My Journey to AWS Certified Developer Associate (DVA-C01)
The one-stop guide to preparing for your AWS Certified Developer Associate Exam.
It was around 10 months back when I decided and told my manager that I would be giving any AWS Certification. And here’s how it went from there -
Certified Developer Associate vs Solutions Architect
The first challenge was to decide which one to choose — Certified Developer Associate or Solutions Architect.
After a good amount of research, I came to a conclusion that -
Developer Associate
- Talks in-depth about every service.
- Tests a lot on your factual knowledge about AWS services.
- The motive of this exam is — you should be able to configure, deploy, test, manage, and troubleshoot AWS services.
Solutions Architect
- Talks about more AWS services.
- Tests you on a lot of scenario-based questions.
- The motive of this exam is — based on some requirements, you should be able to design an infrastructure using various AWS services following the best architectural principles.
I had planned to give both the certifications so didn’t matter much which one to choose.
But I went for Developer Associate first considering
- Since this one focuses more in-depth on various AWS services, I would get a better grip on AWS and then the Solutions Architect would be a little easier to crack.
Preparation
How did I prepare? (Not recommended :P)
The way I prepared wasn’t the best way (not even good) to prepare. Still, I would put some light on it so that you can learn from my mistakes.
I started by requesting a Cloud Academy license from my Company. They assigned me 40+ hours of course(including course videos, quizzes, exams, and labs).
It took me almost 5 MONTHS to complete that…….
But WHY?
I was NOT consistent. After every month or so I was going on trips, having good breaks in between, and every time I had to start from the starting. AWS ecosystem is soo huge that if you are a newbie, and your fundamentals are not clear, you will keep forgetting.
Even after I completed this course, I wasn’t confident at all.
It was in May 2022 that one of my colleagues suggested me the Stephane Maarek Udemy course, and I dedicated my whole month to the preparation.
Took 2 weeks to complete the course and the rest 2 for mocks and revision.
PS: I used to sleep every day at 5–6 AM (not recommended) since I was doing it along with my office. Studied for 3–4 productive hours every day.
How can you prepare? (Recommended)
I won’t say this is exactly how you should prepare but a small suggestion from my side to help you plan well.
- Take the Udemy — Stephane Maarek course and try to complete it within 3–4 weeks. This course is well crafted, covers almost all the topics from the syllabus, and will help you to build strong fundamental knowledge.
- Make sure you get an AWS Free-Tier account and do some hands-on practice. This will help you to have better visualization of the AWS ecosystem and give you some practical exposure.
You can either follow the demo videos from the course above or try hand-on labs from Whizlabs. In my Whizlabs account, I somehow have 1000 lab credit points and 1 lab requires 10 credits. So you don’t need to purchase anything additionally for labs. I only bought their mock tests.
- Take good 2 weeks to write mock tests (1(or more) mock test + analysis daily). The more you give mocks, the more confident you are.
Once you start scoring 80%(still can do better)–85%(recommended)–90%+(best), you should be good to go.
I will cover more about this in the next section.
- One day before the exam, review all the slides/notes you have.
AAANNDDD
Mock Tests
Even after you complete any course, your understanding of AWS services is still going to be immature.
The only way to solidify it is by giving these mock tests.
A few ones which I gave —
Out of all these, I found Jon Bonso the best. The difficulty is a little bit on the harder side and it will prepare you well.
The other two are great as well. These are on the easier side but will strengthen your fundamental knowledge which is much needed.
And, you might not believe it, a couple of questions in my exam were as it is from these tests. So now you know how important these are :)
Important Tips
- Consistency and commitment are required.
As I told you, I started the preparation last year and it took me more than 10 months to give the exam just because I had a lot of breaks in between.
Ideally, 1.5–2 months of time is good(if you are a newbie like I was).
- Making notes is important.
When I started with CloudAcademy, I made all my notes on Notion for ALL the AWS services which were covered.
When I did the Udemy course, a PDF with all the course slides was provided along with that and I wrote my notes on top of that(overwriting the same PDF).
Also made a TODO document where I kept putting questions, doubts, or topics that I needed to go through again. Reviewed all those after the course completion.
On the last day, all I did was revise that PDF.
- Review the mock test results.
After giving a mock test, review all the questions and solutions thoroughly. This is what will really help you.
- Give the same mock test once more after a small break(1–2 days).
This will help you recall your mistakes and help you not to commit the same in the future.
Don’t give a mock test more than twice(waste of time).
- Reading FAQs and Whitepapers from AWS will provide you with an extra edge(Optional but recommended). During my preparation, I read a lot of FAQs.
- A couple of AWS services to focus on are — Lambda, API Gateway, Cognito, Beanstalk, SQS, Kineses, X-ray, S3, DynamoDb, Cloudformation, etc.
Tips for Final Exam
- In your exam, you will get questions where multiple answers are correct but you have to choose the best one as asked in the question(minimal cost, best performance, least amount of effort to set up, etc.). In such cases, you have to do a bit of analysis on the given options and answer accordingly.
- Read the questions carefully and look for small important points. This might help you in eliminating some options.
- Flag the question whenever you are doubtful. Review those at the end.
- Keep a lot of buffer time in the end. Iterating through all the questions again takes a lot of time.
- I preferred to give the exam in a physical center. This will help you avoid struggling with network/power issues.
Helpful Links
P.S 1: I had a LOT of references but my Mac somehow got corrupted and all my bookmarks were gone. Will update this article in case I find anything in the future.
P.S 2: Just one night before the exam I failed a mock test with 67% hahaha. But I was still confident with my preparation and aced the exam.
P.S 3: The feeling you get upon seeing PASS at the end of the exam is truly wholesome.
Do feel free to ping me for any queries.
And don’t forget to leave some claps if you liked the blog :)
