MCSD certification - is it still necessary to land a job?

[Lewis Lang]

MCSD certification - is it still necessary to land a job? ... or, is
it just a money-maker? Is it worth spending the money on the books and
the exam?

Thanks,

Lewis Lang

[Samuel R. Neff]

We're currently hiring for a few .NET development positions and none
of the resumes we've received were from people with .NET certification
(some older certifications) . If someone did have certification we
would value it and be more likely to give them an interview.

My fealing is certification can't hurt (unless you almost fail and
still say you're certified and the interviewer asks your score--if you
don't do well, don't list that you're certified). So always take the
exam. Whether or not you spend extra on books and learning is
optional, you can take the exam without this but also the books
presumably would help make you a better .NET programmer if you don't
already know the material.

My $0.02.

Sam

BTW, there was something wrong with your original post which may be
why there were no follow-ups. Here's the original headers:

Newsgroups: alt.certificati on.mcsd, microsoft.publi c.cert.exam.mcs d,
microsoft.publi c.dotnet.langua ges.csharp,
microsoft.publi c.dotnet.langua ges.vb, microsoft.publi c.dotnet.genera l

Followup-To: rec.photo.digit al, rec.photo.equip ment.35mm

So maybe you have some replies in the photo groups? :-)
BTW, if anyone is in Washington DC metro area and would like to apply
for a mid to senior level VB.NET position (WinForms + Web Services,
some possibility of aspx in future) e-mail me. sam_at_blinex_c om
On 6 Feb 2005 00:11:42 -0800, "Lewis Lang" <co*******@idxc .org> wrote:

MCSD certification - is it still necessary to land a job? ... or, is
it just a money-maker? Is it worth spending the money on the books and
the exam?

Thanks,

Lewis Lang

[Bruce Wood]

Sam,

Just to give you another perspective, I have no .NET anything. No
certs. No exams. I do, however, have 20 years experience doing
object-oriented design and programming. While I'm by no means a guru in
all things .NET, or even the myriad technologies that Microsoft offers,
I am, after 1 year messing around with C#, helping out in this
newsgroup. You can read my responses and judge for yourself my
technical level.

You might still give me an interview, but as you said, you'd be "less
likely" to give one to me than to someone who didn't have my depth of
experience but had passed the certs. Looking for certifications from
Microsoft is not necessarily the best strategy.

If I were interviewing a candidate for our office, I would want to know
two things:

1. To what extent do they understand the kind of software technology
that we are using? We're using Windows Forms and we're looking to get
into Web Services, so I'd want to know if they had any experience in
those things, or at least understood the general concepts and issues
surrounding them.

2. To what extent to they undestand modern design and programming?
Object, classes, overloading? Do they understand when it's appropriate
to use this-versus-that. This sort of thing you learn with experience,
not much from certification exams.

The Java certs impressed me (and scared me, truth be told). In order to
pass one of those things you need hard experience. After looking at the
Java 2 programmer's exam I decided that anyone who wasn't using Java on
a daily basis couldn't pass it. Not so with MS exams: they're more
cram-and-write affairs.

To Lewis, I would say this: Take what Sam said to heart. Spend a few
extra bucks and take the certification exams. _Not_ because this will
give you an edge for the rest of your career. Rather, because it will
improve your chances of getting your next job. Once you have your foot
in the door and some experience under your belt, move from job to job
based on contacts and reputation, not cold calls and MS certs: the
latter are useful only when you don't have the former.

[Wayne]

What's really sad is how wrong some of the books are. Currently I am looking
at getting a cert, I've got all the books (thank you Microsoft). However,
when reading through them I've noticed that the examples are not always the
"BEST PRACTICE". Section of code I just hit has you typing the same 4 lines
of code in two places. This is just wrong, if you are getting the books to
learn how to program properly shouldn't the examples be done properly?

Most people learn by example, and if the books you use to get your cert
aren't the best examples how can you really expect the cert to be worth
anything in the long run, except by HR and Management as stated in a
previous comment, which is my want to get the cert. I am also pick up little
tidbits of useful info here and there along the way, but I don't ever under
estimate the purpose of the book as I go, which is to get you to pass a
test.
--
Thanks
Wayne Sepega
Jacksonville, Fl
"When a man sits with a pretty girl for an hour, it seems like a minute. But
let him sit on a hot stove for a minute and it's longer than any hour.
That's relativity." - Albert Einstein

"Samuel R. Neff" <bl****@newsgro up.nospam> wrote in message
news:vv******** *************** *********@4ax.c om...

We're currently hiring for a few .NET development positions and none
of the resumes we've received were from people with .NET certification
(some older certifications) . If someone did have certification we
would value it and be more likely to give them an interview.

My fealing is certification can't hurt (unless you almost fail and
still say you're certified and the interviewer asks your score--if you
don't do well, don't list that you're certified). So always take the
exam. Whether or not you spend extra on books and learning is
optional, you can take the exam without this but also the books
presumably would help make you a better .NET programmer if you don't
already know the material.

My $0.02.

Sam

BTW, there was something wrong with your original post which may be
why there were no follow-ups. Here's the original headers:

Newsgroups: alt.certificati on.mcsd, microsoft.publi c.cert.exam.mcs d,
microsoft.publi c.dotnet.langua ges.csharp,
microsoft.publi c.dotnet.langua ges.vb, microsoft.publi c.dotnet.genera l

Followup-To: rec.photo.digit al, rec.photo.equip ment.35mm

So maybe you have some replies in the photo groups? :-)
BTW, if anyone is in Washington DC metro area and would like to apply
for a mid to senior level VB.NET position (WinForms + Web Services,
some possibility of aspx in future) e-mail me. sam_at_blinex_c om
On 6 Feb 2005 00:11:42 -0800, "Lewis Lang" <co*******@idxc .org> wrote:

MCSD certification - is it still necessary to land a job? ... or, is
it just a money-maker? Is it worth spending the money on the books and
the exam?

Thanks,

Lewis Lang

[Samuel R. Neff]

Bruce,

I didn't mean to imply I wouldn't give someone an interview without
them--that's hardly the case especially as we haven't received a
single resume with a .NET certification. What I meant is that a
candidate that we normally would not have given an interview (say
someone with 2-3 years programming experience but zero .net
experience) would get an interview when that candidate otherwise would
not.

For me, personally, the biggest factor is when I talk to someone if
they can talk intelligently about their work. I'm amazed when I talk
to people and they have trouble explaining what it is they do and the
technologies they use. I'm not saying things like "explain what SOA
is" or "tell me about design patterns" when they have expressed no
previous knowledge in those areas. I'm saying people that list things
on their resumes but can't explain the things they list. I look for
someone that can hold a decent programming conversation about the
concepts and talk about technologies they've used.

I would definitely also agree that the MS certifications are worth a
lot less than other certifications. The Java ones, of which I have
none but have reviewed, are considerably better from my perspective.
I have several 5 Macromedia certifications and they are even better
than the MS certs.

To get a better understanding of this thread I went ahead and took a
practice exam for 70-306 (VB.NET WinForms) last night and was really
disappointed. It seemed about as bad as the old VB6 exam
concentrating on things that don't necessarily make someone a good
programmer and providing lots of questions that are fairly easy to
guess at without really knowing the material. Still better than
nothing, but not worth a lot.

My $0.02 only...

Sam

On 7 Feb 2005 17:19:12 -0800, "Bruce Wood" <br*******@cana da.com>
wrote:

Sam,

Just to give you another perspective, I have no .NET anything. No
certs. No exams. I do, however, have 20 years experience doing
object-oriented design and programming. While I'm by no means a guru in
all things .NET, or even the myriad technologies that Microsoft offers,
I am, after 1 year messing around with C#, helping out in this
newsgroup. You can read my responses and judge for yourself my
technical level.

B-Line is now hiring one VB.NET developer for WinForms + WebServices position with strong possibility of ASPX in future. Seaking mid to senior level developer. For information or to apply e-mail sam_blinex_com.

[RCS]

I'm not defending books like that by any means, but many times - they take
the simple route, just for claritys sake. For example, a book may have:

string strResult = "";
if ( IsEnabled )
strResult = "Yes"
else
strResult = "No";

when you could do this, instead:

string strResult = (IsEnabled) ? "Yes" : "No";

So a purist would say it'd be more appropriate to do it the second way, but
for someone just starting out, that is a lot of stuff going on in one line:
declaring a variable, initializing it, evaluating an expression, a ternary
expression (spelling?)..

"Wayne" <Me******@commu nity.nospam> wrote in message
news:e4******** ******@TK2MSFTN GP12.phx.gbl...

What's really sad is how wrong some of the books are. Currently I am
looking
at getting a cert, I've got all the books (thank you Microsoft). However,
when reading through them I've noticed that the examples are not always
the
"BEST PRACTICE". Section of code I just hit has you typing the same 4
lines
of code in two places. This is just wrong, if you are getting the books to
learn how to program properly shouldn't the examples be done properly?

Most people learn by example, and if the books you use to get your cert
aren't the best examples how can you really expect the cert to be worth
anything in the long run, except by HR and Management as stated in a
previous comment, which is my want to get the cert. I am also pick up
little
tidbits of useful info here and there along the way, but I don't ever
under
estimate the purpose of the book as I go, which is to get you to pass a
test.
--
Thanks
Wayne Sepega
Jacksonville, Fl
"When a man sits with a pretty girl for an hour, it seems like a minute.
But
let him sit on a hot stove for a minute and it's longer than any hour.
That's relativity." - Albert Einstein

"Samuel R. Neff" <bl****@newsgro up.nospam> wrote in message
news:vv******** *************** *********@4ax.c om...

We're currently hiring for a few .NET development positions and none
of the resumes we've received were from people with .NET certification
(some older certifications) . If someone did have certification we
would value it and be more likely to give them an interview.

My fealing is certification can't hurt (unless you almost fail and
still say you're certified and the interviewer asks your score--if you
don't do well, don't list that you're certified). So always take the
exam. Whether or not you spend extra on books and learning is
optional, you can take the exam without this but also the books
presumably would help make you a better .NET programmer if you don't
already know the material.

My $0.02.

Sam

BTW, there was something wrong with your original post which may be
why there were no follow-ups. Here's the original headers:

Newsgroups: alt.certificati on.mcsd, microsoft.publi c.cert.exam.mcs d,
microsoft.publi c.dotnet.langua ges.csharp,
microsoft.publi c.dotnet.langua ges.vb, microsoft.publi c.dotnet.genera l

Followup-To: rec.photo.digit al, rec.photo.equip ment.35mm

So maybe you have some replies in the photo groups? :-)
BTW, if anyone is in Washington DC metro area and would like to apply
for a mid to senior level VB.NET position (WinForms + Web Services,
some possibility of aspx in future) e-mail me. sam_at_blinex_c om
On 6 Feb 2005 00:11:42 -0800, "Lewis Lang" <co*******@idxc .org> wrote:

>MCSD certification - is it still necessary to land a job? ... or, is
>it just a money-maker? Is it worth spending the money on the books and
>the exam?
>
>Thanks,
>
>Lewis Lang

[Wayne]

Interesting, didn't know you could do that all on one line. HMMM, wonder if
it would pass our code review process.

"RCS" <rs****@gmail.c om> wrote in message
news:qn******** *******@newssvr 33.news.prodigy .com...

I'm not defending books like that by any means, but many times - they take
the simple route, just for claritys sake. For example, a book may have:

string strResult = "";
if ( IsEnabled )
strResult = "Yes"
else
strResult = "No";

when you could do this, instead:

string strResult = (IsEnabled) ? "Yes" : "No";

So a purist would say it'd be more appropriate to do it the second way, but for someone just starting out, that is a lot of stuff going on in one line: declaring a variable, initializing it, evaluating an expression, a ternary
expression (spelling?)..

"Wayne" <Me******@commu nity.nospam> wrote in message
news:e4******** ******@TK2MSFTN GP12.phx.gbl...

What's really sad is how wrong some of the books are. Currently I am
looking
at getting a cert, I've got all the books (thank you Microsoft). However, when reading through them I've noticed that the examples are not always
the
"BEST PRACTICE". Section of code I just hit has you typing the same 4
lines
of code in two places. This is just wrong, if you are getting the books to learn how to program properly shouldn't the examples be done properly?

Most people learn by example, and if the books you use to get your cert
aren't the best examples how can you really expect the cert to be worth
anything in the long run, except by HR and Management as stated in a
previous comment, which is my want to get the cert. I am also pick up
little
tidbits of useful info here and there along the way, but I don't ever
under
estimate the purpose of the book as I go, which is to get you to pass a
test.
--
Thanks
Wayne Sepega
Jacksonville, Fl
"When a man sits with a pretty girl for an hour, it seems like a minute.
But
let him sit on a hot stove for a minute and it's longer than any hour.
That's relativity." - Albert Einstein

"Samuel R. Neff" <bl****@newsgro up.nospam> wrote in message
news:vv******** *************** *********@4ax.c om...

We're currently hiring for a few .NET development positions and none
of the resumes we've received were from people with .NET certification
(some older certifications) . If someone did have certification we
would value it and be more likely to give them an interview.

My fealing is certification can't hurt (unless you almost fail and
still say you're certified and the interviewer asks your score--if you
don't do well, don't list that you're certified). So always take the
exam. Whether or not you spend extra on books and learning is
optional, you can take the exam without this but also the books
presumably would help make you a better .NET programmer if you don't
already know the material.

My $0.02.

Sam

BTW, there was something wrong with your original post which may be
why there were no follow-ups. Here's the original headers:

Newsgroups: alt.certificati on.mcsd, microsoft.publi c.cert.exam.mcs d,
microsoft.publi c.dotnet.langua ges.csharp,
microsoft.publi c.dotnet.langua ges.vb, microsoft.publi c.dotnet.genera l

Followup-To: rec.photo.digit al, rec.photo.equip ment.35mm

So maybe you have some replies in the photo groups? :-)
BTW, if anyone is in Washington DC metro area and would like to apply
for a mid to senior level VB.NET position (WinForms + Web Services,
some possibility of aspx in future) e-mail me. sam_at_blinex_c om
On 6 Feb 2005 00:11:42 -0800, "Lewis Lang" <co*******@idxc .org> wrote:

>MCSD certification - is it still necessary to land a job? ... or, is
>it just a money-maker? Is it worth spending the money on the books and >the exam?
>
>Thanks,
>
>Lewis Lang

[Andy O'Neill]

"Samuel R. Neff" <bl****@newsgro up.nospam> wrote in message
news:rq******** *************** *********@4ax.c om...

Bruce, <<>> To get a better understanding of this thread I went ahead and took a
practice exam for 70-306 (VB.NET WinForms) last night and was really
disappointed. It seemed about as bad as the old VB6 exam
concentrating on things that don't necessarily make someone a good
programmer and providing lots of questions that are fairly easy to
guess at without really knowing the material. Still better than
nothing, but not worth a lot.

Yep.
I've looked at microsoft certification.
The stuff you're tested on is virtually all what I'd call "academic"
knowledge.
Stuff that you just don't care about as you do development.

I'm a contractor, occasionally work as team leader.
I've interviewed a number of people.
To get a feel for how much exerience they have I ask a few very open
questions and just see what they say.
It may be coincidence but the people who were MCSD did badly.
If I were to take my experience literally, certification would seem to be a
negative.

Maybe the approach is interesting.
One of my standard questions was vb6.

You're doing a screen.
The idea is that there's a compound key to the data to be shown.
This is to matched by a series of combo boxes.
Country, county, town or something like that.
The user is to select from the first combo box.
This will then be used to populate a second, which in turn will be used to
populate a third.
When the last one is selected, some other piece of code will be run which
populates other bits of the form.
You're populating each combo by looping through a recordset and adding each
entry.
What problem might you expect to find?

Additem generated a click event, so it'll potentially run the populate next
combo bit for each entry as you populate it.
I'd then go on to ask him what command would that be to stick an entry in
the combo?
Further questions depending on how he/she answers.

My logic being that if the guy had used combo boxes he probably had used
additem to fill em and he probably did something on the click event so he'd
have come across this sort of stuff before.

--
Regards,
Andy O'Neill

[Jason Black [MSFT]]

Unless your code review process has some aesthetic restrictions on the form
code takes, the ?: version ought to pass. Both versions are absolutely
identical from a semantic point of view. They will both perform identically
in all situations, and both will cause the compiler to emit the same MSIL
code.

"Wayne" <Me******@commu nity.nospam> wrote in message
news:uW******** *****@TK2MSFTNG P14.phx.gbl...

Interesting, didn't know you could do that all on one line. HMMM, wonder
if
it would pass our code review process.

"RCS" <rs****@gmail.c om> wrote in message
news:qn******** *******@newssvr 33.news.prodigy .com...

I'm not defending books like that by any means, but many times - they
take
the simple route, just for claritys sake. For example, a book may have:

string strResult = "";
if ( IsEnabled )
strResult = "Yes"
else
strResult = "No";

when you could do this, instead:

string strResult = (IsEnabled) ? "Yes" : "No";

So a purist would say it'd be more appropriate to do it the second way,

but

for someone just starting out, that is a lot of stuff going on in one

line:

declaring a variable, initializing it, evaluating an expression, a
ternary
expression (spelling?)..

"Wayne" <Me******@commu nity.nospam> wrote in message
news:e4******** ******@TK2MSFTN GP12.phx.gbl...

> What's really sad is how wrong some of the books are. Currently I am
> looking
> at getting a cert, I've got all the books (thank you Microsoft). However, > when reading through them I've noticed that the examples are not always
> the
> "BEST PRACTICE". Section of code I just hit has you typing the same 4
> lines
> of code in two places. This is just wrong, if you are getting the books to > learn how to program properly shouldn't the examples be done properly?
>
> Most people learn by example, and if the books you use to get your cert
> aren't the best examples how can you really expect the cert to be worth
> anything in the long run, except by HR and Management as stated in a
> previous comment, which is my want to get the cert. I am also pick up
> little
> tidbits of useful info here and there along the way, but I don't ever
> under
> estimate the purpose of the book as I go, which is to get you to pass a
> test.
>
>
> --
> Thanks
> Wayne Sepega
> Jacksonville, Fl
>
>
> "When a man sits with a pretty girl for an hour, it seems like a
> minute.
> But
> let him sit on a hot stove for a minute and it's longer than any hour.
> That's relativity." - Albert Einstein
>
> "Samuel R. Neff" <bl****@newsgro up.nospam> wrote in message
> news:vv******** *************** *********@4ax.c om...
>>
>> We're currently hiring for a few .NET development positions and none
>> of the resumes we've received were from people with .NET certification
>> (some older certifications) . If someone did have certification we
>> would value it and be more likely to give them an interview.
>>
>> My fealing is certification can't hurt (unless you almost fail and
>> still say you're certified and the interviewer asks your score--if you
>> don't do well, don't list that you're certified). So always take the
>> exam. Whether or not you spend extra on books and learning is
>> optional, you can take the exam without this but also the books
>> presumably would help make you a better .NET programmer if you don't
>> already know the material.
>>
>> My $0.02.
>>
>> Sam
>>
>> BTW, there was something wrong with your original post which may be
>> why there were no follow-ups. Here's the original headers:
>>
>> Newsgroups: alt.certificati on.mcsd, microsoft.publi c.cert.exam.mcs d,
>> microsoft.publi c.dotnet.langua ges.csharp,
>> microsoft.publi c.dotnet.langua ges.vb, microsoft.publi c.dotnet.genera l
>>
>> Followup-To: rec.photo.digit al, rec.photo.equip ment.35mm
>>
>> So maybe you have some replies in the photo groups? :-)
>>
>>
>> BTW, if anyone is in Washington DC metro area and would like to apply
>> for a mid to senior level VB.NET position (WinForms + Web Services,
>> some possibility of aspx in future) e-mail me. sam_at_blinex_c om
>>
>>
>> On 6 Feb 2005 00:11:42 -0800, "Lewis Lang" <co*******@idxc .org> wrote:
>>
>> >MCSD certification - is it still necessary to land a job? ... or, is
>> >it just a money-maker? Is it worth spending the money on the books and >> >the exam?
>> >
>> >Thanks,
>> >
>> >Lewis Lang
>>
>
>

[Samuel R. Neff]

We just got our first resume in for someone that has MCSD. In this
case the person actually took 3 months off work to study for the MCSD
exams (or at least that's what the resume says). Very bad sign.
Hurt the applicant in this case...

Sam

B-Line is now hiring one VB.NET developer for
WinForms + WebServices position with ASPX in future.
Seaking mid to senior level developer. For
information or to apply e-mail sam_blinex_com.