I’ve started school already. Russian, I think, is going to be fun. The prof seems to be pretty excited about the language and is happy teaching it to us. Olessia helped me with my homework yesterday. It was simple exercises to practice writing a select few of the Russian letters in cursive. We practiced the sounds too. Olessia realized I knew almost all the letters to spell Murzik in Russian (she made me spell it!). Since I know how to spell Murzik, I know how to spell purr in Russian too! Its simply the “mur” in Murzik. And what’s also cool, is if you properly pronounce “mur” in Russian, it sounds like a cat purring. Kpyto! (means “cool” in Russian which sort of sounds like krewto)

DSA2 is going to be cool. Sadly, we’re not allowed to use a notebook or other gadget in class. Apparently too many students abused this privilege by playing games and such and the prof had enough. I guess the good thing is I don’t have to lug 7lb of computer gear in my backpack. The bad thing is I’ll have to decode my handwriting!

Here’s some freaky stuff about the two classes:

My Russian class only had 5 students on Monday! Of the 5, there’s another Rob/Robert (but don’t call me “Bob”) in the class. Rob, in Russian, means slave so I don’t think either of want to go with that. In my DSA2 class, there’s maybe 20 students. In there, there’s 3 Robs! My prof for DSA2 is also learning Russian this semester.

Now the one part that had me worried about DSA2 was the use of Java. See, I survived intro to computer science and DSA1 by using C++. It was the language of choice back then. But now the university has switched over to Java. Luckily for me, this is the class is made up of 50% C++ coders and 50% Java coders. This is also the first time this prof has taught Java. Hopefully she’ll have some mercy for us C++ coders. Sorry, but I won’t be able to post the class notes up. I’m not sure if I’ll post the programs.
Continue reading “Russian and DSA2”

Ack!

The Monday schedule:

Go to work (way early)

9-10:30am: Beginning Russian 1 (Tri-C)

Go back to work (maybe grab brunch along the way)

6:40-8pm Data Structures & Algorithms 2 (U. Akron)

Home!

I hope to take notes electronically in the DSA 2 class. If so, I’ll be posting them here on the site.

Continue reading “Back to school”

Whoa! I’m taking a computer science class for once! I’m taking a break from the calculus (just have to take calc 2 now). Data Structures & Algorithms II, the saga continues. When I took DSA I, it was all in C++, which was really nice. Now its in Java, which should be even better but I haven’t coded Java in a class environment so this should be interesting.

Also, I’ve registered for Beginning Russian I at Tri-C (also known as Tri-High, Tri-Again or something like that). Russian is offered at Kent and CWRU, but Kent is at a goofy hour and a pretty lengthy class. The class at Case looks pretty intense. It too is at a goofy hour during the day. U. Akron doesn’t even offer the class. Tri-C offers it as an evening class, but its the same time as DSA II. So, I’ve managed to persuade work to let me out on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.

Learning two langauges in 15 weeks – this will be hectic.

Oh yeah, Computer Science for Life! I finally had a chance to listen to MC Plus+. Great computer science tunes!
Continue reading “Computer Science for Life”

Yup. Crashed and burned in calculus 2. Went down with a big fire ball and flames. Scored a nice 34 points out of 100 on the exam. Thank you for the mercy points! There’s no way to recover from that.

The current plan?

I’m going to take 1 semester for a break from calculus and actually try taking a computer science class for once! No really! My last computer science class was assembler and that was back in spring 2002 (wow – 3 years ago!). I’m a bit cooked on the idea of calculus so I’m going to try some data structures and algorithms and then swing back to calc 2.

Oh yeah, the average grade on that exam? 51 points with an even distro of people from 0 to 100 points (meaning no bell curve).
Continue reading “Calc 2 crash and burn”

For those keeping score at home, the only points I have so far are from homework. We’ve had 3 rounds of homework collected and so far I’ve acquired the following points: 91, 98, and 85 which gives me a total of 274 points out of 300 (91% – the homework points get tweaked down to a total of 200 points at the end of the semester). Next Thursday is our first exam (100 points). A C or better and I’ll stay in the class. Anything else than that and I’m pretty much screwed for the rest of the semester.

Something of interest I’ve learned: The higher the math class, the longer the problems get (and more paper you’ll need). Something else I learned: differential math class and calculus 3 do NOT look at all exciting. I keep hearing, “you’ll need this skill for differential math or for calc 3.”
Continue reading “Calc 2 Point Status”

Ack!

On my way out of the class room, I ended up talking with this girl who is in my calc class. Turns out this is the best calc 2 prof she’s had. This is her 4th time taking calc 2. Yup. She said, “this is the best prof I’ve had so far.” The guy is good. He knows his stuff. But man, we’re plowing through the material without much of a feedback loop to verify we know what we’re doing.
Continue reading “Doesn’t get better than this!”

Fun fun fun. The calculus 2 point system is much like calculus 1’s. There’s a total of 700 points.

300 points for 3 exams (100 points each)

200 points for homework

200 points for the final exam

What’s interesting is there’s no quizes. A math class without quizes? It just doesn’t seem right. Also interesting is with the homework. There’s only about 4 or 5 problems assigned per section. And out of those 4 or 5, only a few will be graded for accuracy. Of course, the prof recommends doing as many of the odd numbered problems as possible (which I plan to do within reason and time).

So far I’m doing great. I’m holding down zero points out of zero points.
Continue reading “Calculus 2 Points”

The prof seems cool. He goes through the material pretty quick (which means no day dreaming!), but seems to do a good job explaining it from a couple different angles.

About half of the class is made up of students from my calculus 1 class. The other half seem to be made up of students who took calculus 3 and failed it or students who have taken calculus 2 several times already. I am really glad I don’t have to worry about calculus 3. Whew!
Continue reading “The Calculus 2 Experience”

I picked up all my school supplies yesterday. Class is tonight. Hopefully I can make it all the way through this semester and survive.
Continue reading “Calculus part Deux”

Brilliant!

The silly parking pass fees are way too high. So it actually makes sense for part timers (like me) to skip buying a parking pass and just pay the tickets when you get them. Do the math, if a ticket costs $10 and a parking pass for 15 weeks costs $115, but you only visit the campus 2 times a week making for 30 total trips, it doesn’t sound too bad if you only get caught one third of the time. But the university has finally wised-up and is now charging $25 a ticket. For me, I guess this is good. I wish they’d lower the price for a parking pass instead and raised the price of the tickets…

Note to self: graduate ASAP to avoid this mess!
Continue reading “Parking Fines”

Got an A- in the class. I had been sitting at 89% for the entire class so I’m very happy with an A-. That was one tough class. Now I’ll catch my breath and get ready for calculus 2.
Continue reading “Woo hoo! I passed calculus (finally!)”

I got my test #4 back last night. I got a 98% by losing 2 points in one problem. I neglected the fact the variable in the problem was to the second power. The problem was solved correctly though, minus the second power and the two points to the problem. I was just so close to a perfect score! I’m happy with the 98% though.

For those keeping score, test #4 bumped my overall grade to 91% (501 points out of 550 total). This means I have to get an 87% on the final or better to maintain an A in the class.

Continue reading “Calculus part 1 is OVER!”

Well, I took the last test. I think the quality of my answers were in the 90-100% neighborhood. I need a 92% or higher on this test to bump my overall grade up and over 90%.

Continue reading “Word on calculus”

Monday evening (technically, Tuesday morning) I was up till 2am working on calculus homework.

Rinse and repeat for yesterday.

I hate to say it’ll be rinse and repeat for tonight as well.

Last calculus test is Thursday. Two homework sections assigned on Tuesday are due on Thursday PLUS I really really have to do the test #4 review sheets (although they’re not collected).

After today, I don’t expect to have any late nighters until January…
Continue reading “In bed before 2am?”

Got a 19 out of 20. I lost a point due to magically making a number disappear. The problem itself gave me problems. I had reworked the problem 3 times and the last time I worked it I must have been in a hurry and missed a number. But I did get mercy points for following the right steps on solving the problem.

All that’s left now is 300 points. One hundred are up for grabs on Thursday and the final on next Tuesday makes up the last 200 points. For those of you wondering, I’m back to 89.55%. I hope the prof is willing to do some rounding!
Continue reading “Results of Quiz 5”

Survey says: “86%”

I hosed up the first page of the test. I scored some mercy points, but managed to botch up the 3 problems. After that, I had a few minor slip ups. It was a tough test and I’ll take the 86%. Currently I’m holding onto an 88% overall class grade. With one quiz and test left to go, I hope to get the overall grade bumped up a bit.

We’re getting into integrals in class now. I discovered that fnInt() on the TI-83 is just Int() on the TI-89. I also whipped up a program to calculate the area under a curve. Its based on a program from our calculus book. But the calculus book’s version only calculates the area based on the right end points. And it just spit out the answer. I needed it to do a lot more. My version calculates the right, left, and middle points and shows its work! I demo-ed it for some students and they were amazed. It took the prof a good 10 minutes to work the problem (and he only did 1 of the 3 variations while the program does all 3 variations) and the program had all the answers within 30 seconds by just pressing a couple buttons. Cheating? Its automating a repetive process. And I really needed a way to verify my “done by hand” work. I’ll have to get it posted.

Continue reading “Calculus Test #3 Done and more TI tricks”

Whew! That test was a real Head Scratcher™. One hundred points spread across 13 problems. One of my favorites:

Cyndi rides her bike going 40 feet per second. She applies the brakes. Her bike slows at 4 feet per second. How far will her bike travel before it comes to a complete stop?

With a question like this, you have to be thankful all the units are the same (the speed could have been miles per hour requiring conversion to feet per second – easy to miss if you’re not careful).

Another fun one was Andy is in a row boat and is 3 miles from shore. He sees smoke pouring out of his house which is 6 miles down the road from the point he is to shore. What is the shortest amount of time for Andy to reach his house if he rows 4mph and can run 6mph?

For those keeping score, there are only 1 quiz, 1 test, and 1 final exam left. This equates to 20 points + 100 points + 200 points or 320 points up for grabs out of 750 total points.
Continue reading “Test #3 Over!”

Its definitely a dim light at this moment. I’ve figured out how many credits and classes I need to graduate. Before I get to that, I’ve registered for another fun filled semester of suffering: Analytical Geometry-Calculus II (or as I like to think, “The Differentiating Continues!”).

I really need to update my school page. But here’s where I’m at. Right now, I’m in Calculus 1 taking 4 credits. I’m assuming I’m going to make it through this class. I need 47 more credits to graduate. You need a minimum of 128 credits to graduate. I’ll end up with a total of 142 because of my transfer credits.

The 47 credits break down into:

• 4 credits of general studies (I have to finish up Western Traditions & Civilization 2 – 1 class)
• 29 core computer science credits (7 3 credit classes and 2 4 credit classes)
• 14 300/400 level classes, of which 12 credits must be in computer science (5 3 credit classes)

This works out to be 10 classes I have no choice to take and about 5 classes I get to pick. For the five, here’s some I’m thinking of taking:

• Artificial Intelligence and Heuristic Programming
• Database Management
• Data Communication and Computer Networks
• Introduction to Software Engineering and Formal Methods
• T:Mobile Computing
• T:Image Processing

The AI class would definitely be intersting, although probably very challenging. Database management and data communications I have a little bit of experience in so those classes are going to be fun. The software engineering class may be challenging, but should help me out on coding projects. T:Mobile is not the same as T-Mobile, the wireless carrier. It isn’t always offered (much like T:Image). Coding for mobile computing is definitely an interest of mine. And the Image Processing class just sounds cool and is taught by a cool prof.

So there it is. About 15 classes making up 47 credits. The classic question: “When will you graduate?” Its hard to say when my rate for taking classes is about 1-3 per semester. Worst case is 8 years and best case would probably be 2 years.
Continue reading “The light at the end of the tunnel”

Eh, got a 17 out of 20 on the quiz (or 85% on the quiz). Right now it appears my overall grade is sitting at a super high B.
Continue reading “3rd Quiz Results”

The 3rd quiz of 5 is done. I think I passed, but won’t know until Thursday.
Continue reading “3rd quiz done!”