Schols Schols Schols, information and venting thread.

Sir Ophiuchus

Hear, hear!

swimfan22

You'll be fine, just make sure to get enough sleep each night and eat plenty. I had four three-hour papers in a row last week, I'm still alive! Good luck!

evercloserunion

Berocca Berocca Berocca

xason1

i'm ****ing pissed , etc associated State of Mind-revelry side affects . and have 4 exams next week. fml

Podge_irl

Liquorice wrote: »

And your tips on midday napping, 'cause I'm gonna need it.

Go for a nap straight after your exam, but restrict it to an hour or at most two. You won't get any work done just after your exam anyway and its the best time to take a nap so as not to disrupt your sleep cycle. Trust me, I have a lot of experience at this.

mathew

It was all going so well... The questions werent hard today, there was just no way anyone could have done them in 45mins each.

Q1 for example was take an input such as 25 January 2009 + 2 w

This meant the user was looking for the date 2 weeks after the 25th of january.

To do this you had to work out the number of days since Jan 1st 1900, and work from there. Leap years had to be taken into account.
If you were doing month or year arithmathic you had to work in days months and years tho..

Its a very easy program.. its just bloody huge... We had to write the WHOLE thing...

claire h

To quote Galaxy Quest - Never give up, never surrender!

JC 2K3

mathew wrote: »

Q1 for example was take an input such as 25 January 2009 + 2 w

This meant the user was looking for the date 2 weeks after the 25th of january.

To do this you had to work out the number of days since Jan 1st 1900, and work from there. Leap years had to be taken into account.

? Why? Is it not just (the date + 14) modulus 31,30,29 or 28 depending on the month and if it was a leap year or not?

mathew

JC 2K3 wrote: »

? Why? Is it not just (the date + 14) modulus 31,30,29 or 28 depending on the month and if it was a leap year or not?

that would work for that input... but it had to be any input..

the 2 could be any integer.

the + could have been a -

and the w could have been d, w, m or y.

oh and we were told to do it working from jan 1st 1900 using day numbers...

rjt

mathew wrote: »

It was all going so well... The questions werent hard today, there was just no way anyone could have done them in 45mins each.

Q1 for example was take an input such as 25 January 2009 + 2 w

This meant the user was looking for the date 2 weeks after the 25th of january.

To do this you had to work out the number of days since Jan 1st 1900, and work from there. Leap years had to be taken into account.
If you were doing month or year arithmathic you had to work in days months and years tho..

Its a very easy program.. its just bloody huge... We had to write the WHOLE thing...

I did that exam too (I'm in maths, guessing you're an engineer?). It was a messy question alright. An entire answer booklet filled with code. John Waldron's questions were pretty ok though. I didn't do q.3, but q.2 was short enough to make up for Q.1 (partly, anyway).

@JC: It had to work for arbitrary time periods - you might input + 22 m or -11 y (add 22 months and subtract 11 years). And although there were shorter ways of doing it, the question specifically asked for us to do it in a certain way.

TheAmateur

JC 2K3 wrote: »

? Why? Is it not just (the date + 14) modulus 31,30,29 or 28 depending on the month and if it was a leap year or not?

Here's the solution if you're interested (we got that program as a practical this year):
http://www.tcd.ie/Engineering/Courses/BAI/JF_Subjects/1E3/Practicals/Solution12.cpp

mathew

I knew I should have looked at the first year site before going in to the exam..

JC 2K3

Upon looking at the solution, it looks pretty horrible all right. (more of a question testing ability to convert between formats and conditional evaluation of operations than getting the best solution to the problem)

In programming exams, the length of questions is always really inconsistent I find. Like in mine the other day, one C question took about 3/4 of a page, whereas another one would have required 4/5 pages to do fully (I got 3 done :S ).

Though I suppose some test logical thinking and ability to form a concise solution, while others test something more simple but with more work involved.

mathew

ye.. it wasnt really a test of our ability to find the best solution. More a test of our knowledge of the code/syntax and if we could design the algorithm that she wanted.

Bit disappointing when you know you can do the question perfectly but just dont have the time to write it all out.

JC 2K3

I've a feeling tomorrow will be the end for me...

Brods

One more left. Well, my only schols exam, but I still feel like I've been at this for years...

evercloserunion

rjt wrote: »

I did that exam too (I'm in maths, guessing you're an engineer?). It was a messy question alright. An entire answer booklet filled with code. John Waldron's questions were pretty ok though. I didn't do q.3, but q.2 was short enough to make up for Q.1 (partly, anyway).

@JC: It had to work for arbitrary time periods - you might input + 22 m or -11 y (add 22 months and subtract 11 years). And although there were shorter ways of doing it, the question specifically asked for us to do it in a certain way.

Wait do you guys have to handwrite computer code in your exam? That's ****ed up!

JC 2K3

It's really not a big deal at all....

tolosenc

JC 2K3 wrote: »

I've a feeling tomorrow will be the end for me...

Chin up, Jimmy!

Winners never quit, and quitters never win. I'm back to ridiculous hours in the library for the next 5 days. Then it's over. Is it the practical or the written tomorrow?

scruttocks

Passed my drop subject yesterday, well on course for exemptions now... alriiiiight

JC 2K3

obl wrote: »

Chin up, Jimmy!

Winners never quit, and quitters never win. I'm back to ridiculous hours in the library for the next 5 days. Then it's over. Is it the practical or the written tomorrow?

Written. Went ok, but messed up the Electrotech question. I'm hoping that doesn't ruin me.

Maths Q1, Programming Q4, Hardware Q6, I hate you.

Practical tomorrow, *shudder.

mathew

That you done after tomorrow or do you have another next week?

JC 2K3

Last one's Monday.

Kwekubo

Schols has gone away!

JC 2K3

Hardware Practical was OKish. Realised I did something a simpler yet less efficient way than was asked for. But it worked about 70%.. Dunno a bout a first in it though...

bright

Hmm. Just got out of my fourth of 7 exams went well enough- seem to be continuing my form of 2.1ish papers, could be firsts- if you were really pushed- but really nothing spectacular. Really not doing myself any favours with this lack of, eh, razzle dazzle.......and structure in my essays. Damn word vomit- like this post. :eek: better recover, eh, in conclusion maybe good exam today?

Karlusss

Would like to thank the taxi drivers for that symphony that lasted the middle hour of today's exams.

mathew

That went pretty well.. I was happy enough..
If I had remembered how to do binary division, or even done it the way i thought was right (which turned out was right) I would have done a bit better.
Over all I'd say a solid 2.1, possibly even a low first..

Only one left to go.. YAY

And ye, nothing like a chorus of car horns to listen to while working away.

(Oppinion of taxi drivers)--;

Jim_Are_Great

Karlusss wrote: »

Would like to thank the taxi drivers for that symphony that lasted the middle hour of today's exams.

Almost as bad as whoever it is that insists on cutting his grass just behind the exam hall the whole time.

mathew

Jim_Are_Great wrote: »

Almost as bad as whoever it is that insists on cutting his grass just behind the exam hall the whole time.

Is that not Dr. Hegarty's garden?