on 2008-04-23 17:25 Peter Sawczynec said the following:
I believe the most beneficial PHP+ cert that we can strive for would be more on par with a Cisco cert. An acknowledged, industry heavy weight,
Note that the lower-level Cisco certs (i.e. everything but the CCIE or its equivalent) now have a multitude of boot-camps available for them to push you through in a weekend, and therefore their value, both real and perceived, is slipping. It's been a while since I've studied the finer trivia of Cisco kit, but I'm confident I could muster a passing score all the way up to CCNP without studying for more than a weekend--a week, tops. Would you let me loose on your routers *only* knowing *that*? (The fact that I deal with Cisco kit in other ways on a daily basis notwithstanding...)
What makes the CCIE so valuable is that it contains both a written and a lab component, and the latter is damn *hard* -- it has a real failure rate in the double digits -- so that it's unlikely that you'll be able to pass it through book learning alone. That is to say: in order to pass it, you're most likely an experienced practitioner already.
I see a lot of talk about certifications, and I have to reiterate the question: why bother? In other words, what are you trying to accomplish? In order for it to really fulfill its mission, a certification basically needs to substantiate someone's years of experience and actual ability to perform: it's a *certification* that you can *do something* that isn't just your word for it, and it comes from an impartial third party (whoever they may be).
Of course, it matters a bit who the certifying authority is (which is why people value degrees from real colleges over mail-order degrees), but unless there is a statutory requirement for licensure and registration, the only value of the certification "in the marketplace" is what the holders are actually doing: if you've got a certificate that is, in a word, achievable in a week's intensive course, it's worthless except to paper collectors, and the market will value the certification accordingly.
difficult but well worth while cert. I believe that the cert should be advanced, sophisticated and relatively difficult -- the PHP+ cert should not be about qualifying entry-level initiates, it would be used for qualifying middle to expert level.
Peter has successfully compiled the correct here. I would take it further: the exam should be QUITE difficult, and dilettantes should NOT be able to pass it.
Make a certification more like the PE, where you must show verifiable years of experience (signed off by another in the field), and have a tough exam on top of that (and I'm not even counting the EIT), or more like the CCIE, with a very difficult pair of exams, *written and practical*, and then you'd have a certification that is worth bandying about--something that conveys the elusive "I should get paid more because I'm *demonstrably* worth it" message.
Oh yes, it should also need to be renewed every 7 years or so, not just to generate income for the certifying authority, but to demonstrate that you're still at the level you claim to be.
There could/should be a separate entry-level cert if needed.
Given the field of programming, I would suggest the "fog a mirror" certification. For $29.95, I'll provide you with a certificate suitable for framing. For $39.95, I'll even make it 3 color. (Latin available upon request, and only to Kristina.)
Peter
//jbaltz -- jerry b. altzman [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.jbaltz.com thank you for contributing to the heat death of the universe. _______________________________________________ New York PHP Community Talk Mailing List http://lists.nyphp.org/mailman/listinfo/talk NYPHPCon 2006 Presentations Online http://www.nyphpcon.com Show Your Participation in New York PHP http://www.nyphp.org/show_participation.php
