I initially created the Cloud Resume Challenge [0] a couple of years ago because I was seeing a huge wave of people trying to get "six-figure cloud jobs" off the back of little more than a couple of certifications. This is not sufficient and it contributes to the industry's bad attitude toward hiring and mentoring juniors.<p>The goal of the CRC was to set people new to cloud a REAL challenge: not to give them a paint-by-numbers tutorial, but to lay out a spec that would require them to open a bunch of search tabs, stay up late, go down rabbit holes, and learn through pain. It self-selects for people who are self-motivated and know how to learn.<p>If you try the Cloud Resume Challenge and can't complete it, or you hate it, then you'll have learned a valuable lesson about whether you really want a job in the cloud right now - because these are the type of problems that cloud teams really work on.<p>But if you can complete the Cloud Resume Challenge, you will learn something about:<p>Front end and back end software development<p>Cloud services and "serverless"<p>Cloud networking, particularly DNS and CDNs<p>Cloud security<p>DevOps principles (version control, infrastructure-as-code, CI/CD)<p>And you'll learn by doing, because the spec doesn't give you enough help to figure any of this out without a lot of trial and error. It's a messy way to learn, but reality is messy. That's why it works as a talking point in real-life job interviews.<p>People sometimes get hung up on the "resume" part of the Cloud Resume Challenge, saying "who would be impressed by a resume site?" Fine, whatever, put something else on your site, it doesn't have to be your resume. (Though I believe personal websites are underrated as learning tools, simply because they give you built-in motivation to keep maintaining and updating the site over time, which gives 90% of the value in any side project.) The important thing is to build something real, something with a purpose in the world - not a toy tutorial. That will give you a baptism by fire that you will not forget.<p>Last thing: though there is a guidebook [1] for the challenge that you can buy (actually 3, one for each cloud! I just updated them! They're great!) the challenge itself is and will remain free for everyone to do. Happy to answer any questions - the CRC is not my job, it's a passion project and I'm always open to suggestions for how to make it a better experience.<p>[0] https://cloudresumechallenge.dev/docs/the-challenge
[1] https://cloudresumechallenge.dev/book/