Microsoft Certification Exams

Question

Not a very 'techy' question but certainly relevant in our field. What are your oppinions on them? Are they valuable or have they lost their meaning with all the readily available cramming / braindump tools out there.

I'm curious as both my previous and current employer wants the developers to sit these exams. Although I'm sure they would like developers that are skilled up on the latest techniques and tool-sets, I think that their motivation comes from the partner points that are assiciated with having certified developers on the team.

I currently have an MCTS: .NET Framework 2.0 Web Applications certification and was planning to take the last exam towards the professional developer title. My issue now is do I take this MCPD exam for the .NET 2.0 track or do I start afresh with the newly released .NET 3.5 exams.

Update : Just found that a similar question has already been asked and answered.

Answer 1

To me it seems your answer is in your question. The current certification you have is already obsolete. I see this trend continuing.

Answer 2

You should just do the last exam if that's all you've got left to do. If you re-start on the 3.5 track, by the time you get to finishing up, .NET 4.0 could be shipping, then what do you do?

If you finish the 2.0 track you'll end up with a MCPD certification that isn't really that obsolete, what you've learned is still valid and I as an employer would still view that favourably. Most employers aren't that bothered about employees having the most bang up to date exams under their belts. Ultimately, in an interview situation you won't be judged on the basis of vendor exams, but on how well you answer technical questions and perhaps demonstrate your skills through practical tasks or whiteboarding, that kinda thing. As I said they are viewed favourably, and if I was to set a weighting of value when choosing/scoring a potential member of staff vendor exams probably come in at around 15% of the overall score.

Employers, for the purposes of keeping their partner status, are always interested in the certs for partner points and are usually not that fussy about how they get them, i.e. a .NET 2.0 MCPD won't be any less valuable than a .NET 3.5 one. I have a 1.1 MCSD.NET, when we did our gold partner application, MS didn't care about the specifics other than seeing MCSD.NET.

When the 3.5 exams come out you can always do the conversion exams so you can upgrade without sitting everything again. As a little annecdote, I have a mate who has delayed sitting exams for precisely the same reason you're needlessly fretting over. So far he hasn't even got his first MCP.

Don't delay, just go do the exam!

Answer 3

Few of my friends have taken up the MCTS exams and they just used a particular dump of the questions. Everyone got more than 950/1000 in their exams. One of them got 1000/1000.

Trust me, not one them know how to write a web application using ASP.net.

Answer 4

I got the MCSD for .NET certification a few years ago. It is on my resume, but no employer or client has ever made any remark, positive or negative, about it.

FWIW, considering the ease of passing the tests, I wouldn't consider a Microsoft certification to be very valuable if I was doing the hiring. But as a developer, I found the process of studying to be a good way to fill in some gaps in my knowledge.