
Microsoft is retiring its MCSA, MCSD and MCSE certifications - terenceng2010
https://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-is-retiring-its-mcsa-mcsd-and-mcse-certifications-in-june-2020/
======
jasoneckert
As an IT college teacher for 21 years, I can tell you that educational
institutions are very angry about this change. We often have courses that map
to Microsoft certificaion. Students write them, and employers want them. They
are a general benchmark that allows organizations to narrow the list of
candidates they interview for a job related to one or more technologies. Most
college grads get jobs in small-to-medium organizations where Azure is not a
common requirement. Moreover, many small organizations that moved their stuff
to Azure at the request of an MSP are current moving it back on premises to
save cost now that they realize it's much cheaper to do so. Together with
Microsoft's abrupt replacement of the Win10 certifications last year (they
gave no notice to colleges or publishers), it looks like the trust colleges
have placed in the Microsoft certification program is disappearing fast.

~~~
peterkelly
I think industry certifications are a mostly pointless idea. If I'm looking at
learning something, my criteria is "will this information still be relevant 10
years from now?" If the answer is no, I either don't bother with it, or I
invest the minimum necessary effort to learn what I need to do to solve the
problem at hand.

Technologies that certifications focus on tend to have a limited lifespan. I
place _far_ more value on more general, conceptual knowledge that will be
applicable to a multitude of implementations, mixed with some practical hands-
on stuff. I've gotten far more out of learning about things like relational
databases, compilers, multi-threaded and message passing programming,
distributed systems, and experience with a range of different programming
paradigms than I believe could ever be gained from certifications. Focusing on
generic topics like this is going to be far more valuable to your career in
the long run.

If I see a company specifically looking for someone with a certification or
experience with a particular library/framework, I take that as a sign that
they don't fully appreciate the value that a well-rounded engineer can bring
to the table. Furthermore, certifications have the effect of tying your
advertised skill set to a specific vendor's products, and expect you to keep
up to date every three years or so as they change the specifics of their
training and certification requirements.

My company, a contracting firm, recently ran some AWS training sessions and
offered to cover the costs of the exams for employee who wanted to do them. I
went along to a couple of sessions but ultimately concluded it wasn't a good
use of my time, relative to other things I could be doing to advance my
career. While I'm fortunate to mostly work for clients who understand that, I
wish there were a wider appreciation of general knowledge rather than people
investing themselves so heavily into skills that have a short lifespan and are
tied so heavily to specific vendors and the current flavor of the month.

~~~
ocdtrekkie
Considering most Microsoft Windows Server features covered have been around
since Windows XP, I’d argue most Windows certs meet your criteria.

I’d call my Cisco certs, combined with the community college courses that
aligned with them, the most effective education process in my life. It
directly impacted my job, immediately. Even aside from the fact that in the
MSP business, certs are super marketable.

~~~
ZephyrP
I think Cisco certifications, even the CCNA, are suspended from scrutiny by
many, even in disciplines famous for their cert-skepticism like infosec.

There exist other prestigious certifications, but they generally lack the
reputation for seriousness that Cisco is credited with, even crystallizing
into a semi-mythological reputation for playing unfair on behalf of recipients
with refusals to license IOS ELX and even lucrative _hardware_ sales to
organizations which don't have CCIE on staff.

~~~
ocdtrekkie
From my understanding, Microsoft certs can be similarly challenging. And from
an IT industry standpoint, there's similar value in terms of partnership:
Microsoft partner levels depend on having Microsoft-certified professionals.

It will be interesting to see what they do here, for instance, the Datacenter
competency for Microsoft Gold partners requires MCSA:
[https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/membership/datacenter-
co...](https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/membership/datacenter-competency)

Right now, the document just says "we're working on something to replace
these".

------
_Understated_
Looks like they're basically throwing on-prem stuff under a bus now: All the
certs are for Azure-related stuff.[0]

[0] -
[https://query.prod.cms.rt.microsoft.com/cms/api/am/binary/RE...](https://query.prod.cms.rt.microsoft.com/cms/api/am/binary/RE4q70G)

~~~
orev
We have a winner! Microsoft is unabashedly trying to destroy on-prem IT. They
are cutting out every reseller, and directly telling users things like “this
feature that would make your life so much easier and make you look great in
front of the boss has been disabled by your control-freak system admin”. And
they have already tipped their hand that they intend to prevent admins from
having any control at all on future things. You can’t even install Windows
anymore without a Microsoft account (without jumping through ever-increasingly
complex hoops).

------
AdrianB1
I got my MCSE exactly 20 years ago; it had a different meaning at that time, S
was for System, not Solution. Today the company I work for has close to
100,000 computers in Active Directory and no plan to change that: most of
these computers are personal laptops and desktops, there is no move to cloud
for these. I have no idea what training and certification the new hires
working in the AD and Personal Computing teams will have to pursue, I will
have to check but it is definitely not a change in favor of simplicity.

~~~
syshum
>> most of these computers are personal laptops and desktops, there is no move
to cloud for these

While the OS will not move, Microsoft wants you to move to Azure AD and Intune
for Management instead of OnPrem AD and Group Policy

They want that monthly per device revenue, and I would not be shocked to see
EA CAL and Core CAL prices increased very soon to be more than the Equivalent
Cloud Product.

I think past 2019 Versions of Server Products it is about to become VERY VERY
expensive for companies to Continue with OnPrem Microsoft products.

better start looking at Directory389 and and FreeIPA..

Edit:

Since I am rated limited (posting too many controversial things)

I will edit my post to say MS has been signalling well since Ballmer left that
Onprem is deprecated and will be a second class citizen in their Line Up

This is just further moving down the path of eliminating all OnPrem for Azure,
5-10 years I would say MAX before they end all support for the Server Side of
OnPrem, or it will become Azure Stack and the only way to use Windows Services
is with a Hybrid Azure, so your OnPrem AD will be a Cached version of AzureAD

~~~
AdrianB1
Azure AD may be a decent solution if you have people doing Office and other
work all day long, not when you have manufacturing plants across the world in
places with poor Internet connections, SCADA and continuity plans that don't
involve reliable Internet. If you need that, the complexity of having on
premise AD and Azure AD is just cost with no benefits.

~~~
jedieaston
Wouldn't AD be just as painful in that instance, since replication could be
interrupted between other sites by connectivity outages and the local domain
controller could become out of sync?

~~~
2J0
We pushed federation caches over the signalling channel of ISDN2 as late as
2007. ISDN is the most commonly misunderstood and under appreciated
communications standard. During the early nineties ISSN acquired a horrible
reputation for incompatibility, but the very nature and value proposition of
ISDN remains the most adaptable and capable L0/1/2 communications standard
that was intentionally designed to adapt to and enable legacy protocols and
future transition requirements. This is why the D channel is capable of
transfer of user defined packet payloads up to 16kbps. Commonly dismissed as
the signalling channel, why was it designated as "D channel " and the commonly
presumed data channels, "B channels"?

The myriad problems and factors that assailed practical IDDN adoption in the
early days when a working ISDN interface was a genuine wonder not of miracles
in configuration but the capability delivered (we ran applications in
advertising that had financial trading style requirements for transactions and
the fact that advertising copy was delivered via ISDN was the kind of
integration that was envisioned originally)

Everyone is confusing me with their apparent over reaction to the connection
of cloud to remote sites. This was what CICS was written for fifty years ago.
I feel like I'm discussing state secrets every time I mention CICS. Can anyone
recall the killer feature of NT3.1? MTS, if you must have it. MTS is why
SQLserver was so easily portable to Linux. I suspect about everyone who reads
HN might have a ball with some of the desperately not trendy things we are
involved in. Like my uncle dusting his suit vests, smiling he only had to wait
thirty years for them to return to fashion. This is a universal interval
someone who can explain it will deserve a Nobel I'm sure...

~~~
temac
ISDN is an edge point to point protocol (although used to get on a network). I
don't really see how it has to do _specifically_ with anything related to AD
vs Azure (a data link is a data link, you could has well have used an analog
modem, or a custom solution involving an avian carrier), neither do I see how
ISDN should be considered as anything else than obsolete technology in all
regards nowadays, no matter the nostalgia factor.

BTW B channel is for "Bearer", and D is for "Delta" or maybe "Data". (Wild
hypothesis: maybe it was initially for "Data" at a time when B was seldom used
for things other than digitized voice possibly with a bit stolen for in-band
signaling)

On my side I consider that ATM was pretty sweet at a time when IP&co was
complete garbage (and still somewhat is), but I know who won.

As for CICS, well, mainframe are still not dead. I suspect they won't, because
why would they? But the model is not the same as the modern "cloud" stuff, at
all levels.

------
remir
Bold move by Microsoft. I get that the cloud is more lucrative, but I feel
like this is a bit premature. Plenty of businesses aren't ready to switch to
the cloud and it seems like MS and others want to push this illusion of
"everybody is doing it and you should too".

~~~
iforgotpassword
It seems overly confident. They know the majority of business depend on their
OS, AD and office suite so they can f them real hard and get away with it. So
either they know really where the boundary is and calculated this well, or
they already know that all this stuff will go away and accepted their fate. Or
they are being really stupid here and rapidly turn themselves into just
another cloud provider.

~~~
2J0
They're turning our dens into the next generation datacenter and personally I
won't be happy until our furnace is substituted for radiators that are heat
sinks / backplanes for the various 1U * servers I'd like instead of overpriced
home automation systems and poor entertainment hardware that is bettered by
miles for much less by actual professional production gear __and this is how I
dream we 're going to be able to heat the homes of our elderly people who not
too long hence will count among their number this comment author or rather my
wife and my ashes after I expire from shock at human kind managing a drinking
session in a brewery. But I have hope, sure and certain hope, as my faith's
liturgy inters it's believers...(I think of religion like a lost advanced
technology that has become entirely misunderstood and its uses forgotten or
even despised because maybe like LISP having faith in our fellow humanity is
plain hard and involves too many macros. But that's the kit of my digression
into that subject, I am merely so deeply worried about global events that I
fear a retrograde to exactly what of theology is most abhorrent and
destructive though ephemerally consoling. This race of man needs to work
afresh to understand anew everything, I believe, and I already think I'm
seeing the failures of modern civilisation caused by the passing of the last
generation who learned the hardest way to work first towards better life for
all and trust that wealth will subsequently follow, instead we're almost
entirely product now of gaming the edge cases of capitalism which cases should
instead be solved to enable the future to be built)

 _(preferably the open computing rack spec or maybe something entirely
different and more suitably designed. This area is ripe for patents and I 'm
looking for like minds to establish some prior art in anticipation of bad
actors especially the mostly unprofitable energy utilities, and I've legal and
development budget carved out of my savings to do so on my hunch I can
reasonably ask to be made whole if the product is useful)

_* slightly involved investigation showed me I can assemble the most excellent
home theater system from pro equipment for plenty less than close to the
higher end of consumer systems, while giving my family the facility almost
every way equal to a professional post production studio. This isn't Lutron.
Lutron don't sell DANTE routing/ volume controls and switching with display to
fit into our light switch soffets. But Teac do for a modest sum. DANTE is the
most advanced pro audio live audio interface over Ethernet so we'll be able to
connect our daughters keyboard music workstation to the DAC in our den, which
can record 32 channels of 5Mhz sample sound to SD card, or have a computer
patched in by a inexpensive Yamaha PCIe (v4!) card capable of incredible
wonders and software process for Dolby and Auro3D (a lesser known but arguably
far better surround format originally adopted by Skywalker and big studios and
now part of the IMAX 8K spec. This is software processing and we can record as
easily as play. We aimed to beat a dealerships quote for a "safely not high
end but show off what's possible today not tomorrow please " setup and managed
by a pleasant amount.

.... all I have written looks like prime Azure/IoT candidate income sources to
my vision of the not distant future. Of course Microsoft is bold. How can you
be anything but hold at trillion dollars scales? How can you move the needle
unless you're playing with a big stack? I amuse myself with thoughts about
splitting Microsoft's businesses now and separating cloud from on premises
lines. This makes sense to me as a business decision that would help the
company to thrive whilst enabling the less connected economic world to access
software systems that aren't subsidies for the cloud computing competition. I
think Azure is a better standalone business than integrated. This may require
a long term investment from shareholders. But our 401ks need genuine growth
stocks. The legacy business will serve the world being served by the Melinda
and Bill Gates Foundation today. That's a sympathy for the good in every way
possible that I've thought about it. I would separate the IP and patent
portfolio into a trust in recognition of Microsoft business in the OSS world
which needs assurance and support but by separating the on premise Microsoft
from Azure, the on prem Microsoft can now compete with open source
alternatives. Equally this is the open source movements greatest opportunity
for all time. Who cares about the Year Of Desktop Linux if Microsoft is
abandoning the desktop? We won already. So did Microsoft. Pooh, capitalism is
about growing pies for real? Hand me my defibrillator!

------
bunsenhoneydew
Good. I spent about 15 years hiring and managing MS devs and these certs were
always a red flag to me. It almost guaranteed the person would only know the
MS exam way and would have no critical thinking capabilities. They also rarely
knew anything beyond the MS world.

They were a very strong indicator of someone’s ability to pass an exam, not
that they were a good engineer.

From talking to other disciplines, the networking and infra certs were useful
but everything I saw about dev certs was negative.

I guess they were useful in helping thin down a pile of CVs as these went
straight to the bottom.

~~~
badrabbit
I've heard that reasoning of certs under different IT disciplines from
different managers as well. To me, the fact that you think that way is a
redflag that you don't do technical interviews right and perhaps you haven't
managed to train people right either.

The cert only tells you that they know the $cert way of doing things and that
in itself shows minimal competency as opposed to someone making things up. A
cert says nothing about other abilities such as critical thinking and abstract
reasoning. It only helps you decide whether or not you should call them in for
an interview. Your technical interview should include practical questions that
filter out candidates that can't be bothered to research a subject and stick
to the cert way no matter what.

~~~
mixmastamyk
Yep, GP rant is middle-brow dismissal.

------
linuxftw
I've been out of the Microsoft loop for a while (thankfully). Their new certs
are confusing, it's not really clear what the person that does the "Active
Directory" stuff even needs at this point.

MCSA was pretty straight forward, not really much marketing fluff. "System
Admin" right in the name of the cert. Matched industry job titles and
responsibilities.

"Microsoft 365 Certified: Teams Administrator Associate"

Does that have to do with Microsoft Teams? The description talks about "Office
365." Microsoft has lost their minds with this 365 nonsense. "Administrator
Associate" also sounds inferior to "Administrator". Is this an entry level
certification? It used to be somewhat simple hierarchy: Administrator,
Engineer, Architect in the IT world. Now it's buzzword soup everywhere.

~~~
illnewsthat
>"Microsoft 365 Certified: Teams Administrator Associate"

> Does that have to do with Microsoft Teams? The description talks about
> "Office 365."

This part seems fairly clear to me. Teams is a product inside of the Office
365 family of products. So that certification would be for someone that wants
to be an administrator for Teams.

That being said, I do agree with some of your points: like "Administrator
Associate" is a bit confusing. Administrators are typically farther along than
associates I would think. Office 365 is for the productivity apps (including
Teams), and then Microsoft 365 is for Win 10 + Office 365 + Security things...
could get confusing quick.

~~~
marcosdumay
> Administrators are typically farther along than associates I would think.

I just never heard "associate" used in reference to a title on anything
related to informatics.

~~~
sah2ed
What about the “associate” in the entry-level CCNA (Cisco Certified Network
Associate)?

------
jeroen
Source, with a list of the more than 40 exams that will be retired:
[https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/learning/community-blog-
post...](https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/learning/community-blog-
post.aspx?BlogId=8&Id=375282)

------
js4ever
I feel like it's not only certs that are retiring, most MS dev/sysadmin I know
(myself included as MCSA) have moved to linux stacks in the past 3 years

~~~
AdrianB1
There is an ever increasing number of Linux servers, that is correct, but
there is still a huge base of personal PC's (laptops, desktops) running
Windows in Active Directory in many companies; there is still specialized
software that runs only on Windows even on servers - I know in the area I work
the top options are Windows only - so there is still need for Windows admins.

------
syshum
People should make their Opinions heard,

[https://trainingsupport.microsoft.com/en-
us/mcp/forum/all/pe...](https://trainingsupport.microsoft.com/en-
us/mcp/forum/all/petition-to-delay-the-mcsa-
deadline/4e080e20-a7b4-4cf0-a557-329d800f84a6)

Probably will not do anything but...

------
garganzol
Microsoft is a pale shade of its former self. Many argue that Ballmer
departure was a good thing™. But I am sure it was the tipping point for a
progressing irrelevancy. The situation is unlikely to change any time soon.
Microsoft is bloodless and dying.

Azure brings them cool money now, but that's a temporary thing. Fast forward
some years and they will degenerate into a hosting company.

Why? Because software is the king. The cost of software distribution is
negligible, and hardware is commodity.

How? Imagine Kubernetes + Digital Ocean combo. Are they a big threat to Azure?
Not at all. Digital Ocean is sweet and beloved, but Kubernetes is hard and
clunky.

Now imagine a piece of software that eliminates all deficiencies. Let's call
it The Killer. Now we have The Killer + Digital Ocean combo vs Azure. And not
only Digital Ocean participates, take any other VPS or cloud-rental company.
Take any other computer in the world.

Azure the Goliath will be defeated by millions of Davids in a blink of an eye.

Microsoft the company is going to face a harsh reality. And given the
direction it follows today, it will have negligible chances of survival by
then.

------
altmind
What are the options to have windows domain controller? We got some 20-30
windows7 and 10 pcs and need to centrally manage them - with profile roaming,
with SMB ACL, and Administrative policies.

With this strong push towards Azure, there is still no replacement for AD,
neither samba reached the point of being a primary controller replacement. Are
active directory domain services supposed to be an alternative? It seems to me
they only provide ldaps and able to login on windows, but no trusts and
nothing to enable sharing ACLs.

So for a new deployment, with ample time to learn the options, I still have to
setup some redundant windows servers, with AD and trusts, the old way.

~~~
jlgaddis
If you're already using Azure, then Azure AD might be an option to look into
if you're not wanting to run your own Domain Controllers. Otherwise, you can
continue running them just as you've been able to for the last 20 years.

Retiring these certifications has exactly zero to do with any Active Directory
or Domain Controller functionality.

(To me, yours seems a bit of an odd question, so I apologize if I'm maybe
missing something in your question.)

------
webwanderings
MCSE was good, back in the days, prior to the proliferation of Internet and
virtualization technologies. It taught fundamental networking and bare server
under the hood. Not sure what new learners learn these days amid all the
virtual abstractions, etc.

------
LargoLasskhyfv
LOL. Finally! I had that MCSE thing for Windows NT4/Networking and IIS. What
an utter waste of time. I had to _actively ignore_ most of what i knew already
to pass the braindead questionairies. It wasn't all BS, especially in
networking, but mostly...?

Anyways, it smelled scammy, it empowered scammy tutors to scam scammy
institutions to scam scammy people to scam employers into employing them. A
whole market of scammers.

That is why i cut the card in two and BURNED it in public at the end :-)

(Don't panic, there was an ashtray...)

------
mixmastamyk
I do wish there was a ‘skip tech interviews’ cert that was taken seriously.

------
TrumpMyGuns
Will this affect my ability to receive useless answers on their community run
support forum?

~~~
AdrianB1
The community answers are not really their fault, I think the moderators are
not meant to be a higher level of support when the community answers suck. The
useful answers are from their paid support like in many other cases, for
everything else there is Stackoverflow.

