<p>So I am taking CMPS 12A right now and overheard some upper CS students talk about how harsh and brutal CMPS 12B/M is, sort of like the final "test" for those who are considering majoring in Computer Science, like a filtering screen that leaves out the lower half and welcomes the upper half into the major. For those who took it, was it a very hard class compared to CMPS 12A? I find 12A to be quite challenging, especially the 2nd half of the course. What are some tips to prepare for 12B extracurricularl-y?</p>
<p>i don’t know how much more difficult data structure is at a uc, but when i was taking c++ 1 and 2 and transitioning into data structure i found them relatively easy in term of concept and theory of how everything worked. It really just finding more efficient ways i guess t solve problem and messing around with like hash table and etc. theres probably more covered in the class. I’d recommended probably looking over what you already know and trying to create a new way of viewing what your coding.</p>
<p>I’m currently taking the class, and yes, it is very difficult. I would say the hardest part about it isn’t learning the actual concepts of data structures, but the amount of material covered and the amount of work. Before going into the class (took 5J and 11 instead of 12A), I had no idea that the C printf() function (a clone exists in the Java library) even existed (we’d been using System.out.print). Looking at Mackey’s example code for the first time scared the crap out of me because it seemed so abstract. So you should definitely look it up [Formatter</a> (Java 2 Platform SE 5.0)](<a href=“JDK 20 Documentation - Home”>Formatter (Java 2 Platform SE 5.0))</p>
<p>Although the first labs focus on getting familiar with Unix, you might wanna start learning your way around the command line (using tcsh or bash) earlier than that, so you can focus on the conceptual stuff.</p>
<p>C gets introduced about a third of the way into the quarter, but I wouldn’t worry about trying to learn it before you get into the class, since the professor does a good job of pointing out the differences between Java and C, and common mistakes that programmers make.</p>
<p>Good luck</p>
<p>hrmm on another note are all the CS classes at a community college going to prep me enough for the material, beside what i do on my own time? I’ve covered Java, Racket, C++ in like intro to java c++1 and 2, data structure and some offset stuff in computer architecture and software engineering</p>