Here I am providing you the whole story about my SCJP2 Exam divided in different categories like my Learning experience, Exam experience, Actual exam and some suggestions.

I does not have any programming background before this SCJP2 exam. I started the real preparation of SJCP2 exam from January 2001 and gave the exam on 28th March 2001.Before this I have done Core Java ( not as per exam point of view) from an institute and got a teaching job in another institute. I have purchased three books on Java:

• "Java2 Complete Reference", by Patrick Nougton (good for starting purpose). 
• "Java2 Certification", by Robert and Heller very good for exam point of view).
• "A Programmer's Guide to Java Certification", by Mughal and Rasmussen (An excellent book for Certification Exam)

I recommend you to purchase the last two Books.  Both of it covers well everything which required for preparation for SCJP2 Exam.  Each chapter have some good question at the end.  These are the books which help me the most in preparing the Java Certification objectives. With this I have done lot of coding practice which is very necessary for the preparation.

NOTE: Sequence of these books also matters as it is difficult to read "A Programmer's Guide to Java Certification" first, it seems to be tough at the starting.

Then I started the searching of different Material on Web.  A lot of topics which you cannot found in any book even in Java Certification Guide is available on different tutorial on internet.  For Example, the Sun Certification Guide have not enough material about Garbage Collector but on the net, I have found a huge material on Garbage Collection which help me a lot.   I have also register myself in some good discussion forums( like www.jchq.net/discus ) on Internet.   All the sites and discussion forums list is available on SJCP Links. 

If you are typing your practice code in Notepad or MS-Dos edit like me in which we have to switch after editing to compile and run it.  Then I suggest you to download TextPad from http://www.textpad.com/download/index.html because it is very specially prepared for Java Program coding with automatic compiling, running it as an application or running it in Applet Viewer with just a single shortcut button.

And at last I was started the learning of different Mock Exam available on different site. This help me a lot in judging my skills as well find out the weak points.

What I have done in last week is tried to attempt as many Mock Exams as possible.I have gone through very useful FAQ from the site madam Roseanne's Javachina site, also read the last minutes tutorials on the site www.jchq.net .

The starting question was related to Basic Java Language like Java Keywords, looping and condition, java main function.   But what I have observed in attempting exam that Sun is trying to ask more than one topic in a single question.

Whenever a questions was large enough to display on single screen, an Exhibit button will display.  On clicking it, the further description of that question will be display in a seperate window exactly in the middle of screen.  It is very difficult to see the questions and it answers at once.   So what I have done is just move the Exhibit window to more appropriate position where I can see both the options and question which is in Exhibit window.

I have complete the Exam about 50 minute earlier.   Then I started to review the questions.  This is one thing which I have found very good that you can goto Previous question rather than to just next questions.This is necessary as in my case I have corrected four questions while reviewing. 

When I pressed the End.  A marks sheet was printed out clearly stating that I had answered 54 questions correctly out of 59 questions and I was declared passed with 91% score in Exam. 

The actual Exam is not tough for anybody who have done enough coding practice. Coding practice is must, you must try each and every small thing you found new to you by writing, compiling and running it. Here I would say a person can easily pass JCP if he/she has habit of JCR (i.e. Just Compile and Run). Moreover coding practice will decrease your code reading time in real exam.

At the time of real exam you should be relax in every respects as I have said in above column tha Sun is trying to ask more than one topic in a single question so you should be very careful in reading code which is only possible if you are feeling relaxed at that time.

I would suggest you to read the answer choices first, before reading the code. It will save your time. For example, if they are asking ( in different choices) something like "There is an error in line Number 5,6,7,8" then you just read the line Number 5,6,7,8 instead of reading the full code, it will save your precious time.

Rest is all depends upon you, do it as you like.