CS 1110

Pettit just seems like a chill guy, and you can really tell he cares. He is very good at simplifying concepts to make them more understandable. However, the quizzes and final seemed to me to be rather poorly written, they are all on paper and the process of doing them is rather disconnected from any real-world coding.

I had no experience with Python coding before this class and I would say that this class wasn't that bad. The only thing that sucked were the quizzes. The first four were super easy and I thought I would be fine, but then I swear the last couple were soooo hard. The quizzes and the final test on the nitty gritty stuff about coding. I studied a lot for the final, but it did not go as I hoped. I think that it would benefit to go to office hours (I didn't so that was probably my bad), but if you want to email a professor it will probably not be answered for a while. Your best bet is to post on Piazza and I bet someone will answer pretty fast.

Pettit is a really cool guy and a good professor, but the other professors also post their lectures so you can watch those if his lectures don't click with you.

Make sure you try to complete the programming assignments as fast as possible because you get extra credit for turning them in. Also, if you have to fix it after it is graded make sure you fix it (check gradescope frequently). The programming assignments are a big part of the grade. So, I would recommend taking this course since it is a good introduction to coding, but keep in mind it's not an easy A. The course requires some effort mostly if you have no experience coding.
#tCCF23

This is a weed-out class, I recommend taking this class if you have an interest in CS. I thought I was going to be a CS major, but I had no prior knowledge of it and honestly i didn't really care for it but for some reason that's what I wanted. Pettit is a great professor; he really tries and makes the lectures as interesting as he can, it was the only way i even got through the class, but I found I pretty quick I didn't care for it. All lectures are recorded so while attendance isn't really mandatory, he does check-ins through an app. I also recommend doing this class with a friend for moral support. Refrain from cheating or copying code because they do from what I've heard and seen crack down on it. There's a coding assignment every week and the earlier you turn the assignment in then you'll get extra-cred. There's lab every week and you have to do an assignment, I hated labs cuz i didn't know how to code and the TA's are no help. Also, half the class knows how to code while the other half doesn't. All quizzes including the final are on paper, there's six quizzes and your allowed one retake. For the final project you have to build a game, it was very stressful especially when you still have no idea how to code. Office Hours are your best friend, make sure to go as soon as possible because the queue gets very long and they can't help much when that happens. There's a good amount of resources to help you learn and there's a website to answer any questions you may have. I ended up completely failing the final and as you get into the course the quizzes get harder. the class was frustrating but not horrible, besides office hours i didn't use any extra resources and I didn't care to learn more. It's not one of those courses that's praying on your downfall so if you put just a little effort you can pass with a good grade.

As someone who didn’t have any experience with coding going into this class, I didn’t think it was too bad at all. It doesn’t really matter which professor you take it with because the grading with all the professors is the same and access to the recordings of all professors are provided. I didn’t do great on the in-class quizzes (I found the 2nd and 3rd ones to be kind of difficult), but still managed a high A by doing good on everything else. It’s pretty easy to get an A on all of the at-home multiple choice quizzes by testing things in pycharm, and the at-home coding exercises were also pretty fair. Here are my main tips for this class:

1) TURN THE PAs in EARLY: You’re able to earn 3% extra credit for turning in the PAs 2 days early and 1.5% for 1 day early and I would highly highly recommend taking advantage of this. The PAs are weighted as 36% of your grade so if you’re able to have an average around 103%, this will give you a lot of cushion in other categories such as the in-class quizzes.
2) Utilize office hours! Lines for office hours are oftentimes long, but I think it was usually worth it to get help with anything you can’t figure out yourself in the PAs/the final project. I found that going in with your code at least partially started was a lot more effective than going in blind (the TAs aren’t very much help then).

#tCFfall22

This class is definitely a weed out class, and those who tell you otherwise are lying. If you go in with absolutely no prior programing knowledge, it's possible you'll have a hard time. Petit was a good professor, although he often didn't go to the greatest lengths explaining certain concepts in lectures. TA's were largely unhelpful in office hours, and the office hours themselves also had a bunch of people waiting for help every time I would go. There are one homework assignment and one 5-question online quiz once a week. A few exams/tests in-person. The final project was to design a game that met certain criteria and it took me way too much time and was a pretty big pain honestly. If you have coding experience and are especially passionate and determined do excel in CS, you'll be fine. Petit is a good choice

I took AP CS A and principles in high school but not the ap test so keep that in mind! was hoping to see if i would want to major in cs and I think this was a good class to determine that. high school was java and cs 1110 uses python but they were very similar, especially in logic. I thought this class was easy and I loved the final assignment of making a game (i was lucky enough to have a partner I liked though!). Prof Pettit was great, he answered my questions, was approachable, and as long as u can explain what ur doing (even if its not the way he taught) he's ok with it. I think a lot of his education/research is in teaching CS which I thought was cool/relatable to his style of teaching. I think some of my friends wished he did more examples in class to help understand the logic I had practice with in high school which is understandable since this was their first time encountering CS. I wish the exams were part online and part on paper bc right now they are all on paper which helps confirm u know the code and logic but the computer does help you problem solve realistically. if u took cs and want a refresher, I learned a new coding language more in depth and solidified what I already knew so I would take this!

I took this class as a pre-req for the cognitive science major, and while I learned a lot, I will never be taking a CS class again. Professor Pettit is an awesome lecturer and nice guy, but by the end of the class I was in such confusion and the class was going so fast so it may have left a poor impression on me. I genuinely believe this class is a great introduction class for people that already have a background in CS, but going in cold is really hard and you'll probably need significant help with homework and assignments. It is definitely no joke of a class, so don't go into it thinking that unless you have an extensive background in CS. I managed to get an A, but it was with a significant amount of aid from TA's and it will take a lot of time outside of class to get a good grade starting from scratch.

I LOVE THIS CLASS. Professor Pettit is really nice (but if you don't vibe with him for whatever reason all the professors post their lectures online, so you can watch one of theirs instead). This class really starts all the way from the beginning so it's very accessible, and you don't need to worry if you have no prior CS knowledge. I had a bit from high school which helped but I learned so much new stuff in this class.

If you like solving puzzles, you'll probably like this class, because that's basically what all the assignments were. There's a lot of opportunities for extra credit through the weekly assignments that can bump up your grade (the average for the second midterm was Not Great but they did curve). The labs are also basically graded on attendance/completion, as long as you attempt them in class. The project wasn't bad either, since you can also get extra credit on that for turning it in early, as long as you follow the requirements. The quizzes are also grade boosters because they're open note. I also HIGHLY recommend going through AS MANY practice tests as you can in order to study for the test, because they're very helpful and the most recent ones often have very similar questions. Almost nobody read the textbook, but I did find it helpful to go over before class so I wasn't jumping into the lessons blindly. Overall, this class was really interesting, the workload was very reasonable, and I learned a lot. Definitely take this class if you think you might be interested in learning CS at all.

Take this class. Like seriously just take it. It is the easiest class I have ever taken and will ACTUALLY teach you about programming. Grading is done based on weekly Programming assignments (EASY and TA help available), weekly open note quizzes (EASY), 2 midterms, 1 project, and 1 final. Overall as long as you pay attention in class you will do well and the professor actually wants to help and cares about his students. All in all - JUST TAKE THE CLASS!!!! #tCFspring2022

Prof Pettit is really good at keeping the lectures interesting and he does a good job at making the harder concepts easier to understand. As far as the class itself, the exams will be harder than they make it seem and they are on paper, so it's different than writing code on your computer. It is important that you take all the practice exams and make sure you thoroughly understand all the material. Also, I heard of several instances where people copied other people's code and subsequently got in trouble for it. It is okay to collaborate to get an idea of how to do an assignment, but make sure that you do not copy other people's code directly. What is nice about this class is that the homework assignments and attending lab are worth a nice portion of your grade, so as long as you do well with these than you can afford to not do as well on the exams.

Prof Pettit is a great professor and person! He tries to make the class as interesting as possible by cracking dad jokes and is always available to answer questions/listen to your concerns. This class was significantly more difficult than I thought it would be, though. As someone who went into the class with minimal, if any, programming knowledge, I had to spend a significant amount of time outside of class understanding and completing the weekly programming assignments. The 2 midterms + final are EXTREMELY difficult as you have to code on paper, but the class as a whole is graded very fairly (weekly programming assignments are worth 35% of your grade and all 3 exams together are worth 25%).

This class is a great introduction to Python. I have three lessons that I learned after taking this class:

1. The exams (2 midterms and a final) are terribly designed and terribly written. You have to handwrite code and evaluate code that in no way judges your own programming capability. So, study the nitty-gritty things like value types, the nuances of loops, and other fundamentals of Python before the exam. Regardless of how well you think you understand Python, your ability to do the assignments or the labs is NOT an indicator of your success on the exams.
2. Do not prioritize a professor or a time slot; all the recordings are posted online! You can watch them anytime in high quality and at 1.5x speed. Professor Pettit's recordings are particularly stellar.
3. I should not have to say this, but do not share code or collaborate with others on assignments. It is not from my own personal experience, but from hearing the stories of others who were caught. Each person's program is unique in style and format. So, it is very easy to spot unusual similarities. It is never worth it to cheat, especially at UVA with the honor code. Please, please, please do your own honest work because many of those who did not were caught.

This is a really great course for those who want to get into programming but have little to no background knowledge in it. The course begins at the barest of basics, but by the end, you'll have all the skills you need to program a game as advanced as Pac-Man or the original Mario. There are weekly programming assignments that range from do-in-your-sleep easy to tear-your-hair-out complex. The exams were notably difficult as you have to program on paper, so there's no trial and error that using an IDE would allow you to. Labs were probably the worst part of the class. They were graded on attendance, but the actual programming you had to do was unnecessarily difficult and awkward as you have to do it with another partner. I didn't take much away from the labs, but the actual classes taught by Pettit were helpful.

Professor Pettit is a great and nice professor that genuinely cares for what he teaches. He explains the core concepts very well and I went from knowing virtually nothing about coding to creating a whole video game by the end of the semester. He also has a certain charm that makes lectures pretty enjoyable, even though you don't really need to go as he posts the recordings online. While some of the exams were somewhat difficult, as long as you do the PA's, you should be able to get an A in the class. They also give you extra credit if you submit the PA 48 hours before it is due (they post it a week before its due), which is a bonus.
The one thing I will say is that the labs were very awkward. Most of the work is done in partners, which ends up usually with one person doing all the work and the other being completely lost as there's not a very concise way to have two people work on the same code together. They felt like the labs were always either super helpful or a waste of time.

By far one of my favorite professors at UVA. I have never taken a CS course before and he made the class so enjoyable and now Im thinking of minoring in CS. Raymond and the TAs were very helpful with all of the assignments and always brought a lot of energy to class and seemed to really enjoy the content they taught. I always got grades back for assignments and exams within 2 days of ocmpletion. I really recommend this class to anyone who is interested in learning more about CS.

#tCFspring2021 If you have any experience coding please take the placement exam before enrolling. For me, I missed the deadline to sign up for the placement so I kind of wasted my time taking this class since I already knew most of the material. Either way, the class is what you would expect from an intro to CS class, you watch lectures, do lab work, and have programming assignments (& tests&quizzes but they are very easy). For my semester the professors teach together in their lectures and they were asynchronous, which was very nice.

#tCFspring2021
This class was fun and taught me how to code thoroughly. I received an A+ and I think if you put in work you if you put in work you will get an easy A. the professors were nice and friendly. I sometimes went to the live lectures. I don't know anyone who watched the recorded asynchronous lectures by Dill. The final project wasn't hard and exams were stretched for time but not too difficult. My main complaint about this course is office hours. You would have to wait up to an hour to speak to a TA in office hours, and they often wouldn't know how to help you if you had a problem that wasn't standard. Additionally, Labs were so bad. It is hard to code with a partner and we were required to have a partner during lab. It made learning much more difficult and not enjoyable. Especially since there was usually an imbalance of knowledge (one knew more about code and was teaching the other). Homeworks were not hard.

Highly recommend taking this course with Prof. Pettit even if you have just the slightest interest in learning some coding. There is a bit of a steep learning curve at the start (esp. if you have zero prior coding experience), but coding is kind of fun once you get a feel for how it works. Definitely start early on the PA homework assignments so that you have time to get help in office hours, which I also highly suggest going to. I took this course online during the summer, so he switched up how testing works compared to his in-person classes. Our 'tests' were verbal 'walkthroughs,' where you talk out the logic behind some of your PAs & the TA asks you some questions. Pretty chill and much easier than his normal in-person paper/pencil exams. Most people get an A or A- as long as stuff is turned in on time.

I took this class over the summer and loved it. The lectures are long and time consuming but helpful for the homework. The PAs take a while so do not leave them for the last minute and be sure to use office hours!

I took this class to see if CS was a thing I could pursue in the future as a career (I'm currently pre-med majoring in bio), and after taking this class, I am 100% sure that I will not be pursuing CS ever again. Nothing was wrong with lecture or the professor, I just hated it. CS is a very important skill to learn and I'm glad I took it for the experience, but this is the first and last cs class I'm ever taking. It is like learning a new language and solving a very hard puzzle. Pettit was a good prof to have and cracks dad jokes all the time, making class more enjoyable, but even then, half the class never goes to lecture (everything is recorded and posted).

Doesn't matter who you're professor is for 1110 everything is the same. Pettit is kind of funny with his dad jokes. Barely anyone attends lecture. Work hard on PAs and try to not miss any points. 60% of the grade is easy enough to get 100%. The other 40% is the 3 exams which are slightly difficult, work hard and work out the practice exams and you'll be fine.