Certified Casper Technician (CCT)

[cainehorr]

Looks like JAMF has a new training course on the menu...

http://www.jamfsoftware.com/training/certified-casper-technician-cct/

Anyone gone to this yet? Looks like a good one. Feedback?

[perrycj]

interesting. Looks like a pre-req course to the CCA cert.

[Chris_Hafner]

A step above CSE and below CCA then I guess.

[cainehorr]

I just took the CCA course. The instructor eluded to the idea that the CCT might actually be a combined CSE + CCA course.

I signed up for the class in my area in November 2014.

[BrentSlater]

Pretty sure it's going to be the CSE & CMA combined as the CCA courses are being expanded to 4 days from about October and the CMA is being phased out a the same stage.

CCT looks like the entry level cert available for Casper

[dustydorey]

Hey folks!
We are really happy to see interest in the Certified Casper Technician course. We think this course is going to be a really great course for administrators to build a solid foundation in administration of Apple devices in the enterprise. Not only will this class be covering the management of Apple devices with the Casper Suite but we will be looking at OS X and iOS in more depth than ever before to provide a more robust understanding of managing those devices.

So what that boils down to is that we will be covering all of the the Casper Suite topics you’d expect such as Packaging, Inventory, patch management etc.. but we will also spend time on topics like using the command line interface, introduction to bash scripting and more.

The class will be four days and will include an opportunity for certification for passing the exam offered at the end of the fourth day.

For full class details and syllabus check it out here: http://www.jamfsoftware.com/training/certified-casper-technician-cct/

Also, as mentioned above the CCT, CCA and CCE will all be four day courses starting in October.

Let us know if you have any other questions!

[cainehorr]

I'm enrolled in the CCT from 11/11/2014 through 11/14/2014 in San Francisco, CA.

Looking forward to it.

[lashomb]

Sounds like the CCT is for the sysadmin who needs to support Apple stuff and is newer to Apple in general.

@dustydorey][/url So is the CCA going to also cover mobile now with the expansion to 4 days or is it still just Macs?

[dustydorey]

Hey @lashomb, thanks for the question! We are always evaluating the content of our courses and the CCA is no exception. The CCT, CCA and CCE are designed to be taken in sequence and they will build upon each other. The CCT will cover both OS X and iOS, the CCA will build on top of that and so fourth, particularly in areas that affect both platforms. We should have more documentation available soon that helps explain the topic coverage and progression in each of the three primary JAMF Software courses.

[tcandela]

Is the CCT a course for a person that is just stepping into using Jamf JSS Casper? Would i need prior hands on prior to attending the course?

[Chris_Hafner]

Yep, CCT would be the way to go. Pre-req is simply basic OS X and iOS familiarity:

http://www.jamfsoftware.com/training/certified-casper-technician-cct/

[Simmo]

I guess this will be the first on the agenda for myself, was planning on doing the CCA course next year but I guess I will be doing this instead!

[Bender]

I took this course which is characterized as a beginning class, however, you must be a production Casper admin to really get anything out of it. They spent the first two days on very simple OSX and IOS configuration, then simple scripting. Only on the third day did they finally get into the meat of JSS and Casper Admin. Then raced through the JSS and Casper Admin detail. Very disappointing.

[Chris_Hafner]

Bummer. I never took the CCT as CCA was available right off the bat when I took mine (4 years ago?). It's a hard thing to judge I suppose. I'm glad I started at the CCA level and moved on from there but some folks in that class really struggled so I can understand the CCT intro course. Then again, I'd been administering a Mac-centric environment for a decade+ prior. I know in talking to some JAMF folks that there were enough failures at the CCA to bring that one about.

[adamcodega]

The certifications are what they are.

The people not getting what they want from the CCT should be taking a different class.

If you need the pre-requirement for CCA and are already administering Macs on a regular basis you should be looking at the CSE.

Topics include:
JAMF Software Server (JSS) administration basics
Enrollment methods
Inventory and reporting
Building and managing packages
Managing policies and profiles
Imaging
Self Service
Mobile Device Management (MDM)
App and eBook distribution

I think the CCT is a great course for JAMF customers to offer IT people transferring to the Mac admin department.

[mm2270]

In agreement here. The CCT description on JAMF's site is fairly clear that it only touches lightly on the JSS as a management tool. In reading through the course outline, its very apparent that the CCT is designed as an overview and introduction to Apple device management as a whole. As such, it primarily covers Apple's methodology, general packaging and management topics, etc. The JSS is introduced, but only as an example of what is possible from a management suite. The focus of it is not to teach you how to really use the Casper Suite.
For an in-depth look and dive into the JSS, you'll want to look at other courses.

[dustydorey]

Hello,
I wanted to jump into the conversation here to provide some more background information and hopefully a little bit of clarity.

Beginning in October 2014 JAMF Software started offering a revamped course curriculum . This revamped curriculum included not only a new course, the Certified Casper Technician (CCT), but also a new curriculum for the Certified Casper Administrator (CCA).

Before building the new curriculum we evaluated all of the various courses we offered as well as other courses and training that exist in our ecosystem. We focused on a few key areas:
What topics are currently taught and to what depth?
What topics are repeated across our classes?
What topics do we assume preexisting knowledge to guarantee success?
If we are missing topics are they covered elsewhere?
What does the course survey feedback indicate customers want? (Yes, we really do read those!)

After a review of the findings we identified that there was a substantial amount of information or knowledge that we were assuming customers had coming into our classes, particularly in relation to the OS X and iOS knowledge. By reviewing situations that resulted in student success we learned that customers benefited greatly from understanding certain fundamental components of the Apple platforms before diving into how the Casper Suite leverages those functions. With that in mind it became clear that we needed a place to cover such fundamental topics. We also saw a couple of repeating patterns, customer success rates were substantial higher when they had a firm foundation of knowledge in Apple use and management. We also found that customers who were the most successful wanted a path to go deeper on Casper Suite topics.

Armed with this information and feedback we begin creating a revamped course curriculum. We first established the entire scope of the topics to be taught, the depth at which they would be taught and lastly the sequence and timing of this material. The result was a course curriculum that contained more than what could be covered in one course and was much, much larger than what we had in the past. We ended up building a lot of new content that was intertwined with existing content, from that we came out with the new Certified Casper Technician - CCT and a longer more in depth CCA.

The CCT is designed to be the foundational course, it contains OS X and iOS foundational knowledge that is key to understanding how the the Casper Suite works with those operating systems and then progresses on to exploring foundational tools and concepts of the Casper Suite. Expect about the first day and a half to be exploring OS X and iOS foundations with the remaining lecture time focused on the Casper Suite. The course is designed to cover each Operating System’s GUI, then establish foundations in Command Line and Scripting for OS X. After that is complete we move into how the Casper Suite is used with these platforms as you’ve all come to expect.

The revamped 4 Day CCA is built specifically to follow the CCT course. Having the CCA built to follow the CCT allows us to more effectively use the students time by not repeating content from the previous course. This gives us more time to explore topics covered in the CCA more deeply than before and the additional day allows us to examine more topics than before.

Thank you,
Dusty Dorey
JAMF Software

[Valabrega]

Just completed training last week, it was awesome!

[Chris_Hafner]

Congrats!

[hkabik]

So as a very experienced Mac Systems Engineer with several years of Casper Administration experience under his belt, which is the appropriate course CCT or CSE? Both seem fairly basic... but are now my only apparent route to a CCA.

Kinda bummed that I need to pay for a likely wasted course to get to the meat and potatoes.

[Simmo]

@hkabik I would suggest contacting JAMF about that, I am sure depending on circumstances they will allow more experienced users to skip the CCT course.

[adamcodega]

Casper Suite Essentials, since it's only a two-day course, be open minded to a refresh. Maybe JAMF could let you bring a co-worker at a discount?

This happens with many certifications but I'd rather have the people next to me on the same level and not have someone trying to overreach and end up slowing down the CCA course or worse get certified somehow without the requisite knowledge.

[mm2270]

I was about to post the same as @Matt.Sim - I would think (hope) that JAMF would allow someone that can show they are already very experienced to skip any prerequisite to the CCA. If not, that doesn't seem like a smart move. The reason its there is to prevent someone who doesn't know the first thing about how Macs/iOS even works from jumping into the CCA and getting overwhelmed.

[BrentSlater]

@hkabik, I would be in the same boat, I don't see the value of doing the CCT course when I have implemented a Casper Suite in one org that I have worked in and am currently an admin of a clustered Casper install now. I will most likely contact my JAMF rep.

[hkabik]

Thanks for the suggestions guys. I'll definitely contact JAMF about it to discus my options.

BTW... there are 0 upcoming CSE courses. I suspect it's either getting re-configured or abandoned.

[mm2270]

@adamcodega - while I think everyone can use a refresh, even the most experienced of us, I think the cost of needing to do both courses to achieve CCA is of concern. Not every place has the budget these days to send employees to training like this. At around $2400 its nothing to sneeze at, especially if it means spending around $5k to get CCA and one course may be more or less a waste of time. Some folks may even need to foot the bill themselves to do it, which may make it unattainable.

[mm2270]

@hkabik - yeah, I also noticed there are no CSE nor CMA courses listed. I believe JAMF did mention they were reworking their courses and combining some together, so you might need to contact them and find out their plans.

[dustydorey]

Hello,
JAMF Software's courses went through a curriculum overhaul that touched pretty much every course we offer. The CCT CCA and CCE as related and progressing courses are a result of that, content is delivered in a sequence and at different depths as the progression goes on. If someone were just to attend CCA course there would be topics that simply would not be addressed for them or talked about as they were covered in the prior course.

The CCT - I've taken to describing this course as foundational rather than intro. There's a lot of content and it moves quickly to cover a lot of ground that is essential to Apple Administration. This course also has a very broad range of topics that is covered giving it the largest breadth of content of the three courses.

The CCA - Courses starting October 1 of 2014 became 4 days long. Some of the content we used to cover in the CCA before that date is now covered in the CCT giving us more time to go deeper on a smaller set of topics.

The CMA - we are covering iOS content in the CCT and CCA courses now. We can still deliver the CMA course as a private for organizations interested.

The CSE - We believe the CCT achieves the goals and content of the CSE and much, much more. The CSE can be delivered as a private course, if you feel it would fit your organizations training goals more accurately.

I hope this helps clear up some of the more curriculum related questions, please let us know if we can help clear anything else up!

[hkabik]

For those of us who are contractors and have to pay for our own training, $4900 is crushing blow to get to the CCA and really puts it out of reach. Especially in my boat where an ACTC, a decade of Administration experience and 5 years of Casper usage makes the "foundational" course seem far less than necessary.

I get it, I really do. As a one size fits all approach the successive classes make a lot of sense... but it's can be pretty painful for those of us who don't fit that size. I've found JAMF to be very VERY in touch with it's customer's needs, I'm going to hope that holds true when I try to make my case to my rep. ;)

[GSquared]

Just an idea for those of us with ample experience: https://jamfnation.jamfsoftware.com/featureRequest.html?id=3874

[mjmoreira]

when did this change happen? if I was schedule to take the CCT class what is the equivalent now?

[isaacnelson]

@mjmoreira, this is an old thread from back when the CCT was introduced. As far as I'm aware there haven't been any changes that would disrupt your scheduled CCT class.