The Updated Designer Core Certification Exam is Now Live!

[ashleysarnacki]

At the beginning of January, we shared the news that changes were coming to the Designer Core Certification exam. Well, the time has come, and the update is now live on the Certifications page. 

The updated version of the Core exam will feel similar, but there are a few new areas of focus and a shift in the assessment type. There are still practical application questions, but now there is content to assess a user's ability to collaborate well with others and run efficient workflows. There are also fewer questions about the specifics of Designer’s features and more questions aimed at ensuring a user is ready to pull in data and build a workflow that runs with few errors.   

The new exam blueprint is included at the bottom of this blog and provides more details about the changes. The updated Exam Prep Guide outlines what is covered. As always, the exam is free, online, on-demand, and open-book.    

If you have any questions, please contact the Certification Team at Certification@alteryx.com.  

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Core Blueprint

Domain	% of the Exam
I.     General Designer Knowledge and Optimization	13%
II.    Input/Output Data and Preparation	36%
III.   Blend Data and Parse	26%
IV.  Transform Data	25%
TOTAL	100%

1. General Designer Knowledge and Optimization – 13%  
   1. Use Designer search and resources  
      1. Help 
      2. Community 
      3. One tool examples 
      4. How to submit a support case 
   2. Navigate the user interface  
      1. Results window 
      2. Messages window 
      3. Configuration 
      4. Interface Designer 
      5. Canvas 
      6. User settings 
      7. Hiding/showing tools 
   3. Identify Alteryx native file formats  
   4. Share and export workflows  
   5. Optimize workflows and collaborate
      1. Document workflows  
         1. Employ the Comment tool 
         2. Customize annotations 
         3. Identify container functionality 
      2. Reduce runtime 
         1. Disable Browse tools 
         2. Cache and run a workflow 
         3. Enable performance profiling  
         4. Enable and disable the Alteryx Multi-threaded Processing (AMP) engine
2. Input/Output Data and Preparation – 36%  
   1. Read and write data  
      1. Create text input 
      2. Navigate data connections 
      3. Input data options 
         1. Record limit  
         2. Output file name as field 
         3. Start data import online 
      4. Write out multiple files and sheets with the Output Data tool 
      5. Overwrite, append, or output new data 
      6. Differentiate between relative versus absolute versus Uniform Naming Convention (UNC) pathing 
   2. Interpret data  
      1. Common data types 
      2. View metadata  
      3. Browse tool 
      4. Profile data 
   3. Cleanse data, including but not limited to the following functionality:  
      1. Remove unnecessary characters 
      2. Find missing values 
      3. Impute values 
      4. Avoid truncated data  
      5. Delimit data 
      6. Remove nulls 
      7. Use the Data Cleansing tool 
      8. Remove duplicate values 
   4. Build formulas, including but not limited to the following functionality: 
      1. Reference formula documentation  
      2. If/Then statements 
      3. And/Or statements 
      4. Formula tool 
      5. Indexes (zero-based) 
   5. Filter and arrange data using the following tools: 
      1. Select tool 
         1. Handling unknown values 
         2. Changing data types 
      2. Select Records tool 
      3. Sort tool 
      4. Filter tool 
      5. Unique tool 
      6. Sample tool
3. Blend Data and Parse – 26%  
   1. Perform unions, joins, and appends  
      1. Join by records position 
      2. Join with multiple keys 
      3. Set up and configure the Union tool 
      4. Differentiate between the Union and Join tools 
      5. Identify the appending process and output 
      6. Create an inner join 
   2. Leverage the Find and Replace tools  
   3. Convert data string formats to and from date formats  
   4. Delimit data with the Text To Columns tool  
   5. Troubleshoot, including but not limited to the following issues:  
      1. Duplication within joins 
      2. Incompatible data types 
      3. Mismatched fields
4. Transform Data – 25%  
   1. Apply the Summarize tool, including but not limited to the following functionality:  
      1. Group By 
      2. Numeric and string operations 
      3. Order of operations impact on output 
      4. Count records 
   2. Configure the Transpose tool, including but not limited to the following functionality:
      1. Key columns  
      2. Data columns 
   3. Apply the Cross Tab tool, including but not limited to the following functionality:  
      1. Grouping data 
      2. Methods of aggregation 
         1. Row and column totals 
         2. Concatenation 
         3. Sum  
   4. Identify when to use the Transpose and Cross Tab tools in tandem 
      

[simonaubert_bd]

Hello @ashleysarnacki 
Just renewed it today, cool to be among the firsts to try the new certification ;)

[simasarry123]

Is it tougher than the older version ?

[simonaubert_bd]

@simasarry123  From my point of view, it's the same level of difficulty

[SombraButler]

Hi Ashley, 

What is the passing score for the new, updated exam? 

[simonaubert_bd]

The passing score is only 64% (which is quite low, I think)

[Sandy5all4]

Nice simonaubert_bd to see your score..

I gave it last evening was not successful but will try hard next time.. :P

[simonaubert_bd]

@ashleysarnackiHello. Is it normal I still didn't get the pdf ? Usually we receive a nice pdf like a diploma.

Best regards,

Simon