Obsolete knowledge?

[Brian E Smith]

As I had mentioned a couply of weeks ago, I'm psyching myself up for the test, studying using the RHE Certification guide, etc. With Java 1.4 just out, I started wondering whether or when a certification will expire, or in other words, when the exam will cover the new stuff in 1.4 (nio, for example). I looked at the copyright date on my book, and it's 1999. So, in your opinion, am I learning obsolete information? Are there things that might be on the test (i.e., 1.3.x-specific things) that I'm not ready for?
Regards,
Brian

[Corey McGlone]

Actually, as far as I know, the exam only covers material in Java 1.2, so there isn't anything from Java 1.3. So does that make the information even more obsolete? I don't think so.
In general, the exam tests the basics of the Java language - the things that aren't going to change much (if at all) from one release to the next. I would say that, by and large, the information that you learn studying for the exam is going to be useful to you no matter what version of Java you're using.
In fact, the majority of the exam isn't even material specific to the API. Granted, there is information about the Math class and some of the collections, but this is a small portion of the exam. The bulk of the exam tests general knowledge, such as program structure, syntax, semantics, flow, etc. These things aren't going to change from one release of Java to the next so I'd say that the information you're studying isn't really obsolete.
I hope that helps,
Corey

[Fei Ng]

Free beta exam for Sun 1.4 is coming though.
: \
what do u guys think?