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Q1) I'm a graduate of BS Mechanical Engineering. I have good knowledge of major computer applications and I intend to enrol for a six-month IT course in Oracle 8i DBA. Do you think six months preparation is adequate to take the various OCP exams? What is the level of difficulties of the 5 exams? (From Nora)

ANS) Six months is a reasonable amount of time to train for Oracle 8i exams, though according to Oracle there is no typical candidate. Since the exams are geared towards hands-on experience and could be challenging, it is very important that you spend a lot of time practicing and playing with the software. Visit the following link to get a copy of the Oracle 8i Candidate Guide for details about the program: http://www.oracle.com/education/downloads/dba8i_cg.pdf 

Please refer to CertAdvisor archives for our earlier response to a question on the difficulty levels of the 5 exams.
http://www.examsonline.com/Resource/CertAdvisor_Archives.asp

Follow up to last week’s Cert Advisor

Q2) I am in tech support and want to get into systems admin. I have some UNIX experience and want to get certified. My colleague here says there are too many different UNIX platforms and getting certified in any of them would confine me to the products of that particular vendor. Is there any vendor neutral certification program on UNIX? (From Andy Barrow)

ANS) There is no vendor neutral certification program on UNIX. It s true that there are different UNIX flavors and platforms (BSD, HP-UX, IRIX, Solaris, etc.) and the available UNIX certification programs are specific to one vendor or the other. You should identify the product you are most likely to work with and get certified in that. 

As you gain experience and competence, you would be able to learn to operate on another UNIX platform, if required, with some effort. Preparing for a certification program would definitely help towards building that competence. Also as you are new to systems admin a certificate would add weight to your resume and help you get employers’ attention.

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Q3) I am a network administrator. I am planning to take CompTIA's Server+. Are there any prerequisites for this exam? (From Kevin Crace)

ANS) There are no prerequisites for Server+ though CompTIA recommends candidates to attempt the exam after getting one of the following certificates: CompTIA A+, Compaq ACT, Novell CNA, Microsoft MCP, HP STAR, SCO, or Banyan. 

CompTIA also expects candidates to have 18 to 24 months of hands-on experience in server hardware. Candidates who have appeared for Server+ exam agree that an in-depth knowledge of servers gained through extensive hands-on experience is key to pass this exam. 

Q4) I have a Certified ColdFusion Developer certificate from Allaire. Now that Macromedia has acquired Allaire Corporation how am I affected? (From Slator)

ANS) The combined company is now called Macromedia. But it has been reported that the merger would have no impact on Allaire’s certification programs.

Share your cert-experience

MCSE or CCNA? ‘Skoppel’ responds to last week’s cert-experience from Nix Solohub.

“You don’t have to sit for MCSE exams to learn networking fundamentals. If someone really wants to go for WAN why should he or she be forced to take the MCSE route? MCSE obviously covers more ground than CCNA. But I think comparison between MCSE and CCNA is unfair. CCNP is equivalent to MCSE and there are without doubt fewer CCNPs than MCSEs. If you are serious about your career why stop at CCNP. Why not CCIE? Where does MCSE lead you?”

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