CS 1110

Prof Dill is enthusiastic and overall a great teacher

Dill is a horrible professor; I recommend skipping his lectures and watching Tychoneveich's videos instead. I also found TA office hours to be helpful most of the time, unless you get a bad TA. Dill also has a habit of making off color remarks about women vs men in CS, and women in general. Overall, he was unhelpful at best and mildly creepy at worst.

Craig Dill is the most inconsiderate and least compationate person I have ever encountered. He is beyond unhelpful. His lectures are boring. He's a horrible professor who couldn't teach if he tried. If you have him do not bother going to lecture...you will learn absolutely nothing.

The class is pretty easy at first but ramps up quickly towards the last third of the semester. I wouldn't recommend Dill for the class- right at the end of the semester I discovered one of Brunelle's videos on Panopto and immediately saw a huge difference in the quality and clarity of his lectures as opposed to Dill. Reading the textbook is helpful- there are some good examples in there for topics you need to know. Lab is a fun part of this course, and I often looked forward to it, but would not recommend Dill as his lectures don't really help you and his "tech grandpa" vibe is a little weird at times.

Professor Dill is very fun and approachable and he adds tons of comment in his lecture program so that you can review it easily after class. He doesn't write on board and simply talks through his program, but i find it very helpful (better than skipping lecture and try to read the program by myself without his interpretation) Homework counts 48% and 3 tests count 13% each. The class is fairly graded and it would be a good intro to simply learn about CS or want to get a CS major.

Extremely nice guy but his teaching and lectures weren't clear. I do not recommend taking him for this class.

Dill is a nice enough guy, but I learned nothing from his lectures, and stopped going entirely by mid-October 2018, except for exams. Everything I learned in this course was on my own, through trial-and-error and reading. Take it with a different professor, or don't take the course.

This class was what inspired me to become as CS minor, but it certainly had nothing to do with the professor. Craig Dill is a very sweet man but eternally boring. By the end of the semester about thirty people showed up to lecture (and less on Fridays). The lecture may be completely useless, but it was still a very helpful class. I went into this with no coding experience, so the first few PA's (programming assignments) were somewhat difficult, but after paying attention in lab, asking more experienced friends, and going to a few TA office hours, I came out ahead of the game. I would highly recommend doing the PA's early, just in case they take longer than you expect. Being able to sleep on my code actually led to me waking up with a new algorithm idea that ended up being functionally correct. The game project is as hard as you make it, so choosing a partner who will pull their own weight (this requires them being on the same level as you so that they understand your code) is crucial. Again, getting ahead on the game project so you can focus on your other finals is also crucial. The tests were very similar to the practice tests (take and retake these--they are very helpful). I can't stress this enough: If you're confused on something basic, make sure you understand it before you have to learn more complicated stuff! This was what allowed me to get a good grade in this class.

This class is not hard if you are willing to teach coding completely to yourself. Dill is the worst lecturer because instead of coding along with you he reads from premed powerpoint that he posts anyway. His study guides for the tests are pretty helpful, but I learned the most in lab and by doing the PA assignments weekly in this class. I would watch the other professor's recorded lectures instead of Dill's because they were way more coherent. Dill is a super nice guy and will help you if you seek him out, but it is very confusing as he reads through powerpoint made a long time ago.

Overall, a pretty easy class if you're into programming. It was easy to not attend lecture but still catch up on the material. It really got me to fall in love with CS!