User Tools
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Acquia Drupal 7, Official Certification Program
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Alert - These notes were taken for Drupal 7, which is still a popular system, but the latest edition is into Drupal 8.
Notes taken by Royce Barber on Aug-18-2015.
Notes taken from the official YouTube channel “AcquiaTV” using the video titled “An Inside Look: Acquia Certified Drupal Site Builder Exam [June 23, 2015]”.
Video Location: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZL-6ZVrDHUg
Video focuses on “Drupal Site Builder Exam”, and mentions the other exams.
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BENEFITS OF BEING CERTIFIED
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* All drupal shops and employers are aware of this certification. They'll know what to expect when hiring you.
* Fills out your resume.
* Respect of your peers.
* Exposure, because you're in the Acquia registry.
* Preparing for the exam, fills in gaps in your knowledge.
* Government employers and major corporations look for Drupal certifications.
* You'll receive a digital badge which you can display on social websites.
* The exam validates your ability to Plan, Build, Manage Drupal7 based solutions. Understand core Drupal practices for site building. Develop and maintain applications using Drupal site building tools. Install and configure new Drupal modules and themes.
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EXAM DETAILS
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* You can take the exam online or optionally at a testing center.
* Exam is 75 minutes long. 50 questions, which are not available to the public. Pass/Fail mark is 68%. Most questions are multiple choice scenarios. Read questions carefully, as comprehension is vital.
* If you've built three to four significant Drupal7 sites which included researching and a lot of experimenting, including installing and completely removing modules, then you can easily pass the SiteBuilder exam.
* Content Modeling is the largest chunk of the exam at 24%, followed by Site Display at 20%.
* The SiteBuilder exam specifically, covers Drupal7, areas of Drupal7, Content and User Management, Content Modeling, Site Display, Community and Contributed Projects, Module and Theme Management, and Security and Performance (for SiteBuilder, not coding).
* Each exam is $155.00 no matter what.
* Passing three exams gives you the “Grand Masters Certification” credential.
* There are four exams. No practice exams are available yet as of Jan2015.
* Practice questions will be posted.
* As of 2015, the exam is ONLY for Drupal7. When Drupal8 officially comes out, the new exam will be fairly similar.
* The Acquia basic three exams have no Git questions. Only the developer exam.
* You can take the test in the comfort of your home, with a Skype professor visually watching you.
* Exam software uses a “Biometic Keystrokes” algorithm to ensure who you are.
* Schedule your exam a week out, to give yourself time to set up testing software on your PC. Sometimes a new OS has software conflicts.
* Exam covers the basic core Drupal7 modules, not third party modules, and not the downloadable Features module.
* Example question, of needing to have real experience rather than book knowledge: “What is Content vs a Block.”
* Exam Help (This may change): If you are taking an exam through a webcam, please call the OLP Technical Support Team at 877-313-2008 or 602-659-4679. If you are a proctor at a Kryterion Testing Network (KTN) Center, please call the KTN Network Management Team at 866-579-8374 or 602-659-4666. Otherwise, please contact your test sponsor or helpdesk.
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Drupal 8 Certification? Eventually.
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* This certification is being developed and will not be available until Drupal 8 is released and becomes mainstream. As of Aug2015, Acquia fully supports development of new Drupal builds with Drupal8 on the Acquia Platform. Drupal8 is ready to be used, but the exams are not.
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GRADING
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* You can officially take one exam three times. After 3 failures, you have to request a fourth try. Each try is the same $155.00. DrupalCon has 1 free retake. Actual scores are never divulged. If you pass at all, you passed completely. You can post your score if you like.
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Misc Drupal and Certification Info
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* In education, site building goes to core development and then to backend development and then to even more sophisticated development teams.
* Drupal Education Costs: Your time. Your classes. Your personal computer. Your every-two-years exams. Your Drupal server space and domain names.
* Normal registry, and the partner program, uses an industry-standard date-stamped “two years”. You'll always have the certification credential employers can verify, but it won't be up to date after two years. If the certification program ends, then employers may not be able to ensure you ever were certified.
Drupal General Advice from Places Other than the Official Video
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* Where to learn Drupal? Practice nonstop with free Drupal hosts like DrupalGardens. Seminars. Webinars. YouTube search for Drupal, or Acquia Certification. Watch Drupal podcasts. Contact educators. College Classes. Adult School Classes. Certification Literature. Drupal Official Documentation. Community Forums. Google searches. Be aware of major Drupal players. Read about Drupal on Wikipedia. Know Drupal in every possible real-world scenario. Keep a diary of your Drupal education.
* Drupal VS Wordpress: Both are extremely popular. Drupal has much more learning curve. Wordpress is faster to learn. Drupal has vastly more options. Wordpress is a glorified blog. Your college may have more Wordpress classes than Drupal. Drupal vs Wordpress is like Android (advanced) vs iPhone (easier).
* Drupal Alternatives: Joomla. Wordpress. Sites.Google.Com. And many other Content Management Systems.
* What's new in Drupal 8? Configuration can now be managed in git and other vcs, and deployed across site environments (dev, stage, prod). Built in dependency management and languages. API Support is finally easy to integrate and maintain. Built-in REST module. Far smarter cache dependency tracking of dynamic changes and less frequent changes. Page markup is now HTML5. Easier visual WYSIWYG editor. Each feature has much more human-friendly customization. Built-in mobile formatting. Twig template theme engine. Older modules are being upgraded for Drupal8. For Drupal8 developer questions, email partners@acquia.com. View changes at https://www.drupal.org/drupal-8.0.
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Other Drupal Certifications
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* Certifications Discussion on Drupal website: https://www.drupal.org/node/271046
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Royce Barber's Drupal 7 & 8 Website Practice
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* DrupalGardens Free Host: http://n.drupalgardens.com/
* Acquia Free Host: http://roycebarberzx838sjzdv.devcloud.acquia-sites.com/node
* Royce lives 4 hours (183miles) from Acquia's San Francisco location.
* Royce lives 3 hours (164miles) from Google Inc of Mountain View CA.
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Internet Links
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* Official Acquia Site: https://www.acquia.com/
* Official Acquia Learning Services: https://www.acquia.com/customer-success/learning-services
* Official Drupal7 Certification: https://www.acquia.com/customer-success/learning-services/acquia-certification-program-overview
* Official Drupal Website: https://www.drupal.org/documentation
* Official Drupal Events: https://events.drupal.org/
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* Wikipedia for Drupal: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drupal
* Wikipedia for Acquia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acquia
* Wikipedia for Drupal: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drupal
* Wikipedia for Comparison of Web Application Frameworks: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_web_application_frameworks
* Wikipedia for Web Application Framework: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_application_framework
* Wikipedia for Web Content Management System: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_content_management_system
* Wikipedia for Content Management System: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Content_management_system
* Wikipedia for List of Content Management Systems: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_content_management_systems
* Wikipedia for Content Management: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Content_management
* Wikipedia for Web Design: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_design
* Wikipedia for Wordpress (similar idea as Drupal): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WordPress
* Wikipedia Category of Free Content Management Systems: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Free_content_management_systems
* Wikipedia Category of Content Management Systems: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Content_management_systems
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* DMOZ Open Directory for Drupal Links: https://www.dmoz.org/Computers/Programming/Languages/PHP/Scripts/Content_Management/Drupal/
* DMOZ Open Directory for Content Managemetn Links: https://www.dmoz.org/Computers/Programming/Languages/PHP/Scripts/Content_Management/
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* About.com for Content Management Articles: http://cms.about.com/
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* Experience of Wunderkraut: http://www.wunderkraut.com/blog/taking-the-acquia-certified-drupal-developer-exam/2014-04-01
* Experience of MidWesternMac: http://www.midwesternmac.com/blogs/jeff-geerling/thoughts-acquia-drupal
* Experience of WebChick: http://webchick.net/node/125
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* deviantArt search for Drupal: http://www.deviantart.com/browse/all/?section=&global=1&q=DRUPAL
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End of Article.
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