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VMware Cloud Native Master Services Competency: What to know
VMware's Cloud Native Master Services Competency now offers certification and training on container management and Tanzu.
VMware created the Tanzu portfolio to enable customers to manage cloud applications and container-based infrastructure as readily as legacy systems. Now, corporations require training and certification support for Tanzu. VMware announced its first Tanzu certification in the form of its VMware Cloud Native Master Services Competency certification.
The shift from legacy, server-based to modern, cloud-based applications represents a dramatic change for organizations, and some might still hesitate to use VMware to manage cloud applications. Mission-critical applications typically run on VMs overseen by proprietary management platforms, such as vSphere. Containers, microservices and Kubernetes represent a quicker and more efficient method for running such applications. The Tanzu portfolio is VMware's rapidly evolving suite of tools to manage container-based applications.
VMware also built Kubernetes into its vSphere 7.0 flagship management platform. IT teams must now understand how to develop and support container-based applications, many of which span multi-cloud environments.
The transition from VMs to containers
The transition from VMs to containers requires organizations to embrace new methods for building applications, and to create repeatable processes for refactoring and replatforming existing applications. Organizations' underlying infrastructure must also evolve to support the new technology.
"Building applications with VMs is quite different than using containers," said Gary Chen, a research director at IDC.
VMware users who build and run applications on containers require help understanding those differences. IT organizations must adjust to managing container workloads, and corporations should write new business practices to reflect the evolving technology.
Inside VMware's cloud-native training program
Training and certification programs can help ease the transition. In July 2020, VMware announced its Cloud Native Master Services Competency (MSC), its first Tanzu-specific training program. This certification focuses on cloud-native applications, with an emphasis on containers, microservices, APIs and the open source Kubernetes container management technology.
The Cloud Native MSC certification validates an admin's understanding of Kubernetes concepts to build, run and manage containerized applications. The program highlights Tanzu Kubernetes Grid, designed to manage multi-cloud environments; and Tanzu Mission Control, which hosts Tanzu Kubernetes Grid as a managed service for public cloud environments.
"There are a lot of areas, such as security, where companies will need to build up new best practices as they embrace Tanzu," Chen said.
VMware offers MSCs in six areas:
- Cloud Management and Automation
- Cloud Native
- Data Center Virtualization
- Digital Workspace
- Network Virtualization
- VMware Cloud on AWS
Partners offering Tanzu training
VMware currently gears its Tanzu training course toward partners but intends to offer it to individuals in 2021. Several VMware partners are MSC-certified and now offer training courses as third parties, including:
- Altoros, an IT consulting firm, which offers a few dozen classes in areas such as microservices, Kubernetes, blockchain, Cloud Foundry and artificial intelligence.
- BoxBoat Technologies, which offers training courses in Kubernetes, Docker, DevOps and cloud-native technologies.
Corporations have embraced container-based development architectures. In fact, Dimensional Research found that, among enterprises running Kubernetes, 59% already use it in production. As VMware builds out its support for container-based environments via Tanzu to match its support for legacy systems, Tanzu training for VMware professionals becomes more necessary.
