Cause damn some of the comments on the message boards are

5/1/2010 7:30:06 PM

that class made me drop engineering and become an accountant

5/1/2010 7:31:22 PM

what message board?

5/1/2010 7:39:20 PM

the class message board.

Not going to call out anything specifically, but holy crap.

5/1/2010 7:42:41 PM

one semester later you'll think to yourself that it was a very easy class.


i think most students dont have the drive to do it. most have the ability but just dont want to push themselves.

5/1/2010 7:44:56 PM

I thought it was easy.

5/1/2010 7:46:28 PM

i had taken a year of java in high school and even took the ap exam but got credit for csc114 or some class that did me no good, but b/c of that intro to java was a breeze. however, i have no idea how people who had not programmed before did the assignments for that class; and i know most people did awful on the tests b/c they were curved like 25 points. the lectures didn't even come close to covering what was needed to do the homeworks.

that said, i suppose nothing in that class is too hard if you just cookbook it yourself.

5/1/2010 7:46:36 PM

java sucks some major ass

5/1/2010 7:50:08 PM

I had never programmed java before this class (c++, c#, fortran, pascal, BASIC experience)...but I thought everything was laid out pretty easily in the lecture slides, and all the programs were pretty self explanatory.

5/1/2010 7:51:42 PM

wait, what the fuck are you asking if you've already taken it?

5/1/2010 8:06:57 PM

luckily, i had two years of c++ in high school before taking that java class.

i could see how that course could frustrate the hell out of someone without programming experience, especially for kids who waited until the last minute to try to write the programs and then freak out when it wouldn't compile.

5/1/2010 8:33:41 PM

I never took 116, even though I was a CSC major.

5/1/2010 8:35:34 PM

^That's because you're old, son

[Edited on May 1, 2010 at 8:37 PM. Reason : I too, took CSC114]

5/1/2010 8:37:17 PM

114 represent.

5/1/2010 8:38:49 PM

Quote :

"I never took 116, even though I was a CSC major."

I took it after the fact, it was easy for me. If you can do C++ you shouldn't have any problem with Java, no pointers (although I like pointers) plus anything you can think to do there's already a class for it. So no, it's not a weed-out class.

5/1/2010 8:42:46 PM

i took 114.

never programmed anything before and made an A.

[Edited on May 1, 2010 at 9:02 PM. Reason : ]

5/1/2010 8:51:47 PM

That was my first experience with programming. It's also the main reason I switched from CPE to EE.

I studied more for that final than any since. I got a 50 on the midterm and ended up with a 96 on the final and a B+ in the class. I still when I think back how many hours I put into studying for that motherfucker.

5/1/2010 9:03:18 PM

Make sure you don't work with anybody on a project at all... Paul Cousins fucked me hard for cheating.

5/2/2010 2:53:54 AM

Aside from some of the joke into classes like E101, CSC116 might be the easiest class I've ever taken.

I never understand people who have trouble in there. Everything is explicitly explained in the instructions and slides and the TAs practically did everything for the people who were lost.

5/2/2010 3:24:32 AM

TGD was my TA

5/2/2010 3:26:19 AM

Quote :

"i have no idea how people who had not programmed before did the assignments for that class"

I had never written even a hello world program in my life and got an A+. Some people are cut out for it, most people aren't

5/2/2010 3:58:49 AM

LOL at this thread and this class, LOL

5/2/2010 4:03:46 AM

try 316 where the professor reopened the course drop window 2/3 of the way through the semester because so many people were failing

those people sure felt stupid when a few weeks later, he handed out 100s for both projects because they were too difficult to grade

5/2/2010 8:31:04 AM

hahaha 316. my year they gave 100s on the projects because they were changing requirements up until the night before and someone complained.

116 was easy sauce.

5/2/2010 9:21:29 AM

^I'm guessing they don't do that too often. Did you have Lester?

The reason they did it for us was that the autograder wasn't giving much partial credit.

5/2/2010 9:32:28 AM

if csc116 is hard for you, you should reconsider having a career in technology

5/2/2010 9:38:29 AM

Do they still grade heavily for comments? When I took 114, they made such a big deal about comments! I figured, what the hell, you want comments? I'll give you motherF*ing comments. For a 20 line program, I'd have 60 lines of comments. It worked, I made an A+ in the class.

As with everything, success usually boils down to learning the system.

5/2/2010 10:42:36 AM

For my section this semester, at least, you have to javadoc the projects (6 per semester), but not the weekly homework assignments. There's nothing on the tests about javadoc. (btw, how sad is it that I'm taking CSC 116? lolz)

WRT to the original topic, I read a paper recently about failure rates in intro to CS classes around the country. Something like 30-60% of CSC majors change to a different major after the 116 equivalent class. A large number of people seem to lack the capacity to understand even really basic programming concepts, and it's not strongly correlated with race, gender, income, overall academic performance, or basically anything you might expect.

The dudes who wrote the paper designed a test to give CSC students on the first day of class with some very simple questions in pseudocode. The students who answered the questions consistently--not correctly, mind you, just consistently--were something like 1/3 as likely to drop the class as the students who did not. The students who were able to work out a consistent model of how things should work, even if they didn't really know what they were doing, were much more likely to succeed.

Instead of reading all of that bullshit, you should probably just read this.

5/2/2010 10:54:51 AM

I had absolutely no trouble with CSC116, and the only programming experience I'd ever had up until that point was that I had taken CSC112 a couple of years prior. I was also a 116 TA a couple of times, and so I got to see a lot of fail up close. In theory it shouldn't have to be a weed-out class, but in practice it always seems to work out that way. Either you get how to program or you don't.

And I must have gotten lucky, because I didn't have nearly that much trouble with 316 (I had Rhee).

5/2/2010 11:00:06 AM

I think this guy is laughing at those who get pwnt by 116, not saying he found it difficult.

There are a lot of idiots at State. Java sucks, but it is pretty easy.

5/2/2010 11:15:52 AM

Programming is easy. Taking written tests on programming is retarded.

5/2/2010 11:24:28 AM

It is kind of bullshit that my pencil doesn't have an autocomplete feature.

5/2/2010 11:29:55 AM

so I'm just curious, since you all think that java sucks

what's your language of choice then?

5/2/2010 11:42:19 AM

i kind of hate to admit it

but Perl


hold on, i have to go milk my cows

[Edited on May 2, 2010 at 11:50 AM. Reason : i may actually like java if i ever actually needed to use it for anything]

5/2/2010 11:50:21 AM

Honestly, C#.

No, really.

5/2/2010 12:01:55 PM

Ruby, yo.

Also,

Quote :

"Do they still grade heavily for comments?"

If I couldn't get a program working quite right, like ten minutes before it was due I'd just start writing comments galore. It's weird what a big deal they make about them in college 'cause people at my work barely even use them.

5/2/2010 12:50:41 PM

had no programming experience in HS and failed 116 the first time i took it because i was in the class for "computer science majors" and was real busy that semester with other things outside of school

by the end of the class i had no idea even what a parameter was

miller taught the class completely different when it was the normal 116

went to wake tech for a semester and took a few programming classes, came back and got an A

CSC316 was the only class i struggled with after that (just the tests were hard as fuck)

5/2/2010 1:08:44 PM

Eclipse by itself takes out 90% of the actual thinking in 116.

5/2/2010 1:38:18 PM

Quote :

"try 316 where the professor reopened the course drop window 2/3 of the way through the semester because so many people were failing those people sure felt stupid when a few weeks later, he handed out 100s for both projects because they were too difficult to grade"

ha, I was one of the ones that dropped it. And I learned jack shit from the class portion of 116. Lab made things a lot easier.

5/2/2010 1:43:08 PM

Quote :

"It's weird what a big deal they make about them in college 'cause people at my work barely even use them."

They stop giving nearly so much of a shit about comments in the later CSC courses... at least my teachers did.

People in the industry barely using comments is probably why they try to make you do it in college, really.... they want to create people who are used to commenting to enter the real world.

Quote :

"Eclipse by itself takes out 90% of the actual thinking in 116."

True. The TAs take out the other 90%, if you ask them something.
They really do try to do everything for people in that class... I guess due to being tired of kids who can't get it. I'd ask them minor questions about syntax and they'd try to jump onto my keyboard and write code themselves.

The questions about terminology on the tests always threw me off, though. I never bothered to learn what everything was called, and I hadn't seen the point in asking. More a mindset of "if it works, who cares what its name is?"

Of course, now, I see the point in knowing terminology, but there's still no point to putting it on the test (besides just not knowing what else to fill the test with). CSC kids will learn the terms through use and necessity as they go on, no need to drill it in on the intro course.


I'm pretty sure they don't even want CSC116 to be a weed-out class at all. They make it as easy as it can possibly be. Like spooky's article said earlier, there just end up being a bunch of people who, for some reason, cannot understand programming.

5/2/2010 2:25:06 PM

Quote :

"I never bothered to learn what everything was called, and I hadn't seen the point in asking. More a mindset of "if it works, who cares what its name is?""

i teach programming at my company now. i had a couple of people get on me about our questions on terminology. If you can't intelligently talk to someone about what you are doing, it makes designing and implementing shit so much harder.

which just goes to show you that ppl obv arent getting it just from college sometimes

[Edited on May 2, 2010 at 3:14 PM. Reason : .]

5/2/2010 3:13:46 PM

Quote :

"If you can't intelligently talk to someone about what you are doing, it makes designing and implementing shit so much harder."

Yeah, I agree. Though like I said, I still don't see the need to put it on the tests for the college intro course. At least not as heavily as they do, anyway. At that point, kids (for the most part) either aren't using the things in the terminology at all, or don't realize when they are using them because they're only involved in such a small part of the language. Understanding the terminology comes more naturally once they understand the actual concepts behind the words and why a term for them needs to exist.

[Edited on May 2, 2010 at 3:35 PM. Reason : .]

5/2/2010 3:35:04 PM

Quote :

"People in the industry barely using comments is probably why they try to make you do it in college, really.... they want to create people who are used to commenting to enter the real world."

everywhere I've worked people always comment. Usually a comment block before a method explaining wtf is going on, what parameters are required etc.

5/2/2010 3:36:37 PM

^Then I'd rather work where you do than at the work of whoever said:

Quote :

"It's weird what a big deal they make about them in college 'cause people at my work barely even use them."

5/2/2010 3:38:11 PM

yeah no kidding. hard enough to figure out wtf ppl were thinking even WITH the comments.

5/2/2010 3:39:12 PM

Not only do comments help other people working on the same project...but people don't realize how much of a HUGE help they are to yourself when you have to revisit a project that you haven't worked on in ages.

5/2/2010 4:21:40 PM

yea. properly structured code and good variable naming is just as important

maintenance is a bitch

5/2/2010 4:29:08 PM

^that too

5/2/2010 4:40:57 PM

i don't comment to improve job security

5/2/2010 4:42:07 PM

Don't you work for the state? Thats job security right there.

5/2/2010 4:44:33 PM