July 12th saw the launch of vSphere 5, the next generation virtualisation/cloud infrastructure suite from VMware. VCP is widely accepted as being the “industry standard” certification in virtualisation, and VCP5 has also been launched!
The VMware Certification portal has already been updated with the VCP5 exam blueprint and even a VCP5 mock exam, and there is a substantial amount of information about the training requirements on the VCP5 homepage
The final exam will be available to take after August 29th 2011, but there will also be the usual beta exam process which begins imminently.
So, is it worth doing vSphere 4 certifications?
Now VMware have launched vSphere 5, one of the big decisions that people have to make is whether to continue with the vSphere 4 certifications or wait for the equivalent vSphere 5 certifications to be released. I think it’s a very individual choice, it depends on a number of things:
- Have you already started preparing, and if so how close are you to being ready for the exam?
- Do you think it’s worth you having the vSphere 4 as well as the vSphere 5 certification?
- Have you already attended one of the vSphere 4 qualifying courses for VCP4?
Now that the VCP5 certification has already been announced, the final exam will be available after August 29th 2011, that’s only 6 weeks from now…
If you’ve attended a vSphere 4 course and are debating whether or not to take the VCP4 exam I’d probably suggest that you should — I would! Why? Well, at the time of writing vSphere 4 is the only version you can download and deploy, it will take time for customers to choose to deploy vSphere 5 or upgrade to vSphere 5, and one other bonus of getting VCP4 is that until February 29th 2012 VCP4 holders can also gain VCP5 certification by passing the VCP5 exam with no mandatory training required. If you choose today not to gain VCP4 you will have to attend a vSphere 5 course in order to qualify for VCP5 either before or after that February date.
If you’ve yet to train on vSphere 4 then you have a tougher decision to make as your decision is probably not just about what version you want to get your VCP on but also what version are you going to deploy/manage/support. vSphere 5 courses will be available within the coming weeks.
