Christopher Kusek, Technology Evangelist

Firstly, a hearty congratulations to the 8 Year old (and 1 day) Lavina Shree who recently completed her MCP Exam in C#.

[NDTV via NewLaunches]

She has made quite an accomplishment for defeating the previous title holder Arfa Karim from Pakistan who was 10 Years old at the time she completed her MCP exam in 2005.

Apparently, she is 8 years old, and not 9 years old as some of the stories report (Her own website reports this)

Okay, time for the Therapy Faq on this.

Q: Should I feel bad about myself and my own certifications?

A:  No, why should you feel bad?   If you had a photographic memory and were 8 years old, wouldn’t you be able to find the time to study just a bit? I mean, outside of your regular 80 hour workweek fixing networks or dealing with your significant other, I’m sure you’d be able to find a few minutes to study for an exam, right?

Q:  What? But seriously, she’s 8 years old! Not even 9 years old like the other reports are saying!

A:  Wait, you’re right.    I forgot these exams aren’t based upon sole memorization and require you to have to think about extremely bound concepts the likes of which cannot exist in books.   I mean when I go into the Oracle to take the exam, it analyzes what I have in my brain and then starts providing dynamic questions the likes of which noone could ever hold challenge to.

Q: Does this happening make the Certification process at all less valuable?

A: Absolutely not.   That same analysis could be said of the Bar Exam, SAT’s or GRE’s.    Some people are extremely good at certain things (say, memorization) but that is not to say that they know everything there is, only what they’ve read.   So, while you can know the ‘answer’ to a defined question, if provided with a question outside the context of original discussion that shows your true ability to innovate and provide a solution.   If I want someone to be able to recite back to me verbatim a fixed question/answer, I’d get Wikipedia or something.

Q: So you’re saying I should feel good for this girl, and not feel bad about myself?

A: Exactly.  I think it is great, prior to this a lot of people didn’t even realize there was such a thing as the MCP.  Now perhaps some may feel this is bad PR, but any PR is better than none, and this will pass.    Especially when a girl who is cited as having performed feats of memorization at age 3? No, this will definitely do wonders for the Certification community and help to improve the process as a whole for years to come.   We’ve been watching it come for the past several years as tests have improved to be more relevant, and this will be no different.

Good luck out there, get ready for a whole new Certification year! And I look forward to the new innovative Betas as you should!

As always, thank you ever so much Joanne Lin (MS) !

For those of you who saw the last Free E-book deal from Microsoft Press, it is back again with another stringent timeline to get it!

You have until December 24th to download these beauties!

With a simple ‘click’ and ‘register’ you can have these two Beautiful E-Books downloaded and in your possession for reading and excitement!

Understanding IPv6, by Joseph Davies

Writing Secure Code for Vista, by Michael Howard and David LeBlanc

If you’re even remotely interested in these technologies, free stuff, books, reading, future certification and anything else – this is the deal for you!

To keep up to date of deals like this, you can subscribe to the Microsoft Press Connection Newsletter.

Happy Holidays, and this gift is wrapped and ready for Christmas and Hanukkah!

Every so often I get asked by people for help improving their skills, making them more marketable as well as ways to get access to training and resources.

And more often than not, I lead them in directions with the huge cost of $0.00 associated with it.    Whether you’re looking for Certification, access to Labs, E-Books, or Training information.

I’m a BIG fan of Free!

So, can you afford freE-Learning?

Thanks to our friends at Microsoft, here is another resource available to you!

By visiting this lovely site, it will display all of the available courses being offered by Microsoft Learning for Free!

What relevant topics are available on there at the moment:

1. SQL 2008
2. Application Virtualization
3. Terminal Services in Server 2008
4. Virtual Machine Manager for 2008
5. Hyper-V
6. ASP.NET
7. .NET Framework
8. Windows Security
9. Microsoft Security Guidance I-IV

…And more!

Seriously, there is a motherload of information here, so much training to wrap your teeth into!

If you saw my previous post about the voucher to get the Hyper-V training for free, this training is very complimentary to that and more! (Especially since that voucher seems to be faulty at the moment)

So get out there, get yourself something Free for this season.  It’s your education, do something about it!

Thanks Kurt Shintaku for the heads up!

Code should be valid now!

Also be sure to check out - Microsoft Learning Free stuff! How much does Free Microsoft Learning Cost? (Hint: Free!)

TRAINING: FREE Microsoft Virtualization Courses - “Configuring Hyper-V in Windows Server 2008”

Are you interested in learning Microsoft’s Virtualization technologies… for free?

Prepare for Exam 70-652 for Free (US$159.99 value)
This collection of five 2-hour online courses helps you develop the skills necessary for implementing and managing Hyper-V in an IT environment, as well as, creating and managing virtual machines and hosts in a virtual environment.

The courses within the collection include the following topics:

• An overview of the Hyper-V technology
• Creating a virtual environment
• Deploying systems in a virtual environment
• Configuring high availability in a virtual environment
• Administering a virtual environment with SCVMM

This collection helps you prepare for exam 70-652 TS: Windows Server Virtualization, Configuring
This collection requires that students meet the following prerequisites:

• At least a year and a half of experience working in Windows Server 2003 or Windows Server 2008 environments as system administrators
• Familiarity with virtualization products and technologies

The package includes all the content from the following 5 online virtualization training courses:

• Course 6320: Introducing the Hyper-V Technology
• Course 6321: Configuring a Virtual Environment
• Course 6322: Deploying Systems in a Virtual Environment
• Course 6323: Optimizing a Virtual Environment
• Course 6324: Managing a Virtual Environment by using SCVMM

How to register for free:

1. Go to the following site:
   Collection 6319: Configuring Hyper-V in Windows Server 2008
   http://co1piltwb.partners.extranet.microsoft.com/mcoeredir/mcoeredirect.aspx?linkId=11062521&s1=3b30899e-0181-e332-5c10-46f4e257ae4a
2. Register using the following promo code:
   9350-Y2W6-3676
3. The course may be revisited for a period of 18 months after registration.

Those of you who have already entered into This is the spirit of giving! Get your Vista on-! Free Giveaways! that is great! If you haven’t entered yet, go post your comment, tweet, digg or whatever for your chance to win those two books and a copy of Vista Ultimate!

The holidays are not over yet! There will be some more prizes for the winning over the next week or so, including: Another copy of Vista (32bit only), a Zune and who knows what else I have in store (Seriously, I don’t even know yet!) (Oh, and a copy of Norton 360) and whatnot!

So, go get your prize on! Comment (Here, there or everywhere) and lets make the running for these prizes a decent one! I’ll stop giving away if I don’t get any interest?!

Oh, who wants some Windows Server 2003 Enterprise 25user Cal! (I still have a bunch of those! :)) (And may have some Microsoft Exam vouchers to give away soon!)

Happy Holidays!

@cxi