CKA exam environment just did not work

Kubernetes
#1

I scheduled the exam for 16th July 2023, 12 AM - 2 AM Indian Standard Time. The system delayed the exam launch for labor 20 minutes. The admission process took another 10 minutes.

After the proctor allowed me to launch the exam, I saw a help and assignment question on the left panel. A readme tab in the middle panel and a “chat with proctor” on the right panel.

  1. There was no terminal icon to launch. I contacted PSI (the exam conductor) tech. support and spent 20 minutes explaining the issue. Following their advice, I restored the Remote Desktop.
  2. I launched the Remote Desktop terminal, from the icon that now appeared at the bottom. Inside the terminal, the assignment gave me some technical “to do” instruction to set up my context.
  3. The README tab listed all the contexts available and how to get into each of them. None of those instructions worked! Without that, I could not complete even the first assignment!
  4. I asked for help again, the proctor came online and directed me to PSI tech support again. They shared my screen, discussed with me and asked me to continue. The proctor told me to contact the PSI tech. support number
  5. I got into a long session with the PSI tech. support person. She was quite friendly, but could not resolve these issues. This is not a PSI or browser problem, it’s an examination set up problem.
  6. Instructions like "please take a backup into /opt/backup/etcd-backup.db, use the existing certification files at /opt/KUxxx/cert., do not work, because these files and folders do not exist at all!
  7. Similarly “use this command to switch contexts” do not work. There are 8 contexts, as per the README. But there were no contexts at all!

Overall, I struggled for 60 minutes (out of 120) just with these issues, and then notified the proctor that I’d be ending the exam. Very frustrating experience, at many levels.

#2

Sorry you had a difficult experience taking the exam. Before you take it again, I’d definitely recommend making use of the killer.sh simulator, which will help familiarize you with some of the conventions of the exam. You’ll also have the experience from the first time you took it to prepare you for the retake.

I’m not a fan of the UI design of the PSI browser either, and for some of this stuff, it’s just having the experience of taking it.

#3

Thanks, I did that about 5-6 months ago. The setup at killer.sh works, though the expected pace is unbelievably strenuous. 25 questions in 120 minutes, and 2 extra questions as bonus. Coy/paste not allowed.
If the CKA exam structure is like this, what are they testing? Typing speed? Grep/sed/regex/cut/tr and pipe|filter skills? Would a normal k8s admin type 20 lines of correct yaml in 2 minutes at a time, for about 2 hours? I wonder what these certificates certify.

#4

These are reasonable questions to ask. Tests tend to be proxies for measuring how well you know a subject. And muscle memory and drill definitely affect your ability to pass this kind of exam. But it’s fair to say that if you don’t know the material very well, the format of this exam makes it pretty hard to pass.

#5

Typical bureaucratic resolution of my ticket. cover-my-ass

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