Just passed the ACP-200 exam and it was tough and thought I might share some of my tips. Some of the questions were complex with day to day scenarios, so you will be tested for your ability to troubleshoot and diagnose problems that users have with Confluence.
I passed the ACP-100 in November 2018 and it was quite challenging as well.
My background and experience with Atlassian
I have been using Jira and Confluence for the last 10 years but as a software developer not as an administrator. So, I did know the basics of Jira and Confluence, but the administration of these applications is just another level of expertise.
Two years ago, I got a new job as a consultant in a new company, and I joined the small team of Atlassian consultants/specialists in the company. In order to maintain our partner status with Atlassian we had to earn some certifications. So, this was the start of my Atlassian certification journey which has been extremely useful.
My study preparations
- Download and install a local Confluence server instance. I recommend Confluence version 6.x.x.
- Your local Confluence instance should not have any third-party apps installed as it will make your Confluence polluted when preparing for the exam. Keep your instance clean.
- The Atlassian Confluence Certification Prep Course gave me the guidelines on how to study.
- Focus on permissions, macros, labels, user management, content export and Confluence look and feel. Study these topics/areas intensively.
- Practice global permissions, space permissions and page restrictions on your local Confluence instance. Create some users in your local Confluence instance. Assign some of them to groups and play with permissions in different browsers. I had three different browsers open sometimes in order to simulate the login with different users and their permissions.
- Play around with all Confluence default macros. Use labels on your pages. You will love labels, I certainly do.
- Compare page templates with blueprints.
- Download the Confluence Complete Documentation (https://bitbucket.org/atlassian/confluence_docs/downloads/Confluence_6-15-0_CompleteGuide.pdf) and use it for fast look up.
My exam recommendations
- You have 180 minutes for the exam. I had to use all of them.
- Use 60-90 minutes to view all and cherry pick questions that you can answer right away. Mark the tricky and complex questions and move on to the next question.
- Use 60 minutes for the questions you have marked.
- Eliminate the wrong answers for each question.
- Use the last minutes for reviewing your answers.
- Make sure that ALL questions have been answered.
Preparing for the exam has been powerful
I learned a lot preparing for the exam. I really touched some areas in Confluence. Cache management, labels, page templates/blueprints and content export were some of the areas, where I really learned how things work in Confluence. I did know the basics, but the deep dive was great.
The preparation is extremely useful for your future use of Confluence. I had a lot of “but off course” experiences during the preparation and I have applied new knowledge to existing Confluence instances that we maintain.
As a developer I also got a few ideas for app development for Confluence.
