ckad-notes

A set of notes, practice test references to prepare for Certified Kubernetes Application Developer exam by Cloud Native Computing Foundation

How to crack CKAD in 1st attempt

https://medium.com/@nikhilagrawal577/how-to-pass-ckad-exam-in-1st-attempt-tips-tricks-in-k8s-9e14477699ca

Section Weightage Marks :

Core Concepts - 13%
Configuration - 18%
Multi-Container Pods - 10%
Pod Design - 20%
State Persistence - 8%
Observability - 18%
Services and Networking - 13%

Details :

Core Concepts – 13%

Understand Kubernetes API primitives
Create and Configure Basic Pods

Configuration – 18%

Understand ConfigMaps
Understand SecurityContexts
Define an application’s resource requirements
Create & consume Secrets
Understand ServiceAccounts

Multi-Container Pods – 10%

Understand Multi-Container Pod design patterns (e .g. ambassador, adapter, sidecar)

Observability – 18%

Understand LivenessProbes and ReadinessProbes
Understand container logging
Understand how to monitor applications in Kubernetes
Understand debugging in Kubernetes

Pod Design – 20%

Understand how to use Labels, Selectors, and Annotations
Understand Deployments and how to perform rolling updates
Understand Deployments and how to perform rollbacks
Understand Jobs and CronJobs

Services & Networking – 13%

Understand Services
Demonstrate basic understanding of NetworkPolicies

State Persistence – 8%

Understand PersistentVolumeClaims for storage

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 : 19 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

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

kubectl create service nodeport
Kubectl expose Pod / Deployment — port=123 — name= Service_Name — namespace= Namespace_Name
kubectl label / annotate / set / scale
Kubectl run nginx — image=nginx — restart=Never — replicas=3
K create secret generic abcd — from-literal=id=1
K create congimap cm1 — from-literal=id=1

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 -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 used Vi.
Things you should know and fast in doing

Find and replace
Going to exact line
Deleting the word and line
Checking the alignment
Save & exit

Tips for the Exam

Kubectl cheatsheet : https://kubernetes.io/docs/reference/kubectl/cheatsheet
Bookmarks :
https://github.com/nikhilagrawal577/ckad-notes/blob/master/CKAD_bookmarks.html
Just import in your browser and use it. I have added all relevant kubernetes.io document links.
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.
If you are unsure of the spec or parameters of a yaml, always use **kubectl explain <resource>.<key>** Eg : kubectl explain pod.spec
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.
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.
Make sure, you are executing the commands in the provided namespace.
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.
Be an expert in terms of Imperative commands . It saves quite a lot of time
Don’t waste time in typing yaml codes. Generate Yamls

Articles :

Course :

Practice Test

How to crack CKAD in 1st attempt