Certification
Passed CLD!
That's one good Christmas present. Congratulations! Please feel free to talk about your experience in order to help others.
Good idea!
Here are some things I learned from both practicing for the test and taking the test:
1. Start developing your code by adhering to the LabVIEW Style Guide and document all your code as described in Chapter 5 of that same document now. This will make style and documenation natural for you. I had several pieces of code that didn't function properly, but I got near 100% on style and 100% on documentation. That includes tip strips. So in short, style and documentation really helped my overall score!
Making sure the style was good and documenting as I go is easiest for me. As opposed to coming back and doing it all at the end when I may not remmeber what I did and remembering what needed to be commented.
2. As many others have said spend the first bit of time (20 min for me) reading and understanding the specification. As I read each section, I made a state chart diagram showing each state and the transitions to/from each state. I also made brief notes about what the state should do and what the UI should do at that point. This helped me have a clear picture of the system as I read the specification and my notes were a handy reference as I coded.
Of course, I was sure to check the code functionality against the original document and not my notes.
I did learn half way through the test that I should trust my notes, because I made a deviation from the notes. Once I realized I had made this deviation it was too late too correct it so I had to document what I had done incorrectly.
3. I stopped coding when about 20-30 minutes was left. At this point I had a sizeable portion of the code functioning. I did not want to risk breaking my existing code. At this point, I started to document the following:
- what didn't work, why it didn't work, and what I would have done differently.
- Tip strips and control\indicator descriptions.
- Remember, at this point everything else was already documented, so I only had to document what didn't work.
4. I didn't have any bad experiences with this, but in the last 5 minutes I did transfer the test the USB flash drive and opened it from there to make sure nothing was broken. I included this step in my practice exams.
5. It is true you should practice, practice, practice. Then when you are done with that practice some more! The first 2 practice exams took me about 4.5 hours, which was disheartening. However, I learned my mistakes from those two tests (mostly the things listed above), and I corrected those mistakes for the last two practice exams. I then was finishing them within 4 hours. Your mistakes may be different than mine, so make sure you practice those exams with a 4 hour chunk of time set aside to see what your mistakes will be.
Hope this helps someone out there!
I thought of one other tip regarding practicing. Practicing is important because the way you code for the CLD exam is probably not how you code on a regular basis. That make practicing so much more important, so that you can get used to coding for the CLD.
