I Became The First Kubestronaut …

A new milestone reached

More than 3 months ago I published a post with an update after not posting for more than 3 months. It seems that it takes that long for me to write a new post. I would love to write and publish posts on my blog more consistently and document my journey, but for some reason I just don't get around to it. So in another attempt to blow some life into my blog, let me share what I did to become the first Kubestronaut in my company in roughly 4 months.

First and foremost, what is a Kubestronaut in the first place? Well, it's a title you get after you've completed/passed the 5 Kubernetes exams by the Linux Foundation. The exams consist of 3 hands-on exams: CKA, CKAD, and CKS, and 2 multiple-choice exams: KCNA and KCSA. And that's also the order in which I've attempted and passed all 5 exams.

Interestingly, I didn't plan to go beyond the CKA, but after I did the exam, I really got the hang of it, and I actually found the CKA to be quite easy. So I just decided to attempt all 5 exams.

I started preparing for the CKA on 11 September 2024, and I know this because that's the date I enrolled for the CKA course by Mumshad Mannambeth on Udemy. Prior to starting that course, I had absolutely zero experience with Kubernetes. Heck, I didn't even have that much experience with Docker or containerization. In addition to going through that course, I also practiced a bit with the labs for the CKA on killercoda.com, and I organized a CKA sharing session within my company for my colleagues who are also interested in doing the CKA. That's all I did to prepare, and I attempted and passed the exam on 11 November 2024. Now that's exactly 2 months of preparation, and looking back, I'm not surprised that I found the CKA quite easy. Even with my lack of experience, 2 months is way more than sufficient to clear the exam.

After I passed the CKA, I immediately enrolled for the CKAD course, which was like 80% CKA, so I completed that course in less than a week, followed by another week of practicing on killercoda.com. I took and passed the exam on 26 November 2024.

Now came the biggest challenge of them all, the CKS. It's well known that the CKS in terms of complexity is the hardest exam in the Kubernetes series. I couldn't find the CKS course on Udemy, so I purchased a 1-month subscription on KodeKloud to prepare for the CKS. In addition, I also followed the 11-hour long video on YouTube by Kim Wuestkamp, the founder of killer.sh, which I forgot to mention above, but I also did the mock exams on killer.sh, 36 hours prior to each exam. After completing the courses and doing the mock exam, I really felt ready, I really felt that I understood all of the concepts, and I wanted to do the exam before the end of the year, so I booked the exam for the 31st of December, did the exam, and failed. And I failed quite a lot. I scored 55 points out of the 67 passing score. Now what bothers me most is that I didn't know what or how to improve, because I completed both courses, and I really felt that I understood everything from those courses.

At this point I was a little bit hesitant to book the resit, because as I've mentioned, I didn't know how to improve, and I didn't want to fail a second time, since you only have one free resit. So for a whole week, I didn't do anything, and I wasn't planning to take the resit anytime soon. But then I remembered the advice I gave a colleague of mine, who did the CKA and failed the first 2 times. I told him to not wait too long to take the resit, because you're still in "exam-ready" mode, and it can take some time to be or stay in that mode, and before you know it you're totally out of it. So I walked the talk, and I booked the exam for 7 January 2025, about a week later, and I passed. I was surprised to see that the majority of the questions were very similar to the questions I had on my first try, just one week prior.

The Linux Foundation says that it can take up to 24 hours for the results, but from my 3 experiences, it takes 24 hours. So instead of staring at my inbox and refreshing my inbox every 5 seconds, I decided to prepare for the KCNA. I did the course by James Spurin on Udemy, and I only did the questions after every chapter and the mock exam at the end, did the exam the next day on 8 January 2025, and passed with a score of 95.

At this moment the only thing standing in my way of becoming a Kubestronaut was the KCSA. So I immediately prepared for the KCSA as well, which I did by purchasing another month of KodeKloud, since I couldn't find any study material for the KCSA elsewhere. I skimmed through the material, and I did and passed the exam on 10 January 2025, which concludes my exact 4-month Kubestronaut journey, and proudly became the first Kubestronaut in my company, and among the sub 50 Kubestronauts in the Netherlands, at least at the time of becoming one!