The Red Hat Certified Specialist in OpenShift Administration exam (EX280) tests the knowledge, skills, and ability to create, configure, and manage a cloud application platform using Red Hat® OpenShift® Container Platform.

By passing this exam, you become a Red Hat Certified Specialist, which also counts toward becoming a Red Hat Certified Architect (RHCA®).

This exam is based on Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4.6.

Audience for this exam

• System and Software Architects who need an understanding of the features and functionality of an OpenShift Container Platform cluster.
• System Administrators who need to support the initial establishment of an OpenShift cluster.
• Cluster Operators who need to support ongoing maintenance of an OpenShift cluster.
• Site Reliability Engineers who need to support the ongoing maintenance and troubleshooting of an OpenShift cluster.
• System administrators who want to demonstrate their OpenShift Container Platform skills
• Red Hat Certified Engineers (RHCEs) who wish to become a Red Hat Certified Architect (RHCA)
• System administrators or developers who are working in a DevOps environment using Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform

Prerequisites for this exam

• Become a Red Hat Certified System Administrator (RHCSA) or have comparable work experience and skills
• Take the Red Hat OpenShift Administration II: Operating a Production Kubernetes Cluster (DO280) course or have comparable work experience using OpenShift Container Platform
• Review the Red Hat Certified Specialist in OpenShift Administration exam (EX280) objectives
• Experience with container technology is recommended
• Take our free assessment to find the course that best supports your preparation for this exam

Preparation

Red Hat encourages you to consider taking Red Hat OpenShift I: Containers & Kubernetes (DO180) and Red Hat OpenShift Administration II: Operating a Production Kubernetes Cluster (DO280) to help prepare for this exam. Attendance in these classes is not required; students can choose to take just the exam.

While attending Red Hat classes can be an important part of your preparation, attending class does not guarantee success on the exam. Previous experience, practice, and native aptitude are also important determinants of success.

Many books and other resources on system administration for Red Hat products are available. Red Hat does not endorse any of these materials as preparation guides for exams. Nevertheless, you may find additional reading helpful to deepen your understanding.

Exam format

This exam is a performance-based evaluation of skills and knowledge required to configure and manage Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform. You will perform the configuration and administrative tasks necessary to deploy Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform and are evaluated on whether you have met specific objective criteria. Performance-based testing means that you must perform tasks similar to what you perform on the job.

This exam can also be taken virtually as part of our remote testing format. Find out more about remote exams to see if this is the right choice for you.

Scores and reporting

Official scores for exams come exclusively from Red Hat Certification Central. Red Hat does not authorize examiners or training partners to report results to candidates directly. Scores on the exam are usually reported within 3 U.S. business days.

Exam results are reported as total scores. Red Hat does not report performance on individual items, nor will it provide additional information upon request.

Recommended next exam or course

• Red Hat OpenShift Administration III: Scaling Kubernetes Deployments in the Enterprise (DO380)

Study points for the exam

To help you prepare, these objectives highlight the task areas you can expect to see in the exam. Red Hat reserves the right to add, modify, and remove exam objectives. Such changes will be made public in advance.

To become a Red Hat Certified Specialist in OpenShift Administration, you should be able to perform these tasks:

• Manage OpenShift Container Platform
  • Use the command-line interface to manage and configure an OpenShift cluster
  • Use the web console to manage and configure an OpenShift cluster
  • Create and delete projects
  • Import, export, and configure Kubernetes resources
  • Examine resources and cluster status
  • View logs
  • Monitor cluster events and alerts
  • Troubleshoot common cluster events and alerts
  • Use product documentation
• Manage users and policies
  • Configure the HTPasswd identity provider for authentication
  • Create and delete users
  • Modify user passwords
  • Modify user and group permissions
  • Create and manage groups
• Control access to resources
  • Define role-based access controls
  • Apply permissions to users
  • Create and apply secrets to manage sensitive information
  • Create service accounts and apply permissions using security context constraints
• Configure networking components
  • Troubleshoot software defined networking
  • Create and edit external routes
  • Control cluster network ingress
  • Create a self signed certificate
  • Secure routes using TLS certificates
• Configure pod scheduling
  • Limit resource usage
  • Scale applications to meet increased demand
  • Control pod placement across cluster nodes
• Configure cluster scaling
  • Manually control the number of cluster workers
  • Automatically scale the number of cluster workers