Kristian Kristensen’s Blog

Today I took the exams for 70-526 in Winforms and 70-528 in ASP.NET. Originally I had booked time for tomorrow afternoon, but a slot opened and I could try today. The new slot was at 2PM, and I found out at 11. So it was pretty tight. Anyway, I took the Winforms exam first, and lo and behold I passed with 860 points. From the result sheet I see that I was strongest in Creating UI’s for Winform apps, Integrating data, implementing printing and reporting, and usability. This means my low topics were Developing Winforms controls, and Configuring and deploying apps. I do think there were a lot of questions on printing and the Background Worker.
After a short break I took the ASP.NET exam. I wasn’t so sure of the material, and quite frankly didn’t exepct to pass. Was of course hoping for it. I did pass it too with 788 points. I was strongest in Creating custom web controls, tracing, configuring and deploying apps, and customizing and personalizing web apps.
With these two exams and the Core I passed in December I’m now a Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist in ASP.NET and WinForms.

My means of preparation for these exams were similar to the Core exam. I read the books and did lesson reviews from the CD as well as several practice tests. Afterwards I’d read up on the topics I scored low on.

So what’s next? I don’t quite know yet. I’m currently pondering to take the Distributed Applications exam 70-529 and then go for an MCPD in Enterprise Applications. Nothing is however settled yet. I think I’m going to skim some of the chapters in the 529 and see it makes sense to go for this exam, or if I should rather aim for the WCF exam due out late February early March. Either way I’ll post about it later.