Mattias, Someone else on this site said it before me, and I totally agree with it. Don't waste your time obtaining a certification. Use your time to build a portfolio of web site using different approaches and different technologies. Take a laptop with you when you interview, and ask your interviewer (not the HR person, but the technical interviewer), if he/she would like a 5 minute overview of the web sites you have designed, and how you designed them. This should open the floor for questions, and give you a chance to "sell" your skills. Make sure you have your favorite IDE's on your laptop, along with your favorite JSP/Servlet/EJB server, so you can open the code up and answer questions. This will not only showcase your skills, it will also show the interviewer that you know how to work with "xyz" tools to get the job done.
Almost anyone can study/memorize enough stuff to pass a test, but not everyone can actual program sufficiently in the real world to get the job done. And it is the person with a proven track record of finishing and deploying projects that will grab my attention first in an interview, vs. the person who has passed 2-3 certification exams, but does not have the experience and the references to back up his/her expertise. One last thing, if you really want to build a working portfolio, consider donating your skills to some of the non-profit agencies who need web sites built for them and do not have the funds to pay. Here in Dallas, the local Jr. Colleges have posted a list of non-profit agencies who are requesting programmers to donate their time/skills to building web sites for them. Although working for free does not sit well with some people, keep in mind that having a working web site that you can point to during your interview, in addition to your portfolio, can earn you extra brownie points in the interview that could land you your next job. And it is going that extra mile that will make you stand out from the crowd when the decision on who to extend an offer to is made. Celeste -----Original Message----- From: Mattias J [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Wednesday, April 10, 2002 1:58 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [OffTopic] Certification In the "Looking for java Positoin" thread, somebody mentioned certification as a way to spark off your career. That brings to mind a question I've had about the certification, that you fellow "listers" (a new word?) might have an opinion on. If I understand the information on http://suned.sun.com/US/certification/java/index.html right, you have to have the "Sun Certified Programmer for Java 2 Platform" before you can get the "Sun Certified Web Component Developer for Java 2 Platform, Enterprise Edition (J2EE[tm])". This seems rather reasonable. What bothers me is that the the "Sun Certified Programmer for Java 2 Platform" includes AWT knowledge. As stated in http://suned.sun.com/US/images/certification_progj2se_07_01.pdf (page 8), this includes "using ... LayoutManager ... and resize behavior,and distinguish the responsibilities of layout managers from those of containers". Surely I start my Java journey learning to program GUI applications with Swing (and thus some AWT). But since I have been developing web apps only for the last year or year and half, I do not remeber how to use the layout manager (thought I remember clearly I hated them...). But if I want to get the J2EE certification I have to learn this again to pass the basic certification (am I right?). What does everyone else think about this? To me it seems like some PR move from Sun, so that everyone with a certification must know how "wonderful" their AWT technology is and be able to promote that. Mattias Jiderhamn Expert Systems [EMAIL PROTECTED] =========================================================================== To unsubscribe: mailto [EMAIL PROTECTED] with body: "signoff JSP-INTEREST". For digest: mailto [EMAIL PROTECTED] with body: "set JSP-INTEREST DIGEST". Some relevant FAQs on JSP/Servlets can be found at: http://archives.java.sun.com/jsp-interest.html http://java.sun.com/products/jsp/faq.html http://www.esperanto.org.nz/jsp/jspfaq.jsp http://www.jguru.com/faq/index.jsp http://www.jspinsider.com =========================================================================== To unsubscribe: mailto [EMAIL PROTECTED] with body: "signoff JSP-INTEREST". For digest: mailto [EMAIL PROTECTED] with body: "set JSP-INTEREST DIGEST". Some relevant FAQs on JSP/Servlets can be found at: http://archives.java.sun.com/jsp-interest.html http://java.sun.com/products/jsp/faq.html http://www.esperanto.org.nz/jsp/jspfaq.jsp http://www.jguru.com/faq/index.jsp http://www.jspinsider.com
