10 tips to help you prepare!
Kristof, one of our Senior developers who’s a Spring Certified Trainer has some tips up his sleeve to help you prepare for your Spring Professional Certification Exam.
To obtain the Spring Professional Certification, you need to pass a multiple choice exam where you need to answer 60 questions and obtain a raw cut score scaled to a value of 300, on a range from 100 – 500 within 130 minutes. In order to help you pass it, here are 10 tips to keep in mind when preparing for the exam.
Tip 1: Read the study guide, then read it again.
The study guide provides an overview of the different topics that you can expect on the Spring Professional Certification exam. It contains a lot of questions you can use to test yourself. If you’re unable to answer them easily, that’s an indication there are some things you should review and look deeper into.
Tip 2: Every subject is important, but don’t forget to focus on your weaknesses.
Tip 3: Know concepts rather than implementation details.
In the exam, it’s often most important to understand the concepts behind the Spring Core and surrounding ecosystem. Although you shouldn’t expect questions about which internal API’s are used by the Spring Container, it is still important to know which annotations are used by Spring Boot, how to build a Spring Data repository interface, how to create a Before Advice, etc.
Tip 4: Documentation is your friend.
There is a great amount of high quality documentation available on the Spring framework, so make sure to use it to your advantage when studying for the exam!
Tip 5: The source code is there to read.
All of the Spring source code is open source and available for you to look into and learn from. It’s always interesting to have a look at what’s going on behind the screens!
Tip 6: Don’t underestimate the exam, it is challenging!
This definitely isn’t an easy exam, so be sure to take your time preparing for it. During the exam itself, you’ll also get 130 minutes to answer 60 questions which should be sufficient to read the question and possible answers well. In case you’re not certain about an answer, you can skip the question and come back to it later during the exam.
Tip 7: Training can be a huge advantage.
During the 4-day Spring Core training, all the different subjects of the certification exam will be looked into. You can expect high quality slide decks and labs given by a qualified instructor that’s ready to answer your questions.
Tip 8: Put your new knowledge to practice.
Tip 9: Online communities can help you.
Online communties like Stack Overflow and Gitter can help you with questions that you might have. Of course, you should start by looking into the Spring documentation first. But if some things are still not clear, you can always try to ask these online communities.
Tip 10: Make sure to be relaxed and in a good mindset before you take the exam.
Taking an exam like this can be stressful. That’s why it’s important to start with a good and relaxed mindset. Take a walk to get some fresh air, drink a glass of water before the exam and make sure you feel ready and confident.
