Passed the VCAP5-DCD tonight

C

Child of Wonder

2[H]4U
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Holy shit that was a brutal test. Almost 4 hours of multiple answer and Visio style design scenarios.

Definitely harder than the DCA.

Time to plant my ass on the couch and crack open a bottle of wine with my wife. :D
 
Child of Wonder said:
Holy shit that was a brutal test. Almost 4 hours of multiple answer and Visio style design scenarios.

Definitely harder than the DCA.

Time to plant my ass on the couch and crack open a bottle of wine with my wife. :D
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The DCD sucked the same in 5 as it did with 4, the difference is they made the scoring much more difficult this time around. A major congrats is in order sir.

I sat the DCA tonight, seemed pretty easy in comparison.. Granted, I don't have my score but there was an hour to spare and plenty of time to even read PDF's to teach myself a few new things :)
 
itrsteve said:
The DCD sucked the same in 5 as it did with 4, the difference is they made the scoring much more difficult this time around. A major congrats is in order sir.

I sat the DCA tonight, seemed pretty easy in comparison.. Granted, I don't have my score but there was an hour to spare and plenty of time to even read PDF's to teach myself a few new things :)
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Yes, the DCA seems relatively easy by comparison. The time limit and slow lab connection is really what ups the difficulty with it.

Now the big question is what do I do with these certs? :D
 
Child of Wonder said:
Now the big question is what do I do with these certs? :D
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Are you going to press on for your VCDX?

(I know without a doubt I passed my DCA, I had almost an hour to spare), Having the opportunity now to finally shoot for the VCDX kept me up for a bit last night. I think it would be stupid not to try, but looking at the list I know that I'm not on that level with some of those guys right now. I mean you have all of the authors, bloggers, VMware technical marketing guys/architects, guys that tweet instead of sleep. Not sure if I'm in those ranks.

But on the same note, do you want to wait another product cycle to have to do all of this crap all over again?

Curious what you think since we're technically in the same boat right now.

I've been pushing that they give the VCAP-DV, VCAP-Cloud, VCAP-DT titles to the people that knock out all of the vcap's in that respective stack, it'll at least clear up some signature blocks :)
 
itrsteve said:
Are you going to press on for your VCDX?

(I know without a doubt I passed my DCA, I had almost an hour to spare), Having the opportunity now to finally shoot for the VCDX kept me up for a bit last night. I think it would be stupid not to try, but looking at the list I know that I'm not on that level with some of those guys right now. I mean you have all of the authors, bloggers, VMware technical marketing guys/architects, guys that tweet instead of sleep. Not sure if I'm in those ranks.

But on the same note, do you want to wait another product cycle to have to do all of this crap all over again?

Curious what you think since we're technically in the same boat right now.

I've been pushing that they give the VCAP-DV, VCAP-Cloud, VCAP-DT titles to the people that knock out all of the vcap's in that respective stack, it'll at least clear up some signature blocks :)
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I know how you feel. I have difficulty considering myself "VCDX worthy." One of my local co-workers is a VCDX and he's available to assist in that pursuit. In fact, we're going to PEX together so I plan on picking his brain as much as possible.

Going for the VCDX seems like a no-brainer to me as well. However, I'm trying to keep it all in perspective and I may take a swing at it VMWorld 2013. If I don't get it, I'll try again PEX 2014. It really depends on how much exposure I get with VMware projects though. I also implement EMC storage and Cisco UCS servers so I get sucked into those projects quite often. Plus, it seems a lot of the "big" enterprise level VMware projects are worked by our VCDX and I'm left with the single datacenter, single cluster, no frills SMB stuff.

Part of the reason I got the VCAPs was a wake up call to my superiors "hey, I'm not too shabby with this VMware stuff so get me involved on the enterprise level projects." If they don't do that, I guess I'll have to see what my options are.

I'm not too keen on keeping up with all these VMware certs, however. One of the reasons the VCDX is appealing is that I'll only need to take the VCP and DCD every major product cycle to keep up with my VCDX rather than taking the VCP, DCA, and DCD (no point bothering with the DCA once I have the VCDX). :)
 
Child of Wonder said:
I know how you feel. I have difficulty considering myself "VCDX worthy." One of my local co-workers is a VCDX and he's available to assist in that pursuit. In fact, we're going to PEX together so I plan on picking his brain as much as possible.

Going for the VCDX seems like a no-brainer to me as well. However, I'm trying to keep it all in perspective and I may take a swing at it VMWorld 2013. If I don't get it, I'll try again PEX 2014. It really depends on how much exposure I get with VMware projects though. I also implement EMC storage and Cisco UCS servers so I get sucked into those projects quite often. Plus, it seems a lot of the "big" enterprise level VMware projects are worked by our VCDX and I'm left with the single datacenter, single cluster, no frills SMB stuff.

Part of the reason I got the VCAPs was a wake up call to my superiors "hey, I'm not too shabby with this VMware stuff so get me involved on the enterprise level projects." If they don't do that, I guess I'll have to see what my options are.

I'm not too keen on keeping up with all these VMware certs, however. One of the reasons the VCDX is appealing is that I'll only need to take the VCP and DCD every major product cycle to keep up with my VCDX rather than taking the VCP, DCA, and DCD (no point bothering with the DCA once I have the VCDX). :)
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The thought of even having to take the DCD again makes me vomit. I actually had fun with the DCA.

My main problem is that I can't submit a design defense on the project that I've been tasked to work on for the past 1.5 years, it's a series of 200+ identical SMB-sized datacenters so it's not at that enterprise scale. I was thinking about going "fictitious" and submitting one from my previous job. It would be nice to sit down a do a design for a customer in real life with the VCDX handbook right next to you, maybe put in a little more work than normal and double down the efforts.

I know the VCDX isn't a "stepping stone" but more of a validation for the best of the best, but it would be stupid to make it this far and not at least try.

Over the break I may sit down and watch the past few vBrownBag VCDX bootcamp videos and see if I can get motivated.
 
Grats. I wish I wasn't broke on so I could grab dca. I need to catch up on my Exchange certs, and server 2012.
 
Child of Wonder said:
I'd really like to know approximately how many DCAs and DCDs there are plus how many have both.
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I somebody recently posted about contacted EduOps for the exact DCD5 count and it was in the low 300's.

Would also love to know the DCA+DCD stats.
 
Congrats. I go and sit for my VCP5-DV between 1-15 and 2-15-2013.(yet to schedule it. I just need to get through the holidays)
 
Nice job man! Those tests are no joke....that was the path I was taking until I was pushed to the Cisco Data Center track by the job...but..hopefully next year i'll have time...
 
Thanks guys. Getting these two certifications was a goal of mine since I started consulting and it wasn't until June this year that I finally blocked out the time to study and take the tests.
 
Just got my DCA score report.... Now we're in that same boat. Middle ground children wondering if they should put on their big boy pants or not.
 
itrsteve said:
I know the VCDX isn't a "stepping stone" but more of a validation for the best of the best, but it would be stupid to make it this far and not at least try.

Over the break I may sit down and watch the past few vBrownBag VCDX bootcamp videos and see if I can get motivated.
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It's a major investment to even try the VCDX. It's far, far more than the VCAP exams. That's the problem. The real work on the VCDX is on the front-end...on building your design and documentation set to submit to get approved for the defense. The defense is the least time consuming, though most stressful.

And...congrats on the DCD passes! And if you guys are going to be at PEX let me know. Registered today and booking my travel tomorrow.
 
NetJunkie said:
It's a major investment to even try the VCDX. It's far, far more than the VCAP exams. That's the problem. The real work on the VCDX is on the front-end...on building your design and documentation set to submit to get approved for the defense. The defense is the least time consuming, though most stressful.

And...congrats on the DCD passes! And if you guys are going to be at PEX let me know. Registered today and booking my travel tomorrow.
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No question, that's why I'm hesitant to even get started. There's a reason it's held to a certain few. The internal debate stems around if I'm going to give two craps to do the VCAP stuff again on the next vSphere cycle ($10 says that I'm not). That's the only thing that's pushing me to try.

No PEX for me.
 
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