in reply to RE: RE: Test validity
in thread Test validity

Well, they do say you are allowed to use online references and books, so that's part of the reason for the time limit. In the real world, you're not expected to know everything, but you had better know how to find the answers.

I scored higher than I expected, though (4.21). I was thinking I got more answers wrong than that. I certainly don't feel like a Certified Master Perl Programmer when I see some of the posts on Perl Monks :)

One thing they could improve on: they give you lots of examples and ask "What does this print out?". It's trivial to cut and paste their code from the test window into an xterm and run it and get the result without having to think about it critically. They could fix this by having the code printed inside a PNG image using GD or something similar, so cut-and-paste would be not be an option.

Hmm, maybe Perl Monks could start some sort of certification program...

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RE: RE: RE: RE: Test validity
by KM (Priest) on May 26, 2000 at 21:59 UTC
    Good idea. They should have the code in a non-cut-paste format. I didn't see that they said you can use online help, I simply went for the test.
    I think the idea of Perl Monks starting a cert program is bad. I do hope you were joking. For any one group to start a cert program, they need to have some kind of credibility in the subject and industry. This topic does come up from time to time on other parts of the community which a am regular. I haven't seen anything come of it yet.

    Cheers,
    KM

[reply]
      Heh, yeah I was (kind of) kidding about that. Although it might be fun having an Official Perl Monks Certificate of Rank (hand-written in Latin on a scroll) after having acheived a certain level. Heck, I'd pay good money for that :)
[reply]
        That could be a fun gimmick. If someone was to create 'certificates' that looked nice, for each level as images, then when someone reaches the level, the image, using GD, or Image::Magick ,or whatever, could dynamically add the persons name to it, then email it to them (by doing this it will make sure you don't have to actually store any of the personalized image on the Perl Monks server). Then, people can print them out, or trade them like Pokemon cards ;)

        Cheers,
        KM

[reply]

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