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I must say that earning the certificate has nothing to do with knowledge. Testking type of prep is the easiest and safest way to pass, but, once you have the title, you are suposed to perform at a level that certainly isn't at the reach of those that passed just with TestKing.
So, IMHO, if you need the certification, go the Testking way. THEN, if you want/need to really know what you're doing, go to the library and/or get some experience.
I think the training kit books are excellent. Codeproject is better. I've been into .Net development for over 6 years, and most of what I know I owe it to Codeproject.
Finally, may I add that the best developers I've worked with have no M$ certification :P
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I would respectfully disagree. While it is true that a certificate by itself does not indicate whether a person excels in the matter, an honest candidate would follow a course of study that leads to the certification and benefit in the process by gaining not only knowledge but also an increase in quality of the knowledge he/she already has. In general our experience provides knowledge in certain focused areas that widen as we have to solve more problems, but theory fills in the gaps and provides hints on better approaches for future challenges by showing what goes on behind the scene and how it works.
I have met people on both sides, most of them favoring experience over a theoretical foundation, but also the other way around. In reality, a professional approach does not rule out either one of them, and hiring managers draw conclusions from our opinions on them as well. An experienced developer who is able to give examples of his proficiency shows them he is willing to go the extra mile by producing a related certification. In some cases, it can also expedite the hiring process.
In summary, a certification could potentially be a good thing, but never a bad one. The question would then be: why not get it if you can?
Juanfer
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I see your point, and I do agree that certification courses are a very good learning tool, but relying on the premise of "an honest candidate" is what bothers me.
Sadly, I've met both excellent and terrible developers with and without certifications and/or degrees, which makes me consider those, at the least, misleading.
Still, it is true that some recruiters do believe in them, so, as you said, why not get it if you can? Plus I consider myself fairly honest...
In my case, when I took into consideration getting certified on .Net, it was a matter of money.
You've in fact made me wonder if I should get certified - Now that I can afford it, I think I'll put my neurons back to work on it!
Thanks Juanfer for lighting that spark in my mind again!
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Basically MCPD is the new MCSD. MCSD certs are geared towards .NET 1.x developers. If you are using .NET 2.0 or above you should consider one of the MCPD certs: Windows, Web, or Enterprise.
IMHO, certs are nice to have but not required. Remember, there is no substitute for experience. You can be a proficient or even expert .NET developer without any help from certifications. But if you are a less experienced developer, and new to .NET then becoming certified will help you along the learning curve and MAYBE help you land a new job.
I used many different sources to prepare for my MCPD: Web. Here they are in order of importance: Experience(real world and experimental), MSDN/Web, Professional ASP.NET 2.0(WROX book), Measure Up and Self Test practice exams, Instructor-led course from HOTT[^], MCPD Self-Paced Training Kit, and the MS Study Guides.
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Hi,
If you're doing this just for the partner points then I think the MCPD is easier and possibly cheaper (fewer exams?). I got my MCPD along with one of my colleagures for the partner points... I can't remember why but I think the MCSD was either harder, or an older 'legacy' exam. There was some reason we didn't do it. MCPD was pretty easy, we sat 3 .Net based exams and we didnt' really study for them... just walked in and did our best. We chose the 'windows forms' route, because that's primarily where we develop rather than web stuff, so you'll have to choose which way to go for yourself.
I don't recall if they were worth different point values though. If the MCSD is worth more points, you'll have to weigh the trade offs yourself.
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Thanks mate! That was helpful.
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They are designed for different people. MCPD is designed for general devs who target either Windows or ASP.NET. When you get MCPD you get it either in Win or Web. It "marks" you as an expert in MS technologies related to either area.
MCSD is for devs who are an expert in both areas (and a few others). As MS sees it MCPDs are for general devs whereas MCSD is for architects and team leads. If you get MCPD in both Win and Web then you are mostly (if not all the way) to MCSD.
Now for the merits. Honestly I have a few certs and they are all but useless to me. They help you get in the door for interviews and look good on paper but they have little real bearing on day-to-day work. I've never lost a job because somebody else had a better/more certs than me. If such a case did exist then the company isn't one I'd be working for anyway.
The problem with the certs is that they test your knowledge of MS technologies exclusively (available at the time the exam was written). How often in the real world do we develop apps that use only MS technologies? Not often. For example if a question on the exam asked how you might display a modal dialog in a web app you might immediately think the AJAX Toolkit but that wouldn't be an option since the toolkit wasn't available when the exam was written.
What makes the tests hard is that you really have to get into the head of the test writer. Many questions on the exam have multiple right answers but you have to choose the "best" one. Best is relative to what is important and rarely do the questions make it clear. I've taken more than one test where the difference between the correct answer and the wrong answer was whether security or performance was more important. Well that depends on the test writer. In my experience the exam questions are too far off of real world to truly verify you are an expert.
True story. Way back when I was a junior dev we were hiring for a sr dev position. I was responsible for the tech portion of the interview. We were using OLE, DDE and threading at the time so my questions were directed that way. We received a resume from a person who had: MCP Windows NT, MCAD, MCSD, MCSE, MCT (amongst others). We brought him in. I figured it would be a quick interview so I through out a "simple" OLE question and was ready to move on. He couldn't answer it. I was shocked so I moved on to another "simple" DDE question. Again, no answer. After a while of this he said "guess you're wondering why I can't answer these questions even though I have these certs". I said yes. He said his company mandated all devs get all these certs to impress customers. Yet none of those skills he had used in quite a while so they were stale.
In summary, get the certs if you are interested (starting with MCPD because an MCSD is automatically an MCPD) but don't plan on getting better jobs or more money because of it. Also keep your skills uptodate because if you put it on your resume you can expect to be "tested" on it. IMHO.
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Thank you, and your story with the candidate made me laugh 
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I have my MCSD and MCDBA and my opinion of the tests is pretty low. I don't think they test technical knowledge well at all. As a matter of fact I passed the ASP.Net test having never written a single line application in ASP.Net. Yes, I knew the material the day I took the test, but I hardly had in depth knowledge of ASP.Net development.
Now for the positives for certification (basically the reason I'll upgrade my MCSD to MCPD - Enterprise):
1. I honestly believe it moves you to the top of the stack of resumes. During my last job hunt I got a call back from every place I sent my resume (March 09, not exactly boom times).
2. Even knowing how poorly the certification test knowledge I would be more likely to hire someone who is certified because it shows that person has the ability to learn. You can be a fantastic developer an you won't pass that test if you can't learn how to take that test.
3. If you do it right, you stand a chance to learn something by studying for the tests. As developers we frequently get into a rut with how we do things, and the tests are a good reminder that there are other ways to approach problems.
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Thanks mate! That was quite helpful!!
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Miguel de Icaza, head of the Mono project, announced a new release of MonoDevelop[^], a multi-language IDE that now runs on Windows, Mac, and Linux.
We intend to make MonoDevelop the Eclipse of the .NET community. Just like Eclipse became the foundation for Java development, we hope that MonoDevelop will become the foundation for .NET development, and hopefully for much more than that.
On their multi-language support,
We are not religious when it comes to supporting other programming languages. We want to embrace not only .NET-based projects like Gtk#, Silverlight, ASP.NET, Boo, C#, F#, Visual Basic and Windows.Forms. We are also embracing other developer platforms like Python, C/C++, Vala, and we want to expand our presence to work with the Flash, PHP, Ruby, Rails, Flex and any other communities that need a cross platform IDE.
Anyone up for ditching Visual Studio?  In all seriousness, given the various designer headaches I've had with VS, I'm willing to try this alternative.
Religiously blogging on the intarwebs since the early 21st century: Kineti L'Tziyon
Judah Himango
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Mono works on the Mac too, right ? I assume there's no WPF support in Mono yet ?
Eclipse does suck. It seems to me that no matter how much VS sucks, no team of volunteers is going to catch the head start MS has. They can write something simple and solid, but not match the feature set. Reading the ASP.NET forums, a lot of 'programmers' today are stuck when a wizard fails, when they can't build something by clicking the mouse a few times, so I can see this project creating something useful to programmers, but not to most people being paid to generate code today.
Christian Graus
Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista.
Read my blog to find out how I've worked around bugs in Microsoft tools and frameworks.
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Christian Graus wrote: Mono works on the Mac too, right ?
Yep.
Christian Graus wrote: I assume there's no WPF support in Mono yet ?
Only the Silverlight subset.
Christian Graus wrote: Eclipse does suck.
Yep.
Christian Graus wrote: They can write something simple and solid, but not match the feature set.
Agreed.
Religiously blogging on the intarwebs since the early 21st century: Kineti L'Tziyon
Judah Himango
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Christopher Duncan brought this up a while back here in the lounge. The general consensus was like you mentioned, that MS is just so far ahead of the game because they got in so early that no team of unsupported developers will catch up. He also firmly believed that should an alternative IDE exist that does not suffer from ESD then that team will be filthy rich. We're talking hamsters in mansions with pools, Ferrari cars, private jets and guinea pig escorts - rich.
If the post was helpful, please vote, eh!
Current activities:
Book: Devils by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Project: Hospital Automation, final stage
Learning: Image analysis, LINQ
Now and forever, defiant to the end.
What is Multiple Sclerosis[ ^]?
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Mustafa Ismail Mustafa wrote: should an alternative IDE exist that does not suffer from ESD
Hi Mustafa,
I am curious : by ESD do you mean "electrostatic discharge" or "electro-shock deterioration" referring to brain damage as a result of convulsive therapies for conditions like deep endogenous depression ... or is there another meaning I'm not aware of ?
Being, by nature, a "language hound," I sniff an interesting trail here.
thanks, Bill
"Many : not conversant with mathematical studies, imagine that because it [the Analytical Engine] is to give results in numerical notation, its processes must consequently be arithmetical, numerical, rather than algebraical and analytical. This is an error. The engine can arrange and combine numerical quantities as if they were letters or any other general symbols; and it fact it might bring out its results in algebraical notation, were provisions made accordingly." Ada, Countess Lovelace, 1844
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ESD in CPTalk is "Everything Sucks Disease"
If the post was helpful, please vote, eh!
Current activities:
Book: Devils by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Project: Hospital Automation, final stage
Learning: Image analysis, LINQ
Now and forever, defiant to the end.
What is Multiple Sclerosis[ ^]?
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Christian Graus wrote: Eclipse does suck.
What sucks in it?
From what I have used in developing Java applications.
1. Java refactoring works great
2. IDE is highly extensible and can do lot of things
3. Java intellisense works great
I have had no complains with it so far. The only problems I had was the difference in paradigm from VS.
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It takes enough time to load that I can get coffee and it's still loading when I come back
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harold aptroot wrote: It takes enough time to load that I can get coffee and it's still loading when I come back
You athlete you! 
Wout
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Are you Usain Bolt posting under a different name? 'Cause Weblogic Workshop (built on top of Eclipse) takes as much time as VS, I can't say one is clearly faster than the other.
Cheers,
Vikram. (Cracked not one CCC, but two!)
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harold aptroot wrote: It takes enough time to load that
So does VS.
Kevin
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It's slow. When I used it, it didn't seem to be more than a glorified text editor, missing even the most simple features. It's ugly ( because it's written in Java ). I found it unusable.
Christian Graus
Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista.
Read my blog to find out how I've worked around bugs in Microsoft tools and frameworks.
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It might have been long time back. I think it is superior to VS in some respects (refactoring being one of them): I am comparing (Java development in Eclipse and C# development in VS).
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