Recent ProctorU & Network Technology TECEP (CMP-3540) Experience

[AllThose299s]

I just completed the Network Technology TECEP (CMP-3540) today and figured I would share my experiences - both the good and the bad. This was my first time using ProctorU, taking a TECEP, and it has been ages since I've taken a networking course (maybe 15 years) since I first learned about the OSI model — but this is CMP-354 TECEP we are taking about here...

ProctorU / Guardian Browser

I had the guardian browser installed on a spare laptop running Windows 11 with 16GB of ram, wifi only (no ethernet port) according to fast.com my internet speed right now is 240 Mbps, ran the pre-check earlier today, no issues. Laptop did not sound like it was trying to take off during the exam. I had the laptop plugged into an external monitor with the laptop kept closed, so windows was only reporting 1 display. Started the exam, the guardian browser kept freaking out about multiple monitors, but I refused to take a 2 hour exam on my laptop screen — if I'm going to suffer I want to at enjoy it on at least a 32" display (a hill I was prepared to die on). The guardian browser would not let me pass, so I closed the app and started again, this time it got as far as downloading the LogMeIn rescue software that the proctor used to control my machine at this point.

The Proctor remotely closed out of the guardian browser, opened Firefox, navigated to the testing session, which I think opened the guardian browser again at some point, then had me log into the myEdison Portal and then asked me to navigate to my exam. This threw me for a curve, because I had to open up my password manager, then log into myEdison and then for the life of me I couldn't find where the my courses link had moved to. Thankfully, the Proctor circled it on the screen, so I clicked it.... and had to then login into Moodle, so had to open the password manager again and finally was able to then go to TECEP course in moodle and launch the exam. Besides that, my ProctorU experience wasn't too bad. My proctor seemed nice, she did ask me if I was cubicle (I took my exam in my office space which is sort of modular — not sure if that made my experience most positive or not with the proctor) The only thing that seemed odd was the proctor asked me to cover my laptop that was on the desk, not sure if I would of had to do that if the laptop would have been on the side or on the floor behind the desk. I used a super old logitech usb webcam to show the Proctor around the room, I've found it to be useful when I was taking SDC exams via RPNow. Just a recommendation if you haven't taken any proctor exams previously and only have a webcam on your laptop, just save yourself the hassle.

Network Technology TECEP (CMP-3540)
Truth be told, I did not spend as much time as I wanted studying for this exam. I scheduled it over a month ago thinking that would give me enough time to cover material but not too long that I would forget details. I watched the videos under the TESU recommendations from the wiki page https://degreeforum.miraheze.org/wiki/Ne...P-3540-TE) sadly a few videos were private such as the 3g vs 4g wireless. On the TECEP Study Tips For CMP-354 Network Technology post, someone mentioned Professor Messer's videos and having watched his video from TESU's recommended videos on the OSI Model, it was a good refresher and I wish I would have watched more of his videos prior to taking the exam.

Overall, the test description seems accurate as far as 60% of the exam being on network concepts, protocols, infrastructure and wireless networking topics. Quoting jch from the TECEP Study Tips post on the topic of the essays — “To keep things sufficiently vague, my exam contained one prompt related to network security, one related to wireless networking, and one related to cloud computing.” This rang true for me as well and considering the essays are worth 30 points, be prepared to know enough on those topics. 

Sadly you aren't able to review all of the questions prior to doing a final submission for the exam, it was broken up into 2 different sets of multiple choice questions, so after you complete one set of questions, you can review those questions before submitting them, then you get another set of questions, which you then have to review before submitting them, and then you are left with the essay questions. So if you suddenly see a question in the second set of questions that makes you realize you answered a question in the first set of questions, you are out of luck. I was able to complete the multiple questions sections rather quickly, so I had a bit of time to focus on the essay questions. The downside is the guardian browser will point out your spelling mistakes but not offer corrections, so I found myself rewriting my sentences because I was expecting that spell check would at least work.

Do I think I passed?
I seriously don't know, I mean I think I did but some of the multiple choice questions seriously threw me off, I swear I had at least 3 questions related to active directory. I feel confident that I passed or at least failed but was very close to passing... I'll find out in about 2 weeks. If I end up not posting a reply to this post or edit it, then I probably bombed the test and my confidence is gone, but as of right now I feel confident that if I did fail it, I could retake the exam and pass it.

For anyone who hasn't taken a ProctorU exam, I hope you have a decent experience and for anyone taking the Network Technology TECEP, wishing you all the best of luck.

[GameSlinger]

I just completed the Network Technology TECEP (CMP-3540) today and figured I would share my experiences - both the good and the bad. This was my first time using ProctorU, taking a TECEP, and it has been ages since I've taken a networking course (maybe 15 years) since I first learned about the OSI model — but this is CMP-354 TECEP we are taking about here...

ProctorU / Guardian Browser

I had the guardian browser installed on a spare laptop running Windows 11 with 16GB of ram, wifi only (no ethernet port) according to fast.com my internet speed right now is 240 Mbps, ran the pre-check earlier today, no issues. Laptop did not sound like it was trying to take off during the exam. I had the laptop plugged into an external monitor with the laptop kept closed, so windows was only reporting 1 display. Started the exam, the guardian browser kept freaking out about multiple monitors, but I refused to take a 2 hour exam on my laptop screen — if I'm going to suffer I want to at enjoy it on at least a 32" display (a hill I was prepared to die on). The guardian browser would not let me pass, so I closed the app and started again, this time it got as far as downloading the LogMeIn rescue software that the proctor used to control my machine at this point.

The Proctor remotely closed out of the guardian browser, opened Firefox, navigated to the testing session, which I think opened the guardian browser again at some point, then had me log into the myEdison Portal and then asked me to navigate to my exam. This threw me for a curve, because I had to open up my password manager, then log into myEdison and then for the life of me I couldn't find where the my courses link had moved to. Thankfully, the Proctor circled it on the screen, so I clicked it.... and had to then login into Moodle, so had to open the password manager again and finally was able to then go to TECEP course in moodle and launch the exam. Besides that, my ProctorU experience wasn't too bad. My proctor seemed nice, she did ask me if I was cubicle (I took my exam in my office space which is sort of modular — not sure if that made my experience most positive or not with the proctor) The only thing that seemed odd was the proctor asked me to cover my laptop that was on the desk, not sure if I would of had to do that if the laptop would have been on the side or on the floor behind the desk. I used a super old logitech usb webcam to show the Proctor around the room, I've found it to be useful when I was taking SDC exams via RPNow. Just a recommendation if you haven't taken any proctor exams previously and only have a webcam on your laptop, just save yourself the hassle.

Network Technology TECEP (CMP-3540)
Truth be told, I did not spend as much time as I wanted studying for this exam. I scheduled it over a month ago thinking that would give me enough time to cover material but not too long that I would forget details. I watched the videos under the TESU recommendations from the wiki page https://degreeforum.miraheze.org/wiki/Ne...P-3540-TE) sadly a few videos were private such as the 3g vs 4g wireless. On the TECEP Study Tips For CMP-354 Network Technology post, someone mentioned Professor Messer's videos and having watched his video from TESU's recommended videos on the OSI Model, it was a good refresher and I wish I would have watched more of his videos prior to taking the exam.

Overall, the test description seems accurate as far as 60% of the exam being on network concepts, protocols, infrastructure and wireless networking topics. Quoting jch from the TECEP Study Tips post on the topic of the essays — “To keep things sufficiently vague, my exam contained one prompt related to network security, one related to wireless networking, and one related to cloud computing.” This rang true for me as well and considering the essays are worth 30 points, be prepared to know enough on those topics. 

Sadly you aren't able to review all of the questions prior to doing a final submission for the exam, it was broken up into 2 different sets of multiple choice questions, so after you complete one set of questions, you can review those questions before submitting them, then you get another set of questions, which you then have to review before submitting them, and then you are left with the essay questions. So if you suddenly see a question in the second set of questions that makes you realize you answered a question in the first set of questions, you are out of luck. I was able to complete the multiple questions sections rather quickly, so I had a bit of time to focus on the essay questions. The downside is the guardian browser will point out your spelling mistakes but not offer corrections, so I found myself rewriting my sentences because I was expecting that spell check would at least work.

Do I think I passed?
I seriously don't know, I mean I think I did but some of the multiple choice questions seriously threw me off, I swear I had at least 3 questions related to active directory. I feel confident that I passed or at least failed but was very close to passing... I'll find out in about 2 weeks. If I end up not posting a reply to this post or edit it, then I probably bombed the test and my confidence is gone, but as of right now I feel confident that if I did fail it, I could retake the exam and pass it.

For anyone who hasn't taken a ProctorU exam, I hope you have a decent experience and for anyone taking the Network Technology TECEP, wishing you all the best of luck.

Excellent review. Thank your for taking the time to report on it. 

Because I remember reading in someone else's post about this exam from a few years ago, was the terminology and tech being discussed currently relevant, or was it all relating to some older tech that gave an understanding of the fundamentals but not about what you would be working with in the real world?

[AllThose299s]

Because I remember reading in someone else's post about this exam from a few years ago, was the terminology and tech being discussed currently relevant, or was it all relating to some older tech that gave an understanding of the fundamentals but not about what you would be working with in the real world?

Hmmm honestly, it felt like both. A mix of what layer within the OSI model is responsible for XYZ, which is the fundamentals with networking (so if you end up doing anything networking related in the real world, something related to a certain layer is going to come up), a mix of cloud computing technologies questions, and then some questions that made me stop and do a hard blink at — a few that I had no idea what they were talking about, a few that seemed too easy and made me question why they were even in the exam, and then some questions which the topics were covered in one of the videos I watched either related to network topologies, wireless networking or mobility, etc.

Trying to study for the CMP-3540 was tricky because I felt like I knew enough about certain topics, but it had been so long since I've focused on networking, I felt that I needed to put more of my focus on it. Now that I've taken the exam, while I don't regret spending my time focusing on the networking topics, I do regret not focusing more on some of the other topics listed on the test description, for example, I now see that the tecep description lists the specific topic of "Directory services" under the "Communication Services" section which explains some of the active directory like questions I had during my exam.

The exam casts such a wide net it is difficult to predict what type of questions you will get; I still feel that the 60% of the multiple-choice exam is covered by the networking topics I mentioned in my first post, but the other 40% seemed to be related to one of the various specific topics listed within the test descriptions. I think those who focus more on the IT side of things rather than the CS side of things will find the exam to be a lot easier.

[bjcheung77]

Great review! Hope you get a favorable score and passed... Good luck on your remaining credits!

[AllThose299s]

I'm happy to report that I've passed! Just barely, but I still passed.

[bjcheung77]

Awesome work, a pass is a pass and you get the credit! You can now update your signature and good luck on what's left to come for your degree...