Recently, INFONETICS president and founder, David J. Frea, successfully completed and passed the Red Hat Certified Engineer course, sponsored by Red Hat, Inc., the premier Linux and open source solutions provider.
Frea commented that, while he had worked in the UNIX field since the late 70’s, this course brought together a number of loose ends and solidified his mastery of UNIX and the Unix compatible “Linux” operating system. Linux has been replacing many legacy and proprietary operating systems, and proficiency in it is seen as a critical component in a successful information technology company.
Becoming a successful systems administrator or programmer requires years of experience in dissimilar, networked computing environments, coping with day-to-day issues, and developing best practices. While this kind of experience does not result from taking one course or exam, it can be measured during training and in a certification exam, especially if these are administered using hands-on exercises in a lab.
The RHCE course consists of four days of training on Red Hat Linux-specific issues. Featuring hands-on lab workshops, which require completion of realistic tasks, each lab itself was an opportunity to validate and test certain Red Hat Linux-specific skills as well as essential system administrator and networking skills. The RHCE Certification Lab Exam, held on day 5, was composed of three elements: a multiple choice test; a server install and network services configuration lab; and a diagnostics and troubleshooting lab. The Lab Exam presented realistic problems that required planning, diagnosis, and development of complete solutions. Since its inception in January 1999, the RHCE Exam has been delivered to thousands of persons. The failure rate on the first exam has ranged between 42% and 37%, with less than 3000 candidates successfully completing the certification process.
INFONETICS remains committed to pursuing excellence through education, cross training and certification in all its personnel. Additional staff members are slated to pursue their RHCE certification in the coming months.