Frank Lu

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since Nov 03, 2006
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Recent posts by Frank Lu

Originally posted by Jeff Walker:


Well, it is a bit expensive at $55, but consider these two things
1. There are no other simulators out there that I'd trust, for SCEA5. The Chinatag one is just a pdf for $49. (Heck, I can write that and sell it for $25).
2. It is from Sun themselves. It will almost certainly give you a true feel of the type of questions that they will ask in the real exam.

The Sun ePractice is a bank of 120 questions, divided into two groups of 60. It is thus two online practice exams, setup like the real exam, and after you purchase it, it is available for 12 months via a username and pwd they send you. I obviously purchased it, but I haven't done it yet, because I am still catching up on EJB3 and JSF. (I will do the first practice exam with my books open, to see if I justify my answers. The second set of 60 questions I will attempt as a real exam).

Selina Tan (a previous poster from a few weeks ago), also purchased it for the same reason I did, You can ask her for her opinion. There are no other trustworthy simulators out there. Mikalai Zaikin is working on a high quality pdf question-answer document for the SCEA5, but it is only half done. I do recommend you read it. I have his exam notes for the SCDJWS and the SCEA5 and his work is usually high quality. I believe he charges $12 for the SCDJWS notes, and the SCEA5 I think is free? Mikalai, is that right?

Be careful handing your money over for junk, and what could be worse, junk that misleads you, costing you a $200 exam voucher if you fail.
Take care all of you,
-jeff



The problem with Selina was that she barely passed her exam, so my feeling is that the ePractice exam didn't cover all the topics it supposed to.

Originally posted by Rodrigo Cunha:
I have contacted Whizlabs and they're going to release their SCEA 5 version of the exam simulator this June/2008. I believe it will be the most reliable simulator we will be having so far, besides the Sun's e-practice which I definetly found a bit weak (but again this is just my feeling, I haven't taken the exam so far therefore I wouldn't be the best person to evaluate it). But anyways, Whizlabs did a pretty good job on their last SCEA 1.4 simulator, so hope they won't let us down this time.

best regards and good luck getting certified.



I have also confirmed with Whizlabs, the offcial release date will be on June 1st. I think it's ok to wait for just one more week.

Originally posted by AJAY SINGH RATHORE:
Hi All,
Could you please tell me which is the best exam simulator for SCEA 5.0. I wanted to purchase one, please guide me for the same. Is it Whizlab's Exam simulator?

Thanks,
Ajay Singh Rathore

SCJP 4.0, SCDJWS



I contacted whizlab on this, they told me their SCEA5 exam sim will be available by the end of this month.
hi ranchers, looks like someone have already rolled out a exam simulator for SCEA5:

[Edit: removed link to company distributing illegal materials]

I am tempted to purchase it, but I am not so sure about the vendor's credibility. looks like they had the simulator out even before the exam was officially released.
[ April 07, 2008: Message edited by: Andrew Monkhouse ]

Originally posted by Mark Herschberg:


There is no evidence to support this statement.

--Mark



well, this depends on how much you know the system already. if you do your certification just to prove your knowledge, they you probably won't gain much.

But if you are using the certification as a learning experience then you would definitely gain a lot from it. I am currently working on my SCEA 5 certification just for the sick of learning the Java EE 5 architecture.
16 years ago
You may try to get a job from major consulting firms like [company names removed -- please do not mention companies by name]. they all have very large financial services sector and would love your domain knowledge.
[ February 25, 2008: Message edited by: Bear Bibeault ]
16 years ago

Originally posted by benjik wang:
That is possible. American companies might move their software development efforts from india to china to make them closer to their manufacture centers there.

But I do not think that they would ever move due to the cost. Actually the average cost for IT is much higher than in India.



Chinese IT is actually cheaper than Indian' .....this is because the most Chinese developers do not serve foreign clients(due to language barrier).

I don't expect too much jobs will be outsourced to china since they pay their programmers as much as regular coporate accountants.
16 years ago

Originally posted by benjik wang:
just my $0.02.

Based on my experience, they have zero (if not, closed to zero) value in job market.

I took them only because they are free (free vouchers from employer or beta)
and I think it is a good chance to force myself to learn. And in turn they do help me perfom better in job interviews.




Certifications had definitely helped me to preform better in job interviews, especially in my job(working in a consulting firm, I have to interview with a different engagement manager for every project).

Beside that, you will definitely perform better at your jobs.
16 years ago

Originally posted by J Vallejo:
Will the two exam versions co-exist for a period of time before the old version is scrapped out?



sure, but the old will expire by the EOY.
I wrote an email to SUN earlier this month asking about the current status of the SCEA 5 exam and here is the reply I got from them:

"The SCEA 5.0 certification should be out of beta testing and available commercially by March 2008. We anticipate that the current SCEA certification will be retired by the end of 2008."

So..... for those of yall who still want to complete the older VERSION of SCEA better start working NOW (including myself).

Originally posted by Atul Sawant:
Congrats Frank!

Which materials did you use and how much time it took you to prepare for it?




the book i like the most is called "Effective Java" by Joshua Bloch. (the book is thin, only has about 200 pages). I think this book is a must-have if you want to score high on SCJD.

I also bought a copy of Andrew's book, which is think is decent. it gives readers a good overview for the project(even has a chapter on how you build the jar file and package your submission). I borrowed his hand-shake locking mechanism.

since this test does not have a time limit so you don't need to prepare!!







16 years ago

Originally posted by Mihai Radulescu:
Nice score Frank, full points every where.
I have a stupid question, where you check you results ?

Regards
M



Same place where you download your assignment.

your score will be shown in the "TestHistory" page if it is ready
16 years ago
Score: 390

Con: 100 90
Documentation: 70 70
OOD: 30 30
GUI: 40 40
Locking: 80 80
Data Store: 40 40
Network Server: 40 40
Total: 400 390

special thanks to all ranchers for all your help!

there is nothing too special about my design, but i would like to clear up some confussions

1) I extended DB interface
2) my GUI design appear to be different than most other ranchers, if you wonder how it looks, just click the search button on you IE window. Yes, all my control buttons are lined up on the tool/menu bar.
3) my GUI does not include a AND/OR dropdown
4) my cookie values are randomly generated (why do they need to be unique?)
5) used hand-shake pattern to manage my threads
[ May 16, 2007: Message edited by: Frank Lu ]
16 years ago

Originally posted by Kaspar Thommen:


For each of the two possible search terms .....



Thanks! you have just opened up my mind

17 years ago

Originally posted by Kaspar Thommen:


For each of the two possible search terms .....



Thanks! you have just opened up my mind

17 years ago