Ask HN: How to get a feel for masters CS specializations?

Decide your objective:

Are you studying to advance your personal knowledge, no particular career goal just "for fun"? (It's reasonably priced and good so not a terrible option)

Are you studying to advance your present skillset for your present work?

Are you studying to prepare yourself for future work?

Are you studying to get a diploma and the courses don't matter?

The answer (and what your present or future work are for those) will determine which courses (don't worry about the specializations yet) you should be exploring. If you're studying for fun or for the diploma (which amounts to "for fun", you need to take either easy courses or ones that can hold your attention) then browse the list for courses that are interesting to you. For present/future work, look for courses based on whatever that may be.

Once you have a list of a few courses, you can decide on your specialization and start deciding on other courses to fill out the degree program with.

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For what to do to prep: Again, prep for the courses not the specialization. Hypothetically, you decide on the ML specialization and intend to take 7641, 7642, 7643. What do those courses require for prep from you? It's going to be different than if you took a different set of courses even in the same specialization.

Ostensibly, 7642 and 7643 have 7641 as a prereq (not a strict requirement by the school, but strongly recommended) and both make use of Python. 7641 has this as a background knowledge document: https://omscs.gatech.edu/sites/default/files/documents/cours.... Run through it and see if you're actually ready for 7641, if not then study based on it in advance of the course. 7642 and 7643 follow from it so you should be, mostly, good after prepping for and taking 7641.

Repeat this process for each course you want to take. You should only really need to focus on the prep work for the first round of courses that are intros and prerequisites for later courses. But still check them out, they may have additional recommended reading and prep work before you take them beyond just a course prerequisite.

> The thing I'm getting a bit hung up on is whether it would make more sense to study something that will probably be in demand for a long time i.e. computer systems, or whether I should try to get a foothold in AI since it's so hot right now.

Something else to keep in mind (I'm looking at doing the same program starting 2024), the specialization requirements only account for about half your classes. Your degree is going to be an MS CS regardless of the specialization you select. So you can mix and match. My intention is to take several of the OS and security courses because it fits my personal interest + career trajectory better. But because of the overlap in core courses between them, I could, and may, technically complete both the Computer Systems and Machine Learning specializations (1 common core course, 4 courses for ML only, 5 more for Computer Systems only; 10 total). I'd be doing the ML ones less for my career but more for edification, if I go that route. But in the end, I'd be able to say I'd done them if my career took a different path where they were more applicable.

Thank you for the advice! I will think about this when looking through the syllabi for the courses.