Re: Re^2: Proving I have mad perl skillzzzlz

Personally, I would save your money.

It depends. For a while they had a deal where you could pay something like $15 and take as many certification tests as you wanted within a 2 week period. They may still do that. That seems like an economically viable thing to do.

I agree though that their prices are high for what they offer regularly. I took one of their free tests to see what they were like and noticed that many of the questions concerned with what I considered "old" technology. Perhaps whatever feed-back loop they have is slow (assuming they have one).

Most people I know dismiss Brainbench completely as a useful assessment of Perl knowledge

Obviously somebody puts stock in Brainbench certifications. Look how many people use it. Perhaps it's most useful when dealing with companies at the level of Human Resources rather than technical people.

I certainly would never take any note of it, especially if that was the only indicator of Perl knowledge.

Certainly it wouldn't mean much if it were the only indicator, but presumably you have your own methods for gauging their perl skill.

I'm not sure how would rank Brainbench though. It would mean more to me if their testing methods were open to independent verification. But I thought I would mention it anyway because it's one of those alternate-reality viewpoints that we so rarely see in the world of open source. :-)

duff

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Re^4: Proving I have mad perl skillzzzlz by adrianh (Chancellor) on Jan 09, 2004 at 15:25 UTC
It depends. For a while they had a deal where you could pay something like $15 and take as many certification tests as you wanted within a 2 week period. They may still do that. That seems like an economically viable thing to do. Even if it was $1 I would say that it would be better to save your money and buy a nice cup of coffee instead (assuming you live in a place where you can still get a coffee for $1:-) Obviously somebody puts stock in Brainbench certifications. Look how many people use it. All this means that BB are good at selling their product. Many people send their CVs off to mass-posting services - it doesn't mean that they're of much use. Certainly it wouldn't mean much if it were the only indicator, but presumably you have your own methods for gauging their perl skill. True. Let me put it another way. BB doesn't give me any useful information about a potential employee. A person who fails a BB Perl test is not going to be useful. However a person who passes a BB test is still likely not to be useful. So regardless of somebody having a BB certification I'm still going to have to ask them extra questions, etc. Time and money spent on BB by a Perl developer would, in my opinion, be much better spent writing a CPAN module or some other demonstration of real-world ability.	[reply]

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Re^4: Proving I have mad perl skillzzzlz
by adrianh (Chancellor) on Jan 09, 2004 at 15:25 UTC

It depends. For a while they had a deal where you could pay something like $15 and take as many certification tests as you wanted within a 2 week period. They may still do that. That seems like an economically viable thing to do.

Even if it was $1 I would say that it would be better to save your money and buy a nice cup of coffee instead (assuming you live in a place where you can still get a coffee for $1:-)

Obviously somebody puts stock in Brainbench certifications. Look how many people use it.

All this means that BB are good at selling their product. Many people send their CVs off to mass-posting services - it doesn't mean that they're of much use.

Certainly it wouldn't mean much if it were the only indicator, but presumably you have your own methods for gauging their perl skill.

True. Let me put it another way. BB doesn't give me any useful information about a potential employee. A person who fails a BB Perl test is not going to be useful. However a person who passes a BB test is still likely not to be useful. So regardless of somebody having a BB certification I'm still going to have to ask them extra questions, etc.

Time and money spent on BB by a Perl developer would, in my opinion, be much better spent writing a CPAN module or some other demonstration of real-world ability.

[reply]