Victor Feinman

I have lost connection to the outer world. I have reneged on my promise to keep you informed and up to date. As September comes to an eventual close, I look back on the last couple of weeks and reflect on what I have done. The problem, I haven’t done a lot. I started a book, Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankle, but have neglected it too and have not finished it. It is a short book which I read half of in one night, but just can not seem to finish it. I have passed the ASP .NET module as expected. Due to being a little sick, I missed one day and an half. They both happened to fall on the ADO.NET module which was a 2 day module. Needless to say, I did not take the test and have to take it on Thursday, two days from now.

Today I took my hands on part of the .NET stream comprehensive exam. The compre, as we call it, is a two day test. The first day we have a hands on test where we have to develop an application in 3.5 hours FROM SCRATCH. I have to build the databases, insert the records, create stored procedures and triggers, then have to develop the front end which in this case consisted of 3 functional forms and 3 ancillary forms. I blew through the database bit, but when it came to my domain (.Net), I ran into some weird problems. I was forced to redo an hours worth of work when I realized I wasn’t crazy and the errors I was getting were not normal. When I created the new project, all my previous errors went away, but it set me back a lot. On top of that, I had to use the restroom, which was another time consuming event. All said and done, I completed about 95% of the requirements, but the last form is not functional. There is code behind it, but it just doesn’t work. It was driving me crazy all day. I was really banking on doing really well on the hands on so I would have slack on the perception exam tomorrow.

The perception exam is the “written” part of our comprehensive exam. It includes one to six questions on each module we learned. That includes modules not in our stream: RDBMS (oracle), QS (quality systems), and PF (programming fundamentals – C). I am not prepared for the exam at all. There was just too much information to cover. Each module was like a cram course in each respective certification exam. Imagine taking a written final in college that included information from your freshman seminar class and you were expected to study all the material given to you. It is insane and I hope I pass the first time, because I know I won’t be happy to have to take it again.

Wish me luck!