What Are You Doing Right Now
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If your running a PC repair shop (which is a dying market in and of itself), then I can somewhat understand the importance of A+ cert, especially for the tech doing the repairs of said pc. Other than that, its a gateway cert, and a poor one at that.
CompTIA needs to get a faster turn around time as far as updating curriculum and keeping it up to date. Otherwise, they themselves will become worthless.
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@wirestyle22 said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@Tim_G said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@scottalanmiller said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@wirestyle22 said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
It's a nice cert for a normal end user
What usefulness would it be for an end user? They don't need to know DOS commands or connectors from twenty years ago.
Does the A+ still have that stuff in it to this day?
Yes it does
Well, I guess if you are a bench tech for some small computer shop in some small town still stuck in the 90s, it could be helpful.
But they can't label it as an IT cert. I'd label it as a computer technician cert. That's not IT.
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@Tim_G said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@scottalanmiller said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@wirestyle22 said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
It's a nice cert for a normal end user
What usefulness would it be for an end user? They don't need to know DOS commands or connectors from twenty years ago.
Does the A+ still have that stuff in it to this day?
Not like they used to, but the stuff in the the one that I took in 1998 was from the 1980s!! So I expect the one today is from around 2000.
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@wirestyle22 said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@scottalanmiller said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@wirestyle22 said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
It's a nice cert for a normal end user
What usefulness would it be for an end user? They don't need to know DOS commands or connectors from twenty years ago.
It's the cabling and hardware portions I'm referring to
Which are not even bench tasks, but electrician ones in most cases.
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@NerdyDad said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
If your running a PC repair shop (which is a dying market in and of itself), then I can somewhat understand the importance of A+ cert, especially for the tech doing the repairs of said pc. Other than that, its a gateway cert, and a poor one at that.
What usefulness is it to a repair shop? And I don't agree that it is a gateway cert, it's truly a barrier cert. It directly makes it harder to get into the first IT job.
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@Tim_G said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@wirestyle22 said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@Tim_G said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@scottalanmiller said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@wirestyle22 said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
It's a nice cert for a normal end user
What usefulness would it be for an end user? They don't need to know DOS commands or connectors from twenty years ago.
Does the A+ still have that stuff in it to this day?
Yes it does
Well, I guess if you are a bench tech for some small computer shop in some small town still stuck in the 90s, it could be helpful.
But they can't label it as an IT cert. I'd label it as a computer technician cert. That's not IT.
I've been calling it a bench cert for decades.
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@scottalanmiller said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@NerdyDad said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
If your running a PC repair shop (which is a dying market in and of itself), then I can somewhat understand the importance of A+ cert, especially for the tech doing the repairs of said pc. Other than that, its a gateway cert, and a poor one at that.
What usefulness is it to a repair shop? And I don't agree that it is a gateway cert, it's truly a barrier cert. It directly makes it harder to get into the first IT job.
Its meant to just fix computers and that is it. Its value to a repair shop is to prove that you know how to take a test in regards to repairing computers.
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@NerdyDad said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@scottalanmiller said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@NerdyDad said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
If your running a PC repair shop (which is a dying market in and of itself), then I can somewhat understand the importance of A+ cert, especially for the tech doing the repairs of said pc. Other than that, its a gateway cert, and a poor one at that.
What usefulness is it to a repair shop? And I don't agree that it is a gateway cert, it's truly a barrier cert. It directly makes it harder to get into the first IT job.
Its meant to just fix computers and that is it. Its value to a repair shop is to prove that you know how to take a test in regards to repairing computers.
It absolutely didn't have anything like that when I took it. Nothing. Nada. Actually taught you useless and wrong info that would make you less useful in that role, beyond wasting your time and money.
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Making the VM that will become our IT dept's "production" documentation wiki
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Looking at the Spreed.ME/NextCloud integration documentation. Gotta RTFM
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@EddieJennings said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
Making the VM that will become our IT dept's "production" documentation wiki
Sticking with DokuWiki?
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@scottalanmiller I am. I probably ought to have played with more, but this seems to fit our needs.
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@scottalanmiller said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@NerdyDad said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@scottalanmiller said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@NerdyDad said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
If your running a PC repair shop (which is a dying market in and of itself), then I can somewhat understand the importance of A+ cert, especially for the tech doing the repairs of said pc. Other than that, its a gateway cert, and a poor one at that.
What usefulness is it to a repair shop? And I don't agree that it is a gateway cert, it's truly a barrier cert. It directly makes it harder to get into the first IT job.
Its meant to just fix computers and that is it. Its value to a repair shop is to prove that you know how to take a test in regards to repairing computers.
It absolutely didn't have anything like that when I took it. Nothing. Nada. Actually taught you useless and wrong info that would make you less useful in that role, beyond wasting your time and money.
Well it has been 20 years since you've taken it, and 12 years since I've taken it. Has anyone taken it in the last couple years on here that can give us some up to date info on what the test is about now?
Maybe it's not the same test you've taken.
I know that when I had taken the test, it covered installing the current versions of operating systems and some minor config. It also covered hardware components, what they are, what they do, how to set them up or match things for best performance. Some troubleshooting, hardware and software.
So I do think it's a decent bench tech cert. It's one that I would want a bench tech to have to at least show some competency of basic computer hardware and operating system knowledge before I were to hire him/her.
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But again, as NerdyDad pointed out... how many places now a days have someone just standing at a bench fixing PCs all day?
It's either scrap it if it doesn't work, or reimage it... LOL
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@Tim_G said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
Well it has been 20 years since you've taken it, and 12 years since I've taken it. Has anyone taken it in the last couple years on here that can give us some up to date info on what the test is about now?
@Dominica took it around 2005 and it was useless then, too. But I guess that that was 12 years ago!
The issue was always that it was SO out of date. And, of course, even if it is current today (ha ha, not realistically possible) they've burned that bridge because hiring managers' experience with it is from the old ones.
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@scottalanmiller Yeah, that's a good point.
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@Tim_G said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
But again, as NerdyDad pointed out... how many places now a days have someone just standing at a bench fixing PCs all day?
It's either scrap it if it doesn't work, or reimage it... LOL
SAM's Revised One Question A+
Question: A customer comes to you with a laptop, they say that things are not working and they need it fixed.
Do you:
A ) Run a diagnostic script on it to determine what is wrong?
B ) Interrogate the user to figure out what "it is not working" means?
C ) Sacrifice a goat to the bench gods for guidance?
D ) Rapidly re-image the machine to ensure that it is clear, working and malware free? -
@Tim_G said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@scottalanmiller said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@NerdyDad said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@scottalanmiller said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@NerdyDad said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
If your running a PC repair shop (which is a dying market in and of itself), then I can somewhat understand the importance of A+ cert, especially for the tech doing the repairs of said pc. Other than that, its a gateway cert, and a poor one at that.
What usefulness is it to a repair shop? And I don't agree that it is a gateway cert, it's truly a barrier cert. It directly makes it harder to get into the first IT job.
Its meant to just fix computers and that is it. Its value to a repair shop is to prove that you know how to take a test in regards to repairing computers.
It absolutely didn't have anything like that when I took it. Nothing. Nada. Actually taught you useless and wrong info that would make you less useful in that role, beyond wasting your time and money.
Well it has been 20 years since you've taken it, and 12 years since I've taken it. Has anyone taken it in the last couple years on here that can give us some up to date info on what the test is about now?
Maybe it's not the same test you've taken.
I know that when I had taken the test, it covered installing the current versions of operating systems and some minor config. It also covered hardware components, what they are, what they do, how to set them up or match things for best performance. Some troubleshooting, hardware and software.
So I do think it's a decent bench tech cert. It's one that I would want a bench tech to have to at least show some competency of basic computer hardware and operating system knowledge before I were to hire him/her.
I took it and tested in Jan of 2016.
It covered modern Windows OSs from XP to now, hardware (what each component does and how it fits into the mix along with types of components), the history of hardware, how to install the OS, how to calculate binary, how to connect it to a network, a little bit on cyber security as to what virus is, what malware is, and it touched on virtualization. But the virtualization portion was completely wrong and should not be placed within A+.
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@NerdyDad said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
It covered modern Windows OSs from XP to now...
So by "now", you mean Windows 10? Did it cover iOS or Android? Linux desktops or Mac? And why would XP be on there, even Vista is a ridiculous thing to have been testing on. And I'd not be happy with it having anything older than 8.1 on a current exam. The best modern bench tech easily will never see XP in his entire career today.
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@scottalanmiller said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
@Tim_G said in What Are You Doing Right Now:
But again, as NerdyDad pointed out... how many places now a days have someone just standing at a bench fixing PCs all day?
It's either scrap it if it doesn't work, or reimage it... LOL
SAM's Revised One Question A+
Question: A customer comes to you with a laptop, they say that things are not working and they need it fixed.
Do you:
A ) Run a diagnostic script on it to determine what is wrong?
B ) Interrogate the user to figure out what "it is not working" means?
C ) Sacrifice a goat to the bench gods for guidance?
D ) Rapidly re-image the machine to ensure that it is clear, working and malware free?The tech side says A) to get to the problem or possibly recover data before going to D). If D fails, I would go to C.
