Last Developer Standing
MSDN Canada is running a contest called "Last Developer Standing". And, in my opinion, it's a joke.
The premise is that there are 8 rounds of tests that test your knowledge in all areas of .NET development, with prizes for whoever gets the most right. There are also prizes along the way for people who do well.
It's not a bad idea, but my problem with the contest is that in many instances, the questions are impossible to answer with certainty.
For example, Question 10 gives some sample snippets of code from two classes, and then asks this question:
You create a project to test your Wizard class. You add the following lines of code to the project's main method:
And doesn't give you the lines of code. The question simply ends there. ???
At the start of the test, they asked if I'm a C# or a VB developer. Then in one of the questions, they give me a snippet of VB code and start asking me questions about it.
Here's a sample of the vagueness of the questions:
You want to design a custom control that extends the functionality of an existing Windows TextBox control. Select the tasks that you must perform to develop your custom control. (Choose all that apply.)
They tell you that you want to extend the TextBox control, but they don't say how. They give a bunch of options, that could be true or false based on your requirements, and they haven't given you the information you need to answer the question. Extending the textbox to support, say, only allowing vowels to be entered, would be different than extending it to support HTML editing.
You only need more than 50% to get in on the weekly prizes, so that's not too hard to achieve, but the "Last Developer Standing" contest is apparently more about random luck than about knowledge of the platform.
The contest is here. It's not too late to join for future weeks.