Exam Layout and Design

Some exam questions require you to select a single answer, whereas others ask you to select multiple correct answers. The following multiple-choice question requires you to select a single correct answer. Following the question is a brief summary of each potential answer and why it is either right or wrong.

Question 1	What does AAA stand for? A. Authentication, authorization, accounting B. Authentication, authentication, accounting C. Authentication, authorization, application D. Authentication, accounting, access-control
A1:	Answer A is correct. AAA stands for authentication, authorization, and accounting. Therefore, answers B, C, and D are incorrect.

This sample question format corresponds closely to the Cisco PIX firewall exam format ”the only difference on the exam is that answer keys do not follow questions. To select an answer, position the cursor over the radio button next to the answer and then click the mouse button to select the answer.

Let's examine a question that requires choosing multiple answers. This type of question provides check boxes rather than radio buttons for making all appropriate selections.

Question 2	Which licenses are supported on the PIX 515E model? (Select two.) A. Unlimited B. Restricted C. Limited D. Unrestricted
A1:	Answers B and D are correct. The PIX 515E can support three types of licenses: restricted, unrestricted, and failover. There is no such license called limited or unlimited. Therefore, answers A and C are incorrect.

For this type of question, more than one answer is required. As far as the author can tell, such questions are scored as wrong unless all the required selections are chosen . In other words, a partially correct answer does not result in partial credit when the test is scored. For question 2, you have to check the boxes next to answers B and D to obtain credit for a correct answer. Notice that picking the right answers also means knowing why the other answers are wrong!

These two basic types of questions can appear in many forms; they constitute the foundation on which all Cisco certification exam questions rest. More complex questions include drag-and-drop and Cisco device simulations. The drag-and-drop questions require you to drag and match question and answer pairs together. The Cisco device simulations asks you to configure a PIX firewall on a software simulation that behaves very similarly to the real firewall device.