How I passed the Certified Kubernetes Administrator Exam
I took the Certified Kubernetes Administrator exam and happy to share I got an e-mail confirmation that I passed the test!
What is Kubernetes? You can read more about Kubernetes under this page.
The Certified Kubernetes Administrator (CKA) exam has a new format and the duration of the exam is now 2 hours with 17 questions. The new CKA general domains and their weights on the exam are outlined below:
Cluster Architecture, Installation & Configuration — 25%
Workloads & Scheduling — 15%
Services & Networking — 20%
Storage — 10%
Troubleshooting — 30%
CKA being a practical exam (not your typical Cloud Platform MCQ type of exam!), you will need significant experience working with clusters — setting up clusters, fixing clusters, and backing up clusters. If you want to know more about the certification, you can find more information about it under this page.
I would like to share tips and some resources I came across which I think can help if you are also preparing for CKA exam.
Preparation
With the limited time I had in preparing for this exam, the experience I have working with AWS EKS/Kubernetes Clusters and deployments really became valuable. Working on that Storage Class/Persistent Volume issue as well as the Cluster Role creation issue reported by one of our user last week helped me answer couple of questions in the exam. Nothing beats hands-on experience!
I recommend spinning up a cluster following Kubernetes The Hard Way. Although the clusters in the exam was deployed using Kubeadm, understanding how each Kubernetes component is installed and configured definitely gives you some advantage. Understanding how certificates works is a must.
Once you are comfortable with the above, follow the steps listed under Bootstrapping Kubernetes Clusters with kubeadm. Understanding and knowing how to upgrade a Kubernetes cluster will definitely give you those needed points in the exam.
Katacoda provides a playground and has several scenario based topics you can practice. Katacoda is great for study purposes, it’s free and there is no setup or maintenance involved. If you’re just getting started, this is a great resource to get comfortable with kubectl.
Kubernetes Doc and Kubectl cheatsheet definitely helps. But you need to know where exactly in the page or atleast what keyword you can use if you are trying to find a command. Switching between the exam console and trying to find a particular entry in that site could cost you some time. Remember, you only have 2 hours to finish the exam.
If you have the time to prepare for the exam, this CKA Udemy module definitely can help you understand basic and other advanced concepts. Be sure to do the the Lightning Labs and Mock exams.
During the exam, have your ID ready and your room prepared, no electronics or anything on your desk. The proctor I was assigned to had a hard time verifying my IDs. I had to use a glass with water (sort of magnifying glass) for them to verify me. I went online early so that didn’t really affected my exam schedule but who want’s to be in that situation when all you want was to focus on the exam :)
