Hi. A friend works at as a restaurant manager for 70 hours a week. He'd like to get his Cisco and Microsoft certifications. What are some free/low cost and quick options for him? Are there free online resources he can use in the (little) free time he has? Thank you.
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A:
I started off working in a hotel back in '99 and getting my MCSE that way. Best thing is get a Safari bookstore account, a copy of VMware Server (it's free) and play around.
kruczkowski
2010-02-08 11:54:35
+1
A:
You don't say how much your Restaurant Manager friend has experience in the programming trade so i'll start from a basic level of knowledge.
The Express Versions of Visual Studio should be enough for a grounding in the basics if he's completely new to it. Experience will be invaluable though so it might be worth using the Express versions first to build a few hobby projects to build up familiarity with the .Net Framework. It's daunting but not impossible.
Then when your friend is getting serious about studying for the exam, the MS study guides include a 90 day trial copy of Visual Studio 2008. 90 days may or may not be enough time depending on how much he can commit to it which is why I recommended the Express versions as a precursor. There may be problems with using the study guide in conjunction with the Express versions but I can't say for sure.
I'm about to do a couple of the exams as a move into C# from VB and am looking forward to it.
Fellmeister
2010-02-18 12:02:58