Famine to Feast -- Completing four new OCPrep Study Guides

I had big plans over the 2013 holiday season.  Oracle Certification had several new exams in beta. My goal was to write study guides for several of them ahead of time and have everything ready for when they were released to production. Life intruded. Well... strictly speaking, laziness intruded. I found it very easy to spend the holiday season relaxing and very difficult to stare at my laptop for hours on end tippy-tapping out study guides.

The sheer number of options caused a second problem. One of my great strengths is the ability to focus all of my attention on a single objective (something my wife will swear to... and swear at when she is trying to get that attention). Both as a developer and an author, I will sometimes get into a writing fugue where everything around me goes away and my productivity goes through the roof. Unfortunately, when I have numerous competing goals, my ability to focus on just one goes right out the window and I often dither between all of them.

This is not to say that I cannot multitask. I am great at multitasking... just so long as I only have to do one thing at a time.

The upshot is that when the middle of January rolled around, I had three books about a third completed and a list of potential study guides that continued to grow. Around that time, I was offered a voucher for the 1Z0-497: Oracle 12c: Essentials exam. One more target should have increased the logjam of potential study guides. Instead, it ended up fixing the problem. I had a hard deadline for completing that book... the end of the beta. I had scheduled my exam on February 21st, so I had to finish the guide before that date.  So I did.  Two of the study guides that I had partially complete were for 1Z0-060: Upgrade to Oracle Database 12c and 1Z0-062: Oracle Database 12c: Installation and Administration. Much of the research I had done while writing 1Z0-497 was applicable to them -- plus I was on a roll. I finished 1Z0-062 and published it. With my inertia now geared towards writing, I was able to finish the guide for 1Z0-060 and publish it. Then, with all of this Oracle 12c administration research sitting around in my notes (and my head), I went on to write the initial draft of the Oracle Certification Prep study guide for 1Z0-063: Oracle Database 12c: Advanced Administration. Oracle Certification has not even released the beta for that yet... but when they do, I'm ready.

Most of my posts on this blog exist to help Oracle certification candidates or to announce something new in the certification universe. This one was really for me. I will note however, that true to the promise I made in my first post of this blog... it is about Oracle certification, and it is not about what I had for breakfast, where I went on vacation or what amusing things my (nonexistent) cat did today.

1Z0-060 Exam Preparation Seminar

One of my contacts at Oracle University gave me a sneak peek at a new training option that is about to be released for 1Z0-060 exam candidates. Their new exam seminar will be a set of recorded videos and presumably will be offered under their existing 'Training on Demand' model. While I did not get a chance to review any of the videos, I saw the complete set that will be made available and the duration of each. The seminar contains 43 videos (44 if you count the 2-minute intro), with a total length of almost exactly twelve hours. You can see a YouTube video with a brief intro here.

Since the current recommended training on the Oracle Certification site for 1Z0-060 is Oracle Database 12c: New Features for Administrators, I compared the content of this course to the seminar. The 12c new features course runs for five days and OU's Training-on-Demand version of it runs $3250. Oracle University courses vary somewhat, but from the ones I have taken in the past, each day nets about 5-6 hours of instruction (with labs and class discussion consuming the rest). A five-day course would have somewhere around 28 hours of lecture time, give or take a few hours. I did not get a price for the seminar (and it may not even be set in stone yet), but it will almost assuredly be lower than the five-day New Features course.

The two courses are not quite an apples-to-apples comparison in terms of content. The new features course is geared towards the features added in 12c but has no information dedicated to the 'Core DBA Skills' portion of the exam. The seminar is focused strictly on the topics covered by the exam. The net result is that the 1Z0-060 seminar is covering more topics than the new features course... in well under half the time. 

Mind you -- I am not saying this is a bad thing. Covering the exam topics in a very concise fashion is what my study guides do after all. However, just as I recommend that exam candidates use my guides in tandem with another source of information, I would recommend the same for those who decide to use this seminar. I do not believe that most people will be able to use this seminar to go from zero knowledge about the new 12c features to being test-ready just by watching the videos. I think candidates who opt for this seminar should use it as either the cornerstone or capstone of their exam preparation. Start with this seminar, or end with it, but be sure to include some time preparing with other materials as well. I suspect that it would work best as a capstone. Prepare for the exam using the documentation or white papers, or OTN articles (e.g. the type of stuff I link to on the 1Z0-060 page of my website). Once you feel that you have covered all of the topics through those sources, the seminar would be a valuable means for reinforcing the information and helping to catch anything that might have been missed in your earlier preparation.

Should I attempt the Oracle RAC certification exam?

I was recently sent the following question about RAC certification by a colleague:

"I don't have hands on experience with Grid and RAC 11gR2 (I last did RAC in 9i 9.2 on Tru64 and Linux). I am quite competent with the core database itself. 
I have been reading the recommended material (e.g. books suggested on your certificationprep site). Do you think it would be worthwhile to attempt the exam without hands-on experience?"

My answer to the question is 'Yes'.  I realize that completely kills any possibility of generating suspense in this post. The more cynical readers might well think that asking that question of me is much like asking a car salesman if now is a good time to purchase a new vehicle. In this case, though, I have no conflict of interest since there is no Oracle Certification Prep study guide for either of the 11g RAC exams.  The two possible options are:

1Z0-058 -- Oracle Real Application Clusters (RAC) 11g Release 2 and Grid Infrastructure Administration
1Z0-593 -- Oracle Real Application Clusters (RAC) 11g Essentials

The Essentials exam covers background information on the 11g RAC solution and how to install it. It is not a deep-dive intended for people planning to administer a Real Application Cluster system. I believe his intended exam is the one for Grid Infrastructure Administration. The topics on this test get into the nuts and bolts of configuring, monitoring, and diagnosing an 11g RAC database environment.

The base question that I am answering is "Would be worthwhile to attempt the exam without hands-on experience?" In this context, "Worthwhile" can be read in a couple of different ways.  It can be taken as "Would I pass the exam?" or as "Would pursuing the exam be worthwhile to my career?" The two are very different things.

In terms of passing the exam, I am confident, based on what I have seen from forum postings of the individual who asked the question, that he will invest sufficient preparation time required to learn the exam topics. Even without a study guide specifically for that exam, there is a wealth of relevant information available. He is correct, however, in being concerned about not having hands-on experience. Having worked with Oracle RAC in 9i is a plus, but there have been a lot of changes in the technology between 9i and 11g.  That said, if he is really serious about acquiring the required skills, it is certainly possible to set up a RAC test environment to obtain that hands-on experience.  Tim Hall has an excellent example about setting up an 11g RAC system using VMWare. It requires a computer with a hefty amount of RAM, but that should not be an impossible obstacle. Even if you have to skimp on memory and the system is dog-slow once setup, the process of installing and configuring it will provide much of the hands-on experience that will be useful for the exam.

In terms of being worthwhile from a career standpoint -- that is a harder question to answer. To answer it well involves knowing a great deal about the career goals of the person asking (which I do not), and being able to predict the future (which I cannot). However, I am a firm believer that it is almost always worthwhile for an Oracle professional to learn more about the Oracle database -- even if it is regarding a particular technology that they are not currently using. I have found it extremely useful in my own career to have a very broad knowledge of the Oracle technology stack.

Summing up, my advice is specifically to use the topic list from the exam as a checklist. Use the resources listed at my website to research the various topics.  Try to locate other resources on the Web -- it is extremely unlikely that I found everything out there (if you find some good links, please pass them on to me and I will add them to the site so others can benefit). I highly recommend setting up a test system.  You can download and use the software for the purposes of preparing for the exam, so the only potential expense is the hardware. I am confident that you can pass the exam and that the knowledge you gain will prove useful to you in the future.

The *right* way to take an Oracle beta exam (finally)

Oracle beta exams and I are not the best of friends.  I have already noted that on my blog in two earlier posts:

• Oracle Beta Exams -- The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.
• The worst-laid plans of mice and men...

However, the GBU article was about my first experience with an Oracle beta, which was bad largely due to insufficient preparation on my part. The 'Worst-laid plans' article was really more about how monumentally bad planning, preparation, and follow-through for an exam can spiral into a horror story. This is true even when the exam is not a beta or not, but bad preparation for an exam with three times the questions is more than three times the horror.

For both of the previous beta exams, the opportunity to take them for free was something that happened at the last minute. I had the choice of either taking the exams without being prepared or missing out entirely. In this case, I was offered a free voucher for the 1Z1-497: Oracle 12c Database Essentials exam via the Oracle Partner Network in early January. This allowed plenty of time to research the topics for the exam fully. The initial draft of my study guide for the exam was completed a couple of weeks before the scheduled exam date.

This time I followed my normal testing routine by arriving at the testing center a full hour before the scheduled exam start. I checked in with the desk to ensure it was the correct testing location and that everything was prepared. The remaining time until the exam was spent re-reading the portions of my study materials for the sections I was least comfortable with. Once done with that, I put the materials up, returned to the desk and was able to start the exam fifteen minutes early. The difference in mental attitude and clarity was light years off my last beta testing experience in December where (largely through my own errors) I started the test an hour late, frustrated, and angry.

This exam went very smoothly and I am comfortable that the result will be a passing score. I will not claim that this experience has completely reversed my opinion on betas.  They are still really long. You still have less time per question (this exam was around a minute per question). You will still encounter errors in the exam. You still have to wait at least eleven weeks to learn whether or not you passed the exam. However, when you go in for a beta exam well-prepared for the material you will be tested on, the experience is only mildly more painful than the production version of the exam.

How you prepare for an Oracle exam is NOT a private matter

A recent poster on an Oracle certification forum was extremely upset. He had studied for the Upgrade to Oracle Database 12c exam but failed it by a significant margin. As he put it in his post, the exam results made it appear as if he had not prepared. There was one question in particular that he was positive that he had answered correctly, but the exam results indicated he had missed the question on that section. He knew that the question was answered correctly because he had found the question and answer on the Internet. In fact, to prove his point, he posted the question and answer right there in the forum.

I replied to his post, letting him know that the information in question was from a brain dump and that using these materials was prohibited by the Oracle Certification Program. Further, I let him know that the Oracle Fraud team would probably be contacting him.

He responded that how people prepared for exams was a private matter.

And from that... a blog post was born.

The short answer to his response is 'No' -- possibly with an exclamation point. Oracle, as the certifying authority, can define what preparation methods are acceptable in order for them to grant a certification. If you would like to learn how to use Oracle on your own and never attempt to obtain a certification for your knowledge, you can make use of any materials you care to. It only becomes Oracle's business when you are preparing for one of their exams. In any event, whatever lies people who use brain dumps tell themselves or others, the long and the short of it is -- using actual questions and answers to prepare for an exam is cheating.

After letting the poster know that using brain dumps was unacceptable, I did some checking on the Q&A he had put in the thread. Sure enough, it was out on all of the usual brain dump sites. I then did some actual research on the question in the... (wait for it) Oracle documentation. As it turns out, the information in the documentation clearly showed that the brain dump answer was wrong.

Shocking, right? It's hard to believe that a company that steals copyrighted test questions and uses them to create study materials for people that want to cheat on exams might employ people who know nothing at all about Oracle to create the answer keys.

So take a minute to think about the person that created the forum posting. He spent time memorizing all of these questions and answers. He paid for, and failed, the exam. At least some of the questions that he memorized were wrong. Which ones? There is no way to tell. His Oracle certification status is now in jeopardy. Since he was taking the 12c upgrade exam, presumably he is an OCP for an earlier release of Oracle. The Oracle Certification Program can legitimately strip him of that certification and ban him from the program. Even if they decide not to do this, his preparation for the 1Z0-060 exam the second time is going to be much worse than if he never used the brain dump. He has no idea how much of what he 'knows' to be the right answer is actually incorrect. Ouch.

You are more than your certifications

I spend a fair amount of time on LinkedIn -- primarily answering questions in a couple of Oracle certification groups there. Recently I have started to see people that use their Oracle certifications as the primary title for their profile. For example, mine is "Database Engineer at Computer Sciences Corporation". I have seen people that use "Oracle Certified Professional DBA" and recently, I saw someone list their title as "Oracle SQL Certified Expert".

The first is not too bad -- the DBA OCP is fairly broad and includes both training and multiple exams. However, I still do not consider using it as a title to be a wise choice. The SQL Expert, however, is a single exam with no required training. Taken in isolation, this certification says almost nothing about an individual. There is a specific place in LinkedIn profiles for professional certifications. Listing all of the credentials that you have earned in that location is what you should do. Any employer or recruiter that is interested in people with a particular certification will find it there. Placing the same information in your profile title sends an entirely different message.

Oracle certifications are a great method for learning about the various applications and skills required to be an Oracle professional.  However, when you get right down it, what any given IT certification really means is "I passed a test" (or two tests or three tests...). Using a certification as the primary title in LinkedIn therefore is essentially describing yourself as "Someone who passed a test". As I discussed in one of my earlier posts, while the Oracle Expert series is a really nice set of exams, passing one does not instantly make you an expert. When I saw the LinkedIn profile where someone had used "Oracle SQL Certified Expert" for a title, my first thought was not that he was expert with SQL but rather than he had nothing to say about himself except that he had passed an exam.

If you are not currently employed and do not have a job title, you can still list yourself as an "Oracle Professional", or an "Oracle Developer". If you are not tied to Oracle, for example if you would also consider a position working with MySQL or another database technology, you can use titles such as "Database Professional", "RDBMS Professional" or "Database Developer". Any of these is better than describing yourself as a piece of paper.

The worst-laid plans of mice and men...

Oracle beta exams have their good points. However I normally prefer to wait for the production version. In this case, though, one of the winners of the 1Z0-062 voucher contest I held on this blog a couple of months ago got one through their employer after the contest was finished. The contest was over and there were no other valid entries to give it to. A brother of one of my coworkers had expressed interested in becoming Oracle certified, so I offered it to him. He considered it, but eventually decided not to. With time running out on the beta and an unused voucher, I decided to take the exam myself. The test does nothing for me since I am already an 11g OCP, but taking it could be useful in preparing my study guide for the exam.

That said -- what possessed me to schedule the exam on Friday the 13th?

Even before I realized what I had done, I knew that the beta was not going to be pretty. Normally I make sure I am well prepared before I ever schedule a certification exam. In this case, the first draft of my guide for 1Z0-062 is only about three-quarters complete.  However, with December 14th being the last day of the beta, I had to schedule it or lose out on the chance. The Pearson Vue center I normally use is not open on Saturdays, so that left Friday (I didn't really pay attention to the day of the month). I did a quick read through on the sections I have not researched yet and hoped for the best. For the record... this is an extremely bad plan.

Normally (there's that word again) when I am taking a certification exam, I make sure that I arrive at the testing center thirty to sixty minutes before my scheduled exam start. I check in with the desk to ensure I am in the right place and everything is set up, and then spend the time until the exam doing some last minute cramming. Yesterday, events conspired to keep me from leaving the house until I had just enough time to make it to the center. I thought it wouldn't be a problem. The testing center was at a community college where I have taken several exams previously. On this occasion, once I signed in at the desk, rather than taking me in to start the exam (as they have every time before), they sent me out to the lobby where about fifteen people were already waiting. I sat there for about twenty minutes watching other people get called in before one of the proctors came out and indicated that there was a problem. More people were in the room than they had on their list.

It turns out -- I (and many other people in the room) were in the wrong building. We were scheduled at the other testing center located halfway across the campus. After a hike and some time waiting in a different room, I finally got to start my exam -- exactly an hour after it was originally scheduled.

Regarding the exam itself -- John Watson contacted me after he took the exam three months ago and said he thought it was harder than it has been in the past. I would have to agree wholeheartedly. I would also add that it is even more difficult when you are not well prepared and are in a really foul mood before hitting the 'Begin Test' button.

It was not until after I got back home that it dawned on me that 'today' was Friday the 13th. It would be nice if I could point to that and seriously believe the problems were not my fault but were instead just a matter of 'bad luck'. Unfortunately, that was not the root cause here. I did not properly prepare for the exam and I did not follow my normal procedures for ensuring everything was correct at the testing center. The only positive factors are that I took the exam for free and that the results will not impact me one way or another. One thing is for sure -- I will make sure to plan better before scheduling my next certification exam.