How to pass CKA -Updated Sept 2020 curriculum

I have recently took the CKA Exam and managed to clear it on my first attempt. I’ve complied few tips on how to clear CKA exam on your first attempt too.

I gave the exam on the updated CKA curriculum in Sept 2020.

I have been working in kubernetes environment for more than a year now. Still i found few things need to be focused in order to get this certification.I will try to give all details and tricks that helped me to pass Certified Kubernetes Administrator exam last week.

I already had cleared CKAD last year December. You can read about that here. https://medium.com/@nikhilagrawal577/how-to-pass-ckad-exam-in-1st-attempt-tips-tricks-in-k8s-9e14477699ca

Resources from the CNCF

• Candidate Handbook
• Curriculum Overview
• Exam Tips

Course Curriculum : Sept 2020 Updated

Here is the official curriculum of CKA which got updated in last sept [2020]. Official Curriculum

Section Weightage Marks :

1. Cluster Architecture, Installation & Configuration — 25%
2. Services & Networking — 20%
3. Troubleshooting — 30%
4. Workloads & Scheduling — 15%
5. Storage — 10%

More details you can check here

Information About the Test:

Once you schedule the test, you can’t reschedule or cancel before 24hr of the scheduled test. You will get 1 free retake incase you didn’t qualify in first attempt.

Here is the following details about the test.

• 2 hours : 17 questions
• Remotely proctored in Chrome browser plus an extension
• Government-issued Non-expired ID Card
• Webcam and microphone
• Completely practical, no theory. All on the command line
• Questions are weighted with a percentage. Harder question, more points

Practice Environment

Once you are gone through the course content, you need to practice practice practice to pass the exam. I used the following platforms to test my skills and relearn the concepts.

1. Katacoda’s Kubernetes Playground
2. Minikube: local testing and getting comfortable with kubectl
3. Google Kubernetes Enginer (GKE): Create a machine and start practicing
4. KubeKloud : It has great set of labs. Do it at least 4–5 times

Course Content

1. https://training.linuxfoundation.org/training/kubernetes-fundamentals-lfs258-cka-exam-bundle/
2. https://www.katacoda.com/courses/kubernetes
3. https://www.udemy.com/course/certified-kubernetes-administrator-with-practice-tests/

Use Imperative Commands

I have noted down few imperative commands. It saves alot of time during the test. Practice these command as many times as you can. :D

1.  kubectl create service nodeport <myservicename>
2.  kubectl expose Pod / Deployment — port=123 — name= Service_Name — namespace= Namespace_Name
3.  kubectl label / annotate / set / scale
4.  kubectl run nginx — image=nginx — restart=Never — replicas=3
5.  kubectl create secret generic abcd — from-literal=id=1
6.  kubectl create congimap cm1 — from-literal=id=1
7.  kubectl create role pod-reader --verb=get --verb=list --verb=watch --resource=pods
8.  kubectl create clusterrole pod-reader --verb=get,list,watch --resource=pods
9.  kubectl create rolebinding bob-admin-binding --clusterrole=admin --user=bob --namespace=acme
10. kubectl create clusterrolebinding root-cluster-admin-binding --clusterrole=cluster-admin --user=root

Generating Yamls

Don’t try to write your own yamls at the exam.
1. Pods , Deployments, Secrets, Configmaps, Jobs, Cron jobs
These yamls can be generated using — dry-run , — export , -o yaml flags

eg: k create deployment — image=nginx —- dry-run=client -o yaml > dp.yaml

2. Persistent Volume, Persistent Volume Claim, Node Affinity, Node Selector, Service Account, Volumes
These yamls can easily fetched from k8s.io documentations.

Editor

Be familiar with the editor you want to use. In my case , I have used Vi.

Things you should know better and fast in doing

1. Find and replace
2. Going to exact line
3. Deleting the word and line
4. Checking the alignment
5. Save & exit

Tips for the Exam

1. Kubectl cheatsheet : https://kubernetes.io/docs/reference/kubectl/cheatsheet
2. Context : Always pay attention to which context are you working ? It is correct or not. Make sure, you set the context before answering the actual question. Context will be given in the top of each question.
3. If you are unsure of the spec or parameters of a yaml, always use **kubectl explain <resource>.<key>** Eg : kubectl explain pod.spec
4. Time is extremely crucial. Try to read the question carefully and understand in a single go. Don’t waste time in reading the question multiple times.
5. As weightage is already given for each question, if some less weightage question is taking more time to solve , you can skip and come back to that question later part of the test.
6. Make sure, you are executing the commands in the provided namespace.
7. Be familiar with mouse or trackpad as you need them to copy paste few names of the objects from the questions and to copy yaml from Kubernete.io page.
8. Be an expert in terms of Imperative commands . It saves quite a lot of time.
9. Don’t waste time in typing yaml codes. Generate Yamls

Don’t Stress

Lastly , Calm down.

Do one round of practice test and note down the mistakes. Rectify in next attempt and do this at-least 5–6 times.

Practice ………….. Practice……………… Practice

All the best for you exam…..

References

1. https://github.com/nikhilagrawal577/CKA-Notes