SCJP – Best final practice exam

It took me a while to take the SCJP. I finished Kathy and Berts study guide and was scoring in the 90’s in the practice questions. But I knew I wasn’t ready. Although I had taken platfrom 2 of SCJP about 4 years and did it quite easily, even with half of the Java knowledge I have now, SCJP 5.0 felt much harder. I wanted to write this small entry to discuss the path I took for the SCJP. The most important place to note is http://www.javaranch.com/. There you will find lots of information and hundreds of Java pioneers who are willing to help you. If you are studying for SCJP I’m sure you know about that place already.

There are lots of other preparatory sources available here http://faq.javaranch.com/java/ScjpMockTests. But what I wanted to write about was this exam simulator: http://www.examlab.tk/. It is free and does not contain any advertisements. Atleast it didn’t when I used it couple of months ago. Why I wanted to talk about this exam simulator is because it showed me a side of Java (or atleast SCJP part of Java) that I did not see with other materials. In Javaranch, this practice exams are recommended mostly as the final step before the exam. But in my exprience, taking this as the final step will prove it a really long step. Because you probably will not be able to zoom through this.

Ever came across a question in the exam that made you go, “come on… I know this… but…”, but you don’t know how to answer the question? because the question was asked in a way that you never expect it to be asked. For example, constructors in Java. They have certain common rules about their usage that you come across every practice material, like a constructor can be called within a constructor only. But in the exam, you might get a piece of code about constructors, that puts the question in a completely different view, using the same common rules you know about them.

That is exactly what this exam simulator will give. I was feeling confident before using this simulator and was going to schedule my exam soon. I did this simulator and I failed. I was astonished with the level I was at. The concepts I was so sure  about earlier, not anymore. I couldn’t answer many of the questions and my exam postponed for a while. This simulator will show you a side of questions that you normally would not find easily with other practice exams. Atleast the onces I did.

Finally, do not use this simulator until you have a fair bit of knowledge. Attempt this when you know the concepts. In my opinion, if you can pass the practice exams in this simulator, you probably wouldn’t have much problem passing the certification. Also, this simulator is a stand-alone program that runs in Windows and it is designed (GUI) like the real exam.

Also, another reason I wanted to write an entry about this simulator is to appreciate the effort and time spent on this simulator which is distributed freely and the questions here really made a difference.

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