Category Archives: Java Certification

Happy Book Birthday! New OCP 21 Book Now Shipping!

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It's a Book!

Jeanne and I are excited to announce our new Java OCP 21 Certified Professional Study Guide is now shipping! Released by Wiley Publishing, this book teaches you all the new (and old) features of Java 21, and helps prepare those planning to take the 1Z0-830 Java 21 Certification Exam.

Are you worried your Java skills are getting outdated? Are you writing code with the same toolset you’ve been using since Java 11, Java 8, or even Java 1.4? This book is definitely for you then! It starts with the basics, incorporating all of the new languages features like pattern matching, text blocks, var, and switch expressions. After that, we add records, sealed classes, virtual threads, sequenced collections, modules, and more. Finally, we cover lambdas and streams, helping you write shorter code and easier-or-read functional code without a lot of boilerplate syntax.

Whether your fresh out of school or have been programming Java professional for over a decade, our book helps you understand how to use all of the features of Java 21. We cover each topic in detail, from the basics to advanced usage, to help you write better Java code in your daily life.

For those looking to become Java 21 certified, look no further. Our book contains 14 chapters of everything you need to prepare for the exam, including exam tips, study suggestions, and hundreds of challenging practice questions. It also includes access to Sybex’s Online Test Bank, where we’ve written 3 simulated 1Z0-830 practice tests and over 500 flashcards!

Order now for the holidays, as Amazon already has our book backordered until the second week of December!

sybex’s new test bank website

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On November 14, 2024, switched to new test bank software. That means the mock exams and flashcards and the like are now on a new website.

If you are registering for the first time

Create an account

  1. Go to study.learning.wiley.com
  2. Click to create a new account

Register your book

  1. Click “Redeem Test Bank”
  2. Choose Sybex and the book you are using.
  3. Then answer a question about the book and you are in. The old PIN code system is no longer used

If you were already using the old site

  1. Go to study.learning.wiley.com
  2. Click to create a new account
  3. Login using your credentials from the old site

Note that any books you had registered that haven’t expired yet will appear. However, your progress/history on them will not.

Different than Real Exam

Be aware that the exam software is different than on the real exam. For example, the real exam lets you flag questions for later, navigate to specific questions, or end the exam from any question.

PASSED! Jeanne’s Experience Taking the Java 21 Certification Exam 1Z0-830

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Oracle Certified Professional Java SE 21 Developer

As we mentioned recently, Oracle announced their new Java 21 Certification Exam 1Z0-830 this week. Scott passed first and wrote about his experience. Now I join the first few Oracle Certified Professional Java SE 21 Developer’s in the world.

Unlike Scott, who passed on the first attempt, it took me two tries. See my blog post from last week for why. Anyway, this time I passed with a 74%. I still had time pressure with only 10 minutes to review answers. (To be fair, it’s 9 days later; not enough time for Oracle to do anything with our feedback about length)

As we mentioned earlier last week, Oracle announced their new Java 21 Certification Exam 1Z0-830 this week. Scott passed on Friday and wrote about his experience. Today was my turn.

Changing my exam date

You have to wait five days to retake an exam. That would have been Saturday. however the exam is not offered on the weekend. So I registered for Monday. I then learned I needed to go into the office on Monday so got to learn how to reschedule the exam. It was very easy.l The exam registration email from Oracle has a link to reschedule. After that the form looks the same as booking originally where you choose a day and then a time. The Tuesday 7am slot wasn’t available by the time I knew Monday was no good so I switched to Wednesday at 7am.

Checking in

The blog post from last week . The proctor did not want to see my paper was blank. (While you don’t see the proctor’s name, zoom said it was proctor 8. Which is the same number as last time. So it might have been the same person.

The exam

Like last time, I had some very long questions. While a lot had a good amount of code to read, there were five where I had to scroll a ton. Those questions take a lot of time. I used the same techniques as last time with two extras:

  • I used my cursor as a pointer as I was reading code. This got me to be more careful reading so I didn’t miss things.
  • Thought in my head as if I was explaining to someone why I was ruling out choices. Again to force myself to be more careful.

Some of the questions on the exam were the same ones I got last week. Many were different. While I was somewhat faster on ones I’d seen before, I deliberately slowed myself down. My problem last week was silly mistakes not lack of knowledge. So I had to make a point of being more careful.

In terms of time, I had 16 minutes left with one skipped question. (There was one with a lot of reading near the end and I figured I’d feel less rushed if I did it last. I spent 6 minutes on that questions. I then spent 5 minutes checking a few. I still didn’t get to check the majority of questions I marked for careful review. Submitted with 5 minutes left.

We let Oracle know about the exam length problem so hopefully they do something to improve the situation.

For content, I got a lot of pattern matching and records. I didn’t get virtual threads or sequenced collections this time (I did last week) so definitely luck of the draw.

After the exam

I removed the Lockdown browser software from my machine. It has a lot of power so I like it not being there.

I also went to the CertView page to get my badge. I used Chrome as Safari on Mac didn’t let me expand the menus.

To see my exam details:

  • Expand “Exam Results” on left navigation
  • Click “Exam History” on left navigation
  • Click “Results” on this exam on the right side
  • This downloads a PDF showing which objectives you got a question wrong on

For credentials, expand “Credential Management” on left navigation. You can then download a certificate or badge. There are also links to post on Linked In or email a link to verify your credential. I then went on Linked in and added a credential including the credential URL.