Re: Is Sr. DBAs afraid of not be able to pass cert exam ??

As promised, I spoke to the certification program manager last night about this issue. My understanding was actually incorrect on one point, so let me quote her answer verbatim:

"The OCP exams are written by internal Oracle experts - in fact, usually the same people who write the courseware. (Even for the 7.3 and O8 tracks, when we contracted the writing out, the writers were technical people who had worked with Oracle, and who were trained to write exam questions, not vice versa.) So the exam writers are among the best and most knowledgeable people possible, but if the Curriculum Developer has a misconception that appears in the courseware, it may very well have been written into the exam and possibly not caught by the other technical reviewers. I can have the issue about using the order by clause in subqueries on views looked at within a day or so.
Our policy is to investigate the exam right away, providing we have sufficient information. Many times candidates contact us with a concern about 'exam questions being wrong', but unless they can provide sufficient description of the question (describe scenario, keywords, etc.) then we cannot identify it to research it. Any time we hear of a potential error, either from within Oracle or from a candidate, we begin research right away. Actual errors are very, very rare. Whether or not we find an error, we respond to the candidate with our findings and what the result will be for them. "

I have the list of issues that Daniel reported, and I will investigate those to see if they are relected in the courseware. If they are, then I'll pass them on to the certification program manager for further investigation to see if they are also incorrect in the exam. Again, if anyone else has further examples of this problem, whether in this exam or other ones in the DBA track, let me know directly at peter.sharman_at_oracle.com. As soon as I hear further on these issues, I'll let you all know - sound like a Texan, now, or should that be y'all to sound like a Texan? ;)

--
HTH.  Additions and corrections welcome.

Pete
Author of "Oracle8i: Architecture and Administration Exam Cram"

"Controlling developers is like herding cats."
Kevin Loney, Oracle DBA Handbook

"Oh no, it's not.  It's much harder than that!"
Bruce Pihlamae, long-term Oracle DBA

"Pete Sharman" <peter.sharman_at_oracle.com> wrote in message
news:qFj68.17$8X1.350_at_inet-nntp1.oracle.com...


> Daniel

>

> Since I'm not part of the certification group, no I can't tell you if

there


> are errors in the OCP exams.  The only time I see the exams is when I do

> them myself, and I haven't done the Intro to SQL exam.

>

> However, I looked back to the previous discussion we had on this to find

> examples of the gross errors you mention.  Unfortunately the only one I

> could see (since our news server seems to age messages out) was one where

> you mentioned that the book said you can't do an ORDER BY in the subquery

to


> create a view.  That is of course something that is possible to do, as you

> stated:

>

> SQL*Plus: Release 9.2.0.0.0 - Beta on Thu Jan 31 14:05:41 2002

>

> (c) Copyright 2001 Oracle Corporation.  All rights reserved.

>

> SQL> connect / as sysdba

> Connected.

>

> SQL> CREATE VIEW empvu80

>   2  AS SELECT employee_id, last_name, salary

>   3  FROM hr.employees

>   4  WHERE department_id = 80

>   5  ORDER BY last_name;

>

> View created.

>

> All I can do is look at the courseware which is what is used to create the

> OCP exams.  In this case, I went to the Oracle9i Introduction to SQL

course,


> which I think matches the book you originally highlighted the problems

with.


> In chapter 11 of that course, it states (and I quote):

>

> . The subquery that defines the view cannot contain an ORDER BY clause.

The


> ORDER BY

>

> clause is specified when you retrieve data from the view.

>

> It would therefore seem that the blame is less Jason's than in the wrong

> material in the courseware (although I would venture to say that an author

> has some responsibility to verify the truth of statements rather than just

> believing them).  From what I understand, the actual question writers for

> the OCP exam are people that are knowledgeable in how to write meaningful

> exam questions, not necessarily people who know the ins and outs of the

> Oracle database.  As a result, the OCP questions simply reflect the

> courseware, so the problem that needs to be addressed here is the

courseware


> (with an automatic flow on to fixing the problem in the OCP exam).

>

> SO, the next step is to look at the courseware.  We have a mechanism for

> logging bugs against particular courses internally.  I went and looked at

> the bugs for the 9i course and this specific issue wasn't there.

>

> To ensure this issue is addressed, I can do two things:

>

> 1.  Since I've never looked at this course or Jason's book, I'm not overly

> familiar with them.  For the sake of future releases of the courseware and

> the OCP, I would ask you (if you have this) to send me a list of the

> problems you know about.  I will log these as bugs for the course, and the

> next release of the course will no longer suffer from this problem.  I

know


> this is probably asking a bit much and it's certainly not your

> responsibility, but this will be the quickest way of addressing the

problem.


>

> 2.  I will also raise the issue with the Certification Program manager and

> ask for her comments, which I will bring back to this forum.  If anyone

> feels that have unfairly failed an exam because of these issues, send me

an


> email (peter.sharman_at_oracle.com - please don't send to the group) and I

will


> also raise that with the Certification Program manager.  I can't promise

> anything can be done about it though, since it's totally outside of my

> sphere of influence.

>

> I'm also willing to discuss this offline with anyone who feels the need to

> do so.

>

>

> --

> HTH.  Additions and corrections welcome.

>

> Pete

> Author of "Oracle8i: Architecture and Administration Exam Cram"

>

> "Controlling developers is like herding cats."

> Kevin Loney, Oracle DBA Handbook

>

> "Oh no, it's not.  It's much harder than that!"

> Bruce Pihlamae, long-term Oracle DBA

>

> "Daniel A. Morgan" <damorgan_at_exesolutions.com> wrote in message

> news:3C592AE1.B0E78D3B_at_exesolutions.com...

> > Thank you for your thoughtful and valuable input. Now can you explain to

> us why

> > we are seeing gross errors of fact in the Oracle Press books that are

for


> OCP

> > training? My email to Jason Couchman has gone (as must confess I

> anticipated)

> > unanswered.

> >

> > And should we infer that it is just the book that is incorrect ... or

that


> the

> > book is an accurate reflection of the test and that the test too is

> incorrect?

> >

> > On the subject of Oracle's education courses I have always found them

> valuable

> > ... if viewed in the context of what they are. They are a great way to

get


> > started with a new product or new release of a product. They are not, in

> my

> > estimation, intended to create competency.

> >

> > Thank you.

> >

> > Daniel Morgan

> >

> >

> >

> >

> > Pete Sharman wrote:

> >

> > > I always find these discussions fascinating, particularly since my

role


> in

> > > Oracle is half training our consultants on new releases of the

database.


> > > One of the things I've always done in my time with Oracle (which is

over


> 7

> > > years now) is to review the course material as it comes out, so I'd

like


> to

> > > make some comments on Howard's viewpoint.

> > >

> > > Firstly, one of the major difficulties when developing courseware for

> > > something with as many different capabilities as the Oracle database

has


> is

> > > determining what to include and what not to include in the courseware.

> If

> > > we covered everything you needed to know to be a competent DBA in the

> basic

> > > training (and by that I mean the DBA Fundamentals I and II courses and

> the

> > > Performance Tuning course), guess what?  You'd probably be paying for

6


> > > months worth of training (OK, maybe I exaggerate, but you get the

> point).

> > > That's why the basic training was developed in the way it was - to

give


> you

> > > the basic knowledge you need to be able to perform normal DBA tasks.

> > >

> > > As a result, some of the less frequently used functionality must be

left


> out

> > > of that course.  I'd include things like partitioning in that

category.


> I'm

> > > not sure what the percentage is, but if you polled people in this

> newsgroup

> > > I think you would find less than 50% actually use it.  However, it is

> still

> > > important to have training on this, and that's why we develop more

> advanced

> > > courseware.  The more advanced courseware expects you to know the

> > > fundamentals, and then spend more time being trained on things like

> > > Partitioning, AQ, Advanced Replication and so on.

> > >

> > > Secondly, to get valuable training on more complex functionality

> requires

> > > dedicated courseware.  Take, for example, RAC.  One of the hardest

parts


> of

> > > writing the 9i New Features for Administrators course was Chapter 12,

> Real

> > > Application Clusters.  It's an incredibly important are of knowledge,

> and

> > > one that is far more widely accepted as useful to the general Oracle

> > > population than OPS ever was.  However, we already have a full 5 days

> for

> > > that course.  To cover it in more detail is just not possible, so we

> > > introduce it in the 9i NFDBA course so people are aware of how useful

> that

> > > technology is.  There is a separate 5 day course on RAC due to be

> released

> > > soon, which takes you into the gory detail you need to know for how to

> > > implement and use it.  I'd venture to say that's the major difference

> > > between the New Features course and any other one.  The New Features

> course

> > > has so many areas to cover that it can only introduce the concepts to

> you,

> > > which you then need to investigate more (either yourself or on

> additional

> > > training).

> > >

> > > Finally let me say where I see OCP to be valuable, personally.  I

> started

> > > life in Oracle as a DBA instructor after 4 years as a DBA before

joining


> > > Oracle.  I started the certification for one reason only - it got

really


> > > embarassing as an instructor for someone to say "Are you a certified

> DBA?"

> > > and to have to answer no.  Now that I'm no longer in Oracle Education,

> that

> > > is far less of a hassle, but I continue to keep up my certification.

> The

> > > reasons?  One - it's cheaper to keep it up by doing the New Features

> exam

> > > each time than it would be to renew it afresh if I let it expire.

 Two -


> > > there are always areas in the exams that I don't know because I don't

> use

> > > them in my day to day job, so it's really useful to find out about

this


> > > stuff so I can determine if it would be useful to employ when I do

need


> it.

> > > Three - before I joined Oracle, I lost out on a promotion purely snd

> simply

> > > because the other guy had a piece of paper and I didn't.  That's all

> they

> > > could separate us on, and it ended up costing me thousands of dollars

> over

> > > the next couple of years.  :(

> > >

> > > --

> > > HTH.  Additions and corrections welcome.

> > >

> > > Pete

> > > Author of "Oracle8i: Architecture and Administration Exam Cram"

> > >

> > > "Controlling developers is like herding cats."

> > > Kevin Loney, Oracle DBA Handbook

> > >

> > > "Oh no, it's not.  It's much harder than that!"

> > > Bruce Pihlamae, long-term Oracle DBA

> > >

> > > "Howard J. Rogers" <dba_at_hjrdba.com> wrote in message

> > > news:3c583ff4$0$8455$afc38c87_at_news.optusnet.com.au...

> > > > I might agree with you, except that the DBA stream for the OCP

doesn't


> > > > mention partitioning once (it's not even on the Performance Tuning

> course,

> > > > which is madness).  It doesn't mention Advanced Replication at all

> (unless

> > > > you're upgrading to 9i OCP, in whcih case it mysteriously makes an

> > > > appearance).  It doesn't deal with Advanced Queueing.  It doesn't

deal


> > > with

> > > > Parallel Server (again, 9i upgrade has 1 rather scanty chapter

devoted


> to

> > > > RACs).

> > > >

> > > > I'm not saying that the DBA stream is not challenging or

> informative -look

> > > > at the number of posts we get here for 'why can't I back up my

online


> redo

> > > > logs?', as a simple example.  But forget all this nonsense about

'you


> will

> > > > learn *all* the features of the product'.  You won't, simple as

that.


> > > >

> > > > If all you have is an OCP, it tells me that you know the basics.

Sort


> of.

> > > > And that's about it.  The real nub of complex database

administration


> is

> > > > entirely absent (which is frustrating enough as an instructor, let

> alone

> > > as

> > > > a would-be DBA who actually wants to learn his craft).

> > > >

> > > > Regards

> > > > HJR

> > > > --

> > > > ------------------------------------------

> > > > Oracle Resources: http://www.hjrdba.com

> > > > ============================

> > > >

> > > >

> > > > "Christian Svensson" <chse30_at_hotmail.com> wrote in message

> > > > news:ccc2a7eb.0201300648.f6fdd3_at_posting.google.com...

> > > > > > >

> > > > > > >Last I just want say if a future employer have to choose

between


> two

> > > > > > >consultants with exact same years of experience and one of them

> have

> > > a

> > > > > > >DBA OCP, which one do you think they will think of most ?

> > > > > > >

> > > > > >

> > > > > > That is IMHO a very good argument.  And the ONLY one going for

OCP


> > > > > > certification in its present format.

> > > > > >

> > > > > >

> > > > >

> > > > > The only one ? How about:

> > > > >

> > > > > - You will get paid more (if your employer agree to this of

course)


> > > > > - You will learn more in the studying process, i.e you will be

aware


> > > > > of "all" the features/options

> > > > > - You get a written proof of you knowledge (you should of course

> also

> > > > > have at least a year of practical experience)

> > > > >

> > > > > I also want to make it crystal clear that I dont belive in

studying


> 1

> > > > > week about 12 hours a day and then take the exam and you are

> > > > > automatically an Oracle DBA. To be a DBA you need experience, end

of


> > > > > discussion. But studying for the OCP is in my mind one way to get

a


> > > > > better DBA or to get a better understanding of Oracle.

> > > > >

> > > > > Regards.

> > > > >

> > > > > /Christian

> > > >

> > > >

> >

>

>