OCI 2023 Certification Learning Paths and Exams now available

We are excited to announce that the Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) 2023 Certification Learning Paths and Exams are now available.

You might be wondering about the timing of this release, as we are already mid-way into the calendar year. Oracle University’s yearly certification releases are tied to the start of the Oracle fiscal year (June 1) – we release new certification learning paths and exams around this timeframe. Similar to last year, we have made significant changes for the 2023 releases, which I will describe in detail below.

OCI has role-based certifications for cloud architects, security engineers, cloud operators, developers, DevOps engineers, data scientists, data engineers and database admins. We also have two entry-level certifications (available for free) that can be taken by anyone, including business professionals. OCI certifications are categorized in three levels – Foundations, Associate and Professional. Our current line-up of OCI certifications is shown below –
 

What’s New – OCI 2023 Certification Learning Paths

OCI is adding features and services at a rapid pace. You can access the complete list of new releases here. We want our courses to be always up-to-date and contain the latest set of OCI services and features; hence, we continuously develop and refresh our learning content including lectures, demos, hands-on labs, skill checks, and practice exams to align with the OCI feature releases.

For the 2023 learning paths, we have added learning content for several recently released services and features, including Container Instances, Application Dependency Management, Serverless OKE, Queues, Service Mesh, Threat Intelligence, Network Firewall, Cloud Guard Threat Detector, Organization Management, Full Stack Disaster Recovery, Oracle Cloud Migration, Confidential Computing, Block Volume Dynamic Performance Scaling, File System Replication and more! We have 21 learning paths and these cover the entire breadth and depth of the OCI platform. Some of the core OCI learning paths include these –

As you can see from the table above, across these 12 learning paths, we have 800+ lessons, ~400 demos and ~130 labs – this is an extensive library created by expert oracle instructors in high-def. video format and available free to everyone!

Besides these 12 learning paths, we also have 5 learning paths for Data Management, 2 for Analytics and 1 each for APEX and Redwood – a total of 21 certification learning paths and exams! This is 400+ hours of solid technical content covering 100+ services across the OCI platform.  

In addition to the new service and feature content, there are a few other enhancements to the 2023 learning paths, including –

• Enhanced Hands-on Labs: A new set of hands-on labs has been added and made available within the respective modules in the courses. Ideally, you should watch lessons and demos and then perform the labs. Currently, you need to perform these labs in your own tenancy, but we are working on launching a paid premium lab offering using which you can run labs in Oracle provided tenancies. As shown below, labs are aligned to a particular topic and available side-by-side with lessons and demos. Clicking on the lab link will bring up the lab guide with step-by-step instructions (you will need to bring your own tenancy to run the labs). Performing these labs will really help reinforce your learning on a particular topic.

• Improved course structure: 2023 courses have been organized into smaller and more manageable modules. E.g., Architect Associate course now has 27 modules vs. 14 earlier. In our experience, shorter modules allow for more effective learning and comprehension.

• Expert Tips: Expert tips have been incorporated to provide guidance beyond the course content. These tips will help you get the most out of your learning experience and gain valuable insights. E.g. in the Architect Associate course, we cover expert tips around how to get a job as a cloud architect, how to navigate day-to-day cloud architecture challenges, and even some of the basics like how to create a study plan and stick to it.

• Ask Your Instructor: If you have any questions or need clarification while consuming the courses, you can now utilize the “Ask Your Instructor” feature. It is a widget available within every lesson using which you can ask questions and receive a response within 24 hours from the Oracle instructors. E.g. while going over the Load Balancer lesson in the OCI Foundations course, I can ask to get more clarification on the differences between a Network Load Balancer and Load Balancer. We learn more by asking questions, so feel free to utilize this feature.

• Skill Checks with explanations: Skill checks are in-course assessments available in every module to examine your understanding of the concepts covered in the particular module. Now, all the skill checks include detailed explanations, so you can understand concepts even better and enhance your understanding. 

What’s New – OCI 2023 Certification Exams

We have made a few changes to the 2023 exams, the most significant of which is the introduction of Hands-on Performance Exams. 

• Hands-on Performance Exams (HPE): Three OCI certification exams – OCI 2023 Architect Professional, OCI 2023 Security Professional, and OCI 2023 Cloud Operations Professional are now a Hands-on Performance Exam, combining hands-on challenges and multiple-choice questions. The hand-on performance section includes two challenges to be completed using the provided OCI environment. These exams also include multiple-choice questions, though there are fewer multiple choice questions than before.

When you start the HPE exam, you will have access to a split screen as shown below. One side will display the exam instructions, while the other will show the OCI console for the Oracle provided environment, where you will deploy your solution. You will also be provided with login credentials. This setup will allow you to easily switch between the exam instructions and the console as needed throughout the exam.

Once you select a challenge, there will be a problem statement and an architecture diagram for each challenge scenario. Read the scenario carefully and understand the problem statement. Refer to the architecture diagram, and you will get an idea about the artifacts that you need to deploy and configure for this solution. The challenge will be further divided into smaller tasks. You need to read the task and deploy it on the OCI Console. You will have ~50 minutes to complete two challenges. 

We believe that hands-on performance exams allow you to showcase your practical skills. A combination of OCI training and hands-on experience (attained via OCI 2023 labs and/or field experience), provides the best preparation for passing the HPE exams. We have included exam prep materials for these exams, so make sure to go over them before taking these exams.

• Exam Weights: All 2023 exams have the exam objectives weights published – this will help you prepare better. E.g., these are the specific weights for objectives on the OCI 2023 DevOps exam – looking at it, you can deduce that CI/CD and Containers have a higher coverage on the exam compared to DevSecOps or Observability.

• Revised Exam and Practice Exam questions: We perform regular psychometric analysis to determine how effective exam items are and how they are performing. Based on this data, we have added a completely new set of exam questions – in some cases, the entire exam is completely new. All our learning paths include a practice exam designed to closely simulate the format and content of the actual certification exam. Similar to skill checks, we have added detailed explanations to the practice exam questions.

And that’s it! Our team has worked really hard on these releases and enhancements and we sincerely hope that you like the 2023 learning paths and the certification exams!

We are continuously building and delivering training, integrating feedback, and monitoring usage data. If something is broken or not resonating with you, we want to know. You can provide feedback directly from within any of the courses. And remember to rate the courses!

Thanks for reading and good luck with the 2023 learning paths and the certification exams!