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8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
Very pleased
This is a very good study guide for the Zend PHP5 exam. Touches on quiet a few of the more subtle subjects in PHP5 and has a very nice learning curve. It's not recommended for the beginners and has to be read alongside other materials (be it online or offline) for maximum efficiency. It's not the definitive PHP study guide and you shouldn't rely on it alone for the exam...
Published on January 9, 2007 by G. Lazu
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42 of 44 people found the following review helpful:
A Waste
One can easily argue that the certification exam itself is a waste of money, but with this book and its associated practice exams, the case is a little more cut-and-dry.
Want to pass the exam? Know the following things:
1. What can and can't go in a function/variable name.
2. What typehints are, how they work, and where they're...
Published on February 22, 2008 by orangekay
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42 of 44 people found the following review helpful:
A Waste, February 22, 2008
This review is from: php|architect's Zend PHP 5 Certification Study Guide (Paperback)
One can easily argue that the certification exam itself is a waste of money, but with this book and its associated practice exams, the case is a little more cut-and-dry.
Want to pass the exam? Know the following things:
1. What can and can't go in a function/variable name.
2. What typehints are, how they work, and where they're applied.
3. What all of the array_*() functions do. The more verbose array_*_*() functions which nobody uses can be safely skipped over.
4. How to use the SimpleXML library in a very general way i.e. access elements, attributes and convert to DOM.
5. Everything about the new object model, including abstract and final classes, the new constructor format, destructors, autoloaders and access specifiers (public, private, protected).
6. How and when to pass by reference.
7. When things go out of scope.
8. What the following php.ini directives do: allow_url_fopen, register_globals, enable_dl, disable_functions.
9. What goes in the superglobals and when ($_SERVER, $_GET, $_POST, $_REQUEST, $_ARGV).
10. What all of the bitwise operators do (you should also be able to convert numbers to and from decimal, octal, hexadecimal and binary notation with nothing but your brain and a piece of scratch paper).
Database topics are covered, but you generally don't have to know any of the nonsense about mysqli or PDO--these things are all too buggy to actually use anyway, so learning about them is doubly pointless. If you can memorize function argument lists, do so with the preg_ and various string functions, because they like to throw some curveballs that use the optional args no one ever thinks about. If you can't, then don't bother because you can usually eliminate at least two of the choices they give you right off the bat and guess your way through the rest.
And please, please, please, leave comments on the questions that have misspelled words. They really need to fix that if they're going to charge $125 for a test.
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12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
Good overview, but poor exam prep, October 8, 2008
This review is from: php|architect's Zend PHP 5 Certification Study Guide (Paperback)
I've been programming with PHP professionally for just a year. This book was a good introduction to some concepts I hadn't encountered in my day-to-day work yet, but little more. After reading this book twice, supplementing it with information from the PHP online manual, and passing their practice exams three times in a row, I still failed the exam.
This book doesn't even cover all the topics presented on their practice exams, much less the actual Zend exam. It's riddled with typos (even some in the code, which I consider unforgivable), has no practice questions or coding exercises to go with each chapter, and contains no "for more information, see..." referrals. The streams chapter, for example, primarily covers file I/O and barely touches on network and socket streams. There are some questions I still don't know where to find answers to short of scouring through the PHP manual itself in hopes of stumbling across it.
In short, a good overview of the PHP language, but pathetic exam prep.
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
A good review, but not in-depth by any means..., May 1, 2007
This review is from: php|architect's Zend PHP 5 Certification Study Guide (Paperback)
If you have already been using PHP5 on a regular basis, this book is a good source of review material but doesn't necessarily cover very much new material. It is, I suppose, a good foundation to study for the test, but it *most definitely* is not the only book that you're going to want to read before taking the Zend Certification test.
I also noticed a lot of errors in this book, so beware of that. I recommend the book by Mike Zandstra PHP 5 Objects, Patterns, and Practice in addition to this one, especially if you are moving from PHP4 to PHP5.
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10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
Not good enough for preparing PHP5 certification, June 22, 2007
This review is from: php|architect's Zend PHP 5 Certification Study Guide (Paperback)
This book provides many perspectives on PHP5 certification. However, as a certification preparing guide, I don't think it is good one to pass the exam just by reading this book.
First, it does not have questions at the end of each chapter to evaluate how well the reader learned from the material, as many other exam preparing guides do. It is hard for me to imagine how does the real exam go without those questions.
Second, it has many errors in this book. Some of them could mis-lead you to get wrong concepts of PHP. I agree with Brian, the previous reviewer, beware of using this book. Once you felt anything confused, check out other books or write some codes to test what is the right concept you should learn.
Finally, it does not mention any information about how to connect / retrieve / update information from / to databases with a PHP script. It does have a chapter called "Database Programming", but all it has are only the introduction of SQL statements. I doubt if we don't need to prepare that part for PHP certification.
However, it provides some chapters for XML, web services, and security, which are valuable to refer to. It brought my attention to find more resources to read for those parts.
If you prefer a book that mentions key points of exam without many details, this book is the one you should read; otherwise, pick another one will be a better idea for you.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
Light Outline, July 21, 2008
This review is from: php|architect's Zend PHP 5 Certification Study Guide (Paperback)
While there were a few perspectives that some might not have noticed or thought about. For the most part, this was pretty light weight compared to the practice exams. If you have been working in the language and keeping up with the world, you should have at least seen most of this before. I would not rely on it for more than a detailed outline of some of what you need to know cold - - - at least for the practice exams. Perhaps I will be surprised by the actual exam, and find that this is exactly what is needed - - - who knows.
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8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
Very pleased, January 9, 2007
This review is from: php|architect's Zend PHP 5 Certification Study Guide (Paperback)
This is a very good study guide for the Zend PHP5 exam. Touches on quiet a few of the more subtle subjects in PHP5 and has a very nice learning curve. It's not recommended for the beginners and has to be read alongside other materials (be it online or offline) for maximum efficiency. It's not the definitive PHP study guide and you shouldn't rely on it alone for the exam. Great value for money!
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
Fair PHP5 Overview, definitely NOT a Certification Study Guide, October 29, 2009
This review is from: php|architect's Zend PHP 5 Certification Study Guide (Paperback)
I've decided to disclose my opinion on this book after a discouraged Italian ZCE candidate contacted me through my personal e-mail asking for help, having failed 3 out of 3 mock tests he had taken. He had prepared himself with this book only ...and now you can probably imagine already where this review will end... but let's move on anyways...
BOOK CONTENTS:
The book is actually a pretty good, smooth to read, primer to PHP, even containing several useful tips here and there; unfortunately if fails to accomplish its main intended purpose, since it doesn't cover all the topics required to pass both the Zend mock and real ZCE exams. PHP basics (Chapter 1) can give you a good overview of PHP; Chapter 7 (Database Programming) and Chapter 9 (XML and Web Services) can also give you a pretty decent preparation, but unfortunately that's where the completeness of this book in terms of preparation for the exam ends.
All other topics require in fact that you deeply dig contents from other sources; in particular, the Streams and Network Programming chapter is, in my opinion, very vague and could be considered as interesting and useful only if it was contained inside of an introductory book to PHP, definitely not so for for a certification study guide; similar considerations, even if to a lesser extent, apply for the Strings and OOP chapters also.
MAIN SOURCES OF DISAPPOINTMENT:
What has actually been even more disappointing about this book for me is that the whole preparation path you'd typically expect from a study guide is completely lacking: there are no practice questions, exercises or references to external sources, where what you'll be asked is explained; it'd have been simple to say: "you need to know at least what every function dealing with strings and arrays does, so just head to the official PHP website and read such extracts from the official manual". But there's actually even more to it ...the simple code snippets included in the book do contain errors, which can sometimes cause big headaches while studying, unnecessarily complicating your preparation pathway.
FINAL VIRDICT:
It's my belief that you should NOT rely solely on this book for your Zend Certification preparation. For the aforementioned reasons, I really can't understand how other reviewers who stated that they passed the certification exam thanks to this book alone, managed to accomplish such a thing; at the same time, I also do not agree with others who stated that you need to take the official courses in order to pass; you can definitely pass the exam without taking an expensive class. What you can do is getting some mock exams, sample out a couple of them to understand what you'll be asked and then study from different sources. Chapters 7 & 9 from this book constitute pretty good material, but make sure you also read the online php documentation (you have to know about streams and network programming, about the main settings of the php.ini file, about SUPERGLOBALS, about variable scope, about the http protocol, what all strings and arrays functions do, plus their parameters and return values) and possibly some other useful good books (for exampleI've found PHP Objects, Patterns, and Practice, Second Edition by M. Zandstra to be very usefulj and interesting), especially in the parts which cover the topics (OOP, PHP 4/5 differences) listed on the Zend official website at the Exam Information page (there's actually a quite detailed list of things you're expected to know there).
And yeah... as about this book... what I can suggest you to do is to definitely get it if you have some extra bucks in your pocket, since it is actually useful for certain topics and possibly during the reviewing phase of your preparation. If I had to choose between this book and a set of mock exams though, I'd definitely pick the latter and use zend.com (Exam Information page) and [...]as my study guides. Of course, just my 2c here...
Good Luck!
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4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
I hate this book, August 5, 2009
This review is from: php|architect's Zend PHP 5 Certification Study Guide (Paperback)
I hate this book for five reasons:
1) It doesn't have all the material you need to pass the exam. It has about half the information you need.
2) The author incessantly repeats "the former" / "the latter". It is annoying, confusing, and unnecessary.
3) The author repeatedly calls a malicious user "she" for no particular reason.
4) The code examples span pages unnecessarily, making it hard to follow the flow of the examples.
5) For some reason, it is almost impossible to get a hard copy of the book.
If you want to pass the exam, you have to take the prep course. Period. There are topics on the exam that aren't even mentioned in the book.
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8 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
I passed!, October 29, 2007
This review is from: php|architect's Zend PHP 5 Certification Study Guide (Paperback)
I took the test and passed :) (I think that says it all ;-) )
I studied the book along with the PHP help in order to digg a little more on the functions. I also bought the online practice test to see which areas I needed to focus on.
I liked the book, easy to understand/read.
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2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
A decent introduction to PHP, terrible guide for the exam, January 8, 2010
This review is from: php|architect's Zend PHP 5 Certification Study Guide (Paperback)
First off, this so-called Study Guide for the PHP 5 Certification is completely inadequate for anyone serious about taking the exam.
Ramsey and Shafik's introduction to PHP is the perfect primer for someone new to PHP from any background. It assumes a little experience in programming and introduces the main features of PHP.
As an exam guide for the notoriously difficult Zend PHP5 Certification, the book is superficial, spending far too much time on the basics of PHP, and glossing over the in-depth material that the exam requires. Some subjects are completely left out. The practice exams additionally offered by php|architect for an additional fee are also superficial and not adequate preparation for the real thing.
If you must take the Zend PHP5 Certification Exam, wisely skip over this book and find a better prep exam.
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