I am a linux/unix sysadmin and our company runs IBM Websphere MQ for linux. We do not currently have anyone with MQ experience on our staff and since i am the one that admins the servers, i am the one that gets to do the most with MQ. We are planning on hiring someone at some point that will be the main MQ admin, but for now we need to fill a gap. So i do not need to go into anything too in depth, but at the same time i need to be aware of certain gotcha's etc. 

Do you guys recommend any good virtual or regular training classes? We were looking at the one from Global Knowledge and it seems to cover quite a few topics.
www.globalknowledge.com/training/course....

Any help appreciated. Thank you 

Hi Richard, delivery of the classroom/virtual training from IBM has been outsourced to business partners.  I took it when it was delivered by IBM and it was good.  But the training has not always kept up with the products.  For example, there's no certification for WMQ 7.5 last I checked.  Now that FTE, AMS and Connect:Direct are absorbed into the product it desparately needs new curriculum but little chance of getting that through IBM's curriculum.

The upcoming IMPACT conference is highly recommended.  That's end of April.  The Capitalware MQ Tech Conference is in September and also highly recommended.  If your main focus is WMQ and not the wider WebSphere family, MQTC is the one you want if you can pick only one.  Both of these have sessions that are up to date and which you cannot get through the Education team.

I also humbly offer my own web site T-Rob.net which is a combination blog, repository for all my conference presentations, and index of all my published WMQ books and articles.  Many of these are pefect for new WMQ admins.

Feel free to contact me directly.  I'm happy to help as time allows and especially new admins who might be struggling with an issue.  Trust me, if you draw too much of my time, I'll suggest we set up a formal consulting engagement.  But I try to answer whatever I can via informal email and phone chats in the spirit of helping the communuity.  There are contact pages on t-rob.net and my business web site IoPT Consulting.