ViewYonder

More Proof that I'm a Nerd

The Twitter jungle drums have been sounding off about a new Cisco certification called the Cisco Data Center Unified Computing Design Specialist.

Not due until October 2009, the details are sketchy.  It looks like a bread-and-butter “how to plan a migration to vSphere”.  Some current possibles:

1. The VMware VCDX certification might be a pre-requisite.
2. This certification is NOT limited to networking, unique for Cisco qualifications,  and it covers storage and other components – but it might have a networking certification pre-requisite.
3. The certification is quite broad, covering a few data center technologies like capacity planning tools and storage, but seems to exclude facilities such as power / cooling.
4. It includes some business features like ROI – nice!
5. It doesn’t mention operations – designing virtualization operations is probably the most critical part.

Being an early contributor to the VCDX development at VMware (before I bailed due to other commitments), I can appreciate the effort that goes into these exams and certifications, and the incredible challenge of cramming something comprehensive and credible into a four-day course or more, and one exam/practical.

Based on the skimpy details, I think it’s a great step forward.  However, I hope there might be something else to come out that covers how to design an operationally efficient, effective and well-governed virtualized data center.

I guess now I’m working for Cisco I can try to find out more!  Let’s see what my digging finds out: if you have information, let me and everyone else know!

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2. Cisco Solutions for a VMware View 4.0 Environment Design Guide
3. Cisco UCS