About the test
Prerequisites - A candidate must have a SpringSource voucher in order to register for an exam. To obtain a voucher, a SpringSource candidate must have attended the four day CoreSpring course or be qualified as a "grandfathered" candidate. (the latest option is not available at moment)
Type of Questions - The type of questions asked in the exam are multiple-choice. Again, if a multiple-choice question has more than one correct choice, it is explicitly stated in the question.
Number of questions - 50 non-weighted multiple choice questions in 10 topic areas that will be described in the
exam section. Time - The time allowed to complete this exam is 88 minutes. You are allowed to go back to earlier questions during the exam and can change the answers, but take care that you are able to review only the marked questions, once all questions are filled in. The review time is included in the total amount of time allowed for the exam. No scheduled breaks are built into exam.
Passing % - You need to obtain at least 75% to be successful. The exam asks you 50 questions and you need to correctly answer at least 38.
Results - Score is provided immediately at the end of the exam. Softcopy certificate sent by e-mail and hard copy has to be explicitly requested.
Retaking exams - Candidates who fail an exam must wait a period of thirty (30) calendar days, beginning the day after the failed attempt, before retaking the exam. Once passed, Spring exams may not be retaken.
Preparation
Core Spring Training Course - The first source of preparation should be the four day CoreSpring course you will have to take in order to take this certification. This might be enough in some cases, especially if you already have a very good work-experience with the Spring framework; however usually this is not enough to pass the exam with a high score.
Topics addressed - A quite detailed description of the topics addressed in the Spring training course can be found here.
Labs - You should be able to perform any lab shown during the course
with no slides and books. Focus - Spring is a very vast framework. Focus only on the sections covered in the class student guide for passing the certification and leave all the rest for later.
Extra resources - You can use extra resources if you feel weak on specific topics. The best are:
You can also check the section resources for a more detailed list.
Spring mock exams - Mock exams will help you to understand if you are ready to take the real exam. The best mock exams available on the market can be found HERE.
Cost
Voucher - There is no cost for the Spring Voucher itself. You will get your voucher at the end your Spring Core course by email. The voucher will expire after 9 months from the date of receipt. However, if you are a grandfathered candidate, registration fee is 150 US dollars (or locally priced).
Retake - If you fail the exam, you can buy an exam retake voucher. It will cost 150 US dollars (or locally priced).
Exam
Topics - The best and most accurate description of the topics that will be present in the exam, is available on the Spring website here. In syntheses topics are:
- Container and test
- AOP
- JDBC
- Transactions
- Web
- REST
- Remoting
- Security
- JMS
- JMX
Questions - There will be different types of questions on the exam:
- Select one answer
- Select X answers
- Select one or more answers
- Select the one that is not correct
REST - In the past exams there were some questions on REST. In the current exam there is none. Our mock exams reflect this update.