On 21 October I took my first shot to pass the VCAP7-DTM Design exam and failed as you already know from my this article. Today I am happy to share that I finally passed the exam! 🙂

What did I do with the last information and notes I had about my weaknesses from the last exam score report? I read a lot additional VMware documents and guides about:

  • Integrating Airwatch and VMware Identity Manager (vIDM)
  • Cloud Pod Architecture
  • PCoIP/Blast Display Protocol
  • VMware Identity Manager
  • vSAN 6.2 Essentials from Cormac Hogan and Duncan Epping
  • Horizon Apps (RDSH Pools)
  • Database Requirements
  • Firewall Ports
  • vRealize Operations for Horizon
  • Composer
  • Horizon Security
  • App Volumes & ThinApp
  • Workspace ONE Architecture (SaaS & on-premises)
  • Unified Access Gateway
  • VDI Design Guide from Johan van Amersfoort

Today, I had a few different questions during the exam but reading more PDFs about the above mentioned topics helped me to pass, as it seems. In addition to that, I attended a Digital Workspace Livefire Architecture & Design training which is available for VMware employees and partners. The focus of this training was not only about designing a Horizon architecture, but also about VMware’s EUC design methodology.

If you have the option to attend classroom trainings, then I would recommend the following:

I had two things I struggled with during the exam. Sometimes the questions were not clear enough and I made assumptions what it could mean and that the exam is based on Horizon 7.2 and other old product versions of the Horizon suite:

  • VMware Identity Manager 2.8
  • App Volumes 2.12
  • User Environment Manager 9.1
  • ThinApp 5.1
  • Unified Access Gateway 2.9
  • vSAN 6.2
  • vSphere 6.5
  • vRealize Operations 6.4
  • Mirage 5.x

But maybe it’s only me since I have almost no hands-on experience with Horizon, none with Workspace ONE and in addition to that I’m only 7 months with VMware now. 🙂

It is time for an update, but VMware announced already that they are publishing a new design exam version called VCAP7-DTM 2019 next year.

What about VCIX7-DTM?

 In part 2 of my VCAP7-DTM Design exam blog series I mentioned this:

Since no VCAP7-DTM Deploy exam is available and it’s not clear yet when this exam will be published, you only need the VCAP7-DTM Design certification to earn the VCIX7-DTM status. I have got this information from VMware certification.

This information is not correct, sorry. VMware certification pulled their statement back and provided the information that you need to pass the VCAP6-DTM Deploy exam, as long as no VCAP7-DTM Deploy is available, to earn the VCIX7-DTM badge.

I don’t know yet if I want to pursue the VCIX7-DTM certification and will think about it when the deploy exam for Horizon 7 is available.

What’s next?

Hm… I am going to spend more time again with my family and will use some of my 3 weeks vacation time to assemble and install my new home lab.

Then I also have a few ideas for topics to write about, like:

  • Multi-Domain and Trust with Horizon 7.x
  • Linux VDI Basics with Horizon 7.x
  • SD-WAN for Horizon 7.x
  • NSX Load Balancing for Horizon 7.x

These are only a few of my list, but let’s see if I really find the time to write a few article. 

In regards to certification I think I continue with these exams:

This has no priority for now and can wait until next year! Or…I could try the VDP-DW 2018 since I have vacation. Let’s see 😀