Hi guys,
I cleared exam on Saturday. I would like to thank the HFSJ book and this forum - they helped me a lot. I would like to give some feedback on the exam and the prep hoping it may help some others in the future:
The exam was pretty easy, some of the answers are sooo straight forward that I had read the question many times to make sure its not a trap. The 3 questions I lost are 1 each from EL, standard actions and session management. Design questions are damn easy, so are the questions from security and the DD. EL questions are a bit tricky, make sure you spend enough time on them in the exam. The JSTL questions are also somewhat tougher, especially with the c:set action. Lots of questions on tag handlers and listeners - almost straight. And an interesting one - there are 2 questions on dynamic attributes, almost similar to each other - which are not covered in the chapters directly in our book, but pay attention - they did in the mock exams.
Regarding prep, my preparation time is 10 days (solid 10 days - an average 7 hrs per day). I've got experience in
J2EE for about 19 months. I've read HFSJ thrice - 2 times completely and the third time skimming before the exam. Did all the mock exams on each chapter twice - they help a lot. The final mock exam +20 worked, in my case +22 actually. So that is it, study hard, you'll rock!!!
Thanks,
Bharathi