Lack of long term thinking
VMware are probably the greediest and of the major U$A corporations when it comes to certification. The more enlightened companies run the certification programmes to provide a people with experience of a product.
There isn't much point in having product if few people can use of configure it.
VMware seem to be using it as a profit centre:
• Exams are more expensive than both Micro$oft and Ci$co
• New entrants before you take an exam, you must sit a course which costs £3,000
• If you have previously certified with an VCP, you have a 6 month Horizon window to sit the upgrade exam. If you don’t do it within this time window you have to attend a course!
VMware contents that by requiring attendance of a course they avoid people studying just for the exam rather than the material. Two points to this, as many who have attended a 5 day course can testify:
1. It is debatable how much you can learn over a 5 day period, by Thursday afternoon must people are in a stupor.
2. If you look at certification forums, VMware VCP try to braindump just as much as the Cisco or Microsoft people.
I don’t see the point of trying to turn certification into a money making exercise, as ultimately you will have less “people” around who understand your product.