Computer Science

Mike Literous

Looking for some tips on what I should start doing now to get a bit of a head start for when I begin the course. =D

-Hoping to head down the interactive entertainment path in time, what should I start learning now?
-What should I take in freshman if I wanted to go down this path?
Digital hardware, networking concepts, programming languages, low-level
programming, information management, mathematics?
-Just tips in general.

Sorry for the ton of questions, my Career Guidance teacher isn't too great on the computers scene =P

boblong

Mike Literous wrote: »

Looking for some tips on what I should start doing now to get a bit of a head start for when I begin the course. =D

-Hoping to head down the interactive entertainment path in time, what should I start learning now?
-What should I take in freshman if I wanted to go down this path?
Digital hardware, networking concepts, programming languages, low-level
programming, information management, mathematics?
-Just tips in general.

Sorry for the ton of questions, my Career Guidance teacher isn't too great on the computers scene =P

There are no choices in first year so no need to worry about electives for now if you want to do CS in Trinity.

There is no prior programming or computing knowledge required for the course - so I suppose it might be more worth your time ensuring that your LC maths is good, remember you need that C3 at HL.

If you wanted to do a little preparation you could perhaps have a look at a little Java or C++ programming. The books everyone recommends are the Deitel & Deitel ones. Apart from that, a book called Digital Design by Morris Mano will be your bread and butter through first year so if you had some free time having a look at the first few bits and getting your head around boolean algebra would be most beneficial I think.

Mike Literous

boblong wrote: »

There are no choices in first year so no need to worry about electives for now if you want to do CS in Trinity.

There is no prior programming or computing knowledge required for the course - so I suppose it might be more worth your time ensuring that your LC maths is good, remember you need that C3 at HL.

If you wanted to do a little preparation you could perhaps have a look at a little Java or C++ programming. The books everyone recommends are the Deitel & Deitel ones. Apart from that, a book called Digital Design by Morris Mano will be your bread and butter through first year so if you had some free time having a look at the first few bits and getting your head around boolean algebra would be most beneficial I think.

Thanks for the reply =D
I started trying to learn Java and wasn't too interested in it. It was more that I was veered away from it rather, I was told it was much slower performance wise than other languages such as C++. Then I was told that C++ is not a good place to start for a beginner and advised to learn C#.
Wasn't sure (and still not sure) about what to take.
Java better than C# for the course I'd be doing?
Or will I just dive on into C++?
Also thanks for the advice on the books, much appreciated =D

boblong

Practicing programming in any language is going to stand to you - so to be honest right now I'd practice in any language you're reasonably comfortable with and allows you to progress with topics, be that C++ or Java or C# (which is syntactically quite similar to Java).

In first year, you'll be programming in an assembly language (probably ARM) and (unless things change), Java. But again, no knowledge in either is required and it would be more useful to sharpen up your problem solving skills in a language of your choice.

Mike Literous

boblong wrote: »

Practicing programming in any language is going to stand to you - so to be honest right now I'd practice in any language you're reasonably comfortable with and allows you to progress with topics, be that C++ or Java or C# (which is syntactically quite similar to Java).

In first year, you'll be programming in an assembly language (probably ARM) and (unless things change), Java. But again, no knowledge in either is required and it would be more useful to sharpen up your problem solving skills in a language of your choice.

Sweet, thanks for the tips =D

ED E

Its a great course(IMO). JF here.

You'll learn ARM in lectures and labs, but as boblong as said, Java would stand to you, though going in without it isnt really a huge issue as the lecturer takes it really slow at the start and assumes you have no experience in programming(hand up here, despite my good intentions:p).

df3n5

I graduated last year and am doing the masters in IET in Trinity at the moment. I graduated from the undergrad course last year.

Don't know how much I'd be prepared to recommend any language but java, because it was used in every year except final year for me.
C# wasn't used at all and is very close to java anyway.
If you're serious about game development then C++ is way to go eventually, but is not a language I'd start off with.
Some cool games like Minecraft have been written in Java though, so it's useful for lot's of things.

All in all I wouldn't worry about preparing for the course too much, I had little programming experience before I started and I did grand.
Just make sure it's what you actually want to do.
If you are interested in Maths at all, then the Maths course in Trinity is very good, and they get to choose all of the 3rd and 4th year computer science modules if they want (which is when the courses get good!) so I'd give strong consideration to that course.
I found the maths background given in the CS course to be a bit inadequate for my masters stuff so I'm suffering for it now.
That said there was nothing to stop me from studying it in my own time.

I guess my advice is to look around and don't be afraid to transfer if you feel the course isn't for you.

mikesligo

Mike Literous wrote: »

Looking for some tips on what I should start doing now to get a bit of a head start for when I begin the course. =D

-Hoping to head down the interactive entertainment path in time, what should I start learning now?

Right I'm going to answer this because it's what I wanted to know too before I came in (jf with lethal_bullet). But in retrospect the question is a little bit pointless as with even a little amount of work, you won't fall behind, so there's no need to get a headstart. You're going to have alot of free time in college, so you should probably come up with some stuff to do now before you properly discover reddit. I'd say just get do whatever takes your fancy right now and keep going with that when you get here (btw this isn't a bad thing at all, it's just up to you not to waste your time).

That said if you really want to do something now you could reduce the amount of lectures you have to go to to as little as possible. You should start with learning/coding java. Be comfortable in just the theory (methods,classes,attributes,objects) and you can (and will) miss programming for the 1st 2 months. Then read ahead on how to actually write some loops (literally just if and while) and you'll be sound up to christmas. After christmas you should start going to a few lectures, we start to go through things a hell of a lot quicker (but still not atm difficult), with an interesting lecturer. We'll mostly cover (multi-dimensional) arrays and strings.

Secondly, electrotech. I have no idea what after christmas is going to be like, and in fairness don't have much experience with before christmas too, but simply put, if you do well in physics, up to christmas is just an easier version of the electronics section of LC physics. You won't need to attend a single lecture, and probably won't. That said if you don't do physics you'll have a bit to catch up on and should probably go. Half the class fail this.

As for computing, c&s, dld and maths, there's not really all that much you can do beforehand. Just when you get here, stay up to date with maths (not your usual stuff), and especially DLD, and you should be fine. Also, join the societies.

Course is awesome btw.

Sorry for the ton of questions, my Career Guidance teacher isn't too great on the computers scene =P

It's a low points course and you're someone who has enough interest to actually want a head start. I wouldn't worry about it.

Jehuty42

write some loops (literally just if and while)

An if statement isn't a loop. Zero on the final.

ED E

If hughes saw that you'd be buying coffee for a month :P

Jehuty42

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andrew

mikesligo wrote: »

you should probably come up with some stuff to do now before you properly discover reddit.

If you take only one thing from mikesligo's post, let it be this.