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OCUP Fundamental Preparation...

 
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Mission Impossible: Prepare for OCUP Fundamental in 5-7 days

This is what I'm trying to do. As per other posts on this forum, there is still very little information about this exam in terms of preparation material.

I have bought the English version of "UML 2 Certification Guide - Fundamental and Intermediate Exams".

Has anyone prepared with just this material and passed the exam?

It seems incredibly concise. Fundamental exam topics covered in less than 100 pages. Wide margins. Lots of diagrams.

There are only 34 sample questions at the end of the book. The real exam has 80! As such, it will be very difficult to gauge readiness for the exam.

My questions are:
- Are the sample questions at the end of the book representative of the difficulty level of the real exam?
- Are there ANY other sample questions for this exam ANYWHERE? (I'm not interested in brain dumps)

Can anyone confirm/deny whether this site offers brain dumps or whether they are genuine practice mocks:
http://www.ace-it-certifications.com/OMG+OCUP-certification.htm

Thank you for your assistance, I'll be looking to book my exam for this Friday or next Monday.
 
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In that case, why rush to take the exam before having more confident?

Nick
 
Peter Cook
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Something may have been lost in translation. I didn't mention anything about confidence.

I'm used to doing one or two mocks before the real thing. In the absence of these mocks it may be a little difficult to ascertain exam readiness. Knowing the material and being ready for an exam are different things in my opinion.

I'm a big believer in the law of diminishing returns, Pareto's principle and Parkinson's first law when it comes to exam preparation. Therefore, I prefer to do concentrated preparation on one topic at a time over a short space of time rather than stretching things out over a period of months.

I suspect I treat certifications completely different to you. There isn't a right or wrong way.

If you have any further information on sample questions for OCUP Fundamental, please feel free to contribute to this thread. That is the main thrust.
[ February 19, 2007: Message edited by: Peter Cook ]
 
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Prepare for OCUP Fundamental in 5-7 days


It took me a year of study (only spare time, never when the sun was shining).

Regards, Jan
 
Peter Cook
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Originally posted by Jan Cumps:

It took me a year of study (only spare time, never when the sun was shining).

Regards, Jan



Thanks Jan,

In that case, I don't give myself very high chances

I only plan to spend 2-3 hours a day from Saturday just gone. Perhaps 4-5 hours on the day before exam.

I saw your post on using 486 material for preparation. I understand some of the reasoning was to get familiar with the test "experience". Fortunately, I've done quite a few of these multi-choice tests at Prometric, Vue etc. so none of that will be a surprise.

I also prefer to stick to exam objectives and OMG are quite clear and specific on what they will be testing on and it's quite different to 486. As such, I probably won't follow your lead on looking at 486 material/mocks etc. though I realize there is some overlap.

Wish me luck!

ITIL Foundation is next for me too. I'm probably going with this:
http://www.amazon.com/Service-Management-Foundations-Study-Guide/dp/0977146901/sr=8-5/qid=1171914740/

[ February 19, 2007: Message edited by: Peter Cook ]
[ February 19, 2007: Message edited by: Peter Cook ]
 
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Good luck;
I think you have a high probability of wasting your money, but good luck anyways.


I am on my second round of reading the study guide and the UML2.0 spec.
I am finnally starting to feel some form of confidence.

I know from experience that is when I have a slieght chance of passing.

If you ever get the desire to waste more money, Please waste it in my direction.
[ February 20, 2007: Message edited by: peter cooke ]
 
Peter Cook
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Thanks for the vote of confidence

Seriously though, us Peter Cook(e)'s have to stick together LOL.

I've just finished going through the material in the study guide the first time around. Now, I'm going to try and really learn the content to an examinable level

It all seems quite straightforward so far but maybe I'm underestimating the level of detail required.

I've decided not to look at the UML spec for preparation. Do you think the study guide misses information out that will be on the exam?

I'll decide tomorrow whether I'll book my exam for Friday or not.

I still haven't found any sample questions for this exam. Perhaps when I've done it, I'll put together some.
 
Peter Cook
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Originally posted by Peter Cook:
I've decided not to look at the UML spec for preparation...



On second thoughts, I may have to give the spec a quick scan after all at some point.

In the Datatypes section right at the beginning of the certification guide, it seems to omit mentioning the String primitive data type

It mentions, the Integer, Boolean and UnlimitedNatural primitives so it seems bizarre that String is missed out...I hope this isn't representative of the rest of the book!

Some of the sample questions at the end of the book, or rather the answers given, are up for debate too. I might mention more on that tomorrow so that others can learn...
 
Peter Cook
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UTI: The UML Technology Institute are the ones who develop the OCUP exams in coordination with OMG as I understand it.

They have what they call a sample exam here:
http://www.umlcert.org/en/sample_exam/fundamental.html

Now, is it just me, or do 3 sample questions not really constitute a sample exam??

More importantly, out of the three questions, the first question asks about information that is not even part of the fundamental exam objectives!!! Somebody, correct me if I'm wrong. There is no mention of interaction operators in the certification guide and the certification guide claims:

- "The official certification resource"
- "Developed systematically to enable you to master all exam topics - without exception"
 
peter cooke
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going into the exam over confident and underestimating the exam. Hey I have been there, got the coffee cup, t-shirt, and photo of the ride. I'll back you all the way into the exam

Seriously good luck. But read the spec at least once.
 
Peter Cook
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Originally posted by peter cooke:
going into the exam over confident and underestimating the exam. Hey I have been there, got the coffee cup, t-shirt, and photo of the ride. I'll back you all the way into the exam

Seriously good luck. But read the spec at least once.



I don't think I've ever gone into an exam over-confident. In addition, I don't think I've ever underestimated an exam. Both of these are largely because most of the exams I've taken had excellent information available pertaining to what to expect (mocks etc.) and therefore I had a good handle on what my chances were.

As for this exam, I have no such handle. That doesn't instil me with much confidence at all!

I don't mind doing a little experiment on my dime. In my opinion, the certification guide should cover 100% of what is required for the exam. If it doesn't then it is next to useless in my opinion and I will be writing the authors to let them know and leave my mark on Amazon.com etc. I already have a list of "issues" I have noted from reading the book.

I did my SCJP 5 or 6 years ago without referring to the spec or even writing a line of code. I could only do that because of the complete certification guide by Roberts et al. I had the confidence to use just the book and nothing else thanks to JavaRanchers and the feedback they gave for the book.

It seems I am somewhat of a guinea pig as far as the UML2 certification guide is concerned - no one has come forward on here or Amazon.com to say how good it is for exam preparation. I'll be the first.

I will endeavour to leave as much feedback on the efficacy of this book for exam preparation once I have done the exam. If I do feel the need to refer to the spec today/tomorrow I will make a note of exactly which parts I think are required.

I have my exam booked for Friday PM
 
Peter Cook
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Originally posted by Peter Cook:
More importantly, out of the three questions, the first question asks about information that is not even part of the fundamental exam objectives!!!



The second question has an invalid UML diagram as Actors cannot have associations with other Actors...
 
Peter Cook
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In preparation for looking at the actual spec if I need it tommorrow, can someone point me to the correct version i.e. one that actually matches up with page numbers, figures etc. on the exam coverage map.

I don't want to spend too much time digging around for this. The ones I've downloaded so far do not match up with the coverage map at all:

Superstructure v2.0: formal/05-07-04
Superstructure v2.1.1: formal/07-02-03
 
Jan Cumps
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I found the United Modeling Language 2.0 Proposal (03-08-02) was matching the coverage table.

Good luck, Jan

(corrected myself)
[ February 23, 2007: Message edited by: Jan Cumps ]
 
Peter Cook
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Originally posted by Peter Cook:


The second question has an invalid UML diagram as Actors cannot have associations with other Actors...



I have informed UTI of the queries I had with their questions and they agreed with my assessment. To confirm:

1) Interaction Operators are NOT part of the Fundamental Exam Objectives. Therefore question 1 is not an appropriate sample question.
2) The Use Case Diagram in question 2 is not valid due to an association between actors.

They have informed me that replacement/amended questions will be in place in the next few days. Stay tuned!
 
Peter Cook
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UTI have now updated sample question 1 and sample question 2:

http://www.umlcert.org/en/sample_exam/fundamental.html

It's a shame they don't have more than 3 questions in total. I encourage anyone interested to send them an e-mail to request more questions.

That's people power for you!
 
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