Important topics to Resivise for IBPS IT Specialist Officer- Professional Knowledge Part-2

This article is about the important topics of Professional knowledge section for IBPS IT Specialist Officer exam. This is part-2 of the article.

Part-1 of this article can be found here. CLICK HERE. It contains important revision topics for DBMS, Networking & Data Structure

NOTE: Topics mentioned here are considered to be most important topics only based on previous papers of IBPS IT Specialist Officer & are for revision purpose only. Syllabus is a lot more than this comprising of all topics of graduation.

Operating System

• Memory hierarchy, OS Structure
• Batch, Interactive, Time sharing (Multitasking), Real Time, Multiprocessor, Multiuser, Multiprocess, Multithreaded Systems- carefully
• System calls- all types & their functions
• CPU Scheduling- Short term, medium term, long term, criteria for scheduling
• Scheduling algorithms- FCFS, SJFS, PS, Round Robin S, multiprocessor S--with their Gantt charts
• Process Control block
• Critical Section problems & semaphores, types of semaphores
• Synchronization problems (bounded buffer, readers-writers)
• Deadlock, necessary conditions for deadlock (all 4 on tips)
• Deadlock prevention, avoidance detection & recovery methods (thoroughly), Resource allocation graph
• Paging, segmentation, virtual memory, swapping, thrashing, fragmentation, page replacement algorithms- these concepts are very easy if revised well
• RAID, File system concepts

Digital circuits & systems, Microprocessor

• Boolean Algebra concepts-conversions, applications (Every one is expert in this but there is no harm in revising it again)
• Logic gates too included
• K-maps
• Adders, Encoders & Decoders (thoroughly)
• Multiplexers & De-multiplexers (thoroughly)
• Micro-controller & microprocessor
• 8085 & 8086 microprocessors, memory, interrupts like RST, TRAP etc basic things about these (IBPS seems to be too much interested in microprocessors-last two years' papers)

Software Engineering

• Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) 
• Models: Water Fall Model, Prototype Model, Spiral Model
• SRS, needs, DFDs, SQA
• Concepts of Software design
• Coupling and Cohesion Measures
• Software Measurement and Metrics
• Testing (All types from a standard book)- Unit, Integration, acceptance, regression, top down, bottom up, black box (functional), white box( glass box or structural), alpha, beta etc--ALL TYPES
• CASE tools
• Verification & validation
• other concepts- because there are too many

Cryptography & Network Security

• Encryption & Decryption concepts
• Concepts related to Network security-- Too many
• Public& private key etc
• Basic concepts of security algorithms: DES, RSA, SHA etc
• Digital signatures, Kerberos, PGP, S/MIME
• IP Security, SSL
• Types of Viruses, phases of virus lifetime
• Intrusion, firewalls etc

Other random topics which I find important (including Basic programming concepts, Compiler & Web technology)

• Types of flip flops, their implementations, conditions
• TTL, ECL, MOS, CMOS & related definitions
• Pipelining concepts
• ASCII, UNICODE, EBCDIC (just definition & used for)
• RISC vs CISC
• Cache hit, miss
• Port numbers used by important protocols
• Object oriented programming concepts (Everybody knows what concepts)
• Constructor, destructor, Virtual classes & other concepts (need not say)
• Compiler phases, types of compilers, tools used
• Hamming code formulae for error detection & correction
• typecasting (in case a program for output is asked)
• Dynamic loading & linking
• Formulae for depth, number of nodes etc in tree, same in case of graphs
• Some basic file commands in C language
• Automata- just basic definitions like Finite,deterministic etc, types of grammar
• Data warehousing basics, Data mining, OLAP, OLTP

I have written these topics here so one does not simply miss any of these while revising. I hope everyone clears the written of IBPS IT Specialist Officer exam this year.

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Important topics to Resivise for IBPS IT Specialist Officer- Professional Knowledge Part-1

This article is about the important topics of Professional knowledge section for IBPS IT Specialist Officer exam. Here are some tips "How to clear IBPS Specialist Officer exam"

Introduction PART-1

It happens many times that we know the answer of some factual question asked in MCQs but can not remember it in exam. We try our best to choose the correct alternative but in the end, we either leave it or choose the wrong one. In the end after getting out of the exam hall, all we give a reaction of 'Why didn't I attempt that question ' or 'Why did I mark the wrong answer'.

So, here I am, with a list of topics to be revised for Professional knowledge section of IBPS IT Specialist Officer. I know you all have studied hard but all that matters is how many correct answers you can mark in the examination hall. So, revise these topics thoroughly because these topics are most likely to create confusion in exam hall if not properly revised.

NOTE: Topics mentioned here are considered to be most important topics only based on previous papers of IBPS IT Specialist Officer & are for revision purpose only. Syllabus is a lot more than this comprising of all topics of graduation.

Database Management System (DBMS)

• Types of schema, difference in types of Schema
• Types of Data Models
• Types of Attributes
• Types of keys- candidate, primary, foreign
• E-R Diagram notions
• Relational Algebra Operators (with their symbols like π etc.)
• Integrity rules
• Types of Joins (Outer, natural etc.)
• Integrity constraints
• DDL, DML, DCL, SDL 
• Commands used in SQL (specially DDL & DML)

• apart from the above- Group by, Like, As, etc.
• Database Administrator
• Specialization/Generalization
• Aggregation
• & all other important topics that you have marked

Data Communication & Networking

• Types of IP Address class

• Subnet & related concepts
• Difference between OSI & TCP layers
• All 7 OSI layers, their functions, Protocols used in each layer
• Repeater, Bridge, hub, bus, router, gateway, switch etc, layers in which these operate.
• All the protocols that are important like HTTP, FTP, SMTP, SNMP, IGRP, NNTP, ARP, ICMP, IMAP MIME, SLIP, OSPF, HDLC, SDLC, ALOHA, FDDI etc.
• IEEE 802 Standards

• Types of Data transmission, transmission medium (Guided & Unguided)
• This syllabus of this subject is very vast. Revise every topic as much as you can because it is one of the important topics

Data Structures

• Data types (All & types)
• Algorithms like Greedy, Divide & conquer, backtracking & their applications
• Recursion & iteration
• auto, static, extern, register
• Pointers, passing as arguments to functions, Arrays
• Types of Linked lists, implementation
• Stack & queue, implementation with Array & Linked list, types, applications
• Trees, implementation, types (all types with applications)
• Traversal in trees
• Heap, B-tree, B+ tree
• Graphs (all types-too many), Adjacency matrix & list
• Spanning trees
• BFS & DFS 
• Shortest path problem ( All algorithms)
• Minimum spanning tree (All algorithms)
• Sorting (All types & you know that), their complexities in each case, their applications
• Searching (Everything)
• Hashing (All methods, collision resolution methods)
• Buddy systems
• Dynamic memory allocation

Important Revision topics for IBPS Specialist IT Officer can be found here. CLICK HERE

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How to prepare for MPPCS 2013 Prelims examination

As MPPCS has announced that State Service Preliminary exam will be conducted on 13.04.2014, it is the right time to start preparing for this exam along with your main target- UPSC CSE.

Last date to apply online for MPPCS: 04.02.2014

MPPSC Prelims Contains Two Papers:
Paper I - General Studies
Paper II - General Aptitude Paper

Both of them will contain 100 Questions of 2 marks each, making total marks for Prelims to be 400.

There will be no Negative Marking.

Last time for MPPCS State Service Examination 2012, the cutoff for prelims was very high because there is no negative marking. Have a look at the cutoff below: 

This is cutoff out of 400. However, the questions asked in the exam were quite easy & very basic in nature that do not require much in-depth knowledge. For basics, NCERTs are the best resource that could be used.

Section-Wise Preparation Strategy for MPPSC Prelims

FIRST PAPER: GENERAL STUDIES

1. General Science and Environment
Questions on general science and Environment (Environmental Ecology, Biodiversity & Climate
Change) will cover general appreciation and understanding of science including matters of every day
observation and experience as may be expected of a well educated person who has not made a special
study of any particular scientific discipline.

Read Science NCERTs from Class 6th to 9th, Available in Hindi and English Both.

2. Current Events of National & International Importance
In current events knowledge of significant National and International level will be tested.

Current Affairs needed to be prepared would be from after Last Year prelims, You can refer to any of the Annual current affair yearbook for last year current affairs and after that read a newspaper daily(Very Essential), Also refer to Monthly Current Affairs Magazines which provide a consolidated Info about monthly current events of National & International Importance.

3. History of India and Independent India
In History, questions of general knowledge related to social, economic and political aspects will be
asked. Also, there will be questions on Indian National Movement and Development of Independent
India.

Read Class 7th,8th History NCERT book. For Indian National Movement, Read Bipin Chandra.

4. (a) Geography of India
There will be questions of general knowledge relating to Physical, social and economic geography. It will also include questions on Indian Agriculture and Natural resources.
There will be questions pertaining to demography and census of India.

Read Geography NCERT of Class 7th,8th,9th. For latest demographics and census refer the current affairs yearbook.

(b) General Geographical awareness of world

Last Year, We had a question on Equator passing through which of the countries and another on which is the City of Canals, So general questions are asked about the Geographical Awareness of the World, about which you can find in any General Knowledge(Not Current Affairs) book. Also get an idea about the World Map

5. Indian Polity and Economy
Political system and constitution of the country, Panchayati Raj, social system, sustainable economic
development, elections, political parties, plans, industrial development, foreign trade and economic
and financial institutions.

Very Important part, Last year also a large number of questions were from this section. For Political system and constitution of the country, Panchayati Raj, social system, sustainable economic development, elections, political parties, plans : Refer Class 6th,7th,8th,9th Polity NCERT, after that Read Indian Polity by M. Laxmikant. -For industrial development, foreign trade and economic and financial institutions : For Basics Read Economics Class 10th NCERT and Foreign Trade and economic and financial institutions from Net(Wikipedia etc).

6. Sports
Important games and sports tournaments, Awards, personalities and Renowned Sports Institutions of
M.P., India, Asia and World.

Read Sports part from General Knowledge and Current Affairs book both. It will cover general awareness about sports and current events both.

7. Geography, History and Culture of M.P.
There will be questions related to the development of Mountains, rivers, climate, Flora and Fauna,
Minerals transportation in the Geography of Madhya Pradesh . It will also have questions relating to
important dynasties of M.P., Contribution of important dynasties in the Histroy & Culture of Madhya
Pradesh, There will be questions on Tribals, Arts, Architecture, Fine Arts and Historical personalities
of M.P.

8. Polity and Economy of M.P.
Political system, Political parties and elections, Pachyati Raj, Social system and sustainable economic
development of M.P.. This will also include questions on Industry, Plans, Economic programmes,
business, demography and census of M.P.

Many books are available for MP General Studies part, but they should be complimented by Latest Information from Internet Resources.

 

Here are some resources:

• Daily Current affairs of Madhya Pradesh
• MP Bulletin

9. Information and Communication Technology
Questions pertaining to characteristics, uses, and terminologies such as website, online, search
engine, e-mail, video mail, chatting, video conferencing, hacking, cracking, virus and cyber crime.

This a easy part with limited syllabus, Lots of Online Resources are available for ICT,Search Computer Awareness on Internet, you will get resources for it.

10. Scheduled Caste & Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) 1989 (No.33 of 1989) and the
Protection of Civil Rights Act, 1955 (No. 22 of 1955)

Last year we had around 8-10 Questions from this section.

• Click Here to Download Scheduled Caste & Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act
• Click Here to Download Protection of Civil Rights Act, 1955 Act PDF

11. The Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993.

Click here to Download The Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993 Act PDF

SECOND PAPER : GENERAL APTITUDE TEST

1. Comprehension
2. Interpersonal skill including communication skill
3. Logical reasoning and analytical ability
4. Decision making and problem solving
5. General mental ability
6. Basic numeracy (numbers and their relations, order of magnitude ect.-Class X level) Data
interpretation (charts, graphs, tables, data sufficiency etc.-Class X level)
7. Hindi Language Comprehension Skill (Class X level)

Note:- Question relating to Hindi Language Comprehension skill of Class X level will be tested
through passages from Hindi language only without providing English Translation thereof in the
question paper.

The above sections can be mastered by continuous practice. If you are not from Maths background read Class 7th-9th NCERT to learn the basics and then buy an Aptitude and Logical Reasoning book for practice.

Here are some books I prefer for this Section in every exam:

Quantitative Aptitude For Competitive Examinations 17th Edition by RS AGGARWAL

      

A Modern Approach To Logical Reasoning 1st Edition by RS AGGARWAL

You can download the previous paper of MPPCS 2012 from here.

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How to prepare for NICL-AO exam in a few days (Previous paper PDF included)

NICL has already conducted the first lot of its Administrative officer exam on 15 December. Two more slots are to be conducted on 22nd & 29th of December.

Looking at the previous papers & reviews from the candidates who have given the paper on 15th, it seems they are not going to change much of the pattern of questions asked. Following strategy could be implemented to give your best on coming dates-

English

They ask just basic English. This section is very easy & scoring. 

Antonyms & Synonyms (Around 8-10 ques.)	Go through some manual or website for this section. Easy one.
Analogy	Just basic understanding
Sentence Correction	Too easy
Fill in the blanks	Easy.
Overall	This section is not going to be tough. Just go through some practice questions.

I would suggest to go through the Verbal ability section of Indiabix.com for practice.

Reasoning

People said it was dead easy. If you have been preparing for Banking examinations, you would surely crack almost all the questions of this section.

There is a lot of time to solve the questions. So don't worry about time on this section.

Coding & Decoding	Easy one. Almost 5 questions
Classification & analogy	These were easy too.  4-5 questions
Seating arrangement	Too easy.
Other reasoning questions	Easy. You don’t need some expertise to solve these questions
Overall	People preparing for bank & other exams will find it very easy & those who are not doing so, they too. J

General Awareness

Here comes somehow tougher part. This section got a little tougher than the last time.

Many of the questions asked are from the previous SSC-CGL & UPSC papers. The nature of the questions asked could not be determined or analysed much. Questions asked on 15 Dec could be found Click here- Questions asked on 15 Dec 2013 NICL-AO

For this section I suggest-

Go through last 3 years’ SSC-CGL papers

UPSC papers of last & present year

Go through Some GK manual, Lucent’s General Knowledge preferably

Go through the current affairs of this year & previous year 2012 because they asked questions from last year too. Chances are they will ask more from the affairs of last year.

Numerical Ability

This section is also going to be moderate. Basic calculations, addition, subtraction, work and time & other simple numerical questions. For Generalist post, the will ask some basic computer knowledge questions.

I suggest you to go through some aptitude practice from R.S. Agarwal.

Descriptive paper

They are going to ask three sections in this paper. Here are the questions from last time:

• Comprehension: It was on 'Manual Scavengers'. Comprehensions are usually easy & answers could be easily found if you just give some time to read them. After that, elimination of wrong answers from the given options is the best strategy to solve the questions.

• Essay:

1. Privatization of Insurance companies
2. The changes mobile phones have brought to our life.
3. Political stability in India
4. Internet & ways of communication through it

By observing the given topics, 3 of them are such that anyone can write an essay on them I suggest you to choose the topic in you feel most comfortable, then take your time(5-10 minutes) to define the structure of the essay & then start writing. Any basic essay writing book can be referred for this or you could search 'How to write an effective essay' on Google.

• Precis Writing: Try to write the summary of the given Paragraph in not more than one-third of the words. Try to avoid using words of the paragraph & restructure the sentences to make it more effective & short. Some summary writing practice will surely help to score well in this section.

I am also giving you the NICL-AO examination paper held on 15 September 2013. It could be downloaded from:

Download NICL AO Paper held on 15 September 2013

Hope this strategy helps you to clear this exam.

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How to prepare notes for UPSC & other exams!

When preparing for any competitive exam, whether it is UPSC, State PSC, SSC, CDS, IBPS, CAT, making notes is one habit that saves a lot of time that later helps in revising what you have studied since the start of your preparation.

Advantages of making notes

Well, there are many advantages, not that all can be written here but could be realized only when the time comes for revision.

You must be able to understand the topic otherwise you won’t be able to prepare them.

10 times reading= 1 time writing (an old saying, yet true)

Good practice for thinking and writing out essays.

Will help you to revise everything whenever you want.

Helps in final revision by reminding us of the most important points of each topic.

Methods to make notes

Sometimes people end up just copying & pasting things from the books into notes. This could be avoided by using any of the two methods.

Linear approach	Pattern approach
Makes use of headings & subheadings.	Main topic is kept at the centre of the page.
These are jolted down to make a linear structure.	Other points are written using lines radiated from it as briefly as possible.
Disadvantage- A lot of copying & pasting.	Advantage-whole pattern can be seen in one go.
Try using loose sheets so that space could be left on each sheet for addition of content later.	Disadvantage- adding too much information could ruin your pattern.

After analyzing the depth of topic, one should decide whether to follow linear approach or pattern approach to make notes.

An example

For an example, let us take the Climate of India chapter 4 from NCERT of class IX. The chapter starts with monsoon. I am going to use linear approach in it since it has a lot of points. One should use whatever method he thinks is more revision friendly.

Climate controllers (& how it affects in brief)

1. latitude(brief)
2. altitude(brief)
3. pressure(brief) etc.
4. Then coming to Coriolis force, Jet stream etc with brief one liners about them.
5. Then Mechanism of monsoon (briefly)
6. Duration of monsoon
7. ITCZ (what it is & what it does)
8. Southern oscillations & El NIno

Seasons In India (duration & other details)

1. Winter
2. Summer
3. Rainy
4. Transition

In addition to all this, keep noting some points that could be of importance like

# Mango showers (pre-monsoon showers) happen during Summer.

# Direction of winds etc.

Other Important details to be remembered

• Try using highlighters or pencil (if you don't want the book to look colorful) for marking points in your book.
• Avoid giving yourself 'notes later' attitude. 
• Keep updating your notes as per needed. You may get more & more knowledge which you would not like to be forgotten. For example, when you read the same chapter given  in above example from Class XI NCERT, you will get some more information about climate of  India.
• Try to leave some space between topics so more points could be added later.
• Don't just make notes. Keep revising them at regular intervals. Nobody has such  superhuman power that he/she will completely memorize a big pile of notes in just last few  days before examination.

Will add some more pints later. Hope it helps. :)

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