My experience with Adobe Flex 3 with AIR ACE Exam

I appeared for the Adobe Flex 3 with AIR exam yesterday morning and cleared the exam with a score of 82 %. I am extremely happy and feel elated that i am now part of the Adobe Certified Expert Community. I want to thank my colleagues (past and present), friends, the Flex India Community who have been instrumental in my learning process and Adobe for giving us a fantastic framework for building some really cool applications.

I am sure many people in India and in other parts of the world must be planning to appear for the exam and to give you a gist of it, i would try to briefly tell you about my experience during certification process.

What is this exam?

The exam is Adobe Flex 3 with AIR (Adobe Integrated Runtime) certification exam, that leads to the accreditation of ACE (Adobe Certified Expert – product specific).

Ideal for .. / Who can take this exam?

You are a college student leaning Adobe Flex, you are a developer creating application using the framework, basically if you write code and want to take the plunge of learning flex or already well versed with the framework, then this exam is for you.

Why should i take this exam ?

You have been working with the framework and want to validate your knowledge, your skills, you want to know where you stand in terms of Adobe’s expectation from a Certified Expert.

Motivation for giving this exam ?

The fact that throughout the process of preparing for the exam, you would end up learning and exploring things to greater detail and would get to touch base with things which you might have ignored or overlooked in the past. Even if you pass or miss by a margin, the whole activity will make you understand where you stand in terms of your knowledge/skillset, this would give you a chance to analyze where did you excel, what are your strong points and where you need to work on. The learning would be immense, believe me you would end up knowing new things at the end of the certification process.

Benefits of getting certified ?

Many, recognition in the developers community, amongst your peers, stand out in the crowd, self satisfaction, a blue print of your skill set validation, chance to introspect, question / challenge yourself.

Right time to start preparing for the exam?

Today, now. There is no right or wrong time or if you think you should find some time or dedicate some special time, if you know you want to give this exam then start preparing for it, be conscious of the fact that you have to give the exam sooner than later, set a timeline, prepare and go ahead give the exam when you feel you are ready for it.

Right time to appear for the exam ?

When you know you are ready for it, when you know you have done good amount hands on practice, and understand the fundamentals of the framework, thats important, if you think that there is something that you still need to explore before appearing for the exam, be sure that your do it and appear for the exam with absolutely no doubts in your head.

Timeline ?

For a developer / student who has a basic programming background but has no framework knowledge – fix a timeline of 20-25 days.

For a developer / student who has a programming background and is still starting to learn the framework – 10 days.

For a developer / student who has good amount of knowledge and is hands on with the framework – 5 days.

Fix the timeline on the basis of the dedicated time you can devote in learning and practicing / writing code, the above suggestions can work out best if you can devote good number of hours during the number of days suggested.

Lets look at the exam specific details ..

How is the exam conducted ?

The exam is computer based,conducted in a proctored enviornment. Authorized Pearson VUE Testing Centers conduct the exam. To know more about the types of the exam and other information, see http://www.vue.com/adobe/

Structure of the exam ?

The exam has 50 questions in all, you get 85 minutes where 15 minutes are given for filling up the survey and for terms and conditions, rest is for the exam. Passing score is 67% and the questions are multiple choice type.

Type of questions ?

There are true / false questions, single answer / multiple answers type questions.

Exam Process ?

You start the exam process by verifying the exam no (i.e 9A0-082 ) on the first screen, you complete the terms and conditions and fill the preliminary survey, exam starts once you see the first question on your screen. The screen contains the question section, the answer / options section, on the top right you see the time left and if you want to mark your question for review.
After selecting a choice, you press next, you can also select previous and see previous questions. After completing all the questions you see the review questions screen, and review all or flagged questions and then finally click end review / review complete. The moment you complete the review, your answers are evaluated and the result is displayed to u and you click exit.
Once you complete the exam, you get a scoresheet in the end showing the grade (pass / fail), scores for each section and other important related information (links, IDs etc).
More information http://partners.adobe.com/public/en/ace/ACE_Exam_Guide_FlexAIR.pdf

Major Topics covered in the exam ?

Creating a User Interface (UI) , No of questions – 11
Flex system architecture and design, 9
Programming Flex applications with ActionScript, 12
Interacting with data sources and servers, 8
Using Flex in the Adobe Integrated Runtime (AIR), 10

More information http://partners.adobe.com/public/en/ace/ACE_Exam_Guide_FlexAIR.pdf

My suggestions for the certification process ..

Ideally you should give the exam in two pass / phases, in the first pass you should mark flag (flag for review) on the questions which raise the slightest of the slightest doubt in your head, at the end of first pass, start again and review all the questions again carefully, in this second pass try to remove flags from the questions which give you some amount of confidence. Ideally if the no of questions in the doubtful bracket is less than 5 at the end of second pass then you are good to go or else you can again go for a third pass and try to minimize no of doubtful questions. Make sure that you manage your time in a such a way that you can atleast have two phases of check and revision.

In my case i had around 14-15 questions that raised eyebrows at the end of the first pass, in the second pass, the no went down to 8-9 and finally i hit end exam button, and surprisingly i had answered the same no of questions (9) incorrectly.

Preparation Material and the success mantra ..

I think the Adobe Livedocs for Flex is probably the best resource for preparing for the certification exam, its well documented with good amount of sample codes there n then after the explanation. I think the success mantra really is to follow what is specified here http://partners.adobe.com/public/en/ace/ACE_Exam_Guide_FlexAIR.pdf and be thorough with the topics in Livedocs. Livedocs offer comprehensive information, focuses on fundamentals and will give you enough ammunition and push to try things out yourself and be hands on with the topics. But this doesnt mean that one should not look at the books , i think Livedocs can be the starting point and then you can further extend your reading by referring books.

Also do look at the mock test engine Attest implemented by PXL Designs (both pro and free version). The practice exams come really handy and can help you revise what you have learnt quickly and effectively.

what next?

Based on the results you can then start working on your week points and apply what you have learnt throughout the process in your current work and practices. And like me and others in the community do share your experience after giving the exam .

Imp links

http://www.vue.com/adobe/
http://livedocs.adobe.com/flex/3/html/index.html
http://www.adobe.com/support/certification/ace.html
http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flex/articles/flex_certification.html

Please do comment if you want me to add anything more or if you would have any question about the exam. I hope you all would find the writeup helpful. My best wishes and good luck to all of you who are planning to give the exam.