The Context:
It appears that the simple scjp ->scja->.... tracks for sun certification have been merged with other oracle style certifications... As a developer, I've spent some time lately trying to figure out the new "pathways" for certification.
Existing Resources:
There is a very dense, but also informative Page here : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun_Certified_Professional The Oracle website is also, of course, full of links and diagrams with different certification factoids.
My Problem:
It's not clear that there is a new paradigm or pathway for java certifications is emerging, and thus whether or not the old SCJP style certifications are still in existence (albeit with a different title), nor is it clear what the entire certification pipeline looks like : for example, this diagram (from the older sun certifications) http://www.whizlabs.com/images/jwhiz.png, clearly related the myriad of certification and training initiatives in a lucid and easily interpreted diagram. But I don't see any such resource for explaining and comparing the modern Oracle Java certifications.
The Question(s):
What is the relationship between the new Oracle certifications? And how do they relate to the original SCJP, SCJD, and SCEA exams?
There wasn't a lot of changes after the Sun acquisition. The exam topics remained as they were (well, there were slight changes because of the migration from Prometric to Perason VUE certification platform - no drag & drop questions anymore).
The pipeline remains the same. If you want to know what prerequisites are required, just enter the Oracle Certification Program and look for interesting certificate.
Exemplary prerequisites are shown here (for Java SE 6 Programmer). It shows that no prerequisites are required to take this exam.
The only required prerequisite for following certificates (beside the Associate level) is the Oracle Certified Professional Java Programmer. Every other certificate (JSP & Servlets, EJB, Developer, Enterprise Architect, WebServices) can be taken after achieving the OCPJP.
However, some time ago Oracle introduced additional prerequisites for Master exams (that is Oracle Certified Master Developer & Enterprise Architect). To take it you need to pass some courses (and of course pay a lot for them). Until that time, in order to take OCMJD and OCMJEA (formerly known as SCJD and SCEA) just SCJP/OCPJP was required.
EDIT:
Forgot to add - the Sun Certified Web Component Developer was splitted into:
- Oracle Certified Expert JSP and Servlet Developer and,
- Oracle Certified Expert Web Services developer.
The Sun Certified EJB Developer was splitted into:
- Oracle Certified Expert Enterprise JavaBeans Developer and,
- Oracle Certified Expert Java Persistence API Developer.
Useful resources:
- http://blogs.oracle.com/certification/
- http://www.coderanch.com/how-to/java/SCJP-FAQ (and a lot of other certificate FAQ sections)
