How to Prepare and Pass Oracle Cloud Infrastructure 2019 Architect Professional (1Z0-997) Exam ...

1.           Frankly speaking, I am not very fond of appearing for professional certifications. It is not that I fear getting my skill-sets evaluated, however, being a hands-on person and having 22+ years of leadership experience in diverse domains of IT Management and Cyber Security and with a PhD in Information Systems, I feel that I have had my share of examinations.

2.           However, during the recent Covid19 induced lockdowns, one of my friend forwarded me an article (https://www.oracle.com/corporate/blog/free-certifications-oracle-oci-autonomous-033020.html) by Raghu Viswanathan, Vice President of Education Products and Delivery, Oracle University. I found the initiative very interesting. I had the time and opportunity to test whether I can apply my theoretical and practical knowledge to a new cloud environment and pass the muster.

3.           I took up the challenge of completing Oracle Cloud Infrastructure 2019 Architect Professional (1Z0-997) certification exam. For those uninitiated, the salient aspects and various levels of OCI Certification path is elucidated in the image below:

Credit: Oracle (https://tinyurl.com/yab479wk )

4.           The OCI certification path for professional exam requires that candidate must have one of the following certifications:

• Oracle Cloud Infrastructure 2018 Certified Architect Associate
• Oracle Cloud Infrastructure 2019 Certified Architect Associate

5.           Since I had neither of the pre-requisite certifications, I had to first appear for and clear the Oracle Cloud Infrastructure 2019 Certified Architect Associate (1Z0-1072) Exam. In the succeeding paragraphs, I will cover the preparation model adopted by me to first clear OCI 2019 Certified Architect Associate exam, followed by Oracle Cloud Infrastructure 2019 Architect Professional (1Z0-997) exam, all within 15 days. Before you proceed further and get the notion that Oracle certifications are easy and test could be cracked easily, I must give a disclaimer. To the contrary, exams questions are not straightforward, knowledge based, rather questions present practical scenarios with multiple options nuanced with subtle differences in design choices. Unless you have practical experience and have sound understanding of cloud environments and underlying foundational concepts, delineating between various options proves to be very tricky.

Preparatory Steps

6.           Let me briefly cover as to how I went about the preparations and the associated timelines. I am not implying that what I did was the best way forward, however, it did work for me. The preparation to a large extend depends upon your background and experience level.

(a)  Sign up for Oracle Cloud Free Tier. As one needs hands-on job or industry experience in architecting or implementing cloud infrastructures, or equivalent practice in labs or test environments, it is imperative that all aspirants create Oracle Cloud Free Tier account at https://www.oracle.com/cloud/free/. The sign-up process does require you to provide credit/ debit card information, but Oracle doesn’t charge you, unless you specifically convert to a paid tier. At the time of signup, Oracle provides free USD/SGD 400 credit for trying out paid features of OCI. The OCI account is very important and vital for acquiring hands-on and practical knowledge required for understanding various OCI features and clearing the test.

(b) Create Oracle Single Sign On Account. Create an account at https://education.oracle.com/. The account presently provides access to self-paced learning videos from Oracle experts for certification paths. As I was to appear for the Associate and Professional exams, I subscribed to both, Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Architect Associate and Professional Workshops. The Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Learning Subscription is at present free. Each self-paced video based Workshop covers all essential modules and key concepts by domain experts of Oracle and has following flow:

• OCI Architect Associate/ Professional Workshop containing 10-17 hours of instructor led self-paced training videos.
• Exam Preparation Guide: OCI Architect Associate/ Professional
• Practice Exam for: OCI Architect Associate/ Professional
• Certification Link for Pearson Vue

(c)         Create an Account on Pearson VUE. You need to create an account on https://home.pearsonvue.com/oracle for taking the online examination. Once you complete the online self-paced workshop and go through exam preparation guide & practice exam for OCI Architect Associate/ Professional, you would be able to register for Proctored Exam on Pearson VUE website. The discount of $245 (as per the current campaign) shall be applied automatically at the time of checkout.

(d)        Your Online Knowledge Partner. I strongly urge all aspirants to refer to the online documentation at https://docs.cloud.oracle.com/en-us/iaas/Content/home.htm in conjunction with the study material and videos available in the workshop at https://learn.oracle.com/ols/user-portal. One should not look at certifications as a destination but a path to continuous learning.

Exam Specific Preparations

Oracle Cloud Infrastructure 2019 Certified Architect Associate (1Z0-1072) Exam.

7.           After going through the above preparatory steps, I registered for the online workshop on 02 April 2020. The associate level certification covers topics such as: Cloud computing concepts (HA, DR, Security), regions, availability domains, OCI terminology and services, networking, databases, load balancing, IAM, FASTCONNECT, VPN, Compartments, Terraform, with focus on how to use it with OCI. The details about various domains covered in the exam and exam preparation guide is available at https://learn.oracle.com/education/downloads/1Z0-1072/1Z0-1072%20-%20OCI%20Architect%20Associate%20-%202019%20Study%20Guide_7F20.pdf

8.           I would suggest that all aspirants go through the workshop videos once. Before going for the next iteration, visualize and prepare solutions (on paper) with various services running in cloud environment. While going through various self-paced videos again, practically implement your solution alongside in the your OCI free tier. If you do not understand a particular concept like load balancers, CIDR, routing etc., it is advisable to do some deep diving using the material available on internet and youtube. Since I have been in the IT field for a long time, I found all the topics easy and could implement the envisioned cloud solution in the OCI. After going through the practice exam, I appeared for online proctored exam on 06 Apr 2020. The exam format was Multiple Choice. One has to attempt 66 questions within 105 Minutes with passing score being 65%. My online proctored exam experience was smooth and I passed the exam. The exam didn’t cover any memory based questions like various data for VCN, Instance etc., but quizzed on problems and solution alternatives. With adequate practice, this exam should be easy to clear.

Oracle Cloud Infrastructure 2019 Certified Architect Professional (1Z0-997) Exam.

9.           This exam is meant for someone who has about a minimum of 2 years of hands-on or industry experience in architecting or implementing cloud infrastructures at enterprise. The exam is very much practice oriented and covers very advanced topics and tests one’s skill on:

• Planning and design complex solutions architectures using multiple services like IAM, Compute, Storage, Load Balancer, Kubernetes and Functions as well as DR and HA.
• Designing for architectures that include databases options like ADW, ATP and DB system on OCI and hybrid cloud solutions
• Migration strategies from on-premises to OCI. You need to be familiar with services like Storage Gateway, Data Transfer Appliance, Object Storage and Database migration using RMAN and data pump.
• Selecting best set of services to deploy new applications on OCI using the core infrastructure services. Also, you need to understand how to troubleshoot the services on event of a problem.
• Deploying applications using multi cloud environments using services like VCN and FastConnect.
• Design for Security and Compliance including IAM, KMS, Policies and Quotas.

10.         This exam is really a beast. Passing score required is 70%. While most of the domains are same as for the Associate Level exam (except for advanced concepts like OSS, ONS, Cloud Events, Functions, DNS Traffic Management, WAF, Firewall etc.,), the level of coverage is advanced. The exam covers all the cloud concepts and best practices in depth. The exam is not about the knowledge, but how to apply the concepts, cloud features in building a real business solution. Don’t try to memorize and cramp up information, but understand concepts and try to visualize implementation scenarios around a concept/ feature. As far as this exam is concerned, not much is available on the internet, at least I couldn’t find. I found a good article at https://www.thatfinnishguy.blog/2019/11/28/how-i-studied-for-the-oracle-cloud-infrastructure-2019-certified-architect-professional-1z0-997/

11.         During my preparation for the professional exam, I went through the study guide (https://learn.oracle.com/education/downloads/1Z0-997/1Z0-997-%20OCI%20Architect%20Professional%20-%202019%20Study%20Guide_E82B.pdf), all the videos including those for associate level at least thrice along with extensive implementation of concepts and solutions through OCI Cloud Console and laptop-based ssh/VM. For couple of solutions like Federation services, I used my Azure account. For few solutions like WAF and DNS Traffic management, I used VMs on my laptop. Having experience of working on AWS, Azure and NIC clouds, I had the practical experience and all that was left to compare and contrast the implementation related peculiarities for OCI. I studied and practiced solution implementation on OCI for a week. I appeared for my Professional exam on 16 Apr 2020. The online proctored exam experience was smooth as usual. The proctor checked my ID, my exam environment and laptop settings and enabled the exam. The exam had 50 scenario-based questions. Majority of the questions had illustrations and graphics/ scenarios with options presenting solution alternatives. The questions were based on application rather than knowledge or understanding of the exam domains. The exam lasted for 105 minutes and I could finish my 50th question, just in time. I passed the exam. WHAT A RELIEF ?

Final Tip

12.         I would suggest that while attempting questions, like any other exam, during this exam too, one should read the question thoroughly. Especially during OCI 2019 Architect Professional exam, you should look for finer clues in the question and understand the situation being painted. You will not be able to figure out the exact solution straightway as all options would present viable alternatives. Look for what is overriding design imperative stipulated in the question and then look at the options. You should be able to rule out two design choices straightway. The remaining two options would be very similar in approach except for the subtle difference in one or two design elements. That is where your deep understanding of the underlying concepts, practical experience or practice thereof using OCI cloud console will come handy. Please don’t waste your time or money on brain dump etc. The official Practice Exam given on https://learn.oracle.com/ are good enough to give a taste of the exam flavour, though questions therein wouldn’t repeat in the exam.

13.         I hope that this article motivates you and helps you in making up your mind for becoming cloud native by learning one of most simple yet elegant cloud solution i.e. Oracle Cloud Infrastructure. The OCI is by far the most simplistic cloud service with intuitive OCI console interface and simple pricing model. I found the IAM, ONS, OSS, Fn, WAF and OKE very useful in building intuitive solutions in cloud native mode. I also wish to thank the OCI product team for providing a wonderfully done learning path and expert training delivered through https://learn.oracle.com/. I am sure with right kind of preparation, one can become OCI Architect Professional and learn transferable cloud architecture skills which could be gainfully used in other cloud environments like AWS, Azure and GCC. Once you clear your exam, based on the Cloud Recertification policy (https://education.oracle.com/certification-program-guidelines#2_8) , your certification is valid for 18 months from date certified.

If you have any questions regarding the preparation or any of its domain, please feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn and/or contact me on [email protected]

ALL THE BEST WITH YOUR PREPARATIONS...