WyzGuys Tech Talk

I have written many articles on certification and professional development, and this page is a collection of those articles.

General Certification Articles

• Certification Exams – Online or Test Center?
  By Bob Weiss I am active on the Reddit.com/r/CompTIA board, and I recently have been reading horror stories (again) about online testers whose online session was terminated by their proctor for very trivial reasons.  Reasons like leaning your head on your hand!  One recent post is from u/Represent…

• Passing Certification Exams
  I recently read a couple of questions on Reddit about knowing if you are prepared for the certification exam.  I wrote the following responses.  The first question is from a tester who failed the 220-1101 exam for A+ Posted by u/Character_Writing825 failed 1101 today I studied the material 3 mont…

• Ports and Protocols
  As you know from taking my classes, computers prefer numbers and humans prefer letters or words.  Port numbers are numerical placeholders for protocol names.  The best way to learn them is through daily professional use, or memorization.  Flash cards can be helpful if you are preparing for an exa…

• Cybersecurity Certification Tip – The Archive Bit and Backups
  Although I am featuring the CISSP logo in this article, the information that follows could be useful for students pursuing a number of cybersecurity certifications (CASP+, CySA+), as well as IT fundaments courses such as the CompTIA A+ This article is the result of a longer email string that passed …

• URL Encoding, SQL Injection, and Directory Traversal for Cybersecurity Certification – Part 1
  Numbering Systems By Bob Weiss Many of the cybersecurity certifications that I teach have content that involves the uses of encoding, code injection, directory transversal, and scripting.  These concepts can be difficult to grasp, and the exam questions can be challenging to answer correctly.  Thi…

• URL Encoding, SQL Injection, and Directory Traversal for Cybersecurity Certification – Part 2
  Character Encoding by Bob Weiss Happy Pi Day.  It is also Albert Einstein’s birthday. As we discussed in our first article, many of the cybersecurity certifications that I teach have content that involves the uses of encoding, code injection, directory transversal, and scripting.  These conc…

• URL Encoding, SQL Injection, and Directory Traversal for Cybersecurity Certification – Part 3
  URL (%) Percent Encoding , Base64 Encoding, and SQL Injection By Bob Weiss As we discussed in our first two articles, many of the cybersecurity certifications that I teach have content that involves the uses of encoding, code injection, directory transversal, and scripting.  These concepts can be d…

• Getting Certified? Here’s How to Keep Your Certificate Valid
  A little blood, sweat, and tears, study, and practice, and amazingly enough you passed the exam and earned your certification.  There used to be a time when a certification was good for life, but these days a certificate is usually valid for only three years.  The good news is that you can maintai…

• Getting Certified? Here’s How To Study For Your Certs
  There are many different ways to go about studying for and passing a certification exam.  Not every method will work for all people.  Here are some techniques that I have used to prepare for, pass, and maintain my professional certifications. Why Certify? – There is no denying that experienc…

• Tools for Pentration Testing
  I have been fortunate to have had time to pursue a couple of information technology certifications recently.  I have added CompTIA’s Network+ and CASP (Certified Advanced Security Professional), and I am working on the brand new CompTIA Pentest+.  The certification is so new there are no tex…

Articles on CompTIA Exams and Performance Based Questions

• Comments on the CySA CS0-002 Exam and PBQs
  As an instructor for the CompTIA CySA+ CS0-002 exam, I like to receive feedback from students who have taken the test, and I collect those comments here, for other students to use a preparatory material.  I have done this previously for the CISSP exam.  This one is dedicated to the Cybersecurity A…

• Network+ N10-007 Performance Based Questions (PBQ)
  Here is a PBQ that many test takers find challenging. Scenario Multiple users are reporting that they are unable to access the network. The ENTIRE network is shown in the diagram. PCs are not statically assigned IP addresses. The following devices will display settings: Workstation A Workstation B …

• Comments on the IT Fundamentals FC0-U61 Exam
  By Bob Weiss On Thursday August 10, 2023 I took and passed the CompTIA IT Fundamentals exam FC0-U61.  IT Fundamentals is a very entry level certification and would be a course to take if you were a complete and utter newbie to the world of computer technology. It is designed to be taken before the …

• New Comment on Passing the CAS-004 Exam for CASP+
  Back on April 13 I received another comment for my most frequently visited web page “New Insights for the CASP+ CAS-004 Exam.”   The comment is so good that I had to publish it as a separate post. By William Maclendon Howard Passed on my first attempt three days ago……. some…

• Preparing for the CompTIA Pentest+ PT0-002 Exam
  Yesterday we provided some commentary on the PT0-002 exam.  Today I am going to share my study resources and notes. First. there are some excellent articles about this from Globalcerts and on Reddit.  I used their guidance to help me prepare for this exam.  I usually do not do a lot of prep for c…

• Comments on the CompTIA Pentest+ Exam PT0-002
  I just passed the Pentest+ PT0-002 exam on January 6, 2023.  I had taken and failed the PT0-001 when the certification was first introduced three years ago.  Of the four CompTIA cybersecurity certifications, Sec+, CySA+, Pentest+, and CASP+, this exam is the hardest of the four. or at least the se…

• Subnetting for the CompTIA Network+ N10-008 Exam
  I wanted to share this subnetting tip.  I came from simiangeek  on the CompTIA sub-Reddit .  I am also including some links to other training resources that I have found I wanted to share my experience, hope it will work for some other people. I went ahead and got to a point where I could jot dow…

• Notes on the New CompTIA A+ 220-1102 Exam
  I took the 220-1102 exam yesterday, and passed with a score of 781 out of 900.  It takes a score of 700 to pass.  Again, there were 80 questions, with 90 minutes allowed to complete.  If you haven’t already read my previous companion article Notes on the New CompTIA A+ 220-1101 Exam, you c…

• Notes on the New CompTIA A+ 220-1101 Exam
  The CompTIA A+ exam may be the best entry-level information technology course and certification exam.  I started my certification training career teaching the A+ course for CompTIA’s IT Ready program back in 2014.  I have tested for all the versions of the A+ since 200-701 and 702, 220-801 a…

• Study Tips for CompTIA Cloud+ CV0-003 Exam
  I passed another certification exam, this time for CompTIA’s Cloud+.  It was harder than I expected, but I passed with a score of 777 out of 900. The test was all single answer multiple choice, with a few PICK TWO questions. The first question was the only Performance Based Question (PBQ), an…

• Comments of the CompTIA Security+ SY0-601 Exam
  by Bob Weiss I am doing a lot of one-to-one tutoring with students who are preparing for the new SY0-601 Security+ certification exam.  As I have done with the CISSP, CASP+, and CySA+ certifications, I have done some research and put together this post to help students prepare for the exam. To that…

• CompTIA Server+ Exam Insights and Performance Based Questions
  I passed the Server+ exam yesterday. 90 minutes for 82 questions. 759 out of 900, and I needed 750 to pass.  All but the first two question were multiple choice, single answer or multiple choose, multiple answer (pick two).  I would recommend knowing a bit of Linux for this exam.  While there is …

• New Insights for the CASP+ CAS-004 Exam
  By Bob Weiss I just took the new CASP+ CAS-004 Exam on March 14.  This exam is an unscored pass/fail exam.  I passed.  There were very many questions where the feeling was “when did we ever learn about this.”   I’m an instructor for this course, and several others.  So the mo…

• Student Comments on the CompTIA CySA+ Exam
  As an instructor, I teach a number of different cybersecurity courses, and one of them is CompTIA’s CySA+.  If you are pursuing this certification, there are a few things to know about preparing for, taking, and passing the exam.  As I did for the CISSP exam, I am going to let the people who…

• Is the CompTIA SY0-601 Exam Difficult?
  By Four Arrows The CompTIA Security+ SY0-601 exam is a well-known certification exam developed to evaluate candidates’ knowledge and abilities in the subject of cybersecurity. This test is renowned for being difficult and thorough since it covers various security-related subjects, such as netw…

Articles on the CISSP

• CHANGES TO THE CISSP EXAM LENGTH COMING SOON
  Beginning June 1, 2022, additional pretest items and time will be added to the CISSP exam for the Computerized Adaptive Testing (CAT) format.  The current CISSP CAT exam contains 25 pretest (unscored) items. The addition of 25 more items will bring the total count to 50 pretest items. With these ad…

• New Insights About the New CISSP Exam May 2021 Update
  As many of you know, I teach a number of information security certification classes, especially the (ISC)2 CISSP certification.  Almost a year ago the (ISC)2 update the course content and questions for the CISSP.  Students that I have taught since then have started taking and passing the new exam,…

• (ISC)2 CISSP Certification
  CISSP is certainly one of the most daunting cybersecurity certifications.   As such, it requires a lot of preparation to pass the exam.  Additionally, the candidate should have five or more years of demonstrable cybersecurity experience. The CISSP is regarded by many to be the pinnacle of cyberse…

• Advice After Failing the CISSP Exam
  Here is the advice I gave to a student who has failed the exam.  Really – It is good advice for test takers too.  The only difference is when you fail, (ISC)2 provides an analysis of the domains you were below proficiency.  If you are prepping for your first exam, you know where you are weak an…

• Are You Ready for Upcoming Changes to the CISSP Exam?
  The CISSP exam is changing on May 1, 2021.  The changes are covering technology updates for the most part.  The official word from (ISC)2 is that the changes are minor, and if you have the industry experience required, and have adequately prepared for the current exam, you should be ready for the …

• Preparing for a CISSP Certification Bootcamp
  Attending a CISSP certification bootcamp should be the final step in your preparation for taking and passing this highly sought and often required cybersecurity certification exam.  How should you prepare for the bootcamp itself? I teach about three CISSP bootcamps a month.  A bootcamp is a full t…

• Comments on the CISSP Computer Adaptive Exam
  I am teaching classes for candidates pursuing that pinnacle of cybersecurity certification, the CISSP.  The CISSP is a challenging course of study, and the certification exam has always been daunting.  When I took the exam in 2016, there were 275 questions and the exam allowed 6 hours for completi…

Articles on the CEH Exam

• Study Tips for Certified Ethical Hacker (CEH v11)
  I have recently recertified for Certified Ethical Hacker (CEH v11).  My existing certification was on CEH v7, which I took in 2006.  One of my training partners needed me to recertify on the current version so I would be qualified to teach the CEH class I originally took CEH v7 back  in 2006.  C…