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Last year, one of my goals was to earn Microsoft’s Azure Data Engineer Associate certification. I was interested in getting it because it is a good way to learn about other services Azure has to offer, and it is good for my CV. I know that having a certification does not mean that you are an expert at something, but it is a good way to prove that you, at least, understand the different topics the certification covers.

Anyway, fortunately for me, I got my certification after my second attempt, and I was happy that all that study finally paid off. Yes, after my second attempt. So, to help people to get their certification on their very first attempt, I decided to share some good tips that will surely be helpful.

1. Microsoft Learn’s learning path

Even if you decide to pay for a training course imparted by one of Microsoft’s training centers, I highly recommend taking the self-paced learning path. Some things are explained more simply in Microsoft Learn courses, and for certain topics, you will be able to do exercises, which will help you to practice and to understand things better.

2. Topics you need to understand very well

The following topics were asked a lot in the practice exams I took and in the final exam.

2.1 AZ Blob Storage – Access tiers

Learn when to use each tier and memorize the number of days they mention in the documentation. At least 2 questions related to this came up.

2.2 AZ Stream Analytics – Window functions

You will find real-life scenarios question in which they will ask you to decide which window function you would use. Of course, you need to comprehend the five window functions to answer the questions correctly. I believe I was asked at least 3 questions related to this.

2.3 AZ Synapse Analytics – Dedicated SQL Pool – Distributed tables

Several questions will come up related to this. They want you to have clear the following use cases:

• Hash tables — Fact Tables

• Round Robin tables — Staging/Temporary tables

• Replicated tables — Dimension tables

To learn more details about this, check out the documentation.

2.4 AZ Data Factory – Foundational concepts

I don’t remember exactly what the questions about this topic were like, but I do remember that you need to have a clear understanding of what they call top-level concepts. You do not need to know how to use all the activities that Azure Data Factory has available to use. Focus on the foundational concepts and make sure you know how to do basic things, such as using the Copy Data activity to read a file and load the data into a table.

2.5 Cosmos DB – APIs

Two tips for this topic:

• Cosmos DB is a top-notch service focused to be used by global-scale applications. If you run into a question in which you need to decide which data storage service to use, and they mention that one of the requirements is that it needs to provide fast global access, then the answer is probably Cosmos DB. For anything related to “global”, the answer will probably be Cosmos DB. I learned this tip from http://www.acloudguru.com, and it was true.
• Learn when to use each of the APIs available. They will present to you real-life scenarios in which you will need to decide which API is appropriate to be used. I assume that they want people to understand this very well because you cannot change the API once you have selected one, and if you have data already, you need to migrate it; it’s not some kind of automatic process.

2.6 AZ Blob Storage – POSIX-like access control lists (ACLs)

To this day, I still do not understand why they ask this, but they do. I saw 1-2 questions related to this, and I had to memorize the levels of permissions and their short form. This table is useful for the scenarios they present in the exam.

3. Practice exam

Maybe the most important tip. If you can pay for this, do it and answer all the available questions; you will end up memorizing them and their answers (please take the time to understand why one option is the answer to a question and not another one). This is very helpful, and some of the questions of the practice exams come up in the real exam. You will also get familiar with the type of questions and the way they redact the questions/scenarios (some of them are tricky).

4. Read carefully

This is not the first time I take a certification exam, but it sure seemed like it. I failed the first attempt because I did not understand completely the way the buttons worked to navigate the different sections of the exam. I only answered around 15 questions and by mistake, I accidentally ended the exam :(; I was so angry and frustrated at that moment. The only thing that alleviated me a bit was the fact that around 90% of the questions I answered were correct. That gave me a bit of confidence to know I was prepared for the exam.

Fortunately for me, I rescheduled the exam and passed it with no issues on my second attempt! 🙂

Do not make the same mistake I did. Read carefully.

5. Exam day

Try to schedule the exam on a day that you know you will not be stressed out. Do not take it after work, take it early in the morning while your mind is fresh and is not overwhelmed by other stuff. Most of the people get nervous (just like me), so this is why I am suggesting to take it early after a good sleep.

This is it, I hope you have enjoyed this post and found it helpful for you.