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SCJA Passed; Thanks Cameron

 
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68 % first attempt.
Obviously by the skin of my teeth; not super proud of the score but I'll take it. Used both the guide and exam questions books by Cameron and ran through the WhizLabs simulations.

Fundamental OOC- 100%
UML -83%
Java Implementation of OOC - 37%
Algorithm Design and Implementation - 50%
Java Development Fundamentals -66%
Java Platform and Integration Technology - %40
Client Technologies - 100%
Server Technologies - 71%

Since Oracle dumped prometric I had to move my exam date back two weeks or reschedule which was a major hassle (refund, pay, drive farther for the personvue test). I took all of the mock exams and noted every wrong answer and went back to try and understand why certain answers were right or wrong. If I had it to do over again I think I would have grouped my weaknesses by category and gone back the guide and really poured over the chapters I was weak in.
Whiz labs stuff is hard, but it also makes you think, so I think it was worth the 25 bucks.
I finished with about a 1/2 hour left and I (against my better judgement) went back through and re-looked at everything. I changed some answers and I am not sure if that saved me or hurt me. I felt like it hurt me, because I was thinking myself out of stuff.
Can't know for sure, but if I was giving advice to someone: (provided the someone doesn't mind taking advice from a guy that barely made it)
1) Be prepared and confident when you walk in there because there are questions that will slowly chip away at your confidence. By the end I wasn't sure of anything and my brain was mush.
2) Don't change an answer at the end unless your 100% sure you made a mistake.
3) Get a lot of sleep the night before.
4) Eat before you go in; they don't let you have water or food.
4)Test and test and test. Practice all you can. I saved Cameron's final exam in the questions book until the night before. (I scored 68 on that to. How about that for similarity of the material and the exam)
5) Re read the areas of the exam guide where you're weak. And then reread them again.
6) Note every answer you get wrong on the mock exams and note why your answer was incorrect.

Anyhow, best of luck to folks. Im on top the SCJP and hopefully I can improve my weaknesses from thee SCJA during that process.

 
Cory Hartford
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Oh and one more thing for Cameron. One of the answers in the exam book references JAF, and then explains the acronym is Japanese Airforce. I lol; has anyone else caught this?
 
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Congrats!
 
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My congratulations What's your next target?
 
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Congratulations!!
 
Cory Hartford
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Thanks folks. =D
Next up is SCJP. I am already working through the Sierra and Bates text. First thing I did was to lose eclipse and start writing/compiling everything in textedit. I kept Eclipse for work though! I really took for granted how much work eclipse does with package management and file placement. Doing it manually was painful at first but I have gotten the hang of it.
 
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