I agree with you that vendor certification is part marketing, but it is the best we have at the moment.

Also, to earn an MCSD took me far more than 160 hours of study time. It ain't easy, especially the Fox tests. Take the Pepsi challenge before judging the process.

>My position on computer certication is that it is basically a joke. I paid thousands of dollars to register for my acturial and chartered financial analyst examinations and I probably spent more than 2000 hours studying for those exams. The passing rates are low, the costs very high, and the time commitment extreme: employers see those certified professionals as having reached a certain level of competency. Compare that with the $100 and 40 hours of study time required to pass most computer examinations...
>
>Certificate that are too easy to obtain are worth nothing. Computer vendors
>use certification for marketing, not to protect the public.
>
>Daniel