Trying out two certification exams: CASA and Cloud+

2024-02-02 07:28:00

In 2020 I took the CV1-003 CompTIA Cloud+ beta. Back then I wasn't really impressed with the quality of the exam. Well, it's time for the next version!

A few weeks ago I took CV1-004 for $50, to see if it's better than last time. Yes, but no. 

The questions on the new beta were more diverse than last time. And I still like the exam objectives / curriculum. But in general, I wasn't a fan of the exam questions. I know CompTIA often has questions where you're not supposed to think from real-life experience, but this time around it's really pretty bad. Know that meme of grandma yelling "that's not how any of this works!". Well that was me. 

Especially the PBQs felt like CompTIA were struggling to come up with something that works. And if I have to see one more white-clouds-on-blue-sky stock photo I'll scream. 

Jill West, an instructor on CIN, wrote it pretty eloquently:

"That was a bizarre exam. Only one of the PBQs really seemed appropriate to the test [...] Some other questions seemed like someone was looking at the objectives to write their questions but didn't really understand the concepts; they just used several items from the objectives as "wrong" answers when those options really weren't congruent with each other [...]"

So yeah. If there's a student interested in learning about cloud computing, I would suggest the read the materials, but I wouldn't suggest they'd take the exam.

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After passing PDSO's CASP API security exam, I thought I'd look at some of their competition. I'm still going through APISec University's courses (which seem good), but I also gave their CASA exam a quick shot. 

In short: I will definitely recommend their training materials to students, but not the CASA. CASA is:

  1. 100 questions
  2. Open book
  3. Unproctored
  4. Untimed
  5. ... and it rings in at $125

Points 2, 3 and 4 unfortunately mean that, from an employer's point of view, the certification isn't worth much because there's no guarantee that whomever has it didn't cheat in some way. Basically my biggest critique of PDSO's exams as well (which has points 2 and 3, but not 4).

The questions on the test were well written, so that's something. They are a decent way for someone who's taken the APISecU classes to test themselves. And the potential employers will simply need to do better BS-testing in interviews. :) 


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