Re: Advice on OCP Exams

In article <8Sd1uPikEGru-pn2-e0ZUiDOKsp25_at_www.framnett.net>, mframness_at_NOSPAM.lakefield.net says...
> On Thu, 1 Jan 1970 02:59:59, design <design_at_yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > If you have no experience with Oracle, get some.
> > I don't know why people think that studying a bunch of books to get
> > "certified" on something they have no experience with is a good thing.
> > To me, alls it shows is that you can study and take and pass a few
> > tests. Big deal.
> > Seems like more and more people are posting saying they don't have Oracle
> > experience but are taking the OCP exams. Hmmm...
> > will the certification eventually be diminished to the level of Novel?
> > Oracle should strive to be more like the Cisco certification -- it'll
> > actually mean something.
>
> Some of this is going to be repeated from another post but live with it!
>
> Catch 22 your first proposition. How to get experience when no one will
> hire you unless you have OCP credentials of some sort? Springing for
> personal Oracle is fine but many people (and rightfully so) will point out
> that personal oracle is no substitute for working with & on real live
> production systems.
>
> In my case I have some experience working with DB/2 and SQL Server 6.5
> (hated it) and messing around with personal Oracle. In fact I had been
> turned down on a consulting assignment because of my lack of credentials
> with Oracle (not a problem for me picking it up but the client did not want
> to mess with that) so I embarked upon the OCP track while I do not believe
> I'll be able to finish it w/o significant on the job training it appears
> the first exam can be done just fine w/o significant on the job experience.
> The app developer track, as a whole, appears to be the same way. DBA
> track I have yet to seriously look at.
>

I doubt every one wants certification. My company certainly doesn't. We would like some experience though. Why don't you try what I did when I came to my current position. I wanted to learn UNIX. I was a Senior VMS sys admin. Every one wanted both VMS and UNIX. I found a place that really needed my VMS skills and was willing to teach me UNIX. When I showed that I could pick things up quickly, they decided to turn me into an Oracle DBA. It sounds like your a consultant. I'm not sure that you can make the switch as a consultant. You may have to become a full time employee. I have yet to meet the firm that wanted to educate a consultant. Find a place that wants you as a SQL Server type, but is willing to let you play with Oracle. I suspect that if there aren't already a lot of interaction between the two products, there will be soon.

Liz
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My real address is L I Z R a t A O L d o t C O M Received on Thu Jan 20 2000 - 09:16:13 CST