Certified Data Centre Professional

Training

With few exceptions, enterprises today rely on IT for the delivery of business-
critical services - often directly to the end consumer. It is therefore vital that
the mission-critical data centre is designed, maintained and operated with
high-availability and efficiency in mind. However, the fact is most data
centres do not meet the full availability, capacity, safety or efficiency
requirements that are often demanded. The ever-changing technologies put
even more pressure on data centre managers along with the faster pace at
which these changes are required.

The Certified Data Centre Professional course is provided over three-days

and is designed to expose participants to the key components of the data
centre. It will address how to setup and improve key aspects such as power,
cooling, security, cabling, safety, etc, to ensure a high-available data centre.
It will also address key operations and maintenance aspects.

Global Accreditation and recognition

www.deesmith.co.za
Location: Cape Town, South Africa.

Date: 9 – 11 September 2015

Course instructor: Lee Smith

Lee is a certified trainer and uses a combination of lectures and

question-and-answer sessions, to discuss participants’ specific
needs and issues experienced in their own environment.

Participants are able to tap into Lee’s extensive experience to

enable them to solve practical problems in their current
environment, thus adding tremendous value.

Contact: info@deesmith.co.za
Phone: +27 (011) 575 3359
Course Benefits
After completion of the course the participant will be able to:

Choose an optimum site for mission-critical data centre

based on current and future needs.
Describe all components that are important for high
availability in a data centre and how to effectively setup
the data centre.
Name and apply the various industry standards.
Describe the various technologies for UPS, fire suppression,
cooling, monitoring systems, cabling standards, etc, and
to select and apply them effectively to cost-efficiently
enhance the high-availability of the data centre.
Review the electrical distribution system to avoid
costly downtime.
Enhance cooling capabilities and efficiency in the data
centre by using existing and new techniques and
technologies for the increased cooling requirements of
the future.
Design a highly reliable and scalable network architecture
and learn how to ensure installers apply proper testing
techniques.
Create effective maintenance contracts with equipment
suppliers ensuring the best return on investment
Setup effective data centre monitoring ensuring the
right people get the right message.
Ensure proper security measures, both procedural and
technical, are established to safeguard your company's
valuable information in the data centre.

Examination
Certification exams are administered at the end of the last
training day by an authorised training partner, using paper-
based format. The exam is a 60-minute closed book exam,
with 40 multiple-choice questions. The candidate requires a
minimum of 27 correct answers to pass the exam. Paper-
based exam results will be known within one week.

Certification
Candidates who successfully pass the exam will receive the
official ‘Certified Data Centre Professional’ certificate.
The certification is valid for three years after which the
student needs to re-certify. More information is available on
the EPI corporate website at www.epi-ap.com.
 Course Syllabus
• The Data Centre, it’s Importance and Causes for • Cooling Infrastructure
Downtime • Temperature and humidity recommendations
• Data Centre Standards and Best Practices • Cooling measurement units and conversion rates
• Sensible and latent heat definitions
• Data Centre Location, Building and Construction
• Differences between comfort and precision cooling
• Selecting appropriate sites and buildings and how to
avoid pitfalls • Overview of different air conditioner technologies
• Various components of an effective data centre and • Raised floor versus non-raised floor cooling
supporting facilities setup • Placement of air conditioner units and limitations to be
observed
• Raised Floor/Suspended Ceiling • Supplemental cooling options
• Uniform, concentrated and rolling load definitions • Cold aisle/hot aisle containment
• Applicable standards
• Raised floor guidelines • Water Supply
• Signal Reference Grid, grounding of racks • Importance of water supply and application areas
• Disability act and regulations • Backup water supply techniques
• Suspended ceiling usage and requirements • Designing a Scalable Network Infrastructure
• Light • The importance of a Structured Cabling System
• Standards • Planning considerations
• Light fixture types and placement • Copper and Fibre cable technology and standards
• Emergency lighting, Emergency Power Supply (EPS) • ANSI/TIA-942 Cabling hierarchy and recommendations
• Testing and verification
• Power Infrastructure • SAN storage cabling
• Power infrastructure layout from generation to rack • Network redundancy
level
• ATS and STS systems • Building-to-building connectivity
• Redundancy levels and techniques • Network monitoring system requirements
• Three-phase and single-phase usage • Fire Suppression
• Power distribution options within the computer room • Standards for fire suppression
• Power cabling versus bus bar trunking • Detection systems
• Bonding versus grounding • Various total flooding fire suppression techniques and
• Common Mode Noise and isolation transformers systems, their benefits and disadvantages
• Distribution boards, form factors and IP-protection • Handheld extinguishers
grades • Signage and safety
• Power quality guidelines • Regulatory requirements and best practices
• Real power versus apparent power
• Data Centre Monitoring
• How to size and calculate load in the data centre
• Data centre monitoring requirements
• Generators
• EMS versus BMS
• Static and dynamic UPS systems, selection criteria, how
they operate and energy efficiency option • Water leak detection systems
• Battery types, correct selection and testing • Notification options and considerations
• Thermo-graphics • Operational Security and Safety Practices
• Electro Magnetic Fields • Data centre security layers
• Electrical fields and magnetic fields definitions and • Physical, infrastructure and organisational security
units of measurements • Safety measures and essential signage
• Sources of EMF
• Effects of EMF on human health and equipment • Labelling
• (H)EMP • Choosing a labelling scheme
• Standards • Recommended labelling practices
• EMF shielding solutions • Network labelling

• Equipment Racks • Documentation

• Rack standards, properties and selection criteria • How to setup proper documentation
• Security considerations • Document management policies and procedures
• Power rail/strip options • Cleaning
• Cleaning practices for the data centre
• MTBF/MTTR
• Standards and definitions
• Calculation models
• The ‘real’ value
• Maintenance Contacts/SLA/OLA
• Mock Exam
• EXAM: Certified Data Centre Professional
Profile of Dee Smith & Associates

The core competencies of Dee Smith & Associates is about bringing together
strategic definition and planning and combining it with focussed program
execution. CIO’s struggle to convey on strategic imperatives such as the
contribution I.T., the growth of an enterprise and the realisation of business-
strategic initiatives. The passionate resolution of these types of challenges
has inspired the establishment of our company which prides itself on visible
results and successful engagements.

For I.T. to be effective and efficient demands a balanced view of execution

and assigning resources to business priorities. Balancing current operations
with new innovation and related initiatives requires detailed focus on
aligning project execution and strategy. Perfecting this balance creates
competitive advantages and sustainability. To be able to continuously
improve this capability requires implementing appropriate and relevant
disciplines such as:

• Processes
• Engineering
• Governance
• Execution capability
• Strategy formulation

Being able to deliver on the above key disciplines and become accountable
will provide an enterprise with the ability to meet the requirements of the
envisaged business strategy. This will be achieve using via sustainable
changes to deliver upon targets and measured outcomes.

www.deesmith.co.za