Friday, April 27, 2012

MCPD upgrade, 70-523 exam

So today I finally did the 70-523 exam in order to upgrade the certification with the longest title ever created:

Microsoft Certified Professional Developer .Net Framework 3.5 Web Developer
to
Microsoft Certified Professional Developer .Net Framework 4 Web Developer

Two characters shorter now, though.

Almost 1 year and a half now since I did the 70-567, to upgrade from .Net 2.0 to 3.5 which means I was already late, considering .Net 4.0 was already launched. The .Net Framework 4.5 is on Developer preview so I guess I could finally catch up.

Like the 70-567 exam, this was composed by more than 1 exam. "An exam within an exam" once said Leonardo. In the case of 70-523, there was 4 exams:

TS Accessing Data with Microsoft .Net Framework 4
TS Windows Communication Foundation Development with Microsoft .Net Framework 4
TS Web Applications Development with Microsoft .Net Framework 4
Pro: Designing and developing Web Applications Using Microsoft .Net Framework 4

Which means you get 3 MCTS and 1 MCPD certificates.

The countdown was per exam, 40 minutes, which was more then enough considering the questions are straightforward, with few text to read.
The way Microsoft does these tests is interesting. I've been doing these exams since 2006 it has always been the same. When I say "the way", I mean normally select 1 out of 4 options, or select 2 out of 6 where:

Each option is a complete solution
or
Both answers together make the solution

The idea that "it's never something too hard to do" is always valid and really helps a lot when you are not sure about the answer. Indeed they always include some questions regarding something you'll never see in your life, but we shouldn't have a hard time if we use the principle: "It's never too complicated".

So they asked something like:

You work for Lorem Ipsum Inc and you have a WCF service you must log all message exchanges. What do you do?

A - Create this config <binding>tralálá..</binding>
B - Create a new project, reference you old service assembly's to the new project, delete the Chrome shortcut from your desktop and make sure you use Internet Explorer and Bing.
C - Copy paste the service implementation and deploy both services on the same server.
D - Buy a new server, setup load balance and deploy your service.

Ok. I made it sound extremely ridiculous, but I want to prove a point here: Which one would you select?
Even if you have no idea what the above text is talking about, if you follow the principle I mentioned, you would select the first option.

How to be prepared? I'm hopping you have a full time job working with Microsoft Technology, this really helps! Plus, most places you work, you don't have the chance to use every single new thing Microsoft launches as part of a new release of .Net Framework, so having a private project or at least play with it at home once in a while does help. On top of that, the standard way of study, (I suppose it's still standard), books.

I read these 3:

MCTS Self-Paced Training Kit (Exam 70-515): Web Applications Development with Microsoft .NET Framework 4 (Mcts 70-515 Exam Exam Prep)

MCTS Self-Paced Training Kit (Exam 70-516): Accessing Data with Microsoft .NET Framework 4

MCPD 70-519 Exam Ref: Designing and Developing Web Applications Using Microsoft .NET Framework 4

If you did 70-536 exam, a number I won't forget because took me a long time to be prepared to and the number of questions regarding pieces of the Framework I have never used were amazing, you might have read this book. It was written by the same guy who wrote the last book I listed above, Tony Northrup.

One thing worth mentioning: I was surprised by the number of errors on the 70-519 book by Tony Northrup, but since it was its first release (5 months ago), it's understandable. I enjoy reading his books but I was hoping better from Microsoft Press review people.

10 comments:

  1. Hi, Bruno, this is Tony Northrup. Congrats on passing that exam! Sorry to hear you found errors in the 70-519 book! This is the first I've heard of it. I just checked the Microsoft Press errata and there are only a handful of items, some of which are minor: http://oreilly.com/catalog/errataunconfirmed.csp?isbn=0790145317780

    Of course, I'd love to make an error-free book, but I haven't managed one yet :). Well, I'll be going through the unconfirmed errata soon, but if you found something else, you can submit it there or drop me a note directly ([email protected]).

    BTW, while the first edition of the 70-536 Training Kit was notoriously bad, the second edition that I wrote by myself was generally considered pretty clean... Which is to say less than the perfection I strive for, but relatively good for the complexity of the topic.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hi Tony, I'm pleased to hear from you. Since you mentioned "a handful of items", I must agree, it's not much. Perhaps I have found 4 or 5 errors, and they are all listed there with the exception of one typo (page 68, Requst.UserAgent).
    Reading 70-536 self-paced was a great study and I always refer the self paced series to everyone ever since. Congratulations for the good job, I hope I can keep reading your books. Thanks for dropping a line on my blog.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Wow! First entry in your blog, which I read to the end! My Congrats! :)

    ReplyDelete
  4. Thanks Nikola and Victor.
    Victor, hopefully you'll enjoy reading the following ones too. :)

    ReplyDelete
  5. Bruno Garcia,

    Congratulations about the post. It was very helpfully!

    It's unbelieveble that the Tony Northrup has answered here! =D

    Obs.: Sorry for my English, I am from brazil \o/ "At the first time i thought that you are too, because your name is common here".

    Thanks!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Thanks Slipmp. E outra, eu sou brasileiro. :)

    ReplyDelete
  7. Vish. hahaha \o/

    Parabéns!

    Logo farei a minha 70-523 também!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Bruno, just a note about the upgrate path: 70-567 (from 2.0 to 3.5) has been retired on July 31st, according to https://www.microsoft.com/learning/en/us/exam.aspx?id=70-567&locale=en-us
    :(
    Looks like I'll have to start all over again...

    ReplyDelete
  9. This exam is scheduled to retire July 31, 2014.
    See http://www.microsoft.com/learning/en-us/exam.aspx?id=70-523

    ReplyDelete

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.