MySQL 5 certification. A new challenge

MySQL 5 is still beta (today, September 23, 2005) and we, the users, don't know when it will become stable. However, some clues are starting to mount, and by putting things together we can try to foresee when this event will take place.

One of such clues is the recent release of a new book, MySQL® 5 Certification Study Guide, the official guide to the exam to become a MySQL certified professional.
The book is available at major bookstores. I am still waiting for my copy from Amazon, but in the meantime I was able to read the interesting parts in Safari. The news are that there are no longer a Core and Professional Certifications. Now there are two certification paths, Developer and DBA, each of which require two exams to get the title.

Therefore, in the new course, rather than holding a "core certification" or a "professional certification", you can get :

• MySQL Developer I
• MySQL Developer II
• MySQL DBA I
• MySQL DBA II

Among the new things that were not in the previous exam and are required in the new one are:

• The Information Schema
• prepared statements
• stored procedures and functions
• triggers
• views
  
• Mysql query browser
• scaling MySQL
  

However, the book seems to have been rewritten almost completely.
The book is 672 pages long. So, if you are thinking about getting a certificate as early as possible, start planning your reading path.