Linux Courses

Sirrel Squirrel

Sirrel Squirrel

Sirrel Squirrel

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Joined
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Can anyone recommend a good 3-4 day Linux course that covers the basics, file systems, kernel, bit of scripting and shell commands, networking, admin tasks and security?

Tailored towards SUSE or Red Hat would be ideal.

Budget of around £3k a seat.

Cheers
 
Cool thanks for that, I was also looking at Firebrand who do an intensive 6 day course that gives you LPIC-1 and CLA Certification, just a bit concerned that the 6 days might be a bit too intense.
 
LPIC-1 isn't to bad, in fact with that time and budget you could do the intensive RHCSA (or even RHCE) course but all of these really require you to have a reasonable existing knowledge of Linux (particularly the Red Hat courses as without it you will fail the exams). (I used to be LPIC-1 certified, it's expired now, and am currently RHCE (RHEL6) certified).

Red Hat do System Admin I and II courses which are the normal per-requisites for doing the basic RHCSA exam (along with 6-12 months hands on experience).
 
Thanks, need to cover SUSE and Red Hat really but I guess what you learn on a Red Hat course can mostly be carried over to SUSE anyway.

The Red Hat courses do sound pretty comprehensive though so I'll look into those, can you recommend anywhere that offers the courses?
 
Last one I did (which was the RHCE intensive course) was booked direct with Red Hat ... it was actually run (by Red Hat instructors) at QA in London (nr Bank). My Colleague did the Cluster course with them last year and that was held at their office at Baker Street.
 
I'm working on RHCSA at the moment from self-study books. If you really need a course to be vendor neutral then I would suggest doing Linux+ because you also get LPIC certification and Novell Certified Linux Administrator certification from choosing this route which is applicable to your SUSE requirement. I completed this earlier this year, it's a good course to take if you are just starting out on your Linux journey, otherwise I would suggest RHCSA if you have the budget for the course and some background knowledge already.
 
I did my RHCSA and RHCE in 3 weeks in India the price of the course including flights, accomodation and meals was about £3k. One to one tuition and was a bit of a holiday too but well worth it. I trained with koenig my company paid for me to go as it was hell of a lot cheaper than doing it in the UK.
 
Sirrel Squirrel said:
Don't think I'll be able to swing a trip to India somehow!

Red Hat sounds like the way to go though, I'll have a look at a few accelerated courses that offer RHCSA/RHCE.
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Think you may be surprised price up a course in the UK then price the India one that's what swung it for my boss as the difference in cost is massive.

Depending on your linux experience accelerated courses can be a good or a bad thing. RHCE is 3 books each of around 100+pages iirc and the exams are practical not multiple choice. Doing an accelerated course may seem a good idea but failing the exams is far too easy if you try and do too much too quickly.

there is a very good study guide called RHCSA/RHCE Red Hat Linux Certification Study Guide (Exams EX200 & EX300), 6th Edition by Michael Jang well worth a look.
 
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I looked up the prices for Koenig and they are very reasonable, I just don't think me and a colleague can get out of work for that long!

The Sys Admin I followed by II inc the exam sounds like a good route to go.
 
I've been to the Red Hat offices in Farnborough, excellent courses, much better than any M$ courses I've been on. Plus it's right next to the Farnborough airport so at lunch there's a great view out of the window.

Depending on your experience, you could go for either:

Red Hat Linux Essentials (if it still exists)
or
RHCSA

The RHCSA/RHCE certifications are good for 2 major releases, so if you get one now you'll still be certified for the lifetime of RHEL7.
 
Yep, I purposely delayed my taking of the RHCE for six months as I was originally scheduled to take it shortly before the release of RHEL6 which didn't make any sense.

I would point out to the OP that the intensive RHCSA and RHCE courses where you do it all in a week and then do the exam(s) on the Friday are really meant to be revision courses for the most part. They are ok if there are a few bits you are not sure about, because you don't use them, but you do really know most of the content already (and be happy with it in a practical environment) or you are just likely to fail the exams.

(When I did it I would say most, but not all, of the people on the RHCE probably passed but the majority of the RHCSA course probably failed as they just didn't have the knowledge and experience needed).
 
as people have said most of the red hat exam stuff is 100% transferrable with the exception of a few things like kickstart, if memory serves the exam alone is about £600 compared to the £3k for the course+exam and since the course is really just a light refresher if your confident in your knowledge you can probably save yourself 2.4 grand.

*source - i recently became an rhcsa, still prefer debian personally though :)
 
I see the Red Hat qualifications being mentioned here, but my advise would be to avoid those, and stick to vendor neutral qualifications so you have some assurance that your staff are capable administrators of any Linux platform. We see declining use of Red Hat in favour of alternative (lower support cost) options, which (to be honest) devalues the candidates with solely RH centric qualifications. Just my £0.02 view
 
the large majority of the RH exams is generic stuff though and applies equally well to ubuntu or SLED etc, if someone can pass there RHCE or RHCSA they can definitely administer at least another RPM based system, having said that though, the other options like LPIC are perfectly valid too
 
mr_stat said:
I see the Red Hat qualifications being mentioned here, but my advise would be to avoid those, and stick to vendor neutral qualifications so you have some assurance that your staff are capable administrators of any Linux platform. We see declining use of Red Hat in favour of alternative (lower support cost) options, which (to be honest) devalues the candidates with solely RH centric qualifications. Just my £0.02 view
Click to expand...

Can see the point you are trying to make but from my experience that is definetly not the case. The red hat exams prove you have the skills to do the job rather than prove you can remember the answer to a bunch of multiple choice questions. I have an RHCE and some of my work is red hat based however a lot of it isnt but the RHCE shows an employer that I have achieved a measurable level of competency in Linux administration.

Some of the other Linux qualifications are not as easily recognised as the RHCE and I have no issue securing new contracts with my qualifications in fact it seems to make it a lot easier.

I can't see how having an RHCE would discourage an employer and to be fair I think after completing mine with the benefit of the experience I have I think I could do any other Linux cert standing on my head. :)
 
Thanks for all the advice, I'm currently looking at this course;

http://www.qa.com/training-courses/technical-it-training/linux/essentials-of-linux-administration/

It's aimed towards LPIC-1&2 and seems to cover quite a lot over the 5 days.

The powers that be think it might be a bit too intensive but I think it's certainly do-able and matches the skill level of those that will be going on the course.

Given the variety of systems at my workplace I don't think the Red Hat specific route is such a good idea now, I think it'd look better for our staff to have a non-specific Linux qualification.
 
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