When Google Cloud launched their Kubernetes platform (GKE) back in 2015 I signed up for the free trial. Today my free credits are long gone, but I still run and launch new clusters on a weekly basis. After putting it off for a while, I recently decided to formalize my experience by getting the GCP Architect certification. In this post I detail some of the resources I used to prepare for the exam.
To my surprise, this exam is not just a test of concepts specific to Google’s products. While a thorough understanding of GCP is required, the exam is also designed to assess your proficiency as a software architect in general. This makes giving study advice difficult since the topics are not just restrained to the GCP documentation. With that disclaimer, here is a list of some of the material I used to prepare for the exam.
These overviews and courses are a good starting point.
The following topics are not comprehensive and they are in no particular order. I included them to provide an example of the depth/breadth of knowledge you will need to know.
Like most people in software I find myself a little suspicious of the value of most certifications. However I believe this particular certification is worth the time investment for anyone building on top of GCP. Preparing for the exam forced me fill in my GCP knowledge gaps and provided insight into the various use-cases that Google Cloud products are intended to solve.
