Lerning Platform and Certification

[gywerd]

Background

Microsoft retired MCPD in 2016 and then MCSA,MCSD & MCSE this january - apparently shifting focus to cloud development. Currently Microsoft LEARN has no plan on replacing them within the role based certifications - leaving a gap for desktop development, SQL-development etc.

Perspective

This is a great opportunity for the .NET Foundation to deliver training and certification independent of the Microsoft cloud-platforms. At least for the next 5-10 years, there will still be a need for desktop applications - and cross-platform

Proposal - Official Training and Certification

The proposal is to initiate a platform for learning the C#-language and development software development with the .NET technologies:

• C# 9+ development
  • Basic
  • Advanced
  • Master
• GUI-development
  • WinUI 3
  • .NET MAUI
• ASP.NET 5+ development
• EF Core 5+ development
• C++/CLI development
  • C++/WinRT
• Experimental development (hatching future .NET contributors)
  • thin layer interoperating programming languages
    • C
    • C++
    • Objective-C
    • Swift
    • Kotlin
    • Rust
    • Pearl
  • native GUI-development with XAML
    • Gtk3
    • Cocoa/Cocoa touch
    • SwiftUI
    • Android UI
  • Roslyn Compiler Modification
    • Supporting other programming languages
    • Aot compiling to Machine Language (avoid runtime inteception)

Additionally the platform could offer inexpensive, quality certification e.g.:

• Certified C# Programmer
• Certified Application Developer
• Certified UI/UX Developer
• Certified EF core Developer
• Certified Software Tester
• Certified Software Architect
• Certified Software Engineer
• Certified DevSecOps Developer
• Certified Innpvative Developer

What is needed

• Webplatform with learning materials etc.
  • HTML5, CSS# & JavaScript based?
  • ASP.NET based?
  • Orchard CMS?
• Certification examination
  • internally proctored examination?
  • through channels like Pearson VUE?
• Experienced contributors developing quality learning materials
• If possible, Microsoft donating their relevant learning materials and retired tests

How can I contribute

• Experienced software developer
• Didactics
• Experience with remote & self study
• Experience with blended learning
• Analysis
• Systematization
• Devoloping & reviewing learning materials
• Ûbernerd 😜

[vertonghenb]

Just heard about this initiative and we'd love to help out. I'm not sure if this is the right place to get in contact but I hope it will find its way. We're a team of 3 lecturers at the University of Applied Sciences and Arts Ghent (Belgium) we're teaching Enterprise C# Web Development in the last year in the Bachelor of Applied Information Technology. Currently we have an open source course with the following goals:

• Has a deep understanding of the .NET framework.
• Can create a client web application using Blazor.
• Can create a REST|GRPC Web API using ASP.NET.
• Can connect clients to server applications using various protocols.
• Can use different (micro)-ORM Technologies to persist data.
• Can integrate authorization and authentication in the application.
• Can test software using unit and integration tests.
• Can deploy production-ready applications on Microsoft Azure.
• Can use various design patterns and best practices.

Technologies:

• C# 10
• HTML in combination with Razor
• CSS in combination with BULMA (like bootstrap but without JavaScript)
• ASP.NET 6 with Blazor WASM
• Entity Framework 6 | Dapper
• ...

The course:

We've created a simple portal with 11 chapters and some optional chapters which can be found here.
The course is open source and can be found here.

A small impression of the course:

@katiesavage, @frankodoom how can we help? you can send me an email at benjamin.vertonghen@hogent.be.