Re:Tell HN: My horror story as a student dealing with my Uni...
by ams6110 on Saturday March 28, 2009 @09:22PM
(#536990)
Agree! My C.S. undergrad program did not even cover specific languages. There were no courses such as "The 'Foo trendy du-jour' Programming Language" -- the language was incidental to the subject matter, and you were expected to learn the language, editor, OS utilities, compilers, debuggers, etc. on your own time.
Re:Tell HN: My horror story as a student dealing with my Uni...
by sketerpot on Sunday March 29, 2009 @04:06AM
(#537222)
There's a difference between expecting students to overcome adversity in a tough curriculum and making things pointlessly painful.
Re:Tell HN: My horror story as a student dealing with my Uni...
by manvsmachine on Sunday March 29, 2009 @04:06PM
(#537725)
CS is not about state-of-the art tools, but it is most definitely about good tools. In fact, I'd argue that much of undergraduate CS is about learning how to recognize, use, and build good tools, and part of the way that you do this is exposure. I think that people still forget that CS is, at least partially, a creative discipline, and the solutions that its practitioners come up with are often influenced by the tools that they use.
A good university does not coddle up students like kindergartners, feeding them pap. It's more like boot camp - in the mud, on foot, carrying a heavy pack. Apparently, it's pointless, sadistic, exercise: the 'product' of the work has no value. Except for the connections your synapses make ...
Frankly, it's hard to feel sorry for students who will not 'read the FAQ', or do anything to improve their conditions by themselves, if they feel it's important. It either is not important, or the culture of helplessness has reached too far.
Also: C.S. is not about this week's 'state-of-the-art' tools - as the late Dijkstra (who taught at U.T.Austin) put it, it's like astronomy and telescopes.
P.S.: in any organization with more than a few dozen people, support staff will ask for emails or web-tickets. That's for two reasons: accountability and knowledge sharing.