BSD Certification Group Publishes BSD Associate Exam Objectives

Last week the BSD Certification Group published its BSD Associate Exam Objectives (.pdf). The preface of the document explains its purpose:

"This document introduces the BSD Associate (BSDA) examination and describes in considerable detail the objectives covered by the exam. The exam covers material across all four major projects of BSD Unix - NetBSD, FreeBSD, OpenBSD and DragonFly BSD.

While the testing candidate is expected to know concepts and practical details from all four main projects, it is not necessary to know all the details of each one. A thorough reading of this document is recommended to understand which concepts and practical details are expected to be mastered.

Throughout this document, a clear distinction is placed on 'recognizing' and 'understanding', versus 'demonstrating' and 'performing'. Certain objectives call for the mere understanding of certain topics, while others call for the ability to demonstrate performance level knowledge of the topic...

Successful mastery of the BSDA examination will, in most cases, require study and practice. The requirements for the exam encompass more background in BSD than is common among casual users or those new to BSD. This is a deliberate decision by the BSD Certification Group- to encourage more cross learning among BSD systems so that breadth of understanding of BSD is as heavily tasked as depth of understanding. The result will be a more well-rounded BSD advocate and a more knowledgeable system administrator."

The objectives describe seven domains:

1. Installing and Upgrading the OS and Software


2. Securing the OS


3. Files, Filesystems, and Disks


4. Users and Accounts Management


5. Basic System Administration


6. Network Administration


7. Basic Unix Skills

Inside the document describes the audience for the certification:

"The BSDA certification is designed to be an entry-level certification on BSD Unix systems administration. Testing candidates with a general Unix background, but less than six months of work experience as a BSD systems administrator (or who wish to obtain employment as a BSD systems administrator) will benefit most from this certification."

Also:

"[T]he SDA certification is only valid for 5 years. Existing BSDAs who wish to maintain their certification will need to recertify every 5 years. Details on how to recertify will be publicly available in a document to be published in 2006."


I like this approach. I disagree that DragonFly BSD should be included, since something like 2% of all BSD administrators use DragonFly.

The guide is 57 pages long, so I will need time to read everything. At first glance it looks like great work.

Although I am still listed on the about us page, I have requested resignation as I have absolutely no time to work on the project while running TaoSecurity.