7 steps to becoming a Certified OpenStack Administrator

The Certified OpenStack Administrator Exam prepares students for the upcoming Newton version of the exam on Ubuntu 16.04. The exam currently tests on Liberty but will be upgraded to Newton in May 2017.

My new book “Preparing for the Certified OpenStack Administrator Exam” will be out in July 2017 on Packt Publishing.

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Here is an excerpt from the first chapter:

Benefits of passing the exam

Ask anyone about getting started in the IT world and they may suggest looking into industry-recognized technical certifications. IT certifications measure competency in a number of areas and are a great way to open doors to opportunities. While they certainly should not be the only determining factor in the hiring process, achieving them can be a measure of your competence and commitment to facing challenges.

If you pass…

Upon completion of a passing grade, you will receive your certificate. Laminate, frame or pin it to your home office wall or work cubicle! It’s proof that you have met all the requirements to become an official OpenStack Administrator. The certification is valid for three years from the pass date so don’t forget to renew!

In addition to the certification, a COA badge will appear next to your name in the OpenStack Foundation Member Directory.

Note:

The OpenStack Foundation has put together a great tool for helping employers verify the validity of COA certifications. Check out the Certified OpenStack Administrator Verification Tool.

Seven steps to becoming a certified OpenStack administrator

Let’s begin by walking through some steps to become a Certified OpenStack Administrator.

Study

Practice. Practice. Practice. Use this book and the included OpenStack All-in-One Virtual Appliance as a resource as you begin your Certified OpenStack Administrator journey. If you still find yourself struggling with the concepts and objectives in this book, you can always refer to the Official OpenStack Documentation or even seek out a live training class at the OpenStack Training Marketplace.

Purchase

Once you’re ready to conquer the exam, head to the Official Certified OpenStack Administrator Homepage and click on Get Started. After signing in, you will be directed to checkout to purchase your exam. The OpenStack Foundation accepts all major credit cards and as of April 2017, costs $300.00 USD but is subject to change so keep an eye out on the website. You can also get a FREE retake within 12 months of the original exam purchase date if you do not pass on the first attempt.

Note:

To encourage students to get their feet wet, the OpenStack Foundation is offering the exam for $150.00 (50 percent off the retail price) with a valid student ID. Check out https://www.openstack.org/coa/student/ for more info.

COA portal page

Once your order is processed, you will receive an email with access to the COA Portal. Think of the portal as your personal COA website where you can download your exam receipt and keep track of your certification efforts. Once you take the exam, you can come back to the COA Portal to check your exam status, exam score, and even download certificates and badges for displaying on business cards or websites!

Hardware compatibility check

The COA exam can be taken from your personal laptop or desktop but you must ensure that your system meets the exam’s minimum system requirements. A link on the COA Portal page will present you with the Compatibility Check Tool which will run a series of tests to ensure you meet the requirements. It will also assist you in downloading a Chrome plugin for taking the exam. At this time, you must use the Chrome or Chromium browser and have access to reliable internet, a webcam, and microphone. Here is a current list of requirements:

Identification

You must be at least 18 years old and have proper identification to take the exam!Any of the following pieces of identification are acceptable:

Passport
Government-issued driver’s license or permit
National identity card
State or province-issued identity card
Schedule the Exam

I recommend scheduling your exam a few months ahead of time to give yourself a realistic goal. Click on the Schedule Exam link on the COA portal to be directed and automatically logged into the Exam Proctor Partner website. Once logged into the site, type OpenStack Foundation in the search box and select the COA exam. You will then choose from available dates and times. The latest possible exam date you can schedule will be 30 days out from the current date. Once you have scheduled it, you can cancel or reschedule up to 24 hours before the start time of the exam.

Take the Exam

Your day has arrived! You’ve used this book and have practiced day and night to master all of the covered objectives. It’s finally time to take the exam. One of the most important factors determining your success on the exam is the location. You cannot be in a crowded place: no coffee shops, work desks, or football games. The testing location policy is very strict, so please consider taking the exam from home or perhaps a private room in the office. Log into the COA Portal 15 minutes before your scheduled exam time. You should now see a “Take Exam” link which will connect to the Exam Proctor Partner website so you can connect to the testing environment. Once in the exam environment, an Exam Proctor chat window will appear and assist you with starting your exam. You must allow sharing of your entire operating system screen (this includes all applications), webcam, and microphone. It’s time to begin! You have two-and-a-half hours to complete all exam objectives.

About the Exam Environment

The exam expects its test-takers to be proficient in interacting with OpenStack via the Horizon dashboard and command-line interface. Here is a visual representation of the exam console as outlined in the COA Candidate Handbook:The exam console is embedded into the browser. It’s composed of two primary parts: The Content Panel and the Dashboard/Terminal Panel. The Content Panel is the section that displays the exam timer and objectives. As per the COA Handbook, exam objectives can only be navigated linearly. You can use the next and back button to move to each objective. The Dashboard/Terminal Panel gives you full access to an OpenStack environment. Chapter 2 of this book will assist you with getting your practice OpenStack environment environment up and running so you can work through all the objectives.

Note: The exam console terminal is embedded in a browser and you cannot SCP (secure copy) to it from your local system. Within the terminal environment, you are permitted to install a multiplexor such as screen, tmux, or byobu if you think these will assist you but are not necessary for successful completion of all objectives.You are not permitted to browse websites, email, or notes during the exam but you are free to access the Official OpenStack Documentation. This can be a major waste of time on the exam and shouldn’t be necessary after working through the exam objectives in this book. You can also easily copy and paste from the objective window into the Horizon dashboard or terminal.If you struggle with a question, move on! Hit the next button and try the next objective. You can always come back and tackle it before time is up.The exam is scored automatically within 24 hours and you should receive the results via email within 72 hours after exam completion. At this time, the results will be made available on the COA Portal. Please review the Professional Code of Conduct on the OpenStack Foundation Certification Handbook.

Exam Objectives

Let’s take a look at the objectives for the exam. As of March 2017, these are all the exam objectives published on the Official COA website. These objectives will test your competence and proficiency in the domains listed below. These domains cover multiple core OpenStack services as well as general OpenStack troubleshooting. Together, all of these domains make up 100 percent of the exam. Note: Because some of the objectives on the official COA Requirements list overlap, this book utilizes its own strategy to ensure you can fulfill all objectives within all content areas.

Getting To know OpenStack – 3 percent – Chapter 1

Understand the components that make up the cloud
Use the OpenStack API/CLI

Keystone – Identity management – 12 percent – Chapter 3

Manage Keystone catalogue services and endpoints
Manage/Create domains, groups, projects, users, and roles
Create roles for the environment
Manage the identity service
Verify operation of the Identity service

Glance – Image management – 10 percent – Chapter 4

Deploy a new image to an OpenStack instance
Manage image types and backends
Manage images (e.g. add, update, remove)
Verify operation of the Image Service

Nova – Compute – 15 percent – Chapter 5

Manage flavors
Manage compute instance actions (e.g. launch, shutdown, terminate)
Manage Nova user keypairs
Launch a new instance
Shutdown an Instance
Terminate Instance
Configure an Instance with a Floating IP address
Manage project security group rules
Assign security group to Instance
Assign floating IP address to Instance
Detach floating IP address from Instance
Manage Nova host consoles (rdp, spice, tty)
Access an Instance using a keypair
Manage instance snapshots
Manage Nova compute servers
Manage quotas
Get Nova stats (hosts, services, tenants
Verify operation of the Compute service

Neutron – Networking – 16 percent – Chapter 6

Manage network resources (e.g., routers, subnets)
Create external networks
Create project networks
Create project routers
Manage network services for a virtual environment
Manage project security group rules
Manage quotas
Verify operation of network service
Manage network interfaces on compute instances
Troubleshoot network issues for a tenant network (enter namespace, run tcpdump, etc)

Cinder – Block Storage – 10 percent – Chapter 7

Manage volume
Create volume group for block storage
Create a new Block Storage Volume and mount it to a Nova Instance
Manage quotas
Manage volumes quotas
Manage volumes backups
Backup and restore volumes
Manage volume snapshots (e.g, take, list, recover)
Verify that block storage can perform snapshotting function
Snapshot volume
Manage volumes encryption
Set up storage pools
Monitor reserve capacity of block storage devices
Analyze discrepancies in reported volume sizes

Swift – Object Storage – 10 percent – Chapter 8

Manage access to object storage
Manage expiring objects
Manage storage policies
Monitor space available for object store
Verify operation of Object Storage
Manage permissions on a container in object storage

Heat – Orchestration – 8 percent – Chapter 9

Launch a stack using a Heat/Orchestration template (e.g., storage, network, and compute
Use Heat/Orchestration CLI and Dashboard
Verify Heat/Orchestration stack is working
Verify operation of Heat/Orchestration
Create a Heat/Orchestration template that matches a specific scenario
Update a stack
Obtain detailed information about a stack

Horizon – Dashboard – 3 percent – Chapters 3 through 9

Verify operation of the Dashboard

Troubleshooting – 13 percent – Chapter 10

Analyze log files
Backup the database(s) used by an OpenStack instance
Centralize and analyze logs (e.g.,/var/log/COMPONENT_NAME, Database Server, Messaging Server, Web Server, syslog)
Analyze database servers
Analyze Host/Guest OS and Instance status
Analyze messaging servers
Analyze metadata servers
Analyze network status (physical & virtual)
Analyze storage status (local, block & object)
Manage OpenStack Services
Diagnose service incidents
Digest OpenStack environment (Controller, Compute, Storage and Network nodes)
Direct logging files through centralized logging system
Backup and restore an OpenStack instance
Troubleshoot network performance