B&S: Passed 387

[Steve Daskam]

Hi All,

Just found out that I passed the SCJD exam with a score of 387. Here's my breakdown:

General Con: 96
Documentation: 70
OOD: 30
GUI: 31
Locking: 80
Data Store: 40
Network Server: 40
Total: 387 (97%)

Like others, I'm not sure about the score on the GUI. I thought that I had a pretty good design. I created the app as an MDI application with a menu, and used some popup dialogs for searching and booking. It's very extensible, but maybe it was overkill. Who knows? Anyway, I'm glad that I passed!!

I worked on the app for about 3 months (in my spare time). I used the Monkhouse book and this forum as my primary resources.

I created a mult-tiered architecture, used RMI, and my data access object was implemented as a singleton which used a single RandomAccessFile object. I just used text files for my documentation.

My advice is to read the specs carefully, and keep your implementation simple. I am happy with my design, but I think that in a few places I went beyond what the specs were asking for.

Good Luck to all of you on your exams!!

Take Care,

Steve Daskam
SCJP, SCWCD, SCJD

[Roberto Perillo]

Alright, man! Congratulations!

[Anirban Das Gupta]

Congrats Steve !!!

Anirban
SCJP 1.4

[Gaurav Bhatia]

Hi Steve,
Any book that you followed and would like to recommend?

Also, I did SCJP5 a few days back....Now, i have to do both SCJD and SCWCD.
But not sure in which order i should proceed. Any suggestions.

Thanks!!

[John Matman]

Congratulations.

[Joe Harry]

Congrats!

[Steve Daskam]

Gaurav,

I would recommend this book by Monkhouse and Camerlengo (it's great):
http://www.amazon.com/SCJD-Exam-Second-Experts-Voice/dp/1590595165/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1216141967&sr=8-1

As for the order of the exams, it's really up to you. They are very different unrelated tests. The SCWCD is a multiple-choice, drag-n-drop, short answer type of test that is focused on java web-related topics, whereas, the SCJD is a hands-on java application. I did the SCWCD test first (a few years ago) as I was wanting a better foundation in the web technology. I just now took the SCJD exam as I have been meaning to take it for a good while, and have just now gotten around to it. Also, I made it one of my personal goals (for work), so I was somewhat forced to finish it.

Anyway, whatever order you take them is fine. I think in my case, I usually go by what I am most interested in studying/working on at the time (i.e whatever will hold my interest).

Regards,
Steve

[rohan tiwari]

nice score!!!

[Oscar Fernando Perez]

Congrats on your high score!
May I ask you how you managed to pass the fileName to the singleton?
Did you create a method getInstance with dbFileName as a parameter or you passed the parameter via a file? I want to implement data as a singleton as well but I cannot figure this one out.
Thanks!

[Steve Daskam]

I had some internal turmoil about creating the singleton, but decided that it was the way to go as it seemed to make my design simpler. So I went through the different possibilities.

I decided against getInstance(fileName) as this could be misconstrued as allowing multiple instances (which I didn't want), and it also turns the class into more of a factory. So I came up with a couple of different alternatives:
1) Set a System property with the file name before calling getInstance()
2) Set the file name via a static initialization method

Overall, I wasn't completely thrilled with either of these alternatives, but ended up going with option 2.

[Steve Daskam]

Just thought of a third option that I considered which is also valid. You could create a separate data factory class and pass in the file name to it. In the factory, you would just have a check to see if the data class is already created and if not, create it with the given file name. Somehow I forgot about this option while I was coding or I probably would have chosen it.

Regards,
Steve

[Steve Daskam]

Vathanak,

I didn't really handle the scenario that you describe. I just noted in javadoc that the lock method MUST be called before those methods and the unlock method MUST be called after those methods.

Steve