VCP6-CMA Beta Exam Experience

I just got back from sitting the beta VCP6-CMA exam so I thought I would jot down a few thoughts in case it helps others out. Firstly, it was my first VCP exam for around 2.5 years, so I’d actually forgotten what kind of level the questions were pitched at! I’m used to VCAP level now, which usually means labbing the shit out of the blueprint so you can get to the exam and be able to hit the ground running with the practical and/or design canvas questions.

Although I’ve only really had dirty hands on vRealize Automation (I’m going to pronounce it as “Vera” I think in the future!) for about 6 weeks. You’d think that not really long enough to go ahead and sit a VCP, but even though the product scope is large, I’ve found it relatively easy to get up to speed with how it works. Enough to sit the exam anyway, and as it was at a special price until the end of the beta today (£36), I thought why not? As a partner we have big plans around the cloud space, so having the VCP can only help.

As for the exam itself, as usual it’s pretty faithful to the exam blueprint. There are 110 questions to be completed in 120 minutes, I believe non-native English speakers get a bit longer. I completed all the questions within about an hour. The exam itself was form based, multiple choice and exhibit based questions, as per most VCP exams I’ve ever sat. With 110 questions, VMware are able to very broadly go across all features of the product (including vRealize Business and App Director) and test you to a reasonable degree. Obviously not as testing as VCAP, but it’s not the same level.

I found myself falling back on my old exam technique of going with my gut response and when I wasn’t sure of an answer, I’d rule out the ones I knew were incorrect and then play the odds with the ones that were left.

There were only a couple of spelling mistakes and a couple of questions I didn’t think were worded too well, but the exam room was quite noisy which didn’t help my concentration, so it may be I was a bit distracted. I didn’t flag any answers for review and I didn’t add comments to any questions. It seems a pretty fair test of product knowledge and a good exam to pass.

Apparently I won’t know if I’ve passed for about 8-10 weeks as the beta exam process runs it’s course (hopefully it may be shorter as today is the last day), so I’ll have to forget about it for now and move on to the VCP-NV which I sit on the 30th. My gut feeling was I’d done enough to pass (around 3/4 correct by my estimation), so we’ll see when the time comes.

A totally different experience to a VCAP and not as intense, but I enjoyed it none the less. Fingers crossed now and onto VCP-NV!