Key Takeaways
- test first, test during, test after, test, test, test
- when designing algorithms, demand the weakest capabilities (e.g. iterable vs. indexable)
- when designing containers, provide the strongest capabilities (e.g. indexable vs iterable)
- build decorators on top of containers, iterators, and functions
- utilize the benefits of being lazy (i.e. yield)
- always look for reuse and symmetry in your code
- collaboration is essential to the quality of your code and to your well-being in producing it
How well do you think the course conveyed those takeaways?
I think this course conveyed those takeaways fairly well. All the points were covered extensively and in a way that made them easily understandable. I did see some disconnect between the beginning of the semester and the end of it. We began the course with Python then ended with code refactoring in Java.
Were there any other particular takeaways for you?
I think most of the things I learned in this course were during the project. Since the project was a complete full-stack application, there were a lot of tools that we needed to learn. Using the concepts we learned about in class was definitely helpful for writing clean, reusable code.
How did you feel about two-stage quizzes and tests?
Having a two-stage test was fine as it was both a teaching and a learning experience. I do feel like having the two-stage quiz was a miss for me. It seemed unnecessary to collaborate just to answer a few multiple choice questions over class material.
How did you feel about cold calling?
Cold calling was something that I think is pretty necessary during these online classes. As if paying attention during class wasn’t already hard enough, this online format facilitates not paying attention. The cold calling definitely helped me engage in class more than I would normally. Professor Downing is nice enough that he will help guide you through the problem even if you have no idea what’s going on.
How did you feel about office hours/lab sessions?
Office hours and lab sessions were definitely helpful for getting help with set up for the project. A lot of us were dealing with cloud services for the first time, so getting help setting up EC2, docker, DNS, etc was definitely useful.
Give me your suggestions for improving the course.
I thought the class material and the projects were very well thought out. On the other hand, the tests seemed a little sketchy at times. Having more extensive tests and specific specifications would help the students determine exactly what they need to do. Leaving the specifications rather vague but expecting a certain implementation seems rather unreasonable. This is just my personal opinion but having daily quizzes doesn’t make much sense. I know most students wouldn’t actually study every day after class to learn the material. Having something like weekly quizzes would be reasonable in order to make sure the students are absorbing the material.
To future students
This class is definitely one of the most useful classes because you will get to learn everything all across the stack. You get to learn React in the front end, Flask in the back end, and setting up cloud services for your database/application. No other class would ever give you experience in such a vast array of fields. At some times, the class materials does seem very disconnected from the projects you are assigned, so don’t be caught off guard by that.
