Free
CIW Certification resources
(Certified Internet Webmaster)
CIW
Study Guides and Practice Questions
CIW Overview
For some time now the ‘Internet industry’ has been self-regulated
with many people able to pass themselves off as web designers, programmers
or developers with no requirement to back those claims up with a
real certification. The CIW certification (Certified Internet Webmaster)
however aims to offer an industry standard by which candidates can
be measured and evaluated.
The CIW certification track is a vendor-neutral certification for
people who wish to formally accredit themselves with a certification
that closely allies itself with their particular job role or set
of skills in an Internet based environment. Vendor-neutral means
that they do not hitch their exams to any particular vendor such
as Microsoft or Novell. This means that you are tested on the actual
skills rather than specific tools of the trade.
The CIW certification comes
in a variety of tracks, each one geared toward a specific industry
area. The CIW certification tracks are (click on the links for more
information):
»
CIW
Associate (1 exam needed)
» CIW
Professional (2 exams needed)
» CIW
Security Analyst (1 exam needed*)
» CIW
Web Developer (1 exam needed)
» Master
CIW Designer (3 exams needed)
» Master
CIW Administrator (4 exams needed)
» Master
CIW Enterprise Developer (8 exams needed)
» Master
CIW Web Site Manager (5 exams needed)
*with additional conditions
As
you can see from the links above, there are a variety of CIW certifications
that you can take, but in nearly all cases you must start with the
CIW Associate before you can move on to other tracks. You obtain
the CIW Associate certificate by passing the CIW Foundations exam
or by gaining a credit if you have already passed the CompTIA I-net+
certification (of course, you’ll still have to pay the exam
processing fee for the CIW Foundations exam even if you have passed
the I-net+ exam). For those who wish to progress further from the
CIW Associates program and go on to do the CIW Administrator, the
CIW certification also offers some credits for those who have already
passed certain MCSE and CNE qualifications. At the time of writing
this overview, candidates with credits from these certifications
only had to pass two additional CIW exams to qualify as a CIW Administrator.
Note: It’s often worth
exploring these cross-certification credits as with a bit of planning
you can obtain multiple certifications across numerous vendors with
a fraction of the work required.
In most cases the CIW exams
are 75 minutes in duration and consist of 60 questions (although
there are sometimes beta questions thrown in to the exam for evaluation
purposes. If this happens you will be granted extra time to complete
the exam and the beta questions will not be marked or affect your
score in any way). Each question is presented to you with 4 possible
answers from which you must choose the correct answer.
To pass the CIW certification
exams you must achieve a score of at least 75% with at least a 70%
pass mark in individual exam modules. For example, the CIW Application
Developer exam is divided into two distinct modules; Fundamentals
of CGI Using Perl, and Dynamic Server Pages. You must achieve at
least 70% in each of the two modules, and achieve an overall score
of 75% to pass. If you are unsuccessful in passing any CIW certification
exam the first time you can re-sit the exam but you must wait at
least 24 hours before doing so.
Like
with most new certifications you have to ask yourself if the time,
cost and commitment needed to obtain the CIW certification will
offer a decent return on investment for you. That is to say will
your current or future employers be aware of the CIW certification,
and will it offer you any advantages to obtain CIW certification?
While many, or most, employers might not be too aware of the CIW
certification, it will certainly do you no harm if you have it on
your C.V. The Internet, while extremely technical in nature, is
also very much artistic orientated so you may find that a portfolio
of work is more beneficial in finding a job than the CIW certification
alone. Having both would be a bonus of course, particularly if you’re
looking at the CIW to actually enter the industry - but don’t
rely purely on the CIW certification alone to get a job working
in the web industry, at least not for anything other than an entry-level
position.
CIW Study Guides and Practice Questions
Good
luck with your studies!
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