this is the main one). If people are trained in it then they will use it. Hence how about an Open Sourced study guide and training materials???

We get everyone trained up and then have a test at say $200 (AUS) that can be taken securely online. Or even have a person set up a server or desktop side system from scratch with device emulations, etc. Then once they are done the system submits to Ubuntu how well the user has set it up.

The reason why I am suggesting this is namely so that people who can't afford the training to go for a Suse or Redhat cert will go the Ubuntu Cert. Hence we market to a different group.

Ok Now feel free to flame me.

[netfighter]

Security was THE missing option in the poll. I think most companies would be interested in someone able to keep their Ubuntu desktops secure using the latest technologies available, such as PaX, SELinux, etc.

[savage]

Security is an important cert, but should be inclusive within Desktop Administration, Server Administration. On the certification materials security should be mentioned somewhere visible.

[Arthemys]

It very well could be just me but, with the MS Access cert I acquired last year, the test was so lame that it didn't even test me on one-tenth of what I was supposed to know. After actually getting a cheapo cert in the mail from MS, I've pretty much forgotten most of Access itself. (Thankfully)

I'm working towards my Server+ cert because my high school is going to be paying for it, so that's ok.

I gave up my CCNA because of time constraints but I have completed 50% of the training which actually does look good at this stage, and I believe I can return to CCNA if I really wanted to.

As well as technical certs, I'm certified in selling Novell products because of my company's partnership with them. You may be saying big deal because this thread is about Ubuntu certs; having a variety of certs makes you a jack of all trades and in some environments that's important, such as mine right now. To compliment the sales certs Novell has sent me many a tome on certify in the technical end of things.

I agree entirely with the distro. independant certification, given the nature of *nix, to me it feels more important to know the basics of everything rather than the complete in's and out's of one distro. Linux+ by CompTIA is one but I've never looked at the latest training material so I can't say much about it, though I do despise A+, as many of you probably know why. ;)

I guess I just straddle the fence on this one. I hate certifications, yet I find them important.

[Gowator]

I am completely against all 'branded certification'
If Ubuntu needs a different cert to other distro's then something is wrong.

(This is the prob with Novell certs)
Look at it this way...
I want to export a filesystem so I
go to YAST .... etc.

nope its ******** if I want to do that I edit/create /etc/exports and install portmap, nfs-kernel-server and nfs-common start them up and it works.

but it doesn't because someone has fsck'd about with the security?

this should be the same on ANY distro and any distro where it is not is not linux by my definition.

linux certs should be multi-distro not single distro for instance I wouldn't take a Novel certified person to work on a real linux distro because they know fsck without using YAST and Novell don't actually make a linux for real computers. (At least RH support IBM )
companies often have little choice over distro if SW suppliers will only support distro X or distro Y and engineeers should understand how it works, not how to use GUI tools for config because when they need to ssh into a SGI or IBM they will be lost.

[miltownkid]

I voted for the 2 desktop ones. I'm very new to the Linux thing, but what seems coolest about ubuntu isn't it's server/enterprise capabilities (which I know nothing about), but it's ability to totally replace Windows (as I type this on XP).

As much as us techies hate marketing and sales, it's what pays your bills (one way or another). Some time ago I went and got my A+, Network+ and MCSE certs (just because I could) and my pay went from 8US/hour to 14US/hour (almost) over night.

My old crusty NT Server 4.0 card still draws the ooooh and aaaahhhs from people when I show it to them (yeah, I like it).

You tell me what looks better to an end user. A company willing to switch you from Windows to *nix. Or a company willing to switch you from Windows to *nix with MCSE, A+, Network+, LPI, Ubuntu, RHCE, etc. certifications displayed on their site (OK, I know that would look a little silly, but you get the idea).

Every certification I got has been money well spent. I'll be getting a Linux and Security one next and if an Ubuntu one came out I'd get that one too. I plan on helping people move from Windows to Linux and having a piece of paper saying I'm certified to do so is only going to make things easier for me.

I've rambled :P

[Gowator]

I voted for the 2 desktop ones. I'm very new to the Linux thing, but what seems coolest about ubuntu isn't it's server/enterprise capabilities (which I know nothing about), but it's ability to totally replace Windows (as I type this on XP).

As much as us techies hate marketing and sales, it's what pays your bills (one way or another). Some time ago I went and got my A+, Network+ and MCSE certs (just because I could) and my pay went from 8US/hour to 14US/hour (almost) over night.

My old crusty NT Server 4.0 card still draws the ooooh and aaaahhhs from people when I show it to them (yeah, I like it).

You tell me what looks better to an end user. A company willing to switch you from Windows to *nix. Or a company willing to switch you from Windows to *nix with MCSE, A+, Network+, LPI, Ubuntu, RHCE, etc. certifications displayed on their site (OK, I know that would look a little silly, but you get the idea).

Every certification I got has been money well spent. I'll be getting a Linux and Security one next and if an Ubuntu one came out I'd get that one too. I plan on helping people move from Windows to Linux and having a piece of paper saying I'm certified to do so is only going to make things easier for me.

I've rambled :P

what would look better is a company with meaningful certs.
RHCE is as valueless as MSCE if you are running a Debian server!
What if you need to support other UNIX's too?

I would look at a scompany displaying those and think they are resellers of Windows and RH...
chuck Novell in too and you have a proprierty suport company.

Ubuntu certs are about as useless as anything else because they fsck the whole security model up so everything you have learned on other *nix doesn't apply.

[kadissie]

It all depends what your market is, and the Ubuntu/Canonical strategy.

If you want enterprise users to take you seriously in the server market, you firstly need server systems admin skills. Yes, these are fairly standard throughout Linux and yes, there are other certifications, but how can I trust Ubuntu if I can't be sure who to employ to run it?

If you want to get a foothold on the enterprise desktop before making the assault on the server mountain, certify desktop admin skills as well as basic user skills. So a company can run whatever file/email/intranet/service-X servers they want - Solaris, RH, Windows, Ubuntu - and have Ubuntu available for all users where Windows desktops used to sit.

I wasn't going to vote, but I think I've talked myself into the "Desktop admin" and "Desktop/Office user" certs.

Robert.

[manofsteel]

I think this is a great idea, only if Ubuntu is going to have a desktop and server edition available to companies. the release cycle would have to be a lot longer. But their right, to get ppl to notice you, you have to have a product ppl want, and ppl love and want Ubuntu. The reason why ppl use Novell, and RH is because they can hire ppl with the certs that know what their doing. If ppl had Ubuntu certs companies would say "Hey, look theres another alternative."

PS. Voted for the Desktop Admin, and the Server Admin.

[Arthemys]

I think this is a great idea, only if Ubuntu is going to have a desktop and server edition available to companies. the release cycle would have to be a lot longer. But their right, to get ppl to notice you, you have to have a product ppl want, and ppl love and want Ubuntu. The reason why ppl use Novell, and RH is because they can hire ppl with the certs that know what their doing. If ppl had Ubuntu certs companies would say "Hey, look theres another alternative."

PS. Voted for the Desktop Admin, and the Server Admin.

Being a Novell rep. I do have to say that's not the only reason people will use Novell or RH, another valid reason is that if there's a problem (kernel compile, application freeze up, etc...) You can pick up the phone, dial a number and get support from a call center vs. a forum.

I hate to admit it, but any large enterprise or corporation will never accept forums and user groups as a form of professional support.

[Gowator]

Being a Novell rep. I do have to say that's not the only reason people will use Novell or RH, another valid reason is that if there's a problem (kernel compile, application freeze up, etc...) You can pick up the phone, dial a number and get support from a call center vs. a forum.

I hate to admit it, but any large enterprise or corporation will never accept forums and user groups as a form of professional support.


True but who would choose a dsitro that only runs on the worst/cheapest architecture?
Although amd64 is much better why would anyone get a distro that doesn't work on all their computers? The advantage of RH is support for other architectures...

The main problems with Suse and the reason it is unsuitable for any large enterprise are YAST, YAST and YAST...

Running a mixed Suse/*nix or BSD environment is no better than a mixed Windows /*nix or BSD except for the advantages of running linux on the desktop... if it can't use vendor independent tools like Webmin, Cpanel because each file says (do not edit by hand...) then it means you need seperate support and admin for the desktops to the real computers.

If you send your sysads on a Suse course its useless if you later want to change to a more professional distro that supports multiarches because they only know how to use YAST, not set up the config's by hand or using webmin etc.

[stoneguy]

Can't really see Ubuntu in a corporate environment. They're the ones who pay attention to things like that. Arthemys is bang on about what corps want before they'll even consider a product.

Where I work, the hot ticket now is PMP. A decade ago, it was MBA. In time, organizations realize that the latest alphabet soup doesn't make the performer. At least until the next one starts hyping itself as the holy grail.

[arctic]

while i voted on the top three, certifications are somehow a no-no [-X for me in some respect.

while business partners would be interested in fast-to-get information on some persons abilities with a linux-system, the certifications do not always show the real capabilities of a linux-user.

some guys simply got the money to buy certifications and passed the tests but are less capable than others who didn't have the money for tests or the interest in a certification in exactly the same area of expertise. and what about e.g. persons like me, who develop other linux systems than ubuntu, suse/novell or redhat? are we somehow inferior? nope. some of us are more capable than many so called "experts" at the big companies. i think, persons like e.g. pat volkerding of slackware are more capable than 50% of the certified redhat-linux guys... but persons like him would falsely be identified as "noobs" without a "proper certification". laughable...

also... is a redhat-certification worth more than a novell one or an ubuntu one? how about a standard of certifications? every distro that does its own "soup" hurts the overall goal and ideals of linux imho.

another factor i do not like is that persons tend to get pushed into a corner where they do not belong to. and companys are probably even more unwilling to test people, to give them a real chance before declining employment. it is so easy in the business world to say: "sorry... no certification, no job, no matter how good you claim to be". :?:

[gratefulfrog]

I am writing as SW devt. manager in a larger international organisation where we build big & very specialized applications.

As such, I do not see Ubuntu or any linux distro coming onto the std. desktop. in our near future.

However, the devt. and excution platforms are completely open to improvements. And inded this is where we are exploring Linux solutions. Like most companies, we are currently on the Red-hat road, but this could change. What counts for us, in that respect is RELIABILITY and GENUINE expertise. We acnnot and do not accept staff who say things like, "try this and see if it helps". We expect "certified" staff to know the solution straight off the starting line.

The "other" part of the certification could be "high-availability" (clustering, etc.). somehting that lots of big organisations require.

Hope this helps!

[Arthemys]

It's unfortunate that so many vendors require you to run Windows based systems. I do know that for most banks, they're required to run Windows internally because the software they need to use (enforced by auditors) will only run on Windows.

Financial institutions originally came from Unix based systems and at the time, the cheapest most viable solution was Windows. (Note I did not say it was reliable) So at that point vendors started writing their software to run under Windows. Locking everyone into using Windows. So it's not entirely MS's fault for so many Windows boxen today, vendors are to blame too.

[pdk001]

i voted for Desktop and office software competency

[pkarlos_76]

True, but what is wrong with recognising the learning done and the skill level attained with certification?
After all MS have done it for years .

When can I start? \\:D/

[nkhansen]

Seeing as Ubuntu is a desktop environment, I voted for the Desktop Systems Administration and Desktop Software Competency. These would seem the logical choices for specific ubuntu certifications. If canonical would like to branch further and offer Server Administration, I think it should be a more general debian certification.

[reid]

what would look better is a company with meaningful certs.
RHCE is as valueless as MSCE if you are running a Debian server!
What if you need to support other UNIX's too?

I would look at a scompany displaying those and think they are resellers of Windows and RH...
chuck Novell in too and you have a proprierty suport company.

Ubuntu certs are about as useless as anything else because they fsck the whole security model up so everything you have learned on other *nix doesn't apply.
I think Ubuntu should throw it's weight behind the LPI (lpi.org (http://lpi.org) ) certifications. We need some unification, and a certification that attempts to be 'vendor neutral' like LPi's is a step towards a brighter linux future, IMHO.

[kvidell]

So..
Any updates on this?
- Kev

[npaladin2000]

I think a 2 level certification is the best idea; it's worked for Red Hat and Novell. The Ubuntu certified admin and certified engineer programs would also likely become the default cert for Debian, since there is NO existing cert program for Debian Linux.

[gray-squirrel]

Shouldn't desktop/office competency be a given?

I agree. Also, I assumed that if one can handle the server administration, they should be able to deal with the desktops without any problems, so I didn't select desktop administration in the poll.

It would be nice to see an equivalent to the MCSD certification, too.

[rabeldable]

Certification is generally a good thing for enterprise level software/hardware.

The problem with having a certification for ubuntu is that everything is so easy to use to begin with I couldn't see a requirement to be certified to use it, especially for servers. Note: servers should not include gnome or kde and if I want to login as root I should be able to. Requiring regular user accounts for seasoned admins make administration and automation a hassle. Server certification should entail how to setup a server WITHOUT the gui.

Also - In the certification task lists there should be a link to the ubuntu wiki that describes the section. For example, in the server certification task list there is a section for configuring kerberos. Immedietly underneath the section should be a link back to the wiki.ubuntu.com website to point the visitor to the proper documentation.


--
David