I’ve reached the second checkpoint of my Kubeastronaut journey! This time, it’s all about security — a topic I honestly never cared much about. I used to think, “Come on, I just want to make the system work. Let someone else deal with security.” 😄

Well, that’s half a joke, of course. In reality, you do need to make sure that what you build is secure. There’s no such thing as a system that can’t be hacked, but you can at least make sure the basics are covered. For example, don’t set the username to admin and the password to admin. At least write admin backwards or something. 😎

Preparing for the KCSA exam was quite an experience — mainly because, honestly, there aren’t many resources out there. Or maybe I just couldn’t find them. I managed to come across two different mock exams, which were incredibly helpful. I’ll share the links at the end of this post.

Since there weren’t many materials, I relied heavily on NotebookLM this time. It’s great for creating quizzes and flashcards. I uploaded my existing Kubernetes notes and asked it to generate questions and flashcards for me. That’s how I practiced most of the time.

Because of the limited resources, I thought, “Maybe I should take a look at CKS — after all, KCSA is basically its smaller sibling.” So I found a Udemy course about CKS. I didn’t finish it completely, but the instructor was really good, and it helped a lot.

As for the exam itself… I studied, but not in too much detail. It’s an associate-level certification — how hard could it be, right? And honestly, it wasn’t hard, but some questions came from topics I barely looked at, which was a bit scary. I remember thinking, “What’s NIST again?” I think I got two or three questions about that. I can’t remember exactly because of the exam stress, but that part was a little intimidating. The rest of the questions were fine — pretty familiar stuff, actually. Maybe I just knew a bit more than I thought.

In my daily work, I mostly use Kubernetes as a service from cloud providers, so they take care of a lot of the heavy lifting. That means I can sometimes skip over details that are already handled for me. It makes life easier, sure — but also a bit too comfortable. So I decided to build my own homelab this time. I was getting bored at home anyway, and it sounded like a fun challenge. I’ll write another post once I start setting it up — what I bought, how I built it, and what I learned from it.

Useful links:

• Kubernetes Security KCSA Mock Exam (Thiago S. Shimada Ramos)
• Udemy – Certified Kubernetes Security Specialist (CKS) Course
• Certified Kubernetes Security Specialist (CKS) Study Guide — Benjamin Muschko
• NotebookLM

So that’s another checkpoint cleared — KCSA, done. Next up are the big ones: CKA and CKAD in November, and CKS in December. Until then, I’ll keep studying — maybe by then, I’ll finally become a real astronaut.