My self-signed certificates

No, I will not write about SSL or X.509. I will write about self-signed knowledge certificates I have issued to myself.

WTF is self-signed knowledge certificate?

I will write about certificates from attended training or - in better case - passed exams. You have probably such certificates at home buried in some drawer. Or - if you are exhibitionist - you have framed it on the wall of your office (yes, I have seen it).

Because not everyone has own office, there is a new habit - publish it on LinkedIn.

I accept there could be certificates from really hard passed exams. I have heart about troubleshooting Cisco exam where admin screwed up again setup that was corrected already by the student.

Such an exam certificate has real value - it shows that the graduate really understands the topic.

But exam certificate is not always proof of quality.
In the past, I have successfully passed the certification exam from one world leader of IT trainings for one SW product (it was free of charge on one IT conference, why not to try it?).

After a brief read of documentation and by using “common sense” - voila - I become a certified expert.

And then there are certificates you could obtain just attending some training. You sit 3 days over there and nobody has a clue whether you remember anything or even whether you are able to use it in practice.

I’m not attending specialized trainings.
Either there are hard times and we are in saving mode or there is no training suitable for my current needs or my skill level is higher than the training offers.

Majority of my knowledge I have obtained myself. During evenings and weekends, in my free time.

Hundreds of hours of study and trials and failures. Unsuccessful configurations, follow up debugging, corrections,…

And I have used in my practice - in my job or in my private projects. Therefore I have a proof I understand the topic and I’m able to use it.

And the certificate? I have got no one!

I have decided to change it.

In the time where lack of LinkedIn profile means that you don’t exist (at least in IT) and the lack of certificates “means” lack of knowledge, I will issue the certificates to myself.

What?!?

Yes, every time I will master some kind of expertise on some level (and have verified in practice), I will give the certificate to myself.

Will you trust it? It’s up to you.

(Who knows what the image with skill level means?)

Docker, docker-compose