1Z0-829 or 1Z0-808

I'm a student in uni and next year will be my last. Our university offered us vouchers for oracle certifications, as I'm more interested in Java, I decided to study for the 1Z0-829 as it is the certification for Java 17. Well, I found it challenging, I'm using Wiley's study guide , and I'm currently reading streams chapter, and I'm realizing that it might take much more time than I expected (I wanted to pass it before the end of the summer). For the previous chapters I've managed to get at least half the questions right, and I was planning to revisit the parts that I didn't quite understand yet, once I finish reading all chapters, but the problem is there's a lot of information and I'm not sure if it's possible in short period time. That's why I'm considering studying for the 1Z0-808. I would love what others think, should I continue or switch to an easier certification?

Welcome to the Ranch

There is nothing “easy” about 1ZO-808. The range of questions is probably just as large as in 1ZO-829. It is probably more useful for you to get good marks for your degree and delay the certification if possible.
Don't sit any exams if you are getting 50% on practice questions. Some practice questions are intentionally set very difficult, but if you get 50% on the real exam, that is well short of the pass mark (⅔). Most people need at least three months' revision, so I think it is overoptimistic to expect to pass either exam before the end of the Summer.
Maybe other people will have different opinions.

Campbell Ritchie wrote:Maybe other people will have different opinions.

No. I personally before taking such exam was trying to spend a lot of time on CodeRanch reading (and trying to contribute) multiple topics and getting practical experience with Java, so I'd need less to remember skimming through the book just for the purpose of remembering Java rules.

Like a good example was posted the other day, where person was trying to understand what would happen with such code:
new Test().method();
Question was sort of what would happen... what is the precedence... etc. Basically not an easy stuff to infer from rules, you have to remember from the book multiple tables contents. But if you have some practical experience, this type of question could be answered using common sense as I described in that other thread. What I meant by that, is leveraging basic practical experience. Now, questions with that is, what is your goal, get practical experience (and some theoretical), or get theoretical knowledge. With latter you need to remember a lot, with former, you just get to know things naturally.

Agree with Campbell. Don't rush. Concentrate on finishing exams first (best you can), that's your first certificate in the queue

There is nothing “easy” about 1ZO-808

Like I said, I don't think it's easy but the amount of the information in 1Z0-808 is less than 1Z0-829 and I'm familiar with what 1Z0-808 covers, I was more interested in 1Z0-829 because it covers generics, collections... things that I've used many times why developing in Java, and I would love to get a deeper understanding of how they work, which I did by reading the book, but the amount of methods, tables and informations in general to remember seems little bit hard to achieve in short amount of time.

It is probably more useful for you to get good marks for your degree and delay the certification if possible.

Well right now, I think this is more important for me, because I'm not from the US and I study in engineering school where the last semester of next year will be an internship that's why I wanted to have a certification to help me find a good internship, but I agree that getting good grades is important, that's why I wanted to complete this before the end of the summer.

>... but the problem is there's a lot of information and I'm not sure if it's possible in short period time. That's why I'm considering studying for the 1Z0-808.

Your thinking is correct. Honestly, the OCP 11 and 17 exams are a bit too much for school/university students. They cover so many areas of Java that students lose focus from the basics. Further, many topics are just an exercise in information retention and retrieval (from your brain).  I agree with Liutauras that a few years of programming experience will be very helpful for the OCP exam because a lot of information will just become "commonsense" to you with experience.

1Z0-808 is a lot better in that respect. It would not be a bad idea for you to go for it if you have your college grades covered.

Just be aware that Java 8 (on which 1z0-808 is based), is quite old now and you will need to bring yourself up to date with the new features sooner or later.

All the best  

If the 808 is based on Java 8 as they say, then please do NOT waste your time on it. Why? Java 8 is obsolete and probably every company has moved to Java 11 and beyond.

Anil Philip wrote:Java 8 is obsolete and probably every company has moved to Java 11 and beyond.

Maybe not every company -- but yeah, it isn't going to be a growth area where you should target.

Paul Clapham wrote:

Anil Philip wrote:Java 8 is obsolete and probably every company has moved to Java 11 and beyond.

Maybe not every company -- but yeah, it isn't going to be a growth area where you should target.

In my last job, it was my understanding that every team was required to move to Java 11 post haste because of security issues with Java 8.
Invariably Java is not used standalone, but with Spring or other products and for instance, current versions of Spring will not work with Java 8, perhaps for the same security reasons. So upgrading was necessary.
A company that refuses to upgrade and uses Java 8 for external facing applications is taking a risk.

If you are a school/university student, OCA 8 (1Z0-808) is NOT a waste at all. In fact, I would highly recommend OCA 8 instead of OCP, for them if they want to acquire a Java certification, for the following reasons:

1. OCA 8 focuses on basics and is doable without going mad over stuff that no one expects you to know anyway (at this stage of your career i.e. Jr Java Developer).

2. As a Java developer you will be expected to know everything that this exam covers, no matter which Java version the company uses.

3. Everything that is covered in OCA 8 is, and will always be, relevant. It will never become "obsolete" because it covers the basics, which don't change with newer versions. You will have to learn all of these topics even if you go for OCP 11 or 17.  Check out the objectives.

It is true that Java 8 is very old and may be only a few companies use it in production. But that doesn't mean Java has somehow changed inherently. No doubt, a lot of new stuff has been added but none of the old stuff has been removed. A substantial amount of code you see in production today doesn't use any Java 11 or 17 feature, even if it is running on Java 11/17. Not because the new features aren't good but because it is old code and/or written by developers well versed with Java 8 and never bothered to use new constructs.

Different versions of Java are not like different models of aircraft!

This is not to say that you shouldn't learn new features of Java 11 or 17 (or 21 even, because it is around the corner now) but you can learn them at your own pace and get a certification for whatever is the latest version after may be a couple of years.

Paul Anilprem wrote:
1. OCA 8 focuses on basics and is doable without going mad over stuff that no one expects you to know anyway (at this stage of your career i.e. Jr Java Developer).

I agree with this point in a different way, but not in terms of certification.
Skip to avoid my rant below:
I got the SCJP in 2000 and SCJD in 2003 and my skills were obsolete and so I need to reskill.
(I recently lost my job at a large bank).
Studying for Java17 OCP 829, I am stunned by how much complexity has been added since Java 5.
Most of the complexity comes from adding a new feature and trying to make it backward compatible with all the previous ones.
Hence there are a lot of edge cases and corner cases because of so many permutations between new and old features.
Because they do not want to delete old features and force everyone to upgrade. (For instance, generics and type erasure to retrofit into Java 1.0).
Furthermore, I found that most of the code wherever I worked in standard companies, was at a Java 5 level.
(I don't know about the elite F-A-A-N-G companies) .
If Lambdas and streams were used, it appeared to either a geek was trying to exercise his/her new knowledge by gratuitously rewriting a for loop into a stream (!) or it was forced by the software API they were writing to.
For instance, Splunk Java library API returns a Stream and so you have to use it as such.
SpringBoot framework method signatures have wildcards and generics and so you must know them.
But Java is no longer the most important part of a developer's suite.
Nowadays one must learn Spring, CICD, Cloud and each of them have their own certifications and steep learning curve.
IMHO if you are going to get a Java certification, then just go ahead and get the latest so you will not have to retool and get another one for (say) 10 years.
If you are just trying to learn Java, then just learn it and save your voucher money for a cloud certification!
Last year, I was shocked to learn that Java is no longer the most popular language - it is 3rd.
#1 is JavaScript, #2 is Python. Imagine that - a despised scripting language has beaten us!
When I wanted to learn AI using my Java knowledge, an AI guru told me that almost all AI uses Python.
I really wonder whether Java is tying itself into knots by all this complexity by insisting on backward compatibility, and that will be the end of Java.
Of course, there are Java gurus like Ken Kousen who insist that "Java 17 is not complex", when I said so in an online chat!
(But he most likely has 80 IQ points more than me and is not your average software engineer).

Anil Philip wrote:A company that refuses to upgrade and uses Java 8 for external facing applications is taking a risk.

Yes, indeed. But there are still companies with COBOL applications in production, so I predict that there will be Java 8 applications in production for quite a while too.

I agree that Java 8 isn't the best choice, but the only available certification for recent Java versions are professional certificates, which you guys said cover more than just the basics, and there's too much to learn without having years of experience with these features. I do have some knowledge with recent java features as I've had a couple side projects with java mostly with spring, but I don't have a deep understanding of how it works. I wish there were some more recent certificates that cover the basics but I think 1Z0-808 is my best right now.

mehdi ridaoui wrote: I do have some knowledge with recent java features as I've had a couple side projects with java mostly with spring, but I don't have a deep understanding of how it works. I wish there were some more recent certificates that cover the basics but I think 1Z0-808 is my best right now.

I personally am finding that boyarsky-selikoff's book for OCP 829 Java 17 certification is the best way to learn Java. It starts from the basics and if you run each of the examples in your IDE and also the review questions it will give you a good understanding and confidence to face the actual exam. Furthermore they have a test bank included with the book which allows you online  access for 1 year.

Mehdi,
Note that it is important to study using materials for the version of the exam you are taking. So if you switch to studying for the 808, I recommend buying a new book. (well new to you, the book has been out for many years so you may be able to buy a pre-owned copy).

I think switching to the 808 is a good idea. It covers about a third of the material and it's the easier third. (The 829 covers everything on both the 808 and 809 plus a bunch of new features).I wouldn't worry about Java 8 being "old". As an entry level employee/intern, having any cert on your resume looks good and is a talking point.  You can always learn the newer/more advanced features after you have the cert. After all, you already have the 829 book

I strongly disagree with the advice on taking an Oracle cloud cert. Oracle cloud is not that popular. AWS/Azure/GCP are the big most used ones. Java is widely used and getting a cert before you graduate is great.

Java 8 is not obsolete

Java is cummulative. Everything covered in the Java 8 book applies to later versions of Java.

Many companies are still on Java 8. It isn't trivial to migrate past 9 and not all companies have upgraded past it yet

Anil Philip wrote:

Paul Clapham wrote:

Anil Philip wrote:Java 8 is obsolete and probably every company has moved to Java 11 and beyond.

Maybe not every company -- but yeah, it isn't going to be a growth area where you should target.

In my last job, it was my understanding that every team was required to move to Java 11 post haste because of security issues with Java 8.
Invariably Java is not used standalone, but with Spring or other products and for instance, current versions of Spring will not work with Java 8, perhaps for the same security reasons. So upgrading was necessary.
A company that refuses to upgrade and uses Java 8 for external facing applications is taking a risk.

Those are probably companies that don't pay for extended support. Which ends in 2030 for Java 8. With extended support, there are quarterly patches and the security issues you reference don't exist.

Jeanne Boyarsky wrote:Mehdi,
I strongly disagree with the advice on taking an Oracle cloud cert.

I did not see anyone advising taking an Oracle cloud cert.

Anil Philip wrote:

Jeanne Boyarsky wrote:Mehdi,
I strongly disagree with the advice on taking an Oracle cloud cert.

I did not see anyone advising taking an Oracle cloud cert.

The original poster has a voucher good only for an Oracle cert. So the advice to take a cloud cert only leaves the Oracle one for that voucher.

Jeanne Boyarsky wrote:

Anil Philip wrote:

Jeanne Boyarsky wrote:Mehdi,
I strongly disagree with the advice on taking an Oracle cloud cert.

I did not see anyone advising taking an Oracle cloud cert.

The original poster has a voucher good only for an Oracle cert. So the advice to take a cloud cert only leaves the Oracle one for that voucher.

Ah... I see. I meant to take the Kubernetes CKAD or AWS Developer certification exam.
I had incorrectly assumed he was paying for it himself; I did not know the same voucher can be used for something else.
(I don't know if there's one for Azure which is also popular in job posting adverts.
But strangely, GCP does not seem popular).
Thanks for clarifying.
In the end, I believe that each person should know which is the best-fit advice for them.
What is right for me may not be right for them.

Anil Philip wrote:(I don't know if there's one for Azure which is also popular in job posting adverts.

Yes, Microsoft has Azure certs. Doesn't help the OP, but wanted to reply in general since you asked

Jeanne Boyarsky wrote:

Anil Philip wrote:(I don't know if there's one for Azure which is also popular in job posting adverts.

Yes, Microsoft has Azure certs. Doesn't help the OP, but wanted to reply in general since you asked

Thank you for the clarification.