Re: PostgreSQL Certification

On Fri, 24 Jun 2005, Jim C. Nasby wrote:

> On Fri, Jun 24, 2005 at 08:42:00AM -0700, Joshua D. Drake wrote:
>> Tatsuo Ishii wrote:
>>>> Am Sonntag, 12. Juni 2005 05:24 schrieb Tatsuo Ishii:
>>>>
>>>>> Thank you for interested in PostgreSQL CE. There is a sample
>>>>> examination problems page:
>>>>>
>>>>> http://osb.sra.co.jp/postgresql-ce/sys/quiz.php?titleid=S74_en
>>>>
>>>> Regarding question 3,
>>>>
>>>> Select one incorrect statement regarding the installation of PostgreSQL.
>>>>
>>>> 1  1. PostgreSQL is unable to use languages other than English unless the
>>>> "--enable-multibyte" option is specified at "./configure" time.
>>>> 2  2. At least 60MB of free disk space is required for compilation.
>>>> 3  3. GNU make is required.
>>>> 4  4. "root" cannot execute "make check" properly.
>>>> 5  5. "--no-locale" should be specified if English is the only language
>>>> to be used in PostgreSQL.
>>>>
>>>> Apparently, the correct answer is 1, but statement 5 is equally false.
>>>
>>>
>>> Really? I vaguley recall that someone who came from US complained
>>> about the sort order of en locale. I thought English speakers prefer C
>>> locale.
>>
>> And if you want to be really picky number 4 is wrong as well:
>>
>> root# su - postgres -c "make check"
>>
>> I know that is really picky but as someone who manages the number of
>> PostgreSQL systems that I do, I might have picked that one. Number 2 is
>> also confusing because am I compiling ALL of PostgreSQL? I just did a
>> check and it took 63 megs just to unpack it, let alone compile it.
>
> This is why I put very little faith in certifications; all that they
> prove is that you know how to pass some test.
>
> Tell me this, does knowing any of the info in this question really make
> you a better PostgreSQL admin or user, other than #1? I would consider
> #2-4 to be trivia, and as others have said #5 is misleading and
> misinformative.

I've been using PostgreSQL since, what, 1995, and, to be totally honest,
I'd probably fail that question without doing some research first :(  I'm
one of those that builds via FreeBSD ports, so I don't care about 2 and 3
... and don't generally worry about 1 and 5 since they are auto-set ... I
know 3, since I spent alot of time in the early days developing the
configure side of things, and, well, as someone else pointed out, 4 is a
no brainer ...

----
Marc G. Fournier           Hub.Org Networking Services (http://www.hub.org)
Email: scrappy@hub.org           Yahoo!: yscrappy              ICQ: 7615664