Re: CCIE R&S Written v4.0 beta

Hey Nickelby,

What was your perception? I sat this exam yesterday and have many
thoughts (some of which I can share, some of which I cannot)...

Since I was ineligible to recertify, passing and/or scoring highly was
not a paramount objective. Fortunately or unfortunately depending on
perspective, having no pass/fail consequences freed me to deeply
ponder and comment on some questions I felt were in need of further
development. This ultimately led to my having a significant swath of
the exam to go with only about 30 minutes left on the clock, which in
turn forced me to answer many questions without even having fully
reading them; get a sense of the issue at hand and answer
instinctively before clicking "Next" (the obvious answer choice is
often the wrong one with this sort of test, though, so such an
approach is suspect at best). I ultimately answered my final question
with 40 seconds left to go, so not much chance I scored well at all
but I'm hopeful that my comments will be considered and will help to
improve the final product.

I will say that emphasis has been lessened in some areas and increased
in others, but this was not the big shift I was anticipating. Many
questions were very familiar to me from previous bouts with the
written. Those that were new were a mixed bag in my view. Some
directly tested knowledge, whereas some seemed to be probing me for
the "Most Correct Cisco Answer," since on a technical plane they could
be answered variously, depending on perspective and interpretation of
the question. That some of these might survive the beta and go into
production perplexes me to say the least - for the money that's paid
for the privilege of attempting this exam, my expectation is that all
questions be of the highest quality and that they directly and
singularly test knowledge and ability. Not having seen the new v4.0
Cert Guide yet, I'm not clear as to how some of the more obscure
topics will be addressed there. Frankly, some questions seemed to
have been borrowed directly from other exams/tracks, which I don't
view positively at all.

This was my first experience with a Cisco beta at any level or within
any track. I received the same question or essentially the same
question three times - twice. So either I earned or lost a lot of
points on just a few topics, depending on whether or not my answers
were the Most Cisco Correct (I resisted the urge to answer differently
each time in an attempt to nullify the outcome one way or the other -
I stuck to my guns). I was also surprised to see so many obvious
typos in the questions and answer choices - one would expect a basic
spell-checking before even going beta. But no real impact to the
candidate there, so I'm not going to blow that sort of thing out of
proportion. It is after all a $50 beta vs. a $350 production sitting.

At the end of the day I can only sit back and hope things are
tightened up a fair bit before I become eligible to actually recertify
in a handful of months (and no doubt they will be - to exactly what
extent is the burning question in my mind). I also object strongly to
some of the new changes that Cisco claims were meant to bring the exam
into alignment with others (e.g. no ability to skip questions and
return to them later, time permitting). The CCIE was the original
certification program, no? Bring the others into alignment with _it_
if there's an overwhelming imperative to do so. This exam is
challenging and includes a time management element that is lacking in
many of the others. I truly wish Cisco would stop trying to make the
CCIE look and feel so much like the lower certs, yet have it be so
much more of a challenge to obtain. All things aren't equal, OK? Or,
as was once said, some things are more equal than others!

Well there you have it from my own personal perspective anyway. No
doubt the list would appreciate hearing from others in a strictly NDA-
friendly sort of way...

Regards,

Scott

On Sep 6, 2009, at 5:21 , Nickelby Thane wrote:

> I am giving it a go at this Sep 9 :-). If I fail, I am going to
> blame it on
> not knowing the technology enough :-). I expect Cisco to throw in a
> few
> L3VPN and MPLS questions and then fail us so we can resit the test
> in its
> final glory form (kidding).
>
>
> --
> Warmest regards,
> Nickelby Thane
> Personal Blog : http://nthane.blogspot.com
> CCIE Blog : http://cciecisco.blogspot.com
>
>
> On Sun, Sep 6, 2009 at 5:25 PM, Marko Milivojevic
> <markom_at_markom.info>wrote:
>
>> So, have any of you guys tried the new beta? Anything,
>> non-NDA-breaking, to report to the rest of us? :-)
>>
>> --
>> Marko
>> CCIE #18427 (SP)
>> My network blog: http://cisco.markom.info/
>>
>>
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>
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Received on Wed Sep 09 2009 - 17:38:40 ART