Table of contents for the Spring 3 certification series of posts:
- Jeanne’s core spring 3 certification experiences (Background information)
- About the test (includes Scope of the test and Spring 2.5 vs 3.0 exam)
- What did I read and how were the resources I tried
- My study plan
- Skills guru mock exam
- What I would recommend as a study plan
I tried some other exams that didn’t claim to be mocks. See the week by week section for those. Or for more details about the resources in this table.
| Resource | Spring Version | Cost | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|
| The official student guide and lab manual from course | 3.0 | came with course | I think studying this would have been enough to pass (with a low passing score.) |
| Spring in Action (3rd edition) | 3.0 | $30/$50 | The parts of the book that are already written were enjoyable to read. I learned a lot from them although not necessarily things that were on the test. Some test material was reinforced well though. |
| Sections from Official Reference Documentation | 3.0 | $0 | Again interesting and I learned a lot, but definitely overkill for the test. |
| Spring Source’s Sample questions | 2.5 | $0 | I thought these questions were too easy when I first read them. Now I think the level is equivalent to the exam. Even though they are 2.5, the content still applies. They are not multiple choice though. |
| Gavin Lasnitzki’s study notes | 2.5 | $0 | These are a lot more detailed than the exam. They are faster to read than the official documentation so good for a review. |
| Skill-guru mock exam #1 | 3.0 | $0.99 | It’s the best we have, but keep in mind it is a lot harder than the real exam and contains material that is out of scope. See Skills Guru section for more detail. |
| Skill-guru mock exam #2 | 3.0 | $0.99 | See comments for exam #1. I felt more questions were out of scope in this exam. |
| BlackBeltFactory’s mock exam | 3.0 | contribution point based | I led the creation of this exam as I was studying. It is significantly harder than the real exam. At the time of this blog post, it is in public beta state. Now released. |
| Jeanne Boyarsky’s study notes | 3.0 | $0 | I wrote them so I’m biased. |
I’ve also read some other Spring books in the past for older versions of Spring.
Disclosure: I received a free copy of “Spring in Action” exchange for writing a review of the book when it prints. I am also a volunteer administrator at BlackBeltFactory from when I was active in the early days. This means I have thousands of contribution points and didn’t have to think about the cost when taking exams.
Previous page: About the test
Next page: My study plan
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Thanks Jeanne for your hard and sincere efforts towards spreading java based technologies. Really appreciate your work.
Thanks!
BlackBeltFactory exam is no longer in beta.
Thanks alot for sharing your experiences with every body. I’m working on my Spring 3 certification and found they are very helpful.
I’m just curious about why you didn’t use Spring Recipes book (I saw you used Spring In Action).
Thanks,
Monique
Thanks so much for this. Just successfully completed my exam using the resources you listed. Cheers.
Congratulation Neil. I am appering for Certification in couple of weeks. I will appreciate if you can share your experience.
Hi
How do u know whether the Spring Course taken was for 2.5 or 3? I took the course six months ago, will start preparing for the exam soon. Is the version mentioned anywhere in the study guide. Pardon me for my ignorance.
Six months ago was probably 3.0. This was covered in the course. You should be able to tell from the manual they gave out.
Hi Jeanne,
Thank you for the information. It was for 3.0.
The official study guide for 3.0X states that the exam will not have questions on “Advanced Topics” section of AOP and Transaction Management with Spring. How far is the claim true? Because your study notes does cover the advanced topic on both sections.
Thank you for all your hard work. It is making life easier for people like me 🙂
Nidhi
I wrote the study guide before taking the exam. And I didn’t trust them because the 2.5 exam did have questions. And my trainer indicated AOP was in scope. I have vague memories of a basic AOP question. It’s been a while though.
I will be writing the exam in 2 days. Thanks for the useful information. I have been stressing about the exam, but your information has settled my nerves a bit.
Hi Jeanne,
By “The official student guide” do you mean the “Student Lecture Manual” which contain the actual slides used in the training ?
I have searched through the material given to us after the training but I could not find a student guide other than the above (and a lab manual).
Thanks a lot for taking the trouble to chart your preparation efforts.
Cheers !!
-Ashutosh
Yes, I meant the lecture manual.
Hi Jeanne
Just wrote an passed the cert exam (82%). I found the guidance on this page and the links from it to be an invaluable resource in passing the exam.
Thank you
Hi,
Are you talking abt the springsource course?Do you feel is it required to take this training?
Required for what? The course is required to take the certification. It isn’t required to learn Spring. (Although it was useful and saved a lot of time in understanding the technology more deeply.)