OCA/OCP 8 Programmer Practice Tests Kindle Edition Available

pt-cover

Scott and I are thrilled to announce that the Kindle version of our third book, OCA / OCP Practice Tests: Exam 1Z0-808 and Exam 1Z0-809, is now available for purchase on Amazon! The paperback edition, available for pre-order, is currently printing is shipping in April.

This book, has over 1000 practice questions. Each exam objective has a chapter designed to focus you in on key points and reinforce them. The two practice exams closely simulate the real exam even telling you how many answers are correct.

Both the paper and Kindle editions come with free access to Sybex’s online exam simulator. The publisher has redone the simulator since our previous editions were printed. I got to beta test the software and was overall happy with the new interface.

my second 3D print

After completing my test run, I didn’t have a lot of time so I wanted to start with something simple. Preferably one I could use as gift on an upcoming vacation.

I had taken a class a year or two on the basics of 3D printing which used TinkerCAD. I like that it is free and easy to use. I’ve forgotten most of what I’ve learned so will get to relearn when I have more time. I did remember enough to assemble two simple objects together. It seemed good enough for a first print. Here’s the design:

TinkerCAD lets you download a .stl file so I was all set to print. Actually printing it, I learned a few things about the software:

  • There’s a size option when printing. I thought it was inches. It’s not. It’s scale. I printed a bit bigger than I wanted, but that’s ok.
  • The abort button doesn’t work. Nor does the emergency stop. What does work is killing the power or unplugging the printer.
  • Closing the software doesn’t work on Mac. Force quit does. I’m not sure if this is a problem with the software or with Mono.
  • The status screen doesn’t let you command tab to it. Instead you have to do the show all windows thing to get to it.

It took a few hours to print (this printer is small so therefore less speedy than some others). It was tricky to get off the bottom of the printer bed. Online suggested a scraping tool. I couldn’t get it with a putty knife. What worked was a nail file.

And the result:

printm3d – my first 3D print

I tried to buy a Tiko on kickstarter. I liked that it was lamp shaped and small. Aka apartment friendly. After the Kickstarter was cancelled, I bought a M3D micro printer. It’s an eight inch cube so still apartment friendly.

Set up was easy. You download the software from the website. It runs on Windows, Linux and Mac.  Once you download, it says it is beta software, but it works. My only complaint is they don’t sign it will. I chad to do “control open” on my Mac because it said the software was from an unidentified developer.

You have to plug the #D printer into your computer. I’m using the printer box as a little table and sitting on the floor so I can do this near the window and near a power outlet. This setup is decent unless I want to code while I’m printing :).

The printer verifies you removed the gantry clips and guides you through inserting the “ink.” This took me three tries. The first time no plastic came out. I think I didn’t shove it in hard enough. The second time, some white plastic came out then the color I inserted did. However, it came out in a bubble. The third try worked.

The manual shows a hook for loading the plastic externally. This hook doesn’t come in the box so you have to either print it or buy it online. It takes 4-5 hours to print it yourself. I’ll get around to that.

The manual also implies sample models are available in “recent models”. This didn’t happen for me so I had to download from the internet. I like that you can easily change the size and quality of your model. And that it tells you the print length before you start. I also like that it tells you the percentage complete down to the hundredth of a percent. Feels like progress!

Now to try to make something of my own! My second 3D print.