G. Matthew Rice wrote:
With the proposed renewed focus of the LPIC-1 certification as a Linux Professional certification (ie. move most of the "adminy" material to LPIC-2 and introduce more general topics to LPIC-1), this lets it (LPIC-1) become a base for other certification tracks that have previously gone undeveloped.
This may be a bit off-topic: Lately, I've noticed that the number of people who are seeking product-specific Linux training is increasing. By product-specific, I mean distribution-specific. For example, I get calls asking for SuSE 10 training and they won't accept a more generic Linux course. I think these people want to learn the graphical management tools of a particular distribution and are uninterested in the way it's done at the command line. How does this impact your plans?
There are numerous approaches that can be taken on this front including a DBA focused developer certification (maybe in conjunction with the PostgreSQL and MySQL people) as well as development methodologies, LAMP and system/kernel level programming topics.
I'm interested in DBA certification - especially real ACID databases like PostgreSQL. However, what do you test for? The PHP crowd just needs a simple data store with a basic SQL interface. These people don't use stored procedures, triggers, views, etc. It's why MySQL is popular. Then there's the crowd that wants to do most things in middleware - not in stored procedures. Like the PHP crowd, they also tend to use a basic SQL interface. The rest of us do take advantage of stored procedures, triggers, views, etc. Perhaps there needs to be two levels of DBA.
I'm purposely being vague on where the developer and dba tracks can go because I would like to hear other opinions first ;) The most contentious issue being raised is whether these developer/dba tracks should require the LPIC-1 or not. I contend that it should be a requirement because I have seen many examples of developers deploying solutions onto Linux systems and then leaving horrendous security holes in their wake because they didn't understand basic Linux/Unix concepts such as file permissions.
I think good DBAs needs to know the underlying details of the database and the OS platform it's running on. Without this knowledge, they'll be unable to troubleshoot some problems, secure the database, and improve performance in some cases.
One of the counter arguments to this idea is that it creates a barrier to entry for people that just want to prove that they have the developer skills.
Why do you care about this? It's up to their (future) employer what skills are needed. Unless you think that employers (or their HR departments) are incapable of making such a determination. :-) Ed Sawicki
Opinions? Regards,
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