<p>Has anybody here taken this course? How is it?</p>
<p>I am a sophomore in the engineering school but I haven't programmed since senior year of high school. Any recommendations on what I need to do to prepare for the course?</p>
<p>It's either going to be easy for you or it's going to be very hard. There really isn't that much you can do to prepare, other than brush up on Java and maybe reading up on the topics covered (wikipedia is a good source).</p>
<p>Yea I took it last year and got an A+ in it. Honestly, don't worry about the programming language, learn the data structures on a conceptual level because that's largely what you're going to be dealing with. I had it with Graeme Bailey, who is reputed to be exponentially tougher than most of the other professors that teach it, but if you just do your work and understand the data structures at a high level you'll be fine. Read some wikipedia articles on Hashmaps, Linked Lists, Queues, etc...and learn the basic algorithms such as Bubble Sort, Heap Sort, Merge Sort, Quick Sort. Other than that, just go ahead and wait. This is not a programming course, but it is a CS course.</p>
<p>I've heard that Bailey is a god among men.</p>
<p>He is ridiculous. Awesome ridiculous.</p>
<p>^yea too bad I don't have Bailey... I have Dexter Kozen. Has anybody heard anything about this guy? I checked ratemyprofessor and he looked okay.</p>
<p>Yea, I hear he's smart. and yes Bailey is a God!</p>
<p>Dexter Kozen wrote the textbook for my theoretical computer science class this past semester at my old school. If he's anything like his text (which was simply an amalgamation of his lecture notes), the class should be straightforward and easy to follow. He has an effective way of communicating ideas using anecdotes, even for advanced CS theory.</p>
<p>Hope this helps! Don't worry too much.</p>
<p>Tommy</p>
<p>I had Kozen. He wasn't bad, but obviously not nearly as entertaining as Bailey (but he's not boring either). He's straightforward (like the above poster noted) and easy to follow in class. The assignments are a lot of work (about 20+ hours for each assignment, their estimates not mine) but there are usually only about 5 each semester. I really did learn a lot form the projects and they were actually kind of fun. Our last project was making Pacman work. </p>
<p>If you have any trouble, the consultants are really helpful, as are the TAs usually.</p>
<p>I had Paul Francis last Fall, and it was really a cakewalk. Depending on your programming experience, you will either have a really easy time or have to put time into it, proportional to your experience. Basically for me, I already knew all of the material covered in the course, but the College of Engineering hates placing people out of it, so I took it anyway, and it was pretty much the easiest class I had my whole freshman year. I never went to class, and it was nice to have one easy class my first semester (especially since Math 192 is the worst course ever).</p>