Docker Certified Associate — How to pass the exam

After working with Docker and micro-services deployed in an orchestrator (Kubernetes, Rancher) for a few years, I wanted to consolidate and validate my knowledge of what I have learnt in a professional context by an official certification.

Preparing the exam is also an opportunity to deep dive into some aspects of Docker and to get a better overview (such as Docker Enterprise features).

In this article, I give you details and tips to prepare and pass the Docker Certified Associate exam.

Certification

It is now delivered by Mirantis, B2B open source cloud computing software and services company. Its container management products are Docker Enterprise Container Cloud and Docker Enterprise.

You can find the official details of the certification in this page:

https://training.mirantis.com/dca-certification-exam/

The format of the exam (as of October 2020, v1.4) is about 55 questions:

• 42 discrete option multiple choice (DOMC) questions
• 13 multiple choice questions

The exam lasts 90 minutes.

The questions cover different aspects of Docker:

The content of each domain is available in the study guide. It will describe details that you might know.

Preparation

Even if you use Docker in your company or for personal projects since a while, passing a certification is different and you have to be prepared.

You will have to learn some aspects of Docker (even if you won’t use it later or think that is useless for you).

Here are some resources I used for preparing the exam:

Official documentation

• docker engine — https://docs.docker.com/engine/
• docker enterprise — https://docs.mirantis.com/docker-enterprise/v3.0/dockeree-products/index.html
• kubernetes manual — https://kubernetes.io/fr/docs/home/ (especially volumes and networking)

A Cloud Guru

• Docker Certified Associate course — free trial a few days if you learn fast ;)

Others

• https://github.com/Evalle/DCA
• https://github.com/bbachi/DCA-Practice-Questions
• https://medium.com/bb-tutorials-and-thoughts/250-practice-questions-for-the-dca-exam-84f3b9e8f5ce

Advices

• Take care that DOMC is not straightforward if you are not familiar with. Prepare yourself for this kind of questions because it is differ that classic multiple choice questions. DOMC represents 42 of 55 questions so it will be awkward if you are not prepared enough. Answers on DOMC questions cannot be modified once submitted and you cannot review the answers later. Please try on www.trydomc.com
• Orchestration is about 25% of the exam. So, even if you have no experience with Kubernetes (or even Docker Swarm), you will have to focus on that domain to pass the exam. Moreover, regarding your tech skills, it won’t be a wasting time to master orchestrators, such as Kubernetes.
• During the test, take your time on each question. 90 minutes is enough. Don’t answer too fast (especially on DOMC questions). You will probably finish the exam in less than 1 hour (or even less).
• The 13 multiple choice questions can be modified and possible to be “flagged” for a review later. Don’t hesitate to use that feature.
• Once ready to submit your exam, take the opportunity to read again the DOMC questions (it is available) and remind some that you might answer wrong. It could be useful if you fail and re-think about your weakness regarding some Docker aspects.

I hope that article will help you in your journey of preparing the DCA certification. See you soon in the Docker Certified Global Community group in LinkedIn.