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Beej's Guide to Learning Computer Science

beej.us

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Re: Beej's Guide to Learning Computer Science

#31

Post by mettamage »

qsort wrote: post #30
monero-xmr wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My university offered the math classes in either CS or Math departments. I always chose the math department. Better teachers and far more interesting professors (as people)

I have a degree in CS and I got a lot from it, so I'm absolutely not going to bad mouth CS, but I have the feeling that it's possible to just get a piece of paper having learned little to nothing in a way that couldn't happen with Math or Physics. Obviously lots of great people have CS backgrounds, but it also feels like "how did this idiot get a degree" happens far more frequently for CS than Math. It's not like eve…

Psychology and business administration is even worse.

I studied CS, psychology and business administration (I dropped out of BA, it was useless info)

Re: Beej's Guide to Learning Computer Science

#32

Post by nsavage »

woile wrote: post #29

I did Beej's Guide to Network Programming and it was fantastic, I learnt a lot, and it was easy enough that I was able to do it in Rust. I'm sure this one is as good as all the others. Point 7.5 of this guide reminds me of the Einstellung effect, I built my own "pomodoro" timer with notifications saying "go stretch" or "go drink water" ( https://github.com/reciperium/temporis in case someone is interested)

Since I had to find the link: https://beej.us/guide/bgnet/

Re: Beej's Guide to Learning Computer Science

#33

Post by armadsen »

silisili wrote: post #20

I feel stupid saying this over and over each time one of his guides pop up, and I know he lurks here, but thanks Beej. All of his material is absolutely top notch. His guide to network programming was instrumental to both my understanding and career. It often feels like thanks isn't quite enough.

I was lucky to work with him for a while. He’s a great guy IRL too.

Re: Beej's Guide to Learning Computer Science

#35

Post by egwor »

matt3210 wrote: post #11

Beej taught me networking in c in the early 00s. He will now teach my son computer science in the 20s. The circle of life.

Looking at the article headings these don't feel like computer science, and rather how to approach coding problems. This is useful, but not Computer Science. I think that we should refer to this as Programming Engineering or Software Engineering.

It is important to call these distinctions out in my mind because the Computer Science is often the concepts or foundations, whereas the Software Engineering is about how to convert those concepts and use them in a situation such that the concepts are well implemented, tested, and will stand the tests of time (including changing it). They're different skills and concepts.

Re: Beej's Guide to Learning Computer Science

#37

Post by jhatemyjob »

Madmallard wrote: post #24

What does this matter now? It seems like economic collapse and the destruction of value coming out of programming is basically imminent

> 7.3 No Copy-Paste Coding

> [...] But nowadays they tend to punt to some AI. Beginning developers should not do this.

I don't know how I feel about this. I get the sentiment, I really do. But it almost reads like a chess Grandmaster in the 90s telling up-and-coming players to not practice against Deep Blue because it will teach you bad habits.

Re: Beej's Guide to Learning Computer Science

#38

Post by Antibabelic »

hahahacorn wrote: post #21
pmontra wrote: post #15

Well done but is this a guide to Computer Science or to Software Engineering? In a Guide to CS I expected to find information theory, computability, complexity, finite state automa, language grammars etc. Anyway, the audience is > Undergrad students just getting into programming so it's naturally biased toward the engineering part of the subject.

> 1 Foreword > Are you getting into Computer Science, or thinking about it? Or maybe you’re in it already. This super-high-level guide is for you! > I’m not going to talk about how to write code (much). I’ll I’m going to talk about in these roughly 40 pages is more about how to learn when you’re a nascent software developer. Page 1

So the answer is "it's not a guide to computer science". It's like a guide talking about how to get better at mental calculation being titled "guide to learning mathematics", or a guide to language learning being titled "guide to learning linguistics".

Re: Beej's Guide to Learning Computer Science

#39

Post by noosphr »

Antibabelic wrote: post #38
hahahacorn wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 1 Foreword > Are you getting into Computer Science, or thinking about it? Or maybe you’re in it already. This super-high-level guide is for you! > I’m not going to talk about how to write code (much). I’ll I’m going to talk about in these roughly 40 pages is more about how to learn when you’re a nascent software developer. Page 1

So the answer is "it's not a guide to computer science". It's like a guide talking about how to get better at mental calculation being titled "guide to learning mathematics", or a guide to language learning being titled "guide to learning linguistics".

Yes, this is a guide on how to be a software developer, not a computer scientist. Poor name aside it isn't terrible advice for what it is.

Re: Beej's Guide to Learning Computer Science

#40

Post by traxler »

jhatemyjob wrote: post #37
Madmallard wrote: post #24

What does this matter now? It seems like economic collapse and the destruction of value coming out of programming is basically imminent

> 7.3 No Copy-Paste Coding > [...] But nowadays they tend to punt to some AI. Beginning developers should not do this. I don't know how I feel about this. I get the sentiment, I really do. But it almost reads like a chess Grandmaster in the 90s telling up-and-coming players to not practice against Deep Blue because it will teach you bad habits.

> But it almost reads like a chess Grandmaster in the 90s telling up-and-coming players to not practice against Deep Blue because it will teach you bad habits.

No idea if chess grandmasters did do that in the 90s, but frankly it would have been good advice. Just as it is good advice today for up-and-coming players not to practice against stockfish, leela or whatever. Unless you are already very proficient in chess, practicing against those engines will teach you very little .

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