What’s next for Sun certifications now that Oracle is in charge?

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At the moment, Sun’s certification page has a preview of the upcoming JEE 6 curriculum.  I’ve saved the image here in case it disappears like the SCJP Plus information did.  The learning paths on Oracle’s site do gel with this info so I think it can be safely assumed this is the plan as of now.

Disclaimer: I have no affiliation with Oracle or Sun.  This entire post is clues/speculation based on what is on the internet.

What is the implied mapping?

Based on the information available, the following chart shows what it looks like Oracle is planning.  Below the chart, I write my evidence for each. This just addresses exam naming at the moment.  I’m sure the content will change over time.  Sun was looking toward changes anyway with the Programmer Plus exam for Java 1.7.  For those uncertain about whether to get certified now, the name is important as is the fact that the certifications have a future.

Current Certification name Future Certification name
Sun Certified Java Associate (SCJA) Same
Sun Certified Java Programmer (SCJP) Same (no word on the programmer plus yet)
Sun Certified Java Developer (SCJD) Not enough info to tell
Sun Certified Web Component Developer (SCWCD) Split into Sun Certified Servlet/JSP developer and Sun Certified JSF developer.  Add JPA to form the Master Sun Certified Enterprise Web Developer
Sun Certified Business Component Developer (SCBCD) Split into Sun Certified EJB developer and Sun Certified JPA developer.  Combine to form the Master Sun Certified Business Application Developer
Sun Certified Developer for Java Web Services (SCDJWS) Renamed to Sun Certified Web Services Developer.  Add JPA and Servlet/JSP to form the Master Sun Certified Web Services Developer
Sun Certified Mobile Application Developer (SCMAD) Not enough info to tell
Sun Certified Enterprise Architect (SCEA) Same
  1. SCJA – As Oracle uses the words associate, professional, master and expert for their own database certification, it is unlikely they would get rid of Sun’s associate exam.  While the SCJA doesn’t show up on the JEE 6 learning path, it didn’t for the JEE 5 one either.  It was treated as an optional pre-requisite to the SCJP or a standalone exam.  I see no reason t his exam would not continue for the forseeable future.
  2. SCJP – Explicitly mentioned in the JEE 6 curriculum.
  3. SCJD – Not part of JEE so no info available.
  4. SCWCD  – The JEE 6 learning path shows this split into Servlet/JSP and JSF.
  5. SCBCD  – The JEE 6 learning path shows this split into EJB and JPA.
  6. SCDJWS – The JEE 6 learning path clearly shows this as a renamed exam.
  7. SCMAD – Not part of JEE so no info available.
  8. SCEA – Explicitly mentioned in the JEE 6 curriculum.  Continues to be independent of the other exams.  (The SCJP pre-requisite has only been for training classes, not for the actual exam.)

What is implied overall?

  1. There are more exams in the new world.  More money for Oracle.
  2. Exams combine to form “master” certifications in an area.  This is good if you want to get certified on just part of an area.  Say you don’t use JSF or EJB but want the other part of the certification.
  3. The word “Sun” is still in the name.  This is good for Oracle as far as branding goes.  Keeping Sun as a brand preserves the legacy built around the certifications.  There is some precedence for this.  The Hyperion and Peoplesoft certifications still have their old parent’s names.

Interesting facts:

  1. This image is named Java-EE-6-Curriculum-Path_option2.gif.  Option 1 is not available on the web server, but is shows some thought has gone into the new certifications.  While these are class listings rather than certification details, but still give some insight into the thinking going forward.
  2. Oracle’s learning paths show the difference between JEE 5 and JEE 6. (When clicking the links, you may have to choose a country and then go back to click the link again.)  The fact that they mesh with the roadmap on Sun’s site shows good consistency.
  3. Oracle’s learning path for core Java is the same.  It still shows the programmer, developer and mobile paths.  It hasn’t been updated in a while so we can’t assume much from this.
  4. We know Oracle is planning JEE 6 exams under the Sun branding.  They are currently advertising betas for the Sun Certified EJB Developer and the Sun Certified JSP and Servlette Developer.  And no, that’s not a typo.  Oracle seems to think “Servlet” is spelled “Servlette.”

What’s next?

Only time will tell.  Until Oracle announces things, all we can do is look for clues.

firefox – I know I saw that web page!

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I can’t find that page!  I know I saw it yesterday evening, but where did it go?

This was the question I posed to Scott earlier today.  After telling him what I wanted to blog about, I said that I just needed to find the web page that had the information.

Firefox history

I was aware that I could use the “search bookmarks and history” feature to look at all the webpages I had been to recently.  I tried narrowing it down to Oracle.com pages but could not find the page that I had seen last night.

Scott told me that I could view my browser history by time.  Perfect!  I know I saw it last night and I didn’t go to that many pages then.

I just went to History > Show all history.  It lets you filter by today, yesterday, the last 6 months and older than 6 months.  I chose “yesterday”, sorted by time and found the page.  It was a java.sun.com page which explains why Oracle.com pages didn’t find it!

When it doesn’t work

This “feature” is a bit creepy.  What if you don’t want your history around for so long.

  • When in “private browsing” mode, your history is not stored
  • If you’ve cleared your browser’s history, it is not in the list
  • If you’ve gone into the history and right clicked “delete”, that item is not in the list
  • If you’ve gone into the history and right clicked “forget about this site”, no items from that domain are in the list.

If you are like me and nobody else has access to your computer, this is an awesome feature though!  I certainly wouldn’t have remembered where I saw that information.

—

As to what that topic I actually wanted to blog about was – you’ll have to check back tomorrow.  Hint – it’s about Java certifications.

Installing the Adobe AIR 2 SDK in Eclipse

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While Adobe makes adding a new Flex SDK easy – just drop a new version folder alongside another version and point Eclipse to the new directory – they make installing a new Air SDK quite frustrating. The Air SDK is installed inside the Flex SDK, so to truly install a new version, you must hijack your existing Flex SDK and replace a few dozen files within the folder structure. It is my sincere hope that Adobe moves away from this coupling and allows Air SDKs to be more easily upgraded in the future without the need to piecemeal copy them onto an existing Flex SDK installation.

Below is short story of how I managed to get my application to build Adobe Air 2.0 applications with Eclipse and the steps I took to resolve the numerous issues that cropped up.

1. Download and Install the Air 2 Runtime and Air 2 SDK

The first step is to download the Air 2 runtime which installs itself within the operating system. The second step is to download the Air 2 SDK, which downloads as a zip file. Assuming you have Flex 2, 3, or 4 installed, there should be a plugin sdks directory that contains an AIR runtime folder such as:

Flex SDK root: C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe\Flex Builder 3 Plug-in\sdks\3.2.0
Air Runtime root: C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe\Flex Builder 3 Plug-in\sdks\3.2.0\runtimes

Backup (for safety) the runtimes folder and replace it with the one in the Air 2 SDK zip file. Congratulations, you have just installed the Air 2 SDK!

Note: You may have multiple Flex SDK folders on your computer with multiple versions. You should use whichever one your version of Eclipse is pointing to, or create a new version (“3.2.0-air2” for example), and point Eclipse to this new version.

2. Turning on Air 2 within your application

Next, try building and running your Air project within Eclipse using the Flash Builder plugin. Upon launching the compiled application, you will likely see the message “IIMEClient error”:

IIME Client Error

A little bit of digging, shows the error is caused by a combination of the following:

Flash Builder 4 + AIR 2.0 SDK + Application with AIR 1.5 app-descriptor

In short, the app-descriptor for my application (such myApplication.xml) requires that the namespace reference xmlns be changed from

http://ns.adobe.com/air/application/1.5
to http://ns.adobe.com/air/application/2.0

Once you change the version number, the application will compile and run without issue.

3. Full installation of Air 2 SDK required for Release Builds

While you can now build and run Air 2 applications within Eclipse, you will receive an error if you try to Export them as Release Builds. To resolve this issue you go back to step 1 and this time merge all of the files from your Air 2 SDK zip file onto your Flex SDK directory. This is especially risky, since you are replacing dozens of files throughout the SDK, so this time make sure to backup your entire Flex SDK folder. You should expand the zip file and replace over all files and folders.

For example, in the sub-directory bin replace two files from the Flex SDK: adl.exe and adt.bat, but leave the existing files in that folder in place. The rest of the files contained in the zip file should be used to replace the existing SDK files in a similar manner. Many operating systems offer a merge functionality that will only replace the files that have changed and keep the existing files in place.

After you are done, you can open a command window, navigate to the SDK bin folder and type “adt -version” to determine which version of Air is installed. My thanks to Michael Christoff for this part of solution that works on any OS.

The Result

Now you should be able to build, run, and release an Adobe Air 2 application. You can test this by exporting your Air Application to a .air release file, then installing your application using the Air 2 graphical runtime which was installed at the beginning of this process.