My experience with Certified Kubernetes Application Developer Exam (CKAD)

In order to better understand Kubernetes it is important that one understands the following terms :

• Images
• Containers

In order the understand the terms above. Its better to learn Docker. I have subscribed to Pluralsight and Linux Academy and the following courses did help me a lot to get a basic understanding of microservices.

On Pluralsight : 

• Containerizing Angular Applications with Docker (by Dan Wahlin)
• Docker Deep Dive (by Nigel Poulton)

On Linux Academy :

• Docker Certified Associate (DCA)
• Certified Kubernetes Application Developer (CKAD)

For Kubernetes I strongly recommend the course by Mumshad Mannambeth on Udemy :

Kubernetes Certified Application Developer (CKAD) with Tests

With this course I strongly recommend doing the labs on Linux Academy and KodeKloud

The following links will help with the practice tests :

• Practice enough with tests tests for the CKAD exam
• GIT Gists
• CKAD PREP Guide Review
• CKAD Notes

I prepared for 2 months. Unfortunately I failed in the first attempt because of the following mistakes :

• Coming from a windows background I didn't get my hands well with Linux.
• I spent too much time on questions with less marks
• Make sure you switch the context correctly for every question as mentioned in the exam
• I installed minikube on windows machine and practiced a bit with it.
• I didn't practice the implicit commands much (These are the real time savers)

Some learnings from my mistakes :

• I installed Ubuntu with dual boot (Windows) on my machine and setup minikube on Ubuntu
• I learned important Linux commands like grep, nc, uname etc. Also SSH into nodes is important and then exiting it coming back up to the original node.
• Kodekloud Lighning labs are very important and really helps
• I learned implicit commands to make the pods, deployments, services in one go
• kubectl explain commands are really helpful
• Time management is the key. Don't waste time if you are stuck at one point for more than 5 minutes. You can flag it and visit it again the next time once you finish other questions

I appeared again for the exam in 2 weeks and this time I cleared it well :).