You will be presented with a full lab scenario which closely echoes the current CCDE lab exam in difficulty and format and then be walked through a full debrief explaining the rationale and reasoning behind the answers. Scoring will be provided - are you ready to take the CCDE lab exam?

This book is the second part of a 3 part series. I intended to release a single publication which included 3 complete CCDE practice lab exams and full debriefs for each but quickly realized that I could help CCDE candidates approaching their lab examinations if I released a lab at a time. Once all 3 lab exams have been completed I will release a bundled publication and include additional hints, tips and background information on the CCDE exam. These practice labs are the culmination of my journey towards CCDE and the thousands of hours of study I undertook in order to be successful.

Taking the CCDE lab exam was a real challenge for me, personally I found it significantly harder than achieving my CCIE back in 2001. The certification has been running for some 9 years at time of writing and there are only approximately 380 certified individuals to date. My biggest issue in joining the 379 others was practice, I just couldn’t get enough quality practice exams that would prepare me for the technical marathon that is the CCDE lab exam. That’s why I wrote this lab exam and why I will create an additional practice lab to help you achieve your goal of joining the CCDE club.

The book is in two parts, Part 1 covers the practice lab exam and Part 2 is the debrief to the exam. Don’t even think about reading the debrief section until you have taken the practice lab.

You need to treat this practice lab as if you were taking the real exam, get somewhere quiet and comfortable where you can focus and imagine you are taking your exam for real. Follow the rules of the real lab exam and do not go backwards or forwards on the questions but feel free to read the background information and any emails that come in as much as you want to. Have a piece of paper to make notes and create drawings on as some of the questions will require diagrams and if possible highlight relevant information within documents to help you detail the facts which are ultimately requirements or constraints.

Read the background information and make notes but do so quickly, highlight what you to be relevant facts if you have editing tools at your disposal (as you will within the real lab exam) you should save as much time as possible for the questions. If you feel you don’t have sufficient information to answer a question then head back to the documentation or emails as the information you need is there.

Don’t worry about stopping at 2 hours and seeing how you have done, carry on until completion but do make a note of your time, if you only managed to get half way through by following the status bar included in the questions and you are at 2 hours just make a note that you need to improve your speed, significantly!

The best piece of advice I can give you for this practice lab and your real exam is that if you feel you cannot choose easily between the presented options then you haven’t absorbed the requirements or constraints given to you, you’ll need to go back and check before you can make an informed decision.

This practice lab is about as close as you can get to taking the real exam, I hope you enjoy it.