Hi Jon, and the rest,
Very short intro about me: in the past I wrote (Dutch) books about LPI
1, 2 and Essentials. Never became millionaire. Still doing daily open
source stuff for a living and still loving it.
I like the idea behind StartIT. I like to help develop it.I think it can
help in the shortage of (open source) software development skills worldwide.
So I contacted the StartIT team and offered my help. Also because I
wanted additional information.
In the end, the answers I got, untill it became silent, left me rather
worried. Let me explain why:
* I need to sign a contract to transfer all publishing rights to the LPI.
* I would get paid to write a unit. Not that I mind that, it's just
rather, well, new as far as I know the LPI.
* There is a git repo in use but it seems to be only open to
contributors who signed this contract.
* The final materials will be licensed with a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
The "NonCommercial-NoDerivatives" part makes me worry about this.
Why not GPL, LGPL, FDL? Does this mean I can not give a StarIT
training unless I pay the LPI? What is the goal?
So I hope somebody can explain to me what the plan is here, because I
can't seem to find it online.
AFAIK the LPI is a non-profit foundation that publishes certification
levels and receives income from exams. It has been that way for 20 years
and I always thought this was an open source certification body that was
in the highest regard worldwide.
So, to keep my rant(?) short, I am left with a few questions I hope
somebody can answer publicly (on this list is fine):
* Is the LPI transforming into a publishing house for educational
materials? (please don't say it has always been a publishing house
for exams. I know)
* Is LPI moving away from its open source roots. And, if so, what is
the direction?
* Why is the repo with the development of the StartIT project
closed/hidden/not-public/hidden-somewhere?
Really looking forward to any and all answers.
Kind regards,
Jeroen Baten
Op 12-08-2021 om 18:53 schreef Jon "maddog" Hall via lpi-examdev:
When I was teaching "Data Processing" ("Computer Science" had not been
invented yet) we had a lot of students who "wanted to work with
computers" and had no idea what a professional life was like in doing
that. They were attracted by advertisements on matchbook covers (yes,
it was that long ago) that promised a good job, big house, fancy car.
In those days they had only seen computers on TV or in the movies.
They came into my class and found out that the computer was not going
to think for them. Two-thirds dropped out.
Today it is not quite as bad, but you still have a lot of "kids" that
think computer science is writing a bit of HTML.
To answer the issue of Ottavio, our school normally used two years to
teach an associate's degree in data processing. We did have a
separate one-year program called "Women in Technology" that was for
women who had obtained a bachelor's degree in some engineering field,
then took time off to raise a family, and now wanted to re-enter the
field. We acknowledged the education and skills they already had,
but brought them up-to-date with new technologies and skills. The
program had a 98% placement rate.
I do not know what skills Octavio had as an "Open Source Evangelist",
but Evan is right in saying that is mostly a Marketing Job. Inside
of Marketing there are positions for Marketing Communications (MARCOM)
and often Technical Marketing. The latter is the position I had when
I met Linus Torvalds. It was my job to take highly technical aspects
of the products and explain their usefulness to customers, among other
things.
If Octavio was a systems administrator AND an Open Source Evangelist,
then the LPIC certifications are the fastest way for re-training and
to re-enter the workforce. If Octavio was a COBOL programmer, but
wants to re-enter the workforce as a systems administrator, the path
is a bit harder, but still a good path. If Octavio was a programmer
and wanted to re-enter programming, then there are paths for that too
and probably the DevOPs Cert is a place to start.
In either case you are not starting from scratch, and do not let
anyone tell you that you are. You learned things from "your prior
life" that may be very applicable even though it has been twenty years
or more.
o Logic flow
o Data types
o Programming Constructs
I could go on for hours.
But you also have soft skills, very important to professionals. How
to work in a team, how to produce a piece of software on time. How
to determine the customers requirements.
All of these are also necessary for "professionalism", but sometimes
as an "older person" you have to remind people of that.
Warmest regards,
Jon "maddog" Hall, Board Chair
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Jeroen Baten | EMAIL : [email protected]
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