TR033 - Computer Science

NSNO · 23-08-2011 06:27PM #1

So, who's starting in September? I'm presuming that there'll be more than a few Computer Science-heads on boards given the nature of the course.

I actually can't wait to start. Roll on September!

Shenlok · 23-08-2011 06:51PM

Howiye

luigii · 23-08-2011 06:52PM

Finally, thought you guys were never gonna start a thread

Incoming third year here, interested in finding out what the story is with the new kids :pac: (or answering any questions anyone has I suppose)

furrylemmings · 23-08-2011 06:57PM

/sleaze

NSNO · 23-08-2011 06:58PM

Is there any point actually buying the recommended books or will the library suffice? The prices of some of the new editions is frightening :eek:

furrylemmings · 23-08-2011 06:59PM

Acquire the books... through.. some other means..

spoonbadger · 23-08-2011 06:59PM

Nutsac

luigii · 23-08-2011 07:00PM

NSNO wrote: »

Is there any point actually buying the recommended books or will the library suffice? The prices of some of the new editions is frightening :eek:

As far as I can see, most people get away with the library and/or dodgy pdfs of the books. Buying them might be beneficial, but it's not essential to passing

spoonbadger · 23-08-2011 07:07PM

Buy a copy of Digital Logic Design by M. Morris Mano, get a cheap second hand copy (it more or less hasn't changed in decades). You'll be using that book for the entire year and go through all of it, so its worthwhile having a copy.

There's slides and online notes for just about everything else, except electrotech, for which there is always a pdf of the relevant textbook going around. Given that you only use about 4 chapters of it, its not worth forking out much cash on it.

Dr D · 23-08-2011 07:07PM

I'd recommend buying one of the books (Digital Design by Mano), having a physical copy is great for the rare time you'll be studying :P

Don't break the bank though, you can get earlier editions for like a fiver off amazon.

edit: spoon, you don't go through *all* of mano, don't scare the poor firsties.

NSNO · 23-08-2011 07:07PM

spoonbadger wrote: »

Buy a copy of Digital Logic Design by M. Morris Mano, get a cheap second hand copy (it more or less hasn't changed in decades). You'll be using that book for the entire year and go through all of it, so its worthwhile having a copy.

There's slides and online notes for just about everything else, except electrotech, for which there is always a pdf of the relevant textbook going around. Given that you only use about 4 chapters of it, its not worth forking out much cash on it.

Perfect mate, sound.

furrylemmings · 23-08-2011 07:08PM

Also, make friends with older cs students in the first week and they might sell you cheap books

Shenlok · 23-08-2011 07:39PM

Something tells me lemmings has some old books he's looking to exchange for cans...

ED E · 23-08-2011 07:45PM

INb4 bullitz trolls(stesh is no doubt just waiting for the chance).

Yeah, buy mano.

Go ducss, sign up for netsoc but never actually go to the room. They just have better hardware(DUCSS admin cant crimp Cat5 properly).

Bin Vinny's book, its a waste of time, but he'll give it to you anyways.

There's no GSM signal in the basement of Lloyd where most of your lectures are, just so you know.

Subway and Donovans for food always.

Watch out for "mloc", he's a slurper who's in your class.

Gibbons is crazy btw, mention lethal weapon to have him ramble for the rest of the lecture.

Think thats about it, enjoy it(I'll see you there if I scrape into 2nd year).

Update: MSISS are grand, dont expect much from bizzkids.

WillD · 23-08-2011 07:52PM

also no one really likes Lethal_Bullet. He's a bit of a twat. (He'll probably be in your year.)

ED E · 23-08-2011 07:55PM

Was gonna include that in my post, but I though an impartial view would be better.

Yeah, wont be in your year, you're safe.

Dongasaurus · 23-08-2011 07:57PM

Don't buy books unless yer minted or can find them cheap. The library has loads of copies of the course texts

Dongasaurus · 23-08-2011 07:57PM

also, NUTSAC

SlyNeko · 23-08-2011 08:00PM

Hi! Welcome to CS ^_^ Future second year here. Awright, I'll try to be a serious non-troll for once.

Things you must know!
-Do NOT buy the books your lecturers tell you to buy in book shops. They can cost over 70 euro. Buy them on amazon where you can get the under a fiver.

-Don't be intimidated by other people, there will be loads of fellow classmates who seem to know everything when you get in there. Just keep up with your classes and you'll be ok.

-Do relax. College is absolutely nothing like the horrors of sixth year, so remember you can afford to chill.

-DOOO join the CS societies. This was the best decision I made going into first year. It was kinda intimidating at first I'll be honest, but very quickly I made friends with pretty much everyone in it and they helped me with assignments, computer troubles, everything.

-Last but not least....don't sleaze super hard on the girls...there is a lot of that in CS unfortunately... >_<

I hoped this helped, if i think of anything else I'll post it

Dr D · 23-08-2011 08:07PM

Since I'm an incoming second year, and I've just gone through first year; I thought I'd give yis a vague idea of what to expect.

Hours aren't too bad, hopefully you won't have as many 9am lectures as we did in our year, but on the plus side it was nice to be done early most days.

Subjectwise you've got Maths, Electrotechnology & Telecomms, Maths, Programming, Computing, Computers & Society, a programming project and Digital Logic Design.

Maths is taught by Hugh Gibbons, who is fairly sound but he's a bit mental and it can be hard to follow his lectures. Do the tutorials and coursework as best you can (coursework is basically homework style problems) and you will have no bother with Maths.

Electrotech and Telecomms are a potentially really interesting subject but are let down by the quality of the lectures. You'll find most people will stop coming to these (Term 1 is Electrotech and term 2 is Comms), after a while. You probably should go to all of them, but you won't. Labs start in term 2 and are basically oscilloscopes 101. If you've done LC physics you'll be grand. If you haven't, you can be like me and pass with like 50% on the coursework :P

Programming is taught by Vinny Cahill in term 1 (at least I think it still is) and Arthur Hughes in term 2. Vinny is alright, once you get over him saying "m'kay" a lot. He will teach you the basics of java, but it'll be up to you to really practice them and get it down. Even if it seems easy, don't get into the habit of thinking it's so easy you won't bother.

Arthur is a great lecturer, and as long as you pay attention and do the labs/tutorials, you'll be fine.

Computing is taught by Jonathan Dukes, and imo it's one of the best subjects in first year. You do a lot of really low level stuff to start, and stick with Assembly language throughout. It will most likely move faster than your programming lectures, and while it starts off nice and easy, it picks up in difficulty a lot if you don't keep up. Again, you'll want always do tutorials and go to labs.

Computers and Society is a class that kind of changes every year, some people like it and some people don't. It's very difficult to do badly in it, so i'll leave it up to yis to form your own opinion.

Programming project is just... well that. You use a language very similar to java so don't worry about having to learn two.

Digital Logic Design is one of the most complained about subjects, and probably the "hardest". It's taught by Brian Coghlan and is a subject that is very easy to find yourself falling behind, mostly because it's so different to anything most of ye would have learned before. You will have labs in this at some point which are so much fun you can only fit them in a giant black briefcase. You will need to get the book for this. It was mentioned earlier in the thread, but you cannot pass this subject if you don't read Mano.

I think that about covers it, hopefully I'll see you all during freshers week. I'll be at the stand for DUCSS (the computer science society) for a fair amount of the week, which you should all join. Once you do we'll get you all set up on irc so you can chat to us (don't worry, we're all not as bad as lethal_bullet), and don't be afraid to ask questions! We were all there at one point so most of us will be glad to help.

Most importantly, have fun (also ignore SlyNeko, she's tripping balls most of the time). She's right though, if you're having any troubles with course stuff, feel free to ask one of us. You'll generally find me asleep on the couch in our society room, or on IRC.

edit: NUTSAC

Unregistered. · 23-08-2011 08:43PM

SlyNeko wrote: »

....don't sleaze super hard on the girls...there is a lot of that in CS unfortunately... >_<

Hahahahahaha

spacedave · 23-08-2011 11:06PM

ALRI PRICKNECKS

Join the computer science society, we're the bestest. But don't interact with the members, most of them are now socially inept and will bite strangers.

Risco50 · 30-08-2011 09:43PM

Incoming first year here, staying in the halls, cant wait to start CS, is the craic as good as im told at trinity?

ED E · 30-08-2011 09:53PM

Cya on the halls Freshers weekend. Will be blaring out tunes with TFM

conzy · 30-08-2011 10:04PM

Do the coursework and labs and pay attention in DLD.. And try really hard to pass the exams first time rounds, repeats are woeful

thysol · 31-08-2011 10:44AM

SlyNeko wrote: »

-Last but not least....don't sleaze super hard on the girls...there is a lot of that in CS unfortunately... >_<

What do you mean by that?

Dr D wrote: »

Programming project is just... well that. You use a language very similar to java so don't worry about having to learn two.

Crap, I hate Java. I'm more the C/C#/C++ guy. Do you not have a choice yourself what programming language you are going to use? I once did a Java tutorial but I gave up on it because for some reason I couldn't cope with it. I hope that at Trinity I will finally get my head around Java, but I'm kinda worried that I don't.

BTW, will there be some stuff about GPGPU? I heard Trinity has some nice Nvidia Tesla Workstations.:D

SlyNeko · 31-08-2011 12:26PM

Unfortunately, you don't have a choice of what language you do in first year. You'll pick up Java in no time. The lecturers assume you have no programming experience. You'll be grand if you have C# under your belt, as a lot of it carries over.

thysol · 31-08-2011 12:36PM

SlyNeko wrote: »

Unfortunately, you don't have a choice of what language you do in first year. You'll pick up Java in no time. The lecturers assume you have no programming experience. You'll be grand if you have C# under your belt, as a lot of it carries over.

I hope so. I'll see when the time comes, if I have problems with Java then I hope I can ask people from the Computer Society for help.:) You didn't answer my other question though:

SlyNeko wrote: »

-Last but not least....don't sleaze super hard on the girls...there is a lot of that in CS unfortunately... >_<

What do you mean?

tabouli · 31-08-2011 01:10PM

There probably won't be many girls in your class, only four in mine. I think what the other poster is saying is that you shouldn't act inappropriately towards them... common sense really but it can happen

shanefitz360 · 31-08-2011 06:49PM

thysol wrote: »

Crap, I hate Java. I'm more the C/C#/C++ guy.

You really shouldn't be worried about Java if you have OOP down with the likes of C++ and especially C#. Don't be worrying yourself too much ha. Java is used to teach the concepts of OOP more than to actually learn the advanced uses of Java.

In my experience, it is taught very slowly anyway, and even the people who find it extremely tough eventually get their heads around it with a small about of practice. If you are vaguely familiar with the three you just mentioned, then you will be well ahead of the average fresher and are just thinking too much into things. Relax

dylanka · 31-08-2011 07:58PM

Imma Incoming first year, and I cannot wait

TR033 - Computer Science

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