Linux Professional Institute and BSD Certification Group Join Efforts

Partnership Expands Certification Offerings for Open Source Professionals 

 

The Linux Professional Institute (LPI), the world's largest certification organization for Linux and open source professionals, and the BSD Certification Group (BSDCG), the organization which sets the certification standard for BSD system administrators, have announced the merging of BSDCG with LPI. The partnership includes the creation of a BSD Advisory Committee which will work with LPI and the BSD community.

“The new partnership is mutually beneficial,“ said LPI Executive Director G. Matthew Rice, “LPI will better fulfill its mission of advocating for the use of all free and open source systems“. According to BSDCG President Dru Lavigne, "BSD Unix use is growing rapidly and globally with BSD professionals involved in every industry. Joining efforts with LPI will help us scale our exam delivery while maintaining the quality of the certification program."

One of the first tasks of the merger is the 2018 launch of the next version of the BSDA certification exam which matches the requirements of the Open Technology certification track. Current BSDA certificants will continue to be recognized and will have the option, upon request, to have their exam credentials hosted on the LPI Candidate portal.

More information about the partnership is available through our media contact, marketing@lpi.org. To join the BSD Advisory Committee, contact Dru at dlavigne@lpi.org.

About Linux Professional Institute (LPI)

For 20 years, LPI is the global certification standard and career support organization for open source professionals. With more than 500,000 exams delivered, it's the world’s first and largest vendor-neutral Linux and open source certification body. LPI has certified professionals in over 180 countries, delivers exams in 9 languages, and has over 400 training partners.

About BSD Certification Group (BSDCG)

Founded in 2005, the BSD Certification Group (BSDCG) is a non-profit organization committed to creating and maintaining a global certification standard for system administration on BSD-based operating systems. The BSDCG works with the BSD and sysadmin communities in order to provide a practical and relevant certification.

Creating the BSDCG Study DVD

It's almost time for the semi-annual slugfest - no, not the eXtreme Games.   It's time to get the next edition of the BSDA Study DVD out the door.  This release will feature DragonFly BSD 4.6, FreeBSD 11.0, NetBSD 7.0.1, and OpenBSD 6.0.  All four BSDs are hammered onto one DVD along with the El Toro boot loader by Oliver Fromme.  If you've been to the BSDCG website, you've probably seen the "Store" tab where we advertise the DVD for sale.  It's a good value and we try to keep it current with the most recent versions of each of the projects.

One of the more challenging parts in producing the DVD is to decide on when to  create the next one.  The projects all have their own schedules and each has it's own cycle time - the time it takes for the project to get all the way from one release to the next.  OpenBSD has taken the approach that they will produce two releases a year with published dates in advance.  The other projects just collect a bunch of updates until they are ready to roll a production quality release.  Both approaches have their merits, which we don't need to sweat about here.  It's usually the case that the best time to produce our next DVD is soon after the latest OpenBSD release.  But sometimes we'll wait a month or two for another project that is just about to pop a new release.

The mechanics of our production follow this simple process:

1. Get the latest binaries from a BSD project and install on a test machine.
2. Get the source code for the release.
3. Find the places in the boot loaders and the install programs where changes have to be made to use the El Toro boot manager and make the changes.
4. Build the source all the way through a release (make release or similar).
5. Copy the .iso file generated in the previous step over to a staging machine.
6. Build a draft DVD .iso file with the El Toro boot loader and test the installation of the the BSD project.  Virtual machines are quite handy for this install step.
7. Repeat steps 1 - 6 for  the other BSDs.
8. Copy extra packages, ports, and documents to the DVD staging area.
9. Build release candidate DVD .isos and test, test, test.
10. Update the release notes for the DVD, get new packaging ready, and finally...
11. Announce the release of the next BSDCG study DVD.  We upload it to our delivery server and also make physical copies so you can get it either way.

 For sure, there are difficulties getting all four BSD projects wedged onto the same DVD.  I've recently written about the headaches in getting OpenBSD to boot from the DVD, but there are other difficulties too:  we can no longer produce 32 bit versions for all projects (DFly does not support 32 bit in their recent releases); we can't get all the packages and source for all the projects on the disc (that would be way over the 4G limit for the DVD);  there's not enough room for all BSDs to have their own desktop suite, though we do provide a minimum X windows environment for FreeBSD.  There are other quirks as well.

Still, it's a rewarding feeling to get the latest projects out the door every time.  I just hope you enjoy using them.  If you do, send us a note to chair@bsdcertification.org and tell us.

BSD Professional Lab Exam Beta Debuts at BSDCan 2014 in Ottawa, Ontario, CA

The Beta version of the BSD Professional Lab Exam will debut at BSDCan 2014 in Ottawa, Ontario, CA.  Based on the BSD Professional Exam Objectives document, the exam is designed to test hands-on skills for senior system administrators with at least three years experience on BSD systems.

The 3 1/2 hour exam will feature the ability to choose your own BSD version to use for the exam and will feature DragonFly BSD 3.6.1, FreeBSD 9.2, NetBSD 6.1.2, and OpenBSD 5.4 in virtual machines managed by Aqemu.  All workstations will feature US ASCII keyboard layout on HP 8540p laptops with 8GB RAM and a customized boot disk.  The exam workstation will load a customized PC-BSD distribution with separate icons for Aqemu instances of the BSD systems mentioned above.  A 1/2 hour orientation to the workstation and Aqemu environments will precede the exam.

Hope to see you at the BSDP Lab Exam Beta kickoff in Ottawa, Sunday, May 18 from 10am - 2pm.   You can register and pay at the BSDCG registration website.

Note:
The BSD Certification Group has partnered with Vernon Technologies for computer rentals for this exam.  Visit their website to view additional information about the exam workstation specifications, or other services that they offer - http://www.vernontech.ca

Update on the BSD Professional Lab Exam

Work has progressed steadily on the BSD Professional Lab Exam.  You may recall we've discussed this before.  Well, the exam is almost ready.  We have an exam booklet, which is based on the BSDP Exam Objectives.  We also have a working exam station with several virtual machines.  The scoring procedure makes use of  Net::OpenSSH with scripts to examine each virtual machine for results. 

And, we have a sample provisional report (based on TAP::Formatter::HTML) that can provide some hopefully gratifying instant feedback, though that report is unofficial.


For our official score report, we are again working with our psychometrician, Dr. Sandra Dolan, to provide valid psychometric scoring.  This ensures our program maintains its high standards and also keeps us in line with requirements for ANSI 17024 accreditation.

We will have a demo available at vBSDCon coming up Oct 25-27, 2013.






We will also have the demo available at LISA 2013.





If you are at either of these cons, stop by for a test drive to see what the BSDP Lab Exam is all about.

Get a Life with BSD

Tired of high prices for server software?  Don't like paying for bloated desktop versions loaded with crippleware and nagware?  Sick of mismatched libraries and applications?  Do you want your own software to do with as you please - not subject to some EULA?

Get BSD and get on with your life.  Server software from FreeBSD, DragonFly BSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD, along with desktop software from PC-BSD can simplify your life.  Install it the way you want, and it works out of the box.  Plus, you can do whatever you want to do with it for as long as you want.

For server software, here's an easy way to get started - the latest BSDCG MultiBSD DVD.  For a modest sum you get:

• DragonFly BSD 3.4.2 - includes the HAMMER filesystem
• FreeBSD 9.1 - production ready, serving millions
• NetBSD 6.1 - highly portable, clean code often used in embedded systems.
• OpenBSD 5.3 - where secure code is  Job 1

All are production quality systems ready to help you get on with your life.  Order your copy today at http://www.bsdcertification.org/store and support the BSD Certification Group.

Updates, Updates, Updates

The BSD Associate exam will again be available at BSDCan this year.  The exam will be held at 12:30 - 2:00pm both Friday, May 17th, and Saturday, May 18th, 2013.  You can register for the exam at https://register.bsdcertification.org/  and you can pay at the conference or online through the website.

The exam objectives are at http://www.bsdcertification.org/certification/CertReqBSDA2012.pdf.

We'll have updated brochures with dates and times for other locations this year at the conference.  Stop by and pick one up, or let us know and we'll email you a PDF you can print and distribute yourself.

Know of an employer who uses BSD?  Having competent people can make a significant difference at any organization.  The BSDA exam can provide the employer the assurance that their employees know their stuff.  Email chair@bsdcertification.org and let us know!

Finally, stay tuned for the next edition of the BSDA Study DVD.  The upcoming edition (in development right now) will have FreeBSD 9.1, OpenBSD 5.3, DragonFly BSD 3.4.1, and if released on time, NetBSD 6.1, all on a single DVD with a customized El Torito Boot Loader so you can boot them all.

New Winter/Spring 2012 BSDA DVD Now Available

The latest BSD Certification Group Study DVD is now available.  This version includes DragonFlyBSD 2.10.1, FreeBSD 8.2 with QEMU and AQEMU, NetBSD 5.1, and OpenBSD 5.0.  The handy DVD includes the El Torito boot loader included so you can boot and install any of these BSD operating systems.

Purchase of the DVD supports the BSD Certification Group and our mission to provide high quality, affordable certifications for BSD system administrators.  You can order the DVD though our website at www.bsdcertification.org.

This version of the DVD also  includes an information sheet about the DVD, additional software, and documentation on the DVD.

New Computer Based BSDA Exam

Announced in April on the BSD Certification Group website, the BSD Associate (BSDA) exam is now available at Schroeder Measurement Technologies (SMT) test delivery centers. The partnership took several months to complete, and it brings together the strength of the exam creation effort of the BSDCG, and the global delivery capability of SMT.  This makes it much easier to take the exam since there are over 300 testing centers across 19 countries.

You'll still need a BSDCG ID which you can get here.

Good luck on your test and tell us what you think of the exam by sending email to chair AT bsdcertification dot org or joining us on the #bsdcert IRC channel on freenode.net.

BSD Professional Certification Requirements Published

It's out the door!  After over 200 hours of work and 15 drafts, the BSD Professional Certification objectives document is now available.  Released just in time for your end of summer reading pleasure, the document contains the official exam objectives for 11 knowledge domains, and contains 140 separate objectives.

Officially called the "BSD Professional Certification  Requirements" the document discusses more than just exam objectives.  It describes the methodology used to create the objectives, information on the importance and frequency of each talk and practical details for study.  The exam will consist of both a written test and a hands-on lab exam, so the objectives document also identifies which tasks are likely to be present on the lab exam as well.

The BSDP exam aims to be the standard of excellence for system administration exams.  Achieving a BSDP certification demonstrates that you have what it takes to get the job done from the get go.  Read the announcement, and download a copy of the objectives today.   Give it a read and let us know what you think on the mailing list.

Thanks to all the contributors, reviewers, editors, and our graphic  artist for helping to get the document finished. 

BSD Professional Certification Exam Objectives Wiki Now Available

Thanks to the efforts of Jeremy Reed, one of the members of the BSD Certification Group, there is now a wiki page to help create the exam objectives for the BSD Professional Certification Exam.

The exam objectives describe the knowledge domains that will be part of the exam. The list of domains came from the BSDP Job Task Analysis Survey we completed a few months ago (see previous blog posts).

The are 11 knowledge domains and approximately 180 topics. The domains are as follows:

1. INSTALLATION and SETUP
2. SECURITY
3. FILESYSTEMS and FILES
4. USERS
5. GENERAL ADMINISTRATION
6. COMMON SERVICES
7. GENERAL NETWORKING
8. BACKUP and RESTORE
9. VIRTUALIZATION
10. LOGGING and MONITORING
11. HIGH AVAILABILITY HIGH PERFORMANCE

You can web to http://bsdwiki.reedmedia.net/wiki/BSDP.html and and see progress on the objectives or create an account and login to help us write some of them yourself.

The objectives form the core of the exam material. Each of the domains listed above has several topic areas that need a 'Concept' paragraph, some 'Practical' elements such as man page references, and a time estimate. Here's an example:

Configure a log server according to a set of specifications.

Importance: 3.9, Frequency: 1.9

Concept:

Syslogd (sometimes known as newsyslogd) is capable of separating log facilities and
log levels into separate output channels. BSDP candidates must be able to configure
syslog to output, forward, or operate on log information according to a detailed
specification for log levels and facilities, and required actions.

Practical:

syslog(8), syslog.conf(5), logger(1)

Estimated Time:

15 minutes to set up a solution

Notice the 'Estimated Time' block. This is intended to help candidates prepare for the hands-on lab portion of the exam. Candidates should be able to perform the objective within the time limit (or less) to ensure that they will have sufficient time to complete the hands-on lab.

Please join us! We're looking for BSD admins, users, developers, and anyone who is familiar with BSD systems to help us get the exam objectives done. Send an email to info at bsdcertification.org or pop into #bsdcert on freenode to get an 'Account Creation Password' for the wiki. Then read through the guidelines and give it a go.

More on the BSD Professional Exam

BSDCan, the premier BSD conference held annually in Canada hosted a talk on the BSD Professional (BSDP) exam  given by yours truly at this years conference.  The talk discussed how the BSD Certification Group is currently creating the BSDP exam including the written form and a "hands-on lab".  If you couldn't make it to Ottawa this year you can still hear the talk and see the slides.  Many of the talks were videotaped.  The BSDP talk can be found at
http://www.fosslc.org/drupal/content/consideration-bsd-professional-exam.

Of particular interest are the lab requirements- 11 in all- that will form the basis for selecting the eventual lab design from the many ideas described throughout the talks.  If you are only interested in the discussion about the lab itself, you can fast forward to about 35:50.  That section presents an example lab and describes the types of things that the candidate would have to perform in the hands-on portion of the exam.

The actual lab tasks are drawn from today's news- a disaster has hit Example Corporation, and your boss Mr. Big, wants you to get things working again, using new 3 new BSD systems.

There are specific requirements for filesystem layouts, network connectivity, and DNS. A description of an example lab virtual environment is also shown.

Be sure to check out the live demonstration after the talk.  The demonstration, though different from what is described in the talk, shows how four virtual machines can be set up in a high  availability firewall environment, using two OpenBSD guest virtual machines, a DragonFly guest system, and a FreeBSD guest system. In the demo, the DFly and FreeBSD hosts  (external and internal hosts respectively) exchange data seamlessly through the  OpenBSD CARP and pfsync interfaces, just as they would in a real world physical environment.

Even more news about the BSD Professional Exam is coming up, including how you can contribute.  Stay tuned!

BSDP Job Task Analysis Survey Results

Development of the BSD Professional Certification Exam is officially underway. A Job Task Analysis (JTA) survey for the exam was held in October and November of 2009. The results have been collated and the report titled "BSD Professional Certification Job Task Analysis Survey Results" is now available at http://www.bsdcertification.org/downloads/BSDP_JTA_Report.pdf.

The 93 page report details how the BSD community evaluated the exam knowledge domains and specific items in each domain. Each item was rated for its "Importance" and "Frequency" for a typical senior level BSD system administrator. The results will help determine the items that will be a part of the BSDP exam.

As with the previous JTA for the BSDA exam, the comments make a very interesting part of the survey report. Some were very vocal about specific topics such as installation and security. It was actually refreshing to see how much interest there is in the BSD Professional exam. Check it out for yourself!

Blooper Reel

Just like those movie reels where you see funny mistakes or gags that occur when the actors mess things up in filming the movie, the BSDCG got to see a blooper of our own recently.

After receiving his exam results, one of the examinees noticed that the scores listed on the exam results PDF file seemed a bit odd. He contacted us through the website and mentioned that he thought the results were incorrect. Turns out- he was right.


The figure above is from the incorrect exam results PDF that was sent out to our sharp eyed exam candidate. The figure shows, from left to right, the Knowledge Domains on the exam, the candidate score for each Knowledge Domain, and the Group Minimum, Average, and Maximum sub scores for each Domain. The "Group" scores represent the scores for all recent attendees for the exam. It shows the Group Minimum score, and the Average and Maximum scores.

Notice anything unusual? Check the Group Maximum score for "Basic System Administration". It's listed at "17%". Now ask yourself- "Is it really true that the highest score for Basic System Administration could really be just 17%??" especially for an exam that is over one year old?

Turns out- it wasn't. Below are the corrected scores for the same candidate.

As you can see, the Group scores (Minimum, Average, and Maximum) appear closer to what you would expect in the real world. That "17%" for a Group Maximum regarding "Basic System Administration" is really "92%"- reflecting the fact that the group scores are significantly better than what was previously posted.

So.... what went wrong??


Like many system failures, this one was more than just a single mistake. One factor was that we've recently instituted a new exam "form" (separate set of test questions) and our exam scorer decided to roll the results into a new file. However, it's not just one file that has to get updated- there are several files and we missed one.

At the same time, our reviewer who mails out the exam PDFs (uh, that's me) didn't carefully review this set. Actually, I did notice that the scores were strange, but assumed it was the result of the form change.

Once we were alerted to the issue, we rechecked and corrected the procedures we use and reran the exam scoring for everyone who took that set of exams. It turns out that the Pass/Fail status for the exams were not affected- just the individual and Group scores.

For us, this highlights again how important community involvement and feedback is to the success of the exam. In this case, we found the mistake and corrected it immediately. And I'm sure glad we did. It brings the importance of reviews back into focus. You can bet we will all be reviewing all exams in the future much more carefully!

New Video- "BSD Certification Group: A Case Study in Open Source Certification"

Dru Lavigne, Chair of the BSD Certification Group, gives an informative talk about the creation of the Open Source certification system for BSD operating systems. This talk covers the BSD Associate (BSDA) and BSD Professional (BSDP) certifications and describes how they were developed. It presents the value of psychometrics and the process of creating a psychometrically valid exam including

• Job Task Analysis - Determining which skills are frequently used and how important they are
  
• Exam requirements - Determining what should be covered on the exam
  
• SME Question Development - Creating and validating test questions
  
• Beta Period - Creating and distributing a limited version of the new exam
  
• Angoff Session - Determining the final pass/fail score for the exam
  
• Final Launch- Getting the exam out the door
  

The talk also discusses other goals of creating Open Source exams- affordability, local availability, the encouragement of local study groups, commercial training materials, Open Source Testing Centers, and more. Finally, it shows many ways you can help improve BSD Certification and Open Source exams.

The video takes about 35 minutes and is available here, or you can just click on the image below.

Thanks to Patrick McEvoy and the fine folks at Manhattan Neighborhood Network for putting this professional video together, and the Internet Archive website for hosting.

Enjoy!

BSD Professional Job Task Analysis Survey

The first step in getting the BSD Professional exam underway is the Job Task Analysis (JTA) Survey. What is a JTA? It's an online survey where you can help define what skills are important for a BSD systems administrator at the "Professional" level.

The survey presents a collection of tasks organized into Knowledge Domains. Each task includes two rankings- one for Importance and the other for Frequency. These rankings are used in Psychometric Analysis to identify the key skills that should be tested on the exam.

The survey takes about 20 minutes to complete and contains several opportunities for you to express your thoughts on the selection or description of tasks for each Knowledge Domain. Your comments are very important, as they help form the direction and style of the exam.

The survey will be provided in other languages besides English as soon as our translation teams get finished. We hope to have the survey available for 30 days in each language.

As soon as the survey is complete, we'll start compiling the results.

One of the questions asked is about whether the BSD Professional exam should be just a multiple choice exam, just a hands-on lab, or both. We are very interested in your opinion on this issue. There are those who say certifications are useless. But if you can really assess skills, like you can with a hands-on lab exam, this makes the certification verifiable, and provides real value to potential employers.

Let us know what you think. Give the BSDP JTA Survey a go and express yourself.

Update on the BSDA Exam

The BSD Associate Exam is now over a year old! Here are some interesting stats so far:

• 12 Events in all of 2008; 14 events in just the first half of 2009
• Over 1000 people have registered for a BSDCG ID (needed to register for an exam)
• The exam has been held in US, Brazil, Canada, Germany, Japan, France, Denmark, Ukraine, Netherlands, Argentina, and the UK
• So far, 66 people have passed the BSDA exam and received their certificates
  

As of April, 2009, there are 6 exam locations coming up: Canada, Germany, Argentina, UK, Netherlands.

If you know of an upcoming conference near you, let us know (send email to www AT bsdcertification.org) and we'll get in contact with the conference organizers to see if they will provide a time and place for the BSDA exam. We'll bring the pencils, you bring the know-how.

In Other News...

We're in the process of reviewing the exam for the next version. Our psychometrician, Dr. Sandra Dolan, has provided us with a report of the exam results for the first year. BSD subject matter experts, drawn from the BSD community have helped modify some the the questions to increase the accuracy of the exam.

The Winter 2008 DVD is out. This edition includes the QEMU virtualization software (and the AQEMU front end) that enables working with multiple BSD systems at the same time. Additional information on using the software is here [bsdwiki.reedmedia.net]. Purchasing a DVD is an excellent way to prepare for the exam, helps fund the exam development effort, and helps keep the cost of the exam globally affordable (still just $75USD).

Planning for the BSD Professional Exam (BSDP) is underway. We will start with a Job Task Analysis (JTA) survey similar to the JTA we produced for the BSDA exam. The BSDP JTA should be ready in a month or two, and we will announce the survey through all our regular media channels. Stay tuned for the next level.

BSD Associate Certification Adv. in BSD Magazine

If you are in your local Barnes and Noble or Borders book store, you might see a copy of a new magazine devoted to all things BSD- BSD Magazine.

Published by the same folks who put out Hakin9, an excellent magazine devoted to information security, the new BSD Magazine has several cutting edge articles about BSD. Some articles in the current issue include:

• Pushing BSD as an open source desktop...
• PC-BSD overview...
• Sguil 0.7.0 on FreeBSD 7.0...
• How to Dual-Boot Vista with BSD – a step-by-step approach...
• Keep smiling, waste spammers' time...
• OpenBSD pf – the firewall on fire...
• Instant Messaging with Jabber/XMPP...

and more. The issue includes a DVD containing FreeBSD 7.0, documentation, and some extra applications.


And if you happen to look closely, you'll see the very first advertisement for the BSD Certification Group. The ad is for the recently released BSD Associate certification.

Special thanks go to the fine folks at iXsystems who helped developed the professional quality graphics and layout. That's their logo in the lower right corner.

We hope to have more advertisements in BSD Magazine in the future.


The BSDA certification is gathering steam. We've presented the exam at conferences in Los Angeles, Ottawa, Krakow, Brussels, Toronto, Berlin, Ede, and Chemnitz. So far, over 400 people have registered for a BSDCG ID, which you need to do before you register for an exam. Some of the comments we've received from the exam said it was "harder than I thought it would be" and it "made you think". Be sure to read the Exam Objectives, currently available in English, Mexican Spanish, and Russian.

If you would like to see the exam at a conference near you contact us, and we'll try to arrange for an exam at that conference.

Certificates, Seals, and More BSDA News

The certificates are back from the printer, and they look good! They have a blue border with dark blue and black printing on a heavy, light grey card stock. The seals are embossed gold foil and are applied separately. The seals look very sharp. The actual certificate doesn't have the dark brown border, but it is positioned so you can use a nice frame for your wall or desk. The whole thing looks very attractive.

We've held the BSD Associate Exam at three conferences so far- SCALE, FOSDEM, and Linux-Tage Chemnitzer with over a dozen candidates. All the exams haven't been scored yet, but they should be finished in a few days. Those sharp enough to pass will get one of these certificates as soon as we can send them out.

The next conferences to host the BSDA exam are Flourish (Chicago, IL, April 4-5, 2008), IT360 (Toronto, Ontario, Apr 09, 2008), NLUUG (Ede, The Netherlands, May 15, 2008), and CONFidence (Krakow, Poland, May 15, 2008).

See the list of upcoming conferences, and register for a BSD Associate exam at https://register.bsdcertification.org//register/events. Cost of the exam is $75 USD (or half that if you took the beta exam). More conferences are being added all the time, so check back frequently to see if there is a conference near you. If not- let us know! Select the Info subject through the "Contact Us" page at http://submit.bsdcertification.org/contact.

Remember, you have to obtain a BSDCG ID before you register for an exam. The BSDCG ID is free, and we keep your ID information private. It is not shared with anyone.

As always, more information on the BSD Certification Group and the BSDA exam is found at www.bsdcertification.org.

BSDA Exam Launched!

The BSD Certification Group launched the first BSD Associate Exam at the Southern California Linux Expo (SCALE) conference held in Los Angeles, Ca. , last weekend. As it was, there was not enough time to promote the first exam, so the number of candidates was limited.

The next BSDA Exam will be held at FOSDEM in Brussels, Belgium, on Saturday, Feb 23, and Sunday, Feb 24. Seating is limited, and you must pre-register. We already have over 30 registrations for FOSDEM. Also coming up is Linux-Tage Chemnitzer(link in German) in Chemnitz, Germany in March, 2008. All exams are paper based and are in English. Cost is only $75 (or half that if you participated in the beta exam.)


So, we're underway with the first exam! Sign up for a BSDCG ID and get to a conference near you to take the BSD Associate Exam.

Get Involved. Get Certified. Get Ahead.

BSDA Certification Moves Forward

Last weekend, members of the BSD Certification Group met in New York to finalize some standards for the BSD Associate exam. The exam is now in its final form- all that is needed is to select the actual 100 questions to be used in the first version. Our psychometrician, Dr. Sandra Dolan, is pleased with the progress so far. We will have a psychometricaly sound exam, that will provide a solid basis for determining the skill level of all candidates.

And the latest news: we now have two slots for the exam at SCALE- the Southern California Linux Expo. A big "Thank You!" to the folks at SCALE for allowing us to hold the exam during their conference. This is our inaugural exam, and we are looking forward to it!

Several other conferences have generously allowed us to hold exams. See the list, and register for an exam at https://register.bsdcertification.org//register/get-a-bsdcg-id

Thanks to all our supporters and friends for getting us to this point!