On the night of 14th January I completed my first goal of the year after I passed CKS. This was a little tougher than the previous 2 certs CKA and CKAD along with the fact that it was also fun to learn new tools while preparing for the exam. The exam will test your skills about how you secure your container orchestration architecture which is why it becomes so important that you should know this. For me I learn lot many new tools and concepts which will certainly help me in my cloud native journey.

Prerequisites:

You should have attempted & cleared the Certified Kubernetes Administrator(CKA) exam prior to attempting the CKS exam.

CKS Topics:

The best source of this information is the cncf official link. Please go through this before you start your preparation such that it gives you the basic understanding of the exam as well as the topics which will come in the exam.

My guide to the preparation:

As there is a famous saying “Practice what you know, and it will help to make clear what now you do not know” the same applies to Kubernetes and this exam. The more you practice the better you become. CKS is not just like any other certificate but a platform where you can learn lot new things. I was not confident that I will clear the exam but honestly I had enough practice which made me clear the exam in the very first attempt.
I did enjoy preparing for the exam as it really helped me to learn new concepts and then practice accordingly. I can refer to these resources which can help you practice and learn in a quick time to appear for the exam:

Killer Shell — CKS CKA CKAD Simulator: This is a very good simulator which will give you exam feeling and enough of time also to practice. You can get two simulators for free when you take the course on Udemy. Even though I referred lot many articles and my self study but I genuinely think that the course on Udemy from #Kim is enough to clear the exam.

Certified Kubernetes Security Specialist 2021 | Udemy: This is also a new course launched by #Zeal on Udemy.

Kubernetes Security Essentials (LFS260) — Linux Foundation — Training this course from linux foundation is there which you can buy as a this has good exercises which will also help you while you prepare for the exam.

Exam tips & tricks

As like any other exam of Kubernetes , you have to be fast enough. The exam duration is of 2 hours. I got 15 questions in the exam. There will be weightage on each question starting from 4% to 11%. Please read the questions completely before you attempt them. For me some questions were straightforward while for some I had to spend some time to understand them. Do not spend too much of time on one question, remember, you just need 67% to pass the exam :). Also, Ensure that you are on the right contexts before you start solving the questions.

There are a few questions on which we will have to modify the files as per the ask. I would strongly advise to take a back up of the file before you start changing so that in case of a mistake you have the back up to refer to.

I am not of the opinion to make too many aliases, but I would advise to make at least one alias which is k=kubectl. If you are comfortable creating aliases then go ahead and create as per your likings like kd=kubectl describe or kg=kubectl get , etc.

I hope this will help you while you prepare for the exam. Feel free to reach out to me one on one in case you need any help. https://www.linkedin.com/in/shubhasis-mathur-14997064/