CKAD Part 3: Tips

If you like to view the video version of this blog post, you can click on the video.

Exam Registration

Use only Chrome browser to check exam requirements to be able to access all peripherals including webcam (I used MS Edge and it was giving the test is ok although the webcam test was not performed!!!).

Desk / Computer Setup

1. If using a laptop, add a new screen but disable the laptop screen monitor (Link to disable main laptop screen on Windows).
2. Make sure the laptop is fully charged and plugged.
3. I prefer to use a wired USB keyboard, and mouse, and avoid wireless devices, as you never know the behavior of the new terminal and browser.
4. Please make sure to have an external good-quality webcam with an autofocus feature, you will be asked to scan the room, under the table, under the keyboard, under the laptop, or behind the monitor, it is better to have movable webcam. Autofocus is required as you will need to scan your id/passport with a clear name displayed. I used Logitech C922.
5. Make sure the room is well-lit as normally webcam needs good lighting.
6. You will need to disable the following features/applications (Other software might be listed by the browser before you begin your exam session):

a. Hyper-V

b. VMware

c. Docker

d. Zoom

Exam tips

1. Open the following help pages to be ready:

Direct Link	Kubernetes documentation navigation
Command line tool (kubectl)	Doc -> Reference -> Command Line tool
Kubectl commands with examples	Doc -> Reference -> Command Line tool -> kubectl Commands
kubectl Cheat Sheet	Doc -> Reference -> Command Line tool -> kubectl Cheat sheet
API doc in one page	Doc -> Reference -> One-Page API Reference for Kubernetes

2. Make sure to run the context command before answering the question, you should find a red warning on every question with the correct cluster.
3. Make sure to use the correct namespace while answering the question, after answering, please verify the creation in the correct namespace.
4. Read the question carefully, some can be tricky to understand.
5. Partial scoring is supported. The Linux Foundation will calculate a score based on successful subtasks. Also, they will consider if some subtasks are harder than others.
6. Edit ~/.vimrc to include either the following:

Short form	Long form
:set ai cuc cul	:set autoindent cursorcolumn cusrsorline

7. Execute the following command to create 20 folders:
mkdir `seq 20`
8. Every time you want to copy text from Firefox into Terminal it shows a warning “Unsafe Paste”. You can just confirm this. You can also disable this in the Terminal Preferences -> General -> Show unsafe paste dialog.

Time management tips

1. Use imperative commands as much as possible to get things done quickly, you can add using dry generate the output to yaml file as initial step then you edit the yaml file answering the question requirements:
kubectl run nginx --image=nginx --labels="app=hazelcast,env=prod" --dry-run=client –o yaml > pod.yaml
2. Try to use short names (ns, pv, pvc, cm, cj, hpa, as, svc, quota, deploy) as much as possible.
3. Don’t wait for a graceful deletion of objects.
kubectl delete pod nginx --force
4. Consider using replace instead of deleting and then creation or apply. 
kubectl replace --force -f pod.yaml
5. Use the following command to search for fields/specs quickly:
kubectl explain pod.spec --recursive | grep -i -B 30 serviceaccount
6. My strategy in solving question was to solve easy quick questions first to gain as much as I can quickly as I know some topics will require more time to solve or troubleshooting, so I decided to skip and mark quetions of these topics for review later as usually require lengthy changes or validation: Network Policy, Ingress, Custom Resource Definition (CRD).

I hope this post will help someone out there, see you soon, bye.