CSC321.01 2015F, Class 14: Course Wrapup

Overview

Preliminaries

Essay: 20%
Percent of reflections submitted on time: 35%
- Slight downward scaling for reflections not taken seriously
- Additional downward scaling for late reflections
Percent of programming assignments submitted on time: 35%
Participation/Attendance: 10%

Big categories

Primary Technologies: Ruby and Rails

Basic syntax of Ruby
Iterators
Convention over configuration
- If you don't understand convention, you make bad choices
Routes in Rails
Gems! People have written things that you can use, and it's normal practice to add these things.
Meta programming. Code that develops code dynamically.
How to use migrations and things like that.
"Bundle install"
Deploying to Heroku
How to start a Rails app
- How not to start a Rails app
The parts of a Rails app
Cucumber - A gem for BDD
RegEx - Patterns
Rails tools like rake
Rspec - For TDD

Additional Technologies/Practices

Software Design

Agile Programming

Software as a Service

Other CS Skills

Pair programming in the cloud
Duck typing as something in programming languages
Different approaches to OOP than in Java
A bit about databases
The dynamic of dealing with ill-defined problems - should we Google, should we try to understand, do we understand correctly?
Relying on existing resources.
Ethics (we wield much power, we should use it appropriately)

General Skills

Building the project builds the knowledge - you have to venture out into the real world
Dealing with incomplete and ill-formed requirements ("The homework is somewhere on the Web site; figure out when it's due and how to submit it.")
Working with others, even when you don't want to and when neither of you know what's going on
Collaborating beyond your close partners
Research methods (How to use Google and Stackoverflow better)
"There's more to life than CS"
How to deal with unexpected questions from an authority figure (more or less)
Using MOOCs/SPOCs, particularly ones that are not quite up-to-date
More self-directed learning
- Choosing resources - Is video or text better?
Thinking about deeper reading

Misc

TLAs and TPLAs and Buzzwords (how to sound more impressive while confusing those around you)

You know the drill. I'll leave the room while you fill out the evaluation form.

Things that will change

Half-semester, full-time
- Too fast; Worry that next semester will be even faster
I will know more of the material
I'll try to keep the Web site up to date
I'll try to provide more feedback

Things that won't change (at least for the near future)

How did you feel about the following approaches?

"Focused" small group/large group discussion in class.
- It's hard to have a good big-group discussion
- Small group is good; speed it up
- This feels more factual; lecture might be useful; more "work through the example" would be good
- Need more examples, perhaps examples to work through
- Seems like a bit of a binary - If you understood it, the time wasn't useful; if you didn't understand it, the small group got stuck.
- More time to work on the homework in class, with advice.
- Success days: Early in the semester, first code smells, two ethics discussions
- Applying the reading to a new problem would be a good model.
- More info on what the goals of assignments was (logic or convention)
  - Taste of the approach
  - Start to learn convention
- Disconnect between class and homework
- For three fifty minute classes, about 1:1 or 1:2 talk/code
- We covered a lot of material, but none of it deeply. Should we focus it more tightly?
- Planning is hard for a one-day-a-week course.
Timeboxed homework assignments.
- Good idea; relieved stress. (Or at least necessary.)
- Having available solutions would be good.
- More feedback would be good.
- Compendium of knowledge to get around the stupid things so that you can focus on the more important things.
Mixed text/video.

Issues

The book was not great in Kindle format; some parts that were hard to read.
- (Printed copies around the department would help.)
Need more support / less work / more focused work / better scale of projects / improved schedule
Find a better ruby tutorial
There's not enough information to let you do the assignments. The book did not prepare students well enough for the homework.
Use a Rails book (or a Rails site) to learn things, use this book for the higher-level overview. Gap between homework and book.
Make it Grinnellian - have one of us write the readings and such (or at least supplemental readings and such).
Focus on big-picture ideas rather than particular skills; skills we change and you will learn them on your job.

What are things that went well?

What are things that you would change?
More information on Ruby/Rails!
- Plan one day per week on philosophy, one day a week on Ruby/Rails (or at least conventions and the work that Rails does for you and the rest of the world may not), one day per week for work time?