Is worth taking the SCBCD 1.3 exam?

[Renato Veneroso]

Hi folks,

I would like to hear your opinion on taking the SCBCD 1.3 exam. Now that Sun has released the SCBCD 5 is still worth taking the "old" 1.3 version of the exam? I'm finishing preparing to take the SCWCD exam. As soon as I succeed in it, I'm considering the idea of preparing to take SCBCD. I know A LOT of things has changed in EJB world so studying for the SCBCD 1.3 exam doesn't seem much helpful (if any) to take the SCBCD 5 exam. I'm really in doubt about what version of the exam to take.

As far as I'm concerned the most common used certification books - "Head First EJB" from OReilly and "SCBCD Exam Study Kit" from Manning - haven't been updated for the new SCBCD 5 exam so the lack of material may be a problem to take the new version of the exam.

What do you think.

Thanks in advance.

[Patrick Beck]

It depends on what you wanna do later? Are you going to maintain/extend existing (often) EJB2 applications, then you probably wanna take "old" EJB. Well, it is not really old. Most applications today are written with EJB2, therefore, therefore some knowledge in EJB2 may help you in your next job.

Maybe you are a freelancer and are going to do some new projects for your customers, your probably wanna do them in EJB3, then head for EJB5 certification.

Make your choice. You won't be happy if you have EJB3 and are going to work on a lot of EJB2 projects... then you need also to learn ejb2 stuff...

[Nguyen Long]

...besides, it's you passed SCBCD 1.3, it's wont be a big problem when learning SCBCD 5, but it's really a hard to learn EJB 1.2 from EJB 3 knowdlege, EJB 3 is much easier than EJB 2.x , anyway it's your choice finally

[Renato Veneroso]

Thank you for your replies guys.

Actually, I haven't worked with EJBs so far and don't even know if some day I will. My first thoughts on taking the SCBCD exam are for a matter of career improvement. However, you mentioned two points I think I should really consider when deciding what version of the exam to take:

1 - Most applications are written with EJB2;
2 - Learning EJB3 from EJB2 is likely to be easy but the opposite isn't true.

So I think I'll take the 1.3 (EJB2) version of the exam.

Thank you very much again.

[Dibbo Khan]

I don't think it makes sense to take the EJB 1.3 exam if career advancement is what you are after.

I have based my career advancement on knowledge of the latest technologies. Think of it this way, many people have EJB 2.1 experience and just having certification in EJB 2.x might not open many doors.

But relatively few people have EJB 3 experience, so having certification in EBJ 3 will open many doors.

Secondly, do you want to do dull maintenance work or cutting edge EJB 3.0 work. I prefer development to maintenance any day.

[Renato Veneroso]

Well, after saying I would take the 1.3 SCBCD exam I've changed my mind. Besides the advices I've got here, I talked to my former Java teacher and he strongly recommended taking the new SCBCD 5 exam.

So, I would like to ask you another question: which book do you recommend reading to prepare to the EJB 3.0 exam? As I said before, the two well-known EJB certification books ("Head First EJB" and "SCBCD Study Kit") haven't been updated to EJB 3.0 so I will have to use another book.

From your experience and knowledge of the topic, which book(s) do you recommend me? By the way: I've never worked with EJB's.

Thank you once again.

[Patrick Beck]

Originally posted by Renato Veneroso:
Well, after saying I would take the 1.3 SCBCD exam I've changed my mind. Besides the advices I've got here, I talked to my former Java teacher and he strongly recommended taking the new SCBCD 5 exam.

So, I would like to ask you another question: which book do you recommend reading to prepare to the EJB 3.0 exam? As I said before, the two well-known EJB certification books ("Head First EJB" and "SCBCD Study Kit") haven't been updated to EJB 3.0 so I will have to use another book.

From your experience and knowledge of the topic, which book(s) do you recommend me? By the way: I've never worked with EJB's.

Thank you once again.

Almost every 2nd topic here is about "which book...". In addition, there is also a search function...

Well, I think you heard about the links page?
http://faq.javaranch.com/java/ScbcdLinks