In preparation for the Zend Certification Exam (ZCE), Zend provides a great (sarcasm) online practice test that consists of 8 questions. That is right, 8 questions. A certification exam that consists of 70 questions and Zend offers 8 questions. And the other thing with the practice test, is that if you get 5 out of 8 correct, then you are “ready” to take the exam. Which I would not suggest, unless of course you have at least 1 year of real PHP experience coding, testing, even hacking. Plus, there is a good amount of DB stuff on the test, as well as security, streams, XML/Web Services and other stuff. I also suggest you pay (that is right, pay) for a set of practice exams. But I digress. Back to the Zend practice test. They give you 8 questions, then just tell you how many you got right/wrong. There is no feedback (like a real exam) on the practice test, which I think there ought to be. So I decided I would not only give you the answer, but why it is the answer. Following is the exam questions and the answers and why they are the answers.
Continue reading Zend Certification Practice Exam
Monthly Archives: September 2008
Ghost Town
I did not post on Monday, which I really wanted to do. I am studying for the Zend Certification, but may have to put it off based on work load, and family obligations. Do I think I can just take the exam and pass it? Well, I am not that conceited, but I am sure I may be able to pass it on a good day. However, test taking is not one of my strengths, so even if I knew everything on the test, I may still fail the test. So studying really helps me go through the exam work, and then helps me to get through the anxiety of tests.
And there is also new work things I am doing on the side. Most involve CakePHP, some involve just doing some very basic PHP work. So I am doing those and having less time to actually blog. And let’s not forget football season is now in full swing, so I spend a good portion of my Saturday afternoons watching college football and doing some studying.
Hopefully next week I can make a couple of posts, and hopefully I will make a couple of posts per week.
The next post will probably deal with more of the CakePHP work I am doing. (Working on a “social” calendar, like there isn’t already 2000 of them already).
Zend Certification
Another quick post this week, as I am bogged down in work and preparing for a Zend Certification Exam. I am going to be taking the exam for Zend Certified Engineer (ZCE). While I do not expect it to be much problem, these types of exams are usually worded in a way that may not give you all the basics.
I do highly recommend to visit the Zend site, download the exam prep book, and then also get a 5 pack of the test exams. The Zend store has the book and you can add on the practice exams for $17 (for 5 exams). The book explains the basics on the exam, things like network programming, XML and web services, and other items that will appear on the exam. Then if you get the 5 pack for the exam, you can take a practice test 5 times, and be able to get an idea of what the exam will be like.
Some of the questions seem like no brainers, but then there are times when the question has a key word, that makes the question mean something completely different than first appearances. One of the things I learned a long time ago, is that with these types of exams, the multiple choice has four to five questions that can be peared down quickly. Usually one is not going to be correct because of absurdity, one is going to sound like it is right, but for obvious reasons it is incorrect. Then there are the final 2 questions that can both be correct, but there is one answer they are looking for.
Sounds easy right? Would be if it was just like college, where you get to take a test, if you do not get a “pass” grade, then there are other things you can do to make up the score. With these exams, and this one in particular, it is $125 for one certification exam. You do not pass, not only are you out $125, you do not get anything, no certification of any kind. You need to pay again for another shot at the exam. So no matter how much you know a language, no matter how much you think you may know, always study and prepare. It never hurts and in the process, you may get to know more about the language than you did before.
CakePHP Auth error message
Today is just going to be a quick post. It is Labor Day here in the States and that means a whole heap of people are not going to be working, including me. So I am just messing around with some stuff in CakePHP as I am doing a side project for a local church to put up a calendar. Most of it is complete, but there was one thing that I wanted to change.
I am using the Auth component in my User model. I have allowed register, resetpass, and index. So when I go to view a user’s detailed profile, there is that message: “You are not authorized to access that location.” Which is a fine message and all, but I want it to be site specific, and also controller specific. So the Users controller will have a separate Auth error message than the Calendars controller. So here is what I did.
In the Users controller, I built a beforeFilter function. I set my authorized actions, set redirect to false. I also set a session level variable with the Auth, then I set the error message. There are a couple of messages you can set for the Users controller. You can set the loginError and the authError. The loginError will be the error when the user logs in and is unable to for whatever reason. The authError is what the user will see when they try to perform an action that is not allowed by them, whether it is because they are not logged in (as in my case) or you are using Auth to “authorize” an action.
So here is what it would look like:
function beforeFilter() {
parent::beforeFilter();
$this->Auth->allow('register', 'index', 'resetpass');
$this->Auth->autoRedirect = false;
$this->Auth->authorize = 'controller';
$this->set('my_id', $this->Auth->user('user_id'));
$this->Auth->authError = "Please log in first in order to preform that action.";
}
So when you want to change the standard Auth error message, just remember to set the “authError” to whatever message you would like. Happy Labor Day!