By Clark Jason Ngo

I have just taken the AWS Certified Developer - Associate Exam on July 1st of 2019. The result? I failed.

Image My AWS Developer Certificate score card

The AWS Certified Developer - Associate (DVA-C01) has a scaled score between 100 and 1,000. The minimum scaled score needed to pass the exam is 720.

I got 642

The total number of questions was 65. I did some rough calculations. With 5 more correct answers, I would've passed the exam.

Recap and reflection

  • When I was taking the exam and gone over the questions, I already felt I was not going to pass. I review my questions. Nothing.
  • What did I do next? I used the erasable paper provided by the testing center to write down the topic of each question.
  • What did I find? There were a lot of scenario-based questions, I was expected that. Question using a combination of AWS services, I also expected that. But throttling, troubleshooting, and root cause analysis? Not so much. There were no simple questions. Nothing about SQS (Simple Queue Service), SNS (Simple Notification Service). Also, no computational questions for WCU (Write Capacity Unit) and RCU (Read Capacity Unit) on DynamoDB, which I'm also prepared for.
  • What did I feel? I must've gotten unlucky with the question pool and maybe I need more time to do more real hands-on experience in using AWS services and encounter problems.

What now?

Did I regret taking the exam? No. I learned a LOT during the process.

I'm still optimistic as usual and here's my Jedi Mind Trick:

Failure makes me work hard and be more humble (makes me think I'm a human being after all).

Accomplishments (as much I love them) can make you complacent if you are not mindful.

Timeline

2018

September

I got my feet wet with AWS services

Image Same speaker on a different event

November

I learned simple project ideas to create in AWS.

Image He visited us at City University of Seattle

December

I got hands-on experience with IAM, S3, Lambda, API Gateway

Simple project created from the workshop here.

Image Serverless Workshop at City University of Seattle

2019

I presented about AWS services to my schoolmates.

January

My own talks:

March

Watched tons of AWS conference talks. Check my blog here on my journey in my master's program.

AWS Training

AWS Educate - Cloud Computing Introduction and Software Developer Pathway

June

I resumed my studies for AWS Developer Exam as I felt some confidence that I can do well in the exam.

Tip on how to learn again here.

Qwiklab courses

Conclusion

As of writing this blog, I'm moving on to other stuff for now.

My current job as graduate teaching assistant in City University of Seattle, requires me to focus on TypeScript and create content.

We are also preparing to teach Amazon apprentices and it requires us to study up Linux system administration, networking, web development, MEAN stack, and Django to able to support them.

As an Auth0 Ambassador, I need to get up to speed with identity and security. Awesome material from Auth0 here.

As an open-source contributor, I need to refactor my code and create a new pull request in the hackathon-starter repository.

Reach out here:

Twitter

LinkedIn

Till next time! Don't let failure define you =)