There are multiple PDF converters available online. It is however always convenient to install a PDF converter on your PC, and I have already introduced you to PrimoPDF a while ago. I should note here that we are exclusively discussing a PDF converter for Windows, since Macs come with a built-in PDF printer.

An alternative to PrimoPDF that has been brought to my attention is FreePDF Creator from PDFConverter.com. The installation is very straightforward: just head to the website and download the software. After downloading the executable file (which is about 12 MB), double-click to install the converter. You need to supply a name and email in the installer, and you’re good to go.

To try the software, open the file that you need to convert to PDF – a Word or Excel file, for instance – and select File > Print (or the Office Button > Print). Select the printer named ‘FreePDF Creator’, and you are presented with a range of options within the software’s simple interface.

The first of these options concerns the quality of your PDF document, where the available options are ‘Web Ready’, ‘Print Quality’ and ‘Prepress Quality’. The second option allows you to customize the PDF document with a title, author and subject, while the third option enables you to secure the document with passwords.

A full-fledged PDF editor is available on the website, called PDF Converter Elite. This is an alternative to the famous Adobe Acrobat, much like the NitroPDF from PrimoPDF.

It is preferable to have a PDF converter installed on your PC, in case an Internet connection is not available and you cannot use web-based solutions. FreePDF Creator is a PDF converter that is both lightweight and user-friendly; I recommend that you give it a try.

If you are a project manager or a project planner, and particularly if you work in the construction industry, you cannot have missed Primavera software, particularly Primavera Project Planner – or P3.  You also know that, for a very longtime, it was almost impossible to find a decent reference in the market for this high-end project management tool. Just go to Amazon – for example – and search for ‘Primavera’: the book we are about to discuss comes out on top, while other publications are either outdated, expensive or hard to find.

The Premise

An explanation is in order: a veteran of Primavera scheduling software, I have worked on Primavera Project Planner since 1994, during the MS-DOS days. Primavera Systems – that’s what the company was called then, way before it was acquired by Oracle – shipped with the software a couple of thick manuals that helped prospective users learn the package. That was a welcome bonus to the accelerated training that my colleagues and I received at that time.

However, Primavera was unlike, say, AutoCAD, the famous engineering design and drafting tool. You could easily buy a comprehensive reference on AutoCAD from a publishing house like Sybex to learn AutoCAD on your own time – the books even came with a demo CD containing an evaluation version of the package. I had AutoCAD books for releases 11 and 13, (respectively on DOS and Windows) for instance. But Primavera users? No such luck: the books published for them were hard to come by, and when they existed, they were complicated, insanely expensive or just not normally available in libraries. Believe me  – I have tried, for years on end!

The Answer

I was therefore pleased to find a reference on Primavera – now called P6 – that was recently published by Packt Publishing. The book is about 350 pages long and can be downloaded as an e-book for around $30, or as a combined book/e-book bundle for double that amount (which is still very reasonable).

Catering to the latest version of Primavera Project Planner, which is now called Oracle Primavera P6 Version 8: Project and Portfolio Management, authors Daniel L. Williams, PhD and Elaine Britt Krazer take you on a tour of this immensely powerful project management tool, following a logical sequence that starts with the basics of the P6 interface right up to resource management. Divided in 16 easily digestible chapters, this is the book that you were waiting for if your daily work involves the latest release of Primavera P6. The authors mention that you should be already familiar with P6 before reading their work. While I personally think that one should be able to catch up even without a prior knowledge of P6, a basic knowledge of planning and scheduling principles and general project management – for example, by being familiar with relevant parts of the famous PMBOK Guide published by the Project Management Institute – should be very helpful.

To conclude, this is a highly recommended book, from a respectable publisher – and a long-awaited addition to the library of any Primavera user.

If your daily work includes the creation of project schedules, a safe bet is that you make use of Microsoft Project or Oracle Primavera. These two competing products are the mainstream, and their new versions are more powerful than ever.

What if you just needed a small application to quickly prepare and modify a small project plan that you can carry with you in the field while leaving your notebook in the office? How about using your iPad for more than playing Angry Birds? This is where Project Planning Pro comes in.

I have discovered this neat little software more than a year ago, and below is my long overdue review.

First Impressions

You can download the application from the iTunes store for free as a trial version. It is available for the iPhone as well, but my guess is that not many people will want to prepare or edit a schedule on their mobile phone. On the iPad, however, it starts to make sense.

When you open the application for the first time, you are treated to a great-looking interface that looks remarkably like a simple version of MS Project. It is possible to create a full schedule from scratch – it depends on how fast you can type and ‘pinch’ – seeing that you do not have a full physical keyboard and mouse to help you. What is admirable is that the software enables you to use all four types of relationships between activities: Finish-to-Start (the most common), Start-to-Start, Finish-to-Finish and Start-to-Finish (probably the least used).

Importing your Project Plan

The killer feature of this application, however, is the ability to import the schedule that you have painstakingly created in MS Project (at the office, say) and see it inside Project Planning Pro. How do you do that?

You can import your MS Project file in one of three ways:

• Using Dropbox (from the ‘cloud’), where you should have uploaded your schedule previously;
• Using email (Gmail for example) – one caveat is that you have to use the mail application on the iPad, and not the browser;
• Using iTunes – that’s right, let iTunes synchronize your files and find your MS Project schedule.

This is what makes the app a powerful one: build a schedule in the office, and use it (and edit it) on site, perhaps to track the completed tasks, or present your ideas to the project stakeholders.

Exporting the Project Plan

Now that we have imported the plan and used it on the iPad, how to get it out?

The original version of the software allowed the plan to be exported as follows:

• As a .csv file (that can be opened in Excel);
• As a PDF (and emailed to be shared and printed, naturally);
• As a Project Planning pro file – to be edited later (perhaps on another iPad).

The updated version added a very useful feature: you can now export the file as an .xml file that can opened in MS Project for further editing.

Other Notable Features

I’ll let you discover the app yourself –the website is very user-friendly. However, I should add that you could view your schedule differently, as in MS Project. New features are a timeline view and a resource sheet (yes, you can also add resources). The authors have also recently allowed for the possibility of cost-loading said resources. I have not tried this feature yet, but the app is useful even as a standalone Gantt chart.

The Takeaway

For a reasonable price (less than $20 for the iPad version), Project Planning Pro is a very useful application. While I doubt that many will create Gantt charts from scratch on a tablet, the ability to import a schedule from MS Project and take it with you to a construction site or client meeting is what makes it all worthwhile!

Background

One month ago, I became an early adopter of the latest release of Mac OS X: the much-awaited OS X Mountain Lion, which promises to bridge the gap between your Mac and iOS5, the operating system that powers the iPad and iPhone. The new OS X release adds features that are found in iOS5 such as Reminders, Launch Control, Notes and iCloud integration, for instance. But how do you find out about all those new features, as well as the numerous improvements? Is there a reference that you can use, without having to haul a 800-page tome around?

Summary

This is where the OS X Mountain Lion Pocket Guide comes to the rescue. It is small enough to carry around, and is destined to two sets of readers:

• The veteran Mac user who wants to learn all about the new OS, after having upgraded from OS X Snow Leopard (keep in mind that you cannot upgrade from earlier versions);
• The long-time Windows user who has recently switched to the Mac and wants to find out all about the Mac operating system  – all in one place.

Synopsis

Starting with the new features, and after a quick overview, Chris takes you on a comprehensive tour of everything inside OS X Mountain Lion, from Applications to system Preferences and Utilities. You will find chapters dedicated to password security, troubleshooting, installation (and data migration) as well as a glossary of special keyboard shortcuts. I found this last chapter of particular interest, since Mac users have long prided themselves about having much more shortcuts available to them than their Windows peers – and after reading the supplied shortcut tables, I tend to agree!

Technically minded users who want to dig deeper will have to get a bigger reference. Network configuration, for example, is beyond the scope of a Pocket Guide – Chris clearly states so. The explanations are sprinkled with witty humor all through the book. This is a guide that you will enjoy reading, and it can be finished in a couple of days.

Conclusion

This rich but concise reference is one that you will want to keep on your desk. It is a quick read, and if you need a rapid overview of OS X Mountain Lion – even if this is your first Mac – along with a healthy dose of witty humor, it’s really all you need.

OS X Mountain Lion Pocket Guide by Chris Seibold is available on the O’Reilly website here.

Here’s a brief roundup of the articles about certification contained in this blog so far. If you want to get a project management or sustainability certification, you will find the following information that I hope will be of interest to you.

Let’s start by project management certifications.

• If you are new to project management, you will want to get the CAPM certification, which will last you five years without the need to maintain it. Bear in mind the requirements in term of course-ware or experience: all the information you need is provided in the CAPM article.

• Once your CAPM is expired, you will want to get the highly coveted PMP. You might be experienced enough to get your PMP without stopping by the CAPM, which is entirely acceptable. The course-ware and experience requirements are more stringent than those of the CAPM. You will find all the necessary info in the PMP overview. The PMP will be valid for three years, during which you will need to meet certain criteria in order to maintain your certification: get the details in the corresponding article.

For both certifications, the ultimate reference is naturally the PMI website.

• To get the LEED Green Associate (or LEED GA) certification, which is the stepping-stone to the LEED AP, you will need to meet certain requirements in term of course-ware, employment or project involvement. The overview of the LEED GA is found here. Once you pass your test, you enter a two-year maintenance cycle. The actions that you need to take to keep your LEED GA are explained in detail in this article.

Regarding green initiatives and green buildings, the most famous certifications are provided by the USGBC. There are other alternatives as well, particularly as far as the Middle East is concerned.

• One such certification is the Estidama PQP of the Abu Dhabi Urban Planning Council. You can get a certified as a Pearl Qualified Professional in Communities, Buildings and Villas. You can get the first two by passing an exam: they are discussed here, along with their context and the Estidama initiative itself. No other requirements are needed. To get certified in Villas, you will need to attend a course given by the Abu Dhabi UPC and pass an in-course exam. These certifications are all non-maintainable.

You will also find a general discussion of certifications, including what type of certification is available, why to get certified, and how to go about it.

Whether you choose to be certified in project management or green buildings, I hope that the above articles will be of help to you. If you need more information, or should you want to discuss the above, please use the comments box below.

I hope that your long study nights and heavy caffeine intake will be rewarded, whatever certification you choose to pursue. Good luck !

If you are working – or would like to work – in the domain of sustainability, or if you are a Green Building enthusiast, it makes sense to get a relevant certification – it might even be a part of your job requirements.

Arguably, the US Green Building Council provides the most famous of these certifications, and we have discussed before how to get and maintain the LEED Green Associate designation, which is the stepping-stone to the highly regarded LEED AP. An individual holding a LEED AP is a key person in the team tasked with designing a LEED-certified building, and is the main contact person between the design firm and the US Green Building Council.

The Estidama initiative

In the Middle East, effort is being made to develop Green Building rating systems tailored to the region’s particular requirements, notably with respect to the hot and humid climate. The leader in the domain is the Abu Dhabi Urban Planning Council (UPC) in the UAE. The huge undertaking started by the UPC some five years ago resulted in the development of a full-fledged rating system that was released early in April 2010.

This initiative is called Estidama, which means sustainability in Arabic. A narrative on the Estidama website explains that the UPC expanded the triple bottom-line of sustainability – people, planet and profit – to account for the cultural sensibilities and tough climate of this part of the world. The three pillars of sustainability hence become four: social, environmental, economic and cultural. These four pillars are reflected in the simple but powerful Estidama logo itself.

The rating system that is at the core of the Estidama initiative is called the Pearl Rating System.

The Pearl Rating System

The Pearl Rating System developed by the UPC and launched in April 2010 is subdivided in three parts:

• For buildings, the Pearl Building Rating System
• For communities, the Pearl Community Rating System
• For villas, the Pearl Villa Rating System

For the first two rating systems, an interesting comparison can be made with the LEED New Construction and Major Renovations and LEED for Neighborhood Development rating systems, respectively. The site Carboun.com published an article comparing and contrasting LEED, BREEAM and Estidama in April 2010, when the Estidama Pearl Rating Systems had just been released.

While the LEED system has four rating levels – LEED certified, Silver, Gold and Platinum – the Pearl Rating System (or PRS) has five: from One Pearl to Five Pearls. One Pearl is, naturally, the basic rating whereby the building, community or villa has attained the required credits only. Credits acquired beyond the minimum requirements allow the design and construction teams to aim for a higher Pearl certification. It is interesting to note that the PRS grants credits both for design and construction: the building, community or villa is designated as ‘Pearl Design Rated’ or ‘Pearl Construction Rated’. The  FAQs found on the Estidama website indicate that the application for ‘Design’ rating should be made before the building permit is approved, while the ‘Construction’ rating must be applied for after construction is completed.

The Abu Dhabi UPC is currently developing an ‘Operation’ rating system that would grant a ‘Pearl Operational Rating’ to the building, community or villa two years after construction is completed and occupancy has reached 80%.  The US Green Building Council has a similar rating system for LEED: Existing Buildings: Operation & Maintenance.

The respective PRS pages for buildings, communities and villas include, in addition to the rating systems themselves – currently in version 1.0, with a new version already completed and to be released soon – a set of tools that are beneficial to the design/construction teams seeking Pearl ratings for their projects. On offer are water calculators, waste calculators, energy templates and scorecards; they are all very beneficial and should be used with the corresponding rating system.

Finally, the updates page should be consulted regularly: it contains newsletters and information bulletins that are released by the UPC continuously. Two items of note:

• Since September 2010, all new developments (buildings, villas and communities) are to achieve a minimum Pearl rating of 1.
• All government-lead projects (including schools, mosques, government buildings) are to achieve a minimum Pearl rating of 2.

One building aiming for a Pearl rating of 2 is the Midfield Terminal Building construction at the Abu Dhabi International Airport, signed last month and to be started in the third quarter of 2012.

The Pearl Qualified Professional certification

A LEED AP is the point of contact with the US Green Building Council regarding projects aiming for LEED rating. In the same fashion, the individual whom acts as a point of contact with the Abu Dhabi UPC is a Pearl Qualified Professional. So how does one become a Pearl Qualified Professional, or PQP?

First of all, why to become a PQP? Isn’t it specific to the UAE, and Abu Dhabi in particular? The answer to that question depends on the individual, but having recently acquired a PQP for both the ‘Building’ and ‘Community’ rating systems, I think that it is interesting to get the certifications if only to compare LEED and Estidama as well as to boost one’s credentials. Individuals interested in sustainability should definitely be familiar with more than one rating system. How to go about passing the exams is outlined below.

Two exams available: ‘Buildings’ and ‘Communities’

It is possible to attain certification in all three rating systems – buildings, communities and villas – but exams are available worldwide for the first two only. The ‘Villas’ certification is attained after attending a course at the Abu Dhabi UPC headquarters – the training page show currently available courses.

• The two available exams grant you PQP status for Buildings or Communities as applicable. No prerequisites are needed, meaning you do not have to take a course to be allowed to attend an exam.
• The certifications are not ‘maintainable’ either: you do not need to take courses or attend presentations in order to keep the PQP designation. This is in contrast to the LEED and PMP certifications.
• The first step in your studying to do is to download the PRS of choice and the associated tools (Buildings or Communities).
• Make yourself familiar with each PRS thoroughly, and allow yourself one month of study for each exam. Get familiar with the tools available for each PRS as well.
• When you feel that you are ready, go to the exam page and use the link to the Prometric site. Each exam costs $200 and is on-hour long, with 40 questions. You need to get 70% or 28 questions correct, and the time allocated is enough to finish on time – but you need to ‘know your stuff’, as for other exams.

It would be beneficial to use the Estidama and Development Review page to download the ‘Planning for Estdama’ document and read it before each exam, and to print the pages outlining the Development Review process on the Abu Dhabi UPC site. This will allow you to become more familiar with the development process in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi and its relation to Estidama.

After passing the exam(s), go to the Manuals and Guidelines page of the UPC and download the ‘Estidama Brand Guidelines’ at the bottom. This page also contains all documents referenced in the PRS manuals – it is a page to be bookmarked.

I hope that I have given you a good overview, and that you are now encouraged to get your PQP(s). Good luck and sound off in the comments!

I have learned yesterday that Microsoft is bringing back the MCSE. Not really the MCSE, but an MCSE nevertheless. Confused yet?

As I have mentioned before, I owe the original MCSE a lot. It has allowed me to change careers into IT and has helped me build my experience and ‘move up’ as an IT professional for almost a decade, before working as a Civil Engineer again. I have other certifications, but having those three MCSEs (on Windows NT, Windows 2000 and Windows 2003) has been extremely beneficial. Will this vendor-specific certification again establish Microsoft as the premier technical certification provider? Why did Microsoft bring the MCSE back?

A bit of history

Let’s go back in time a little bit. When Windows NT Server was the dominant server in the workplace, you could get an MCSE in Windows NT. Then Windows 2000 was released, and in a bid to establish Windows 2000 Server in the corporate world, the company released a new MCSE based on Windows 2000, and offered certified individuals an upgrade path in order to make the transition easier, with less exams to pass than the first time.

In 2003, as Windows 2000 Server was replaced by Windows Server 2003, Microsoft again provided an upgrade path to the new MCSE based on Windows 2003. An MCSA was also offered, whereby you could pass fewer exams to become a Microsoft Certified Systems Administrator (at the time, the MCSE was called Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer).

The power of a brand

Then something funny happened: the tech giant decided to replace the MCSA and MCSE by the MCTS ( Microsoft Certified Technical Specialist) and MCITP (Microsoft Certified IT Professional). So when Windows 2008 Server was released, there never was a corresponding MCSE 2008 certification. Microsoft geeks everywhere went ‘huh?’ while the company explained that the focus would now shift to the new certifications. But the question remained: why to retire the MCSE, four letters that had so much brand recognition everywhere? You could arguably ask any IT recruiter or hiring manager about the MCSE, and they knew immediately what you were talking about. But the MCITP ? Not so much.

The MCSE is back…or is it?

Finally, then, Microsoft is bringing back the MCSE. Technically, only the four letters ‘MCSE’ are back: they stand now for Microsoft Certified Solution Expert, while the MCSA – which has also been resurrected – is now called the Microsoft Certified Solution Associate. Hmmm, can you see what’s missing here? Could it have to do with the uproar a few years back that, to become an ‘Engineer’, you needed a Bachelor’s degree and possibly professional licensure, and not just a few exams and a glossy certificate?

The Takeaway

Microsoft is saying that the MCSE has been ‘reinvented for the cloud’. Whether the new MCSE becomes as popular as the old one remains to be seen. However, even if it does – and I do hope so, for the original MCSE has, again, been of huge benefit to me personally – it will remain what certifications have always been: a proof of your knowledge, but not in any way a substitute for experience. Your foot in the door!

Are you happy the MCSE is coming back? Indifferent? Do you think it’s too late? Sound off in the comments!

(Thanks to @doblerco for the link to the article mentioned in the first paragraph of this post).

In this eagerly awaited update of the previous edition that covered SharePoint 2007, Dux Raymond Sy takes you by the hand and shows you the capabilities of SharePoint 2010 as a Project Management Information System, or PMIS. Having bought the first book, I was alerted by my favorite publisher of the availability of the updated book. I grabbed the second edition as quickly as possible. The differences between SharePoint 2007 and 2010 are many, and it is preferable to get the edition that covers the version that you use at your place of work. An overview of the basic differences between the two editions can be found here.

The renowned speaker, author, blogger and Microsoft MVP shows the SharePoint novice how to use the platform for creating a PMIS, managing stakeholder interaction, task distribution, project tracking, uploading documents and implementing workflows, and other important project steps.

Assuming you have been tasked with implementing SharePoint and have read a technical book and learned some of the ins and outs of this powerful software, you might be wondering ‘OK, so how do I use all that?’ Dux first defines SharePoint thus: ‘SharePoint allows individuals in an organization to easily create and manage their own collaborative solutions’. He then proceeds to answer your query by taking you on a small tour of SharePoint’s capabilities as a PMIS.

You might also be a project team member who has started to use SharePoint because it has recently been implemented at your company. In that case, this book will of tremendous help: a series of ‘Workshops’ chock-full of screen captures form the skeleton of this book, making it easy to read for anyone interested in SharePoint or tasked with using it on a daily basis.

The compatibility with Microsoft Office and the familiar Office-like interface of SharePoint 2010 makes learning the basics a breeze with Sy’s help. My only beef is that I wished the book could have been longer, specifically regarding the use of workflows. Coverage of the interaction between SharePoint and Visio would have also been helpful, but there are other books – of a more technical nature – that deal with Visio and workflow implementation.

All in all, this book is highly recommended, and a valuable addition to any SharePoint library. In fact, I advise you to start here if you are relatively new to SharePoint.

SharePoint 2010 for Project Management is available on the O’Reilly Media website here.

Today is the 30th anniversary of one of the most famous home computers of the 80′s, the Sinclair ZX Spectrum.

Tributes are surfacing on the Internet, and a couple of must-read articles are by the BBC and the tech site The Register.

This machine and several similar ones by Atari, Amiga, Commodore, and others, were used at home by tech geeks everywhere, much before the ‘Mac or PC’ era, and the ZX Spectrum is special to me because it is at the origin of ‘The Tech Bug’.

Three years before the university days – in the summer of 1983, to be exact – this little machine planted in me a passion for tech and computing that never abated. Even as a freshly minted Civil Engineer, I knew that I would be a tech guy, as a hobby or a part of my career. And though I really wanted to become an Engineer for as long as I can remember, the ZX Spectrum is largely responsible for the fact that my love for tech never waned, even when computers were but a tool that I used at work.

The following is my tribute to the Sinclair ZX Spectrum and its sucessor, the Spectrum+ – it’s an article that I wrote sometime in 2005, collecting dust bunnies on a home PC and waiting for an occasion to be dug out.

The Background

Back in 1983, my uncle sent us (by us, I mean my two brothers and I) a shiny Sinclair ZX Spectrum. This little machine was half the size of today’s keyboard, and had a whopping 16 kilobytes of memory. The black metal casing contained the computer itself and its keyboard, with rubber keys representing each letter of the alphabet and special functions. To use a monitor, you had to plug the computer in your television set using video output cables; this was typical of many small machines of the era. It had interfaces at the back, allowing you to plug a printer and something Sinclair called the ‘Microdrive’ – an early adaptation of the external hard disk. Of course, all these devices were proprietary; that was before IBM revolutionized the industry with their PC, and before minimum acceptable standards were adopted by almost everyone in the computer hardware business.

A Geeky Family

Evidently, to us children, the perspective of using that machine for learning and gaming was very attractive. After all, our only brush with home ‘computers’ was with that hugely successful game console that Atari was selling; we spent days and evenings playing Pac-Man, Space Invaders, Asteroids, and other famous games, challenging each other, and our father, in two-player mode. The Sinclair enabled us to play more sophisticated games, ‘loading’ them from cassette tapes available in the market using a plain old tape recorder. At other times, we keyed programs found in computer magazines using BASIC. Some of these programs were games as well; all three of us learned BASIC, which was the easiest programming language to grasp back then if you wanted to get ‘into computers’.

A fascination with that piece of technology quickly swept us away; each one of us started doing more and more advanced stuff with the quirky language that is BASIC. From drawing simple and complex geometric shapes to simulating a dialogue with the computer, we spent long hours programming, all the while studying the thick manual accompanying the Spectrum. While other kids were happily soaking sun outside, my brothers and I showed unstoppable determination to uncover the secrets of this mysterious black box. What seems inevitably trivial today allowed us to use some critical problem solving skills, and being that none of us had actually learned anything similar before, it was a great extra-curricular activity.

Onwards and Upwards

As luck would have it, my uncle sent us another package, called the ‘Expansion Pack’. After opening the large box, one found the equivalent of today’s laptop docking station: you connected a small device to the back of the Spectrum, containing various ports and interfaces. Other contents included a tiny printer (with horrible ink: the words always seemed to tremble), the famous ‘Microdrive’ (Sinclair’s attempt at an offline storage device), several miniature tapes to be used with that drive (with some new games), as well as a few cables to connect everything. It was our firsthand experience with computer peripherals. The next few hours – and few months – were spent reading manuals, connecting, attempting to print, failing, reading again, printing, attempting to load the new games, failing, troubleshooting, loading games and playing…

The ZX Spectrum+

Our dear parents quickly encouraged us to further explore this new little toy. After watching us a whole summer tinker with the Sinclair, they drove their kids to the brand’s distributor. To budding programmers, it was a dream come true: it was there that one found all the hardware and software (on cassette tapes, remember) that Sinclair offered. We proudly brought home a new computer, the Spectrum+. This wonderful little machine had a better keyboard: a mechanical one, with plastic keys replacing rubber. It also had a great-looking black plastic case, its size closer to that of your typical keyboard today. But the greatest news was that the size of memory had tripled – to 48 kilobytes. No more ‘Out of Memory’ errors when you tried to type a large program; even better was that we could also buy those 48K games that friends and relatives were showing off. And of course, everybody knew that the coolest games were the 48K ones, but they did not run on our old 16K ZX. Along with the new computer, my parents bought us a slew of gaming tapes, including a surprisingly realistic ‘Flight Simulator’.

The Takeaway

Back then, it was great to have a computer that you had the possibility of carrying to your friend’s house, especially after seeing what the ‘real thing’ looked like on TV. I am of course talking about mainframes, and the reason every kid was impressed was the sheer size of these giants (a mainframe filled a whole room – and a really large one). But the greatest amount of time that you spent on your Atari, Commodore, Sinclair etc…was to play games. In a way, the home computer of those early days was partly a glorified (and highly programmable) game console.

What computer did you first use ? Did you witness the era that preceded Windows and the start of the Mac-PC wars? Sound off in the comments!

If you are a Project Manager who has sought to be certified, you might have acquired the Project Management Professional (PMP) certification from the PMI. It is arguably the most prestigious certification in the field of Project Management. As mentioned in our general article on certification, it is a maintainable certification, meaning that you have to renew it – every three years, in the case of the PMP. Having discussed how to get the PMP certification, we now turn the subject of maintaining your PMP.

How to go about keeping your PMP, and how to do it in a cost-effective way is discussed in what follows.

The Three-Year Certification Cycle

Once you pass the PMP certification, it is valid for a period of three years. This period, called the certification cycle, starts from the moment that you exit the testing center having passed the test. During that time, you need to earn Professional Development Units or PDUs to keep your PMP certification. In the case of the PMP, you will need to acquire 60 PDUs during the three-tear cycle.

The first page to visit on the PMI website is a page called Maintain your Credential. You will want to read the CCR frequently asked questions for a quick overview of the Continuing Certification Requirements System (CCRS). However, the PMP Handbook that you will have downloaded upon applying for your PMP exam contains valuable information on the recertification process and CCR on pages 34 to 47, and I advise to read this section before proceeding in order to familiarize yourself with the process. The PMP Handbook is the top-right link on the Project Management Professional (PMP) page, under ‘Quick Links’.

How to Earn PDUs in a Cost-effective Way

Having read the PMP Handbook, you can consult two links on the Maintain your Credential page for more information: Ways to Earn PDUs and Professional Development. The first of these two links is the most important source of information regarding the type of PDUs that you can get in those three years. Focusing on the second paragraph, ‘Give Back to the Profession’, consider item 10: ‘Doing Your Job’. If you look carefully at page 41 of the PMP Handbook, you will notice that you can gain 5 PDUs per year, or 15 PDUs per cycle – just by doing your job! If you are a Project Manager, therefore, you already have 25% of the total 60 required for free.

On the Ways to Earn PDUs page, look at item 3: ‘Community Offerings’ under ‘Continue Your Education’. This is a potential source for another 25% of the required PDUs. How? By joining your local PMI chapter! You will probably be informed by email of the events that your chapter is organizing, including events, meetings, seminars, lectures, and the like. By attending a lecture, for instance, you can net 1 PDU for each hour that you attend. So if the session runs for 2 hours, you get 2 PDUs. Supposing that you attend five one-hour lectures per year, that is another 15 PDUs that you get for free during the three-year cycle.

Before we leave the cost-effective ways to earn PDUs, I should mention again the PMstudy website: this is an example of a Registered Education Provider (R.E.P.) that offers online courses and provides PDUs in coordination with the PMI. The PMstudy website offers courses in Six Sigma, Risk Management, HR…the cost per PDU is very acceptable and could be a nice way to boost your total number of PDUs.

Other Notable Ways to Earn PDUs

Under ‘Continue Your Education’, you will notice items 4 and 5: PMI Global Congresses and Events and PMI Seminars World. These are global events held several times each year, and they are interesting venues to network with Project Management practitioners from around the world, attend seminars and gain valuable knowledge – and a significant number of PDUs! The downside of such events is, of course, the associated cost. However, particularly if the event is in your region, it could be an interesting experience. It is certainly something that I plan to undertake in the near future.

Please note that there are many other ways to secure PDUs and give back to the profession, such as Volunteering with the PMI, writing articles and books, giving lectures and courses at your local chapter or at a College or University (this will net you more PDUs than if you are an attendee, of course).

Submitting Your Professional Development Units

Each time you earn PDUs, you can submit them on the CCR page, or the Continuing Certification Requirements System. On this same page, a Certificant User Guide is available to give your more information should you need to. You can also search for activities or REPs on the same page to give you some ideas. Remember to submit PDUs immediately when you gain them, and keep all associated documentation for courses, seminars and the like. This will help you keep track of earned PDUs and will be valuable in case of an audit from the PMI. For example, whenever you complete one year as a Project Manager, enter those 5 PDUs online before you forget to do so. At the end of the three-year cycle, you will need to pay $60 to the PMI – if you are a member, and $150 for non-members. Remember, being a member is of the utmost importance!

I hope that this short guide to maintaining the PMP was useful. Questions? Drop them in the comments box below. Good luck in getting and maintaining your PMP!