RHCE Certification: Am I Current?

With Red Hat releasing thier next server upgrade, one question that RHCE are asking themselves is "Am I current?" Red Hat does offer a site where one can find out.

A point to remember is that all RHCE's earned on Red Hat Linux 7.3 or prior are in teh process of needed to be upgraded due to the release of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4.0 this month.

Red Hat is offering a special offer for those who need to upgrade themselves. Red Hat phases out the lifespan of those certified to ensure they are current on the most recent release of their products. If I remember right Red Hat has been keeping to a 15 month time frame for their server upgrades.

Linux is in business

Network World Fusion has an article which covers some of the reasons why corporations are moving toward including Linux in their operations. I think the first reason (the need for shops using smaller servers to find an alternative operating system to what is offered by Microsoft) will start picking up more steam as Windows tries to move people from older systems to something newer. Obviously Microsoft is looking for someone to move towards their product, but what corporations are looking at are the uncertainties they've had in the past with Microsoft products and comparing those to their experiences or rumors of experiences with Linux. Linux has been able to maintain a quality name for itself for several years and that is one area where corporations respect.

I still think there will be a huge push to include Linux on the network layer for corporations and possibly onto the desktop. The one stumbling area for Linux's move to the desktop is the individual user who might be reluctant to migrate themselves and anyone else they work with away from Microsoft. As a general rule people don't like to learn new things, like to work with what they've got.

It will be interesting to see where these different drivers push Linux in the future.

Why you should train your staff

Alan McKinnon has another good article on why companies should be looking to train their staff for technologies and skills which will be needed. One thing I do believe is that if most people are left to their own choices they will rely on seniority and time in a job for future career progression, rather than rely on improving their skill sets and positioning themselves for a proper job promotion.

I like his closing comment "Trained, knowledgeable people can control their jobs and deliver value. Untrained people cannot do this."

Linux desktops have internal role at Cisco

LinuxWorld has an article which discusses why Cisco is moving towards Linux on the desktop. The mainfactor which is pushing towards using Linux on the desktop is the ease of administration. Linux comes with the built-in tools to help in remote administration. These tools allow a Linux administrator to support between 200 and 400 desktops, whereas a Windows administrator is limited to about 40 desktops.

A very interesting article which hints towards a corporate move towards Linux for the larger corporations when they have to chose between Windows and something else for an upgrade. Something to make people go hmmmm!!!

redhat.com | Training Specials

redhat.com | Training SpecialsHey Look at what Red Hat is offering for anyone who is purchasing Red Hat training material.

Sometimes it helps when I click on my own Ads by Google ;)

LPI Certification Exams Top 75,000 Worldwide

LPI - LPI News talks about the increasing popularity of the LPI exam. I have talkd about this before where LPI will be battling it out with CompTIA in offering Linux certification. Included in their story is a second story where LPI will team up IDG World Expo to offer Linux certification exams at all LinuxWorld expos.

I've said it before this is a great time to be involved with Linux and things will only get better as the economy improves, companies upgrade their system from older Windows systems and the right people are available to help operate those systems.

Fewer pink slips for techies

CNET News.comhas an article about how there are fewer pink slips being handed out in the IT industry.

I can personally attest to this due to the fact that since about a week ago I am currently working what is essentially two jobs. I was offered more money from one company and the second company didn't want to lose me. So I worked out a schedule where I can work both jobs. Fortunately for me they are about 12 min apart. & that makes the drive to and from easy with an early morning commute and a late evening commute.

To add to this I found out earlier today that my new company will be looking to expand later this year. They have more contracts which are opening up and they will need more IT technicians.

LPI Study guides

LPI Study GuidesMichel Bisson is in the process of posting his LPI study guide. Michel is a Linux instructor over in Germany. Some of these documents are in German and others are in English. I've heard from tome people that these are an excellent resource to use to prepare for the LPI exams.

He also makes his information available in a downloadable format, a /sxw format, and a .pdf format.

Tectonic -- Choosing the right Linux certification

Choosing the right Linux certification Alan McKinnon has published his third article on Linux certification. In it he compares the LPI and Red Hat exams. One of his conclusions is that if you can pass the LPI exams then you should be able to pass the Red Hat exams.

He ends his article with a recap of the test numbers; Red Hat has delivered 36,000 exams and LPI has delivered 70,000 exams. It will be interesting to see where things go during the next couple of years with these two products combined with teh other Linux certifications that are out there.

Free Certification Testing at LinuxWorld Expo, Boston: Linux Professional Institute

Free Certification Testing at LinuxWorld Expo, Boston: Linux Professional InstituteLPI will be offering free Linux certification tests for delegates and a reduce priced test for everyone else. If you happen to be in Boston between Feb 14th and the 17th, stop by Toom 205 before 1 PM and ask them about the exams.

LPI will be growning in popularity this year as Linux takes off within the US. It will be interesting to see how far people will go to appreciate LPI's role in certifying people with a vendor neutral certification.

Tech employment slips in January | CNET News.com

Tech employment slips in January After adding 57,300 jobs since Dec '03 only having a 300 job decline is more like holding steady that any real decline.

As the article also points out, there might be some areas within the IT sector which are being left behind. That always happens; everyone never sees the same growth that everyone else sees. The points to be aware of are which skills are in demand and which skills will there be a continue demand for.

Some of the skills which are in high demand is networking skills, along with Linux skills. There is a move to improve the network structure within America and the need for networking skills will be strong for several years to come. The need for Linux skills will be moderated by the fact that unix workers will be migrating from a Unix system over to Linux. The thing to remember though will be the demand for Linux skills will increase more than what this migration can fill.

Overall I think the next several years will be very exciting for anyone who is seriously involved in the IT environmnet. Much better than a couple yuears ago where companies where looking for someone with 5 years experience with Oracle to accept a Jr. Oracle DBA position.

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UPDATE

Linux Pipeline has picked up on this story and goes into the numbers a little bit more than what the CNET article did. I think it will still be interesting to see where the IT industry goes from here.

One point for anyone who might be struggling and wondering if they should stay in the IT industry: For those who stayed with the IT industry from the late 80's to the early 90's were rewarded very well with high paying jobs or with a respected position within the company they were with. The key to preparing yourself for the next big boom time in the IT industry is to expand your skill base and look for what technologies & skills companies will be looking for in the next ten years. Also think about what services you might be able to offer as either side jobs or as starting your own company.

We have Audio!!!!

Links: Kevinux tips

Wow audio!!! I know I can only put up audio clips in 5 min pieces. Maybe in the future I can look at including a fuller podcast with visual tools also. There shouldn't be anyreason not to include either a flash clip or a powerpoint clip to add to the experience.

Linux Pipeline | IT Salary Survey

Seems Like Old Times Following on the heals of yesterday's Hudson Highland Groups survey which looked at how good IT workers feel about their jobs and where they currently are in corporate America. Dice, Inc has their Salary Survey for last year.

In it Dice reports that the average salary for tech professionals actualy fell last year by 2.6%. The pay for Unix experienced professionals' was at $75,000 on a nation-wide scale. At the lower end of the scale for PC technicians and Help Desk technicians pay fell by 10.4% and 9.5%. I can personally attest to this fact in the Chicago area. Pay for Help Desk positions fell what felt like 15%. To add to that though there does seem to be a rebound for Help Desk pay in certain sectors. Telecommunication companies seem to pay above average and pharamaceutical companies seem to be offering above average pay. It will be interesting to see if the rest of the area follows suit later this year as the economy improves.

One of the differences to remember between the Hudson Highland survey and the Dice survey is that the Hudson Highland survey is a monthly survey and Dice is a annual survey. Although I think either people refer to the Dice survey throughout the first part of the year or they might publish new results every 6 months. I remember a similar survey from Dice last year.

Either way as the economy improves over the next couple of years it will be interesting to see which areas imporves faster.

IT worker confidence holds steady | CNET News.com

IT worker confidence holds steady. The Hudson Highland Group has published their monthly index for the Information Technology sector.

It looks like the job market for the IT industry has been improving in several ways including the job security that IT workers feel with their current positions, their personal finances, and any concerns IT workers may feel over outsourcing.

I personally think the trend to outsource to overseas locations is a trend which is past its prime. If there is to be any other outsourcing it will be within the US. An example is McDonald's outsourcing their drive through order part of their business from some locations within Oregon to a location in North Dakota.


The backlash that several firms felt for moving jobs outside of the US wasn't worth the money they saved in the short term. This also reminds me of a flash cartoon with Foamy.

eWeek article: Group to Divide Linux Standards Base

Group to Divide Linux Standards Base eWeek has an article which is discussing how the Linux Standards Base (LSB) wants to move away from a single standard and move towards a modularized version that will break things down into modules that are required.

The next release of LSB 3.0 is planned for later this quarter, and LSB 4.0 is scheduled for release in the later part of 2006.

For anyone who read the post on the LPI exam they will recognize the fact that LPI bases their exam on what the LSB posts. This will bring up some interesting possibilities for what LPI can do with their exam over the longer term.

Looking towards another idea to pull from the article is the fact the LSB is trying to maintain a set standard that applications and vendors need to maintain to ensure the future stable growth of Linux into the corporate environment. Corporate entities have complained that there seems to be a fragmentation within what is available within the open-source community. The LSB hopes to answer these questions."

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UPDATE

Slashdot has picked up on the article and for the most part people are scratching their heads as to why should there be a single set of standards associated with Linux. One person did have some good comments...

"LSB defines a set of libraries and applications that will be present on all LSB compatible distributions/installations. It specifies things like kernel version, libc version, etc. so that a commercial application provider can say that "This application is certified to work with LSB 1.x" instead of "This application is certified to work on redhat 7.2, and may work on debian 2.2, suse 8.0 and possibly other installiations that have kernel 2.4.x, glibc 2.y, and foobar 3.0"

What they are talking about doing now is adding optional components to the LSB. That way an application provider can say for example "This product is certified with LSB2.x + LSB Webserver 1.y" without having to add a web server as part of the LSB and thus requiring it to be installed on non-server computers. Likewise the current LSB defines few (if any) X toolkits, libraries, applications, etc. so in order to say that a commercial desktop application will run on any LSB certified platform, providers would have to statically link a lot of libraries that are already present on most desktop linux machines because the LSB doesn't include them. Also, as the article points out, there is a lot of interest in having Java be part of the standard, but so far they have not made it required because of the licensing issues. This way, Java installations could be standardized but made part of a separate module so that they would not be required for all LSB compliant installations. "