Hello
readers,
It's
seems to be a pretty good semester so far however this semester most of my
classes have many assignments, quizzes and labs compared to the usual past
semesters where I had 1 or 2 term tests then only a final exam. The term test
is just around the corner and I am in an extremely tough position because along
with CSC148 I have two more midterms scheduled this week so 3 back to back
midterms plus 2 more next week. WOW. These 2 weeks will definitely be extremely
hectic but the thought of reading week is somewhat comforting. Emphasis on
somewhat. I say that because similar schedule is going to repeat after the
reading week.
Anyways,
let's get back to my journey in CSC148. Initially,
I was really worried about this course because of the rumours floating around
that CSC148 is far more difficult than CSC108. These few weeks are not enough
to grasp the difficulty of the course, but I continuously tell myself that if I
were to put my hard work I should be able to do fairly well in class.
Of
course the picture is a bit of exaggeration, but I would definitely need to put
more effort compared to my peers who have a strong background in programming.
My journey so far in the course has been full of ups and downs. For my first
two weeks I was enrolled in Diane’s section however, due to my course schedule
changes I later enrolled in Danny’s evening section. Turtle is what completely
went on top of my head when I first sat in Danny’s class only because Diane’s
section did not use turtle. So it was like a whole new world.
However,
I decided that I needed to go back to Danny’s previous two weeks lecture to
comprehend the turtle examples. Furthermore, I approached my lab partner who
was also in Danny’s section and with her help and by visiting the previous
weeks lecture notes and example I was finally on the same page as everyone
else. In these weeks we also learned various new concepts including inheritance,
and list comprehensions to name a few. List comprehensions is especially interesting
which is not exactly a novel concept but it a concept of doing things the efficient
way in coding. A four line code that we
would have wrote in CSC108 is simplified into just one line. Just one line.
For
example,
L
= [2,5,8,10]
Returning_ans
= []
For
item in L:
Returning_ans.append(item**2)
Return
Returning_ans
Can
you believe that this above code can be written in just one simple line. Yeah that’s
right. Just one line. Voila !!!!!
[item
** 2 for item in L]
List
comprehensions as you can see follow this form:
[<expression> for <variable>
in <iterable>].
I
am highly impressed by how the labs correspond to the lecture material in this
courses. The quizzes in labs were okay in general such that doing the lab
material would be sufficient to get you a decent mark. The second quiz however
was worded very awkwardly and therefore it was very unclear as to what was
asked of the students. I have read in Varun’s blog and when speaking with other
students that they also found the second quiz very confusing. In general course notes and the lectures are
very helpful in learning the concepts. Furthermore, it is more essential to
revisit the notes, lecture examples and even do extra practice problems to
actually grasp the concept. You know what they say, “Practice makes perfect.”
If not perfect it will definitely improve your abilities. Well following that
principle in mind, I shall embrace this course with open arms and hope to have
a great time not only in this course but also in my other courses.
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