VMware VCAP5-DCA (A 4 hours dream)

Late is the hour in which I have talked about my experience but I was waiting for my results and thankfully I did pass my VCAP5-DCA examination, let me share with you my experience and if possible I would shed light and confirm that which have been said earlier by others regarding this exam.

Experience:

I attended VMworld 2013 – Barcelona and I had a little spark pushing me towards doing the exam but I wasn’t 100% sure of it nor I had even prepared for it properly, but what happened? What was the sudden change? Well I was lucky enough to attend the VCAP-DCD and the VCDX bootcamps lead by John Arrasjid, Mustapha Khalil.

Having those sessions was a heart beating experience but my luck had a little push where in the VCAP-DCD boot-camp I was the sole attendee whom actually represents the audience the boot camp addresses _AND_ I was sitting in a room with more than 9 VCDX’s around me, surely I didn’t ask a lot of questions because I was literally assimilating knowledge from the whole room and each entity existing in it, actually I would call the medium a virtualization enriched air space yes these people can give you such an effect. From there after I got this shot of motivation I had the VCDX in mind and I was determined to submit to my defense next year at Barcelona.

So, I had my mind sent and I booked my exam on 17th (last day of VMworld) at 11:45AM and from there this was my status:

1. I had plenty of hands of experience since ESX 3.5.
2. I had already downloaded Jason Nash VCAP5-DCA training (Trainsignal before it was Pluralsight).
3. I had the The Unofficial Official VCAP5-DCA Study Guide which was REALLY helpful.
4. I had my trusty 16GB w/ SSD HDD workstation where I setup a new lab.
5. I had 3 nights of preparation (ditch sleeping, eat a lot of chocolate and be ready for a whooping cold water bath every 5 hours).
6. I went over the blue print to double check that the points covered in the above two resources were 100% covered.

That was for the preparation, on the other hand I went down to the education services booth where I meet  Jon Hall whom had setup a mock VCAP-DCA exam environment and I was lucky to do some try outs there, he generously allowed me to do a couople of labs which actually gave me a bit of a relief because I felt how the questions might be and I found a couple of  weak spots that I should brush up.

On 17th I went up the examination room, and I spent the sweetest technical hours and technical enthusiast can ever spend while doing an intense test. I was simply happy with the labs because they were challenging, I had 26 labs to accomplish and while doing each lab it was as if I was living a dream, because in my position at work I don’t get to deal with VMware projects all the time and the tasks are not always challenging but rather standard so the labs were just a portal to do all that which I thrive to do at customer sites.

Eventually the time passed and the exam finished without clicking the finish exam button ;-) so don’t expect to click it yourself because the people behind the exam have made sure that none should actually finish the exam in time.

Tips:

1. Michaels Webster’s exam experience was a good read.
2. Be technically well prepared, don’t take anything into granted and say to yourself that I know this and I know that, you should have hands on experience to where a task such as creating a cluster is something that you would do with eyes closed and only two fingers on the mouse (this will save you precious minutes).
3. Be confident that doing the exam is not a loss or a waste of time, if you fail it you will know your points of strength and weakness.
4. This has been ever said, but again I confirm it; do the things you know first and then go for the labs you don’t feel that they will be an easy task for you.
5. Make sure to read and reread the requirement, the tasks don’t always suggest advanced configuration skills but rather requires some logical thinking towards redeeming a problem that would occur at a customer’s site.
6. If you can do the exam at VMworld it would be just great not just in terms of money but in terms of the momentum you will get from just being at a technical and social intense event.

Finally I wish you all best of luck and hopefully I will be posting on VCAP5-DCD soon ^_^.

(Abdullah)^2