SCMAD BETA EXTENDED!!!!!!

[Evelyn Cartagena-Meyer]

Good Morning Everyone,
I have extended the Sun Certified Mobile Application Developer for the J2ME, Version 1.0 beta exam until Sunday, March 7, 2004.
I am sorry if this causes any inconvience, but I would like more beta takers for the certification exam.
I have sent out many vouchers and the majority of voucher holders have not signed up to take the beta, PLEASE sign up to take the beta, if you are NOT going to take the beta, please return the voucher to [email protected].
I still have vouchers available for candidates too! Please send an email to [email protected] and they will send you a FREE voucher. Please send the below information:
On Subject Line: J2ME Voucher
Name:
Email:
Country:
Prometric Id number
If you have any questions or need any help with anything, please send me an email at [email protected] and I will be more than happy to help you.
Thank you.
Evelyn Cartagena

[calvin zhu]

Great!
I was expecting this. Since I really don't have time for the past 2 weeks.
I have to study for WebSphere Portal certification, Weblogic Portal at the same time.......That's such a good news!
One more question, is it possible because Sun might already have enough tester then , so I won't be able to take the test at Mar 6 even I book it?

[Steve Hamilton]

Hello Evelyn,
I am glad that you extended the exam, because I will not be able to be ready by this Wednesday to take the Certification. There is one problem, the Prometirc number that I called said that I will not be able to use my current voucher for any later than the original date. What do I do? I already canceled my Wednesday exam. The only way that I will be able to take the exam is at the later date. What do I do to get a new voucher with the extended date?

[Evelyn Cartagena-Meyer]

All,
You may use your voucher that you currently have to extend your date for the beta.
If you have any problems, please send me an email directly to [email protected] and I will send a direct email to Prometric.
Thanks.
Evelyn

[Terence Doyle]

Having just sat the exam with just 2 weeks to prepare all I can say to anyone who hasn't taken the exam yet is
Go for it!!

[Evelyn Cartagena-Meyer]

All,
I just spoke with Prometric and they are having problems with the existing vouchers.
If you want to reschedule your exam date and have redeemed your voucher, you will need a new voucher from Prometric. Please send [email protected] an email stating you have a voucher, send them the voucher number, and that you want to reschedule your date. They will cancel the current one and send you a new voucher number.
Sorry for any inconvenience.
Thanks,
Evelyn

[Jemima Job]

My exam is tomorrow, can i still reschedule.

[Xinyi Zhang]

I sent email to [email protected]. No response. I think I have no chance to reschedule.

[Nicholas Cheung]

Thanks Evelyn,
You give me 1 more week to prepare for the beta exam.
I have re-scheduled it successfully.
Many many thanks for your help.
Nick.

[Amy Caruso]

Glad that you made it, Nicholas.
I am still waiting for a reply from [email protected] and [email protected] and may not be able to reschedule my test if they won't reply soon.

[Abdullah Yoldas]

I took the exam today and now learned that the exam period is extended. I think this is not fair. This exam gave me a chance to make up my mind and study all the subjects throughly. However, I could not study some objectives enough such as MMAPI. If I had known this, I could have one more week to study.
I think a good beta examination process should have strict days. I can understand that you need enough sampling to understand the quality of the exam but you could probably determine a longer period for beta dates before.
Anyway thanks for this exam, the exam I liked most, ever. Congratulations for this good work.
Abdullah Yoldas

[Sunar Susanto]

I do strongly expect that those who wouldn't make it to pass on the Beta Exam would be given a second chance once the Beta period is ended and would be given another FREE Full Voucher to take the finalized exam.
Anyway 4 hours and 15 minutes (could be more considering the trips to the test centers) are so precious, one should deserve another chance.
Thanks for all the good discussions here.

[manoj pillai]

I took the exam yesterday and I think I blew it . I only got to skim thru certain topics for my prep due to time contraints. Well.. I guess I'll be waiting for the real exam now - hope a free voucher for the real exam is not too much to expect given the pains we've taken - btw I did sit through all 4 hours!!!

[Ken Boyd]

I mine this is totally useless practice. I had no chance to even study for beta test originally schedule on 25th. So return voucher. I appeared for SCBCD on 14th. It's just 9 days for SCMAD but I had thin client experience using set-top box. But 9 days are not enough given that I am still new to many topics.
If SUN would extend like this it makes no sense to me.
Next you will hear on 7th that Sun has not received enough candidates for exam so another extension. That is totally bizarre.. I am angry no doubt about that..

[Jack Yang]

me too.I'm still waiting the reply from the 2 address.tomorrow is the expired date.I need them could deal it as soon as posible!

[Nicholas Cheung]

I think this practice is not bad, if people who got the vouchers and actually go for the exam.
When SUN announced that there was a FREE beta exam starting from 5 Feb to 25 Feb, you already know that what you will be done on that period. Thus, you are sure that you have enough time to study for the exam, and go for it. Otherwise, you SHOULD NOT apply for the voucher, and see whether you can have enough time to study for it. Moreover, I feel some people even think that, since it is free, and thus, I applied the voucher first, no matter I sit for the exam or not!!!
That's why Evelyn said, she has sent out lots of vouchers, but only a few people registered for the exam. When Evelyn sent out the vouchers, she has already expected the number of candidates taken the exam, and thus, the deadline did not extend (I have asked for extension on 9 Feb, but seems at that time, many people have applied for the free voucher). But then, when the deadline of the exam approaching, the people who attend the exam is far less than the expected number!
If the one who applied for the voucher does schedule the exam, I think SUN will not consider to extend the exam because SUN has already had enough number of candidates take part in.
Thus, I dont think the extention is SUN's fault. SUN needs to extend the exam is solely because there are some people who get the vouchers do not go for the exam, which leads to insufficient number of candidates.
And all of us hope that the exam we are taken part in, is worth to put afford in. We also hope the exam be a high quality exam, and SUN is now trying to maintain the quality of the exams.
Nick.

[Mike Wang]

The evil is free!
If sun said, It is free,And If you get it, you can sit for the exam, dont be worry about the Magic Number 400, but conditions applied*
*1. you must pay $10 to get the voucher first
2. when you go for the exam, your $10 will be refundable.
3. If you give up the exam, your $10 will not refundable, and you can not attend sun's furture beta exam anymore if you dont return the voucher back to Sun.
frankly , $10 is nothing even it is not refundable,if we got the certification kit. But for those, "I got the voucher first" , it will let them be more consideration.

Originally posted by Nicholas Cheung:
I think this practice is not bad, if people who got the vouchers and actually go for the exam.
When SUN announced that there was a FREE beta exam starting from 5 Feb to 25 Feb, you already know that what you will be done on that period. Thus, you are sure that you have enough time to study for the exam, and go for it. Otherwise, you SHOULD NOT apply for the voucher, and see whether you can have enough time to study for it. Moreover, I feel some people even think that, since it is free, and thus, I applied the voucher first, no matter I sit for the exam or not!!!
That's why Evelyn said, she has sent out lots of vouchers, but only a few people registered for the exam. When Evelyn sent out the vouchers, she has already expected the number of candidates taken the exam, and thus, the deadline did not extend (I have asked for extension on 9 Feb, but seems at that time, many people have applied for the free voucher). But then, when the deadline of the exam approaching, the people who attend the exam is far less than the expected number!
If the one who applied for the voucher does schedule the exam, I think SUN will not consider to extend the exam because SUN has already had enough number of candidates take part in.
Thus, I dont think the extention is SUN's fault. SUN needs to extend the exam is solely because there are some people who get the vouchers do not go for the exam, which leads to insufficient number of candidates.
And all of us hope that the exam we are taken part in, is worth to put afford in. We also hope the exam be a high quality exam, and SUN is now trying to maintain the quality of the exams.
Nick.

[ February 24, 2004: Message edited by: Mike Wang ]

[Tobias Reinhardt]

I know the policy for this forum is to be nice, but sorry, I am p....d off.
I did hear on the 18th that there are a few places free for this exam. Applied for and get my voucher on the 19th. Since than I have been studying every day about 8h, concurrently to my day job. You can imagine that this is not too much fun. I took the exam today and saw that the exam is extended when I came home.
I understand the necessarity to extend the beta exam if you didn't have enough tester until yet, but this was predictable for you at least one week ago. In my opinion you did take the p.... out of all beta tester which have done the exam in the last few days.
And don't tell me that I did know about the exam long enough for a stress-free preparation. I didn't know it before the 19th. And I think that I am not the only one, this might be one of the reasons that you didn't get enough beta tester.
The ones which have already given up are now winner.
And I am not one of those guys who just tried there luck because it is a free shot. I have developed real world J2ME application in the last years. Without this former experience I would never have tried to take the exam.
A few words to the people who consider to take the beta exam:
I don't think it is worth the effort, even if it is free. It is such a large (lots of APIs, underlying technologies, no logic concepts like OO in SJCP) that to be sufficient prepared you have to spend at least 50h. You could try it with maybe 20h, but this would be a waste of time for sure as you will not pass even with a lot of luck. Even if you have experience with J2ME development. Lots of things which are asked you will maybe have looked up one time during a project and since then long forgotten.
If you compare the necessarily time to the saved money, it is just no relation. Wait until there are enough information available about this exam and you can do the preparation in half the time. Even if you are working for 10$ per hour the saved exam fees are not worth the stress. Not to talk about the waste of brain cells.
Tobias Reinhardt
Ahh and I don't like the fact that Sun Certification are becoming like MS Certifications. You don't have to understand anything, just memorize some books.

[Ko Ko Naing]

I just sat for the exam yesterday, the day that the announcement for the extension of SCMAD Beta exam is posted in the JavaRanch...
I couldn't do the exam well too...

[Sunar Susanto]

Hi All,
I am about to take the exam in 1 hour today (Tuesday, Feb 24, 2005). I couldn't cancel, rather than waiting for the email confirmation to change schedule and ask for another voucher, I'll just go for it. I hope that Sun would be kind enough to us to get a second chance to do it for FREE after the Beta has ended and take the finalized exam as I mentioned before.
Wish the Best for All.

[Ken Ho]

I just made my exam and before that, I had read this news and still went for it. Since I have already scheduled it and prepared for it, and don't want to defer it anymore.

[Tobias Reinhardt]

An explanation why I think that this is unfair to the ones who did take the exam before the extension.
As more information about the test you have as more easily it is, as you can concentrate on the areas which you know that will be asked. For example if you would know that you don't have or have to memorise the error codes of the installation process or spelling of JAD attributes that would give you an advantage. Not to talk about the advantage you have if you have some of the real questions.
If you do the exam and do a memory dump after the exam you can recover quite a lot of questions. This might be not allowed but that happens.
Most people usually take the exam in the last days of a beta exam period, this means that there is not much time for this information�s to spread. But now these lists with memory dumps have nearly two weeks time to spread.
The ones who did do the test before the extension are three times betrayed,
- they did have to learn more stuff,
- they had less time,
- and as with more information available the results of the exams in the extended period will be better. This means the pass mark will now rise.
On the long sight this move isn't very clever also. During the next beta exam people will wait for an extension to get more information. Maybe the next time the beta exam will have to be extended three times.
Tobias Reinhardt

[Kelvin Chan]

As it is free I do think SUN is the boss ...., you can say that SUN pay for the exam for you ....

[Theodore Casser]

I concur as well that it's faintly unfair to those of us who took it on time... but hey, life's not fair. Oh well.
Could any consideration be given to those of us who didn't benefit from this?

[Steve Hamilton]

I received my new voucher and tried to use it, but it also showed an expiration date of February 25th when I tried to reschedule.

[Mehdi Chaouachi]

I also sent an email to get exhange my old vochure with a new, but still no reply, I sheduled my exam tomorrow 25. What should I do?

[Rajkumar Saboo]

Hello Durga,
Same with me. I am also waiting for new voucher. Bit confuse what to do (appear it on tomorrow or wait for reply ) ??
Please help us Evelyn....

[Xinyi Zhang]

I received my new voucher and tried to use it, but it also showed an expiration date of February 25th when I tried to reschedule.

I am experiencing the same thing.

[Amy Caruso]

I received my new voucher and tried to use it, but it also showed an expiration date of February 25th when I tried to reschedule.

Me, too, having the same problem with new voucher.

-------------
SCJP 1.4
SCBCD 1.3
And more

[Mike Wang]

I just got mine 2 hours ago

Originally posted by Durgaprasad Velagaleti:
Did any one get a new voucher for the extended Beta ?
I have my exam tomorrow feb 25, i sent an email to send me a new voucher and cancel the old one.
I didnt receive any response yet.
Did any get a response ?
Thanks.

[Mike Wang]

We may not claim Sun but those , "Got the voucher first", abused the voucher.

[snow bound]

Free and beta. That says it all; I don't think I have any right to complain about anything Sun does. Anyway, I'm going to my originally scheduled test in 3 hours. Then I can stop studying and get back to my other projects, yay!

[Evelyn Cartagena-Meyer]

All,
Prometric is sending out the vouchers directly to the candidate. I have urged them to respond to your emails the same day. I am trying my best to get them to be more responsive.
Please let me know if you have any questions or need any help.
Sorry for any inconvinience!
Evelyn

[Mike Wang]

24 Feb morning (Singapore time) I cancelled my exam which is scheduled on 25 Feb and ask for extention from SunCert@ . And I got the vourcher this afternoon

Originally posted by Durgaprasad Velagaleti:

Is your original exam on Feb 25 ?
When did you send the request for the new voucher ?

[ February 24, 2004: Message edited by: Mike Wang ]

[sh yh]

Originally posted by Evelyn Cartagena:
All,
Prometric is sending out the vouchers directly to the candidate. I have urged them to respond to your emails the same day. I am trying my best to get them to be more responsive.
Please let me know if you have any questions or need any help.
Sorry for any inconvinience!
Evelyn

Thanks Evelyn.
I got the new voucher. But when I re-registered the exam, the Prometric center said the voucher cannot be used for the 311-310 exam.

[Steve Hamilton]

I talked to someone at Prometric regarding the new vouchers not working. They said that their scheduler has not been updated with the new expiration date and that I should wait for about two days before I reschedule my exam. Then, everything should be fine. Hopefully....

[Amy Caruso]

An extension for the test is probably appropriate for whomever had gone through the hassle trying to reschedule using the new test vouchers, no?
Evelyn, do you know when the new test vouchers will be ready for use?

[Billy Tsai]

so is it still possible to register the exam now? because i have been busy with the project at work and our company is also providing trainings so no time to sit the exam recently

[Jim Crawford]

I'm also a tad peed off that there has been an extention and I was forced to take the exam earlier. Guess we can just hope for the best and maybe Sun would give us 0.5% credit or something. :roll: