Skills required for Sun test CX310-065

Sun has specified more than thirty five objectives for Sun test CX310-065 (Sun Certified Programmer for the Java Platform, Standard Edition 6). These objectives are grouped under seven topics. Before taking the test, an individual should possess a good command over the following areas:

1. Developing code that declares all kinds of classes, nested and inner classes, interfaces, packages, import statements, enums, and abstract classes.
2. Developing code that declares, initializes, and uses primitives, arrays, enums, and objects as static, local, and instance variables.
3. Using JavaBeans naming conventions in code. Using variable-length argument list in code.
4. Making proper use of overloading, overriding, and method declaration. Determining if the default constructor will be created.
5. Developing code by using if, switch, while, do-while, labels, break, continue, for, and enhanced for loop.
6. Developing code that makes proper use of assertion and differentiating between appropriate and inappropriate use of assertion.
7. Developing code that makes proper use of exception and exception handling clauses. Differentiating between Runtime exception, checked exception, and an error.
8. Identifying situations in which different exceptions will be thrown. Understanding which exceptions are thrown by JVM and which are thrown programmatically.
9. Developing code for using wrapper with and without autoboxing/unboxing. Differentiating between String, StringBuffer and StringBuider classes.
10. Developing code for reading from and writing to a file using java.io. Classes used are BufferedReader, BufferedWriter, File, FileReader, FileWriter, PrintWriter, Console, DataInputStream, DataOutputStream, FileInputStream, FileOutputStream, ObjectInputStream, ObjectOutputStream, and Serializable.
11. Using the java.text package to correctly format or parse date, number, and currency value. Making use of the java.util.Locale class and describing its use.
12. Understanding API in java.util and java.util.regex. Using Pattern and Matcher classes to write code. Using the Scanner and Format classes and the String.split() method.
13. Using java.lang.Thread and java.lang.Runnable to start new threads. Recognizing various states of a thread and writing code that makes use of wait, notify, and notifyAll methods.
14. Writing code to implement loose coupling, high cohesion, and tight encapsulation. Writing code that demonstrates the use of Polymorphism. Understanding the difference between overloading and overriding.
15. Distinguishing between correct and incorrect overrides of hashcode and equals method. Differentiating between == and equals methods.
16. Using generics with collection API, particularly with Set, List, and Map interfaces. Explaining the difference between generic and non-generic versions of collection API. Writing generic methods using wildcard types.
17. Recognizing the limitations of the non-generic Collections API and refactoring code to use the generic versions. Writing code to use the NavigableSet and NavigableMap interfaces.
18. Using java.util to write code to manipulate a list by sorting, performing binary search and understanding conversion of list to Array. Using Comparator and Comparable interfaces to manipulate an array by sorting, performing binary search and conversion of array to list.
19. Writing code example using access modifiers, package declaration, and import statement. Determining expected Runtime behavior for a given piece of code.
20. Identifying the point at which an object becomes eligible for garbage collection. Recognizing the behavior of System.gc and finalization.
21. Deploying class files inside/outside JAR, and determining the correct classpath for file compilation. Using various operators in code including assignment operator, arithmetic operator, relational operator, instanceof operator, logical operator, and conditional operator.

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