Skip to content

📖 Cert Study Guides

Status: ✅ Complete Priority: 📌 Important (Tier 2) Category: 🎬 Content / 💼 Official Created: 2026-04-10 Completed: 2026-04-11 Part of: Free Tools Section Live at: aguidetocloud.com/cert-tracker/ Roadmap: aguidetocloud.com/cert-tracker/roadmap/

The Problem

Microsoft constantly updates certification exam objectives. Students spend weeks studying outdated material because they didn't know the exam changed.

The Solution

A certification hub at aguidetocloud.com/cert-tracker/ that:

  • 📊 Tracks 41 active Microsoft certification exams across 7 categories
  • 📋 Shows current skills measured (objectives with percentage weights)
  • 📖 Links to Microsoft Learn study resources for each exam
  • 🔍 Filterable by category, level, and search
  • 🔄 Weekly change detection — structured tree-diff on exam objectives
  • 📡 RSS feed for exam change alerts
  • 🎯 Direct links to practice assessments and official exam pages

Architecture

Same proven pipeline pattern as AI News and M365 Roadmap:

┌──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  GitHub Actions (Weekly Cron — Sundays 5:00 UTC)         │
│                                                          │
│  1. fetch_exams.py  → Study guide markdown from Learn    │
│  2. diff_engine.py  → Structured tree-diff vs previous   │
│  3. generate_data.py → Index + per-exam JSON + RSS       │
│  4. Push data to main site + deploy                      │
└──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Tech Stack

Component Tech Cost
Data source Microsoft Learn study guide pages (markdown endpoint) $0
Exam list Curated config (exams.json) — 44 exams tracked $0
Diff engine Python — structured tree-diff, content hashing $0
Scheduling GitHub Actions weekly cron $0
Frontend Hugo + vanilla JS, emerald (#10B981) theme $0
Hosting Azure SWA (existing) $0
Total $0

Key Decisions & Learnings

  1. Learn Catalog API is INCOMPLETE — Missing flagship exams (AZ-900, AI-900, SC-900, etc.). Only 25 of 137 exams had providers. Switched to curated exam config + direct study guide scraping.

  2. Markdown endpoint is gold — ?accept=text/markdown on Learn pages returns clean markdown with YAML front matter (updated_at, git_commit_id). Much better than HTML scraping.

  3. Split JSON for performance — Index (49 KB) for listing + per-exam detail files (8 KB avg) loaded on demand via modal. Total 340 KB across 41 files.

  4. Rubber-duck agent caught the API issue — The critique flagged that the Catalog API was incomplete BEFORE we built anything. Saved significant rework.

Data Coverage

Category Exams Example Codes
Azure 12 AZ-900, AZ-104, AZ-305, AZ-500, AZ-802 🧪
Security 7 SC-900, SC-100, SC-200, SC-300, SC-500 🧪
AI 6 AI-900, AI-102, AI-901 🧪, AI-103 🧪
Data 6 DP-900, DP-100, DP-300, DP-420, DP-750 🧪
Microsoft 365 5 MS-900, MS-102, MS-700, MD-102
Power Platform 6 PL-900, PL-200, PL-300, PL-400
Dynamics 365 10 MB-210, MB-230, MB-310, MB-800, MB-820

Interactive Features (all on every study guide page)

# Feature How it works
1 ✅ Study Progress Checkboxes Tick off objectives as you study, localStorage persistence
2 📊 Progress Bar "35 of 57 (61%)" with emerald fill, reset button
3 ⏰ Retirement Countdown "47 days remaining" on 10 retiring exams
4 🖨️ Print Checklist One-click clean B&W print of objectives
5 ⏱️ Prep Time Estimate 2-4 weeks (Fund), 4-8 (Assoc), 6-12 (Expert)
6 📅 Study Plan Generator Pick exam date → weekly plan by domain weight
7 🔗 What to Study Next Cross-links to related exams (from JSON)
8 📋 TOC Numbered List Auto-built from h2 headings
9 🔄 Collapsible Sections Click h3 to expand/collapse skill domains

Certification Roadmap Page

  • URL: /cert-tracker/roadmap/
  • Style: Kanban board — 6 category swim lanes × 3 level columns
  • Design iterations: Tree ❌ → Metro ❌ → Card grid ❌ → Kanban ✅
  • Data-driven from latest.json, auto-updates weekly

Repos

  • Pipeline: susanthgit/cert-tracker (private)
  • Frontend: Part of susanthgit/aguidetocloud-revamp