Passed SCJP 1.4 with 91%.

I have many years of programming experience but

never worked in JAVA before. But knowledge in other programming languages
helped a lot. The questions were not that tough. Some questions were a little bit
tricky though. I made some silly mistakes otherwise my score could have been
better. Some questions on Thread and Garbage Collections were little bit tough.
Other sections were easy. My suggestions for would be examinees are – at first,
read any book on JAVA thoroughly (Mughal Khalid or RHE would be a good
starting point) and try to understand the concept. Then write small codes and
experiment, and give as much mock tests as possible. Those who have no
programming background at all should understand the fundamentals of
programming first using any programming language. That will create the
foundation. Once it is done you are half a through any kind of certification.
Finally thanks to everyone in java ranch for help and suggestions.

For Assertions read Sun’s tutorial on Programming with Assertions. This is

enough:
http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4/docs/guide/lang/assert.html

To make your self ready for any kind of brain hammering questions take
Danchisholm’s exams. It will force you to understand the ins and outs of every
topic he covered:
http://www.danchisholm.net/sept27/index.html

For quick review before exam day read Velmurugun notes. It’s very neat and well
organized. Written for SCJP 1.2 though.
http://www.geocities.com/velmurugan_p/notes.html

Also try out the following Mock Exams:

Marcus Green:
http://www.jchq.net/mockexams/exam1.htm
http://www.jchq.net/mockexams/exam2.htm
http://www.jchq.net/mockexams/exam3.htm

Mughal Khalid:
http://www.ii.uib.no/~khalid/pgjc/jcbook/engine.html

Jxam:
http://eddiemcnally.hypermart.net/jxam.html

19 Hardest Questions:
http://www.lanw.com/java/javacert/HardestTest.htm

John Hunt:
http://www.jaydeetechnology.co.uk/certification.htm
Boone’s Exam:
http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Orchard/9362/java/javacert/newboone1-
19.html
http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Orchard/9362/java/javacert/newboone20
-39.html
http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Orchard/9362/java/javacert/newboone40
-70.html

MindQ:
http://www.javaranch.com/maha/_Mock_Exams/MindQ_s_Sun_Certified_Java_Pr
ogrammer_Practice_Test.htm

Sarga:
http://www.levteck.com/MockExams/TestSarga.htm

Ashok Kumar Gupta:

http://www.geocities.com/ashok_12_66/exam_applet.htm

Java Exam Simulation:

http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Screen/5046/test1.html
http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Screen/5046/test2.html
http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Screen/5046/test3.html

Valentin C.
http://www.valoxo.ch/jr/mocks/mock01a.html

Hi Guys,

Passed the SCJP 1.4 with 90%. My special thanks to JavaRanch.

My experience:
Phase1
Went through the practice questions to get used to the interface.
Phase2
Completed the exam in 45 min. Marked the questions which are doubtful.
Phase3
In this phase I went through all the marked questions.
Phase 4
In the last phase I went through all the questions.

After doing all the phases I had 15 mins left.

About the questions:

The exam started with 10 thread questions. 3 questions on synchronization.
remaining easy.
garbage collection was easy. Remember that local object will not be garbage
collected if its reference is returned by that method.

Know about the String and StringBuffer methods. questions will try to call
StringBuffer methods from String objects and vice versa. so be alert.

3-4 questions on main function arguments. most of them will be runtime errors.
dont confuse if u see arguments like -b , -c etc.

very basic questions on Collections framework. but know the methods as many
as possible.

2 questions from assertions. but very basic.

be alert about the local variables being accessed from out of scope. especially for
loop variables.

a couple of questions on short circuit operators.

know the 3 rules of hashcode.

****if you see compile error or runtime error in the answer then be careful.
most of the times answer will be either of them. and if u feel that a piece of code
is very easy then the question is trying to trick u.

one good thing about the exam is all the questions will ask about how many
answers to select.

My personal recommendation is read velmurugan notes. it has everything.

and don't forget to take caffiene during the exam. it keeps u active.

I got 75-80% in marcus green exams. the exam questions are <= tricky than
the questions in marcus tests.

Thanks to Valentin, Dan, Alfred and other javaranchers for instant responses.

JavaRanch never Sleeps!!!

Next targets - SCWCD, CCNA and UML.

Proud to be a SCJP!
Well as you know that I passed SCJP 1.4 with 96% on the 28th January. I want
to discuss the way I prepared for the exam so that others can benefit from it.

Though I had 2 years of experience in programming in java when I first saw the
exam questions in some mock test sites I felt the lack of understanding I had
regarding the Language. I felt that in order to get my skills polished I have to go
through rigorous preparation.

I set a time frame of 3 months for the prepration. Then I started to search the
net for a proper book. It was this time that I came across Javaranch. I found
names of some book that were recommended at a number of places. They
included:
1) Book by Heller and Robert.
2) Java 2 Exam Cram
3) Book by Khalid Mughal.

I went through all the books and found that Khalid Mughal's book suited my
standards. The way the book is written and arranged is excellent. At the same
time I was regularly giving mock test on the "Rules Round Up" in java ranch.

After getting the book I god the syllabus from the Sun Site and found that a
new topic called "Assertions" is included with java.awt and java.io being
eliminated. Also topics like Wrapper Classes, fundamental classes and others
were required to be covered in more depth.

After setting my time frame I started off with the book but felt a stumbling block
as gradually reading the book became monotonous. What I recognized that if I
first get an overall picture of the entire test and then read the book and
simultaneously give some mock tests then the thing will be more interesting.

Then I started for searching of some notes. I found two notes

1) By Velmurugan
2) By Ashraf Fouad

I started both of them parallely and stopped reading Mughal's book. I covered
all the topics from the notes. Now I was armed with an overall idea of the entire
syllabus.

Now as the confidence in me was building up I started with Mughal's book. Now
I was grasping all the bits in the book and I felt it interesting as never before.
Now I started reading all the topics posted in the Javaranch Programmers
Certifiation and Advanced Section. Whenever I had confusion I either posted
message on the Ranch or I sent private message to those people whom I felt
will help me. And no doubt about it that everybody reponded so quickly.

When I had covered almost 80% of the book and felt that I was ready for the
exam I found "Dan's Mock Test". After giving a few mock test I felt that I stood
nowhere. Dan's question was mind boggling. They made me wired. I really
respect "DAN".
Sudharsan posted January 30, 2003 08:26 AM
G'rajan
ranch hand Here is a link which had links for most of the pointers you've
Member # specified.
32649 www.geocities.com/technofundo/tech/scjp/scjp1_4.html
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