We've Added New Tests: Kubernetes and GPC Tests

Last updated on Mar 13, 2024

Since releasing our first test to assess cloud skills on Amazon Web Services, we knew we wanted to offer skills assessments for all the major Cloud providers. Lately, we've been working hard to do just that.

New DevOps Assessments Added to Our Testing Library

This month, we released two tests for Google Cloud: a short test for more junior engineers, and a more complex test tailored for mid to senior candidates.

We also decided to release an easier version of our most popular Kubernetes test that will provide quick validation of whether an engineer knows how to work with applications running on Kubernetes. This test was designed so it could be used by both software engineers and cloud engineers (DevOps, Cloud, SREs).

We added these junior-level assessments to our testing library because many of our clients expressed an interest in faster and easier skills assessments that would take only 15-20 min to complete, while still providing the same high-quality standard of assessing engineers' hands-on skills in certain technologies.

Read on to learn more about the new tests we are launching this month.

GCP Skills Assessments

Both Google Cloud Platform (GCP) tests provide candidates access to the Google Cloud console to work with cloud resources. Each candidate's test is created in a separate Google Cloud project, so their testing environment is completely isolated from others.

Unlike AWS, Google Cloud doesn't allow the creation of usernames and passwords to access the GCP Console, so this means a candidate must have a Google account to log in to the GCP Console.

To overcome this limitation and to provide a seamless experience for candidates, we've implemented the Workforce Identity Federation. This allows candidates to use existing their Brokee credentials to log in to Google Cloud to complete skill tests.

This experience proved to be even more convenient than creating users on AWS, so in the future, we will attempt to achieve the same workflow for our AWS tests.

Similar to AWS and other tests on Brokee, hiring teams can still expect to receive the same detailed reports for each candidate. We will provide a history of user activity and AI summaries of the candidate's performance.

Junior Kubernetes Assessment

Our most popular test for Kubernetes is often considered pretty difficult for mid-level - and even sometimes senior - applicants!

In addition to needing to know their way around Kubernetes (which is complex on its own), engineers need to understand how external-dns and cert-manager can be used together to automatically create DNS records and SSL certificates for the application running on Kubernetes.

We usually see one of three things when candidates take this test:

a) they solve the test completely in a reasonable time frame (1-2 hours),

b) they complete 70-80% but have a tough time

c) they can't do it at all.

Not all engineers who work with Kubernetes necessarily have (or need!) a deep understanding of Kubernetes administration. Some developers just need to be able to deploy simple applications, while their colleagues do Kubernetes administration.

This made us realize that a simpler test would be sufficient to filter out the majority of unqualified candidates, and checking core Kubernetes functionality would be more applicable to a wider pool of companies.

Introducing our Kubernetes Junior Test!...

This test can be used for software developers or junior DevOps candidates (even though some would argue that there are no Juniors in DevOps 😈).

Candidates will fix configuration errors in a Kubernetes application to make it run correctly on the cluster. This should be a quick puzzle for those with at least some knowledge of Kubernetes.

Thank you for reading - we invite you to try out our new tests with your teammates or hiring candidates, and let us know what you think. What's coming up next month? We are developing skills assessments for Azure, stay tuned!

And if you missed last month's newsletter, check it out here.