CS 2150

It's a very difficult course, but Bloomfield is a great professor and you will learn a ton.

I finished all but one post-lab in the lab period and all but one pre-lab in a couple hours the night before. Fairly interesting programs though for the labs.

Bloomfield is a great lecturer. He's enthusiastic about the subject and knows it very well. He's very friendly to talk to, and gives good help/advice.

The class itself is very interesting. The course focus on different types of data structures such as Lists, Trees, Hashes, as well as a few others. You learn how to code these in C++, and implement them in using different examples given in the course. The things you learn in the course will be the core of your CS knowledge, and many place will ask technical questions during job interviews about things you learn in this course.

The lab sections are fairly straightforward - they give you an assignment in lab that isn't due until the Friday after lab.

However, the coursework is pretty heavy. Lab assignments could take anywhere from 2-5 hours, and are very in depth. But I actually found the assignments enjoyable, albeit long, and didn't find them dull. They always kept me thinking about how to do certain tasks, or how to make it faster.

Overall, it's a great course, and I really enjoyed it. It's a hard class, but it's interesting and very rewarding.

Tries to do too much in short time. Bloomfield is a great guy, super smart, charismatic, nice, thoughtful, witty, but he just goes too fast. The jump from 2110 to 2150 is pretty high, especially in the 2nd part of the class. 11 Labs in total, don't mess them up, esp when you get to Labs 6-11. The first five will seem like kid stuff after that. Wasn't as fun as everyone is saying it is, you spend 10+ hours A WEEK on the labs, they don't stop coming. Also you spend most of your time writing lab reports and trying to sound coherent when you know you aren't. Be prepared, this class is not fun.

This class was very tough but it pays for itself. Everything you learn will be applicable to your future CS career. Bloomfield is a great teacher, kind of goes fast, but he's clearly passionate. Just pay close attention in class and you'll be fine. The labs are divided into 3 parts per week and can take quite a lot of time, but again, you are well rewarded for your work!

I had a lot of fun with this course. But here's what I wish I knew before I took this course:
1. Labs are not created equal. They tend to follow a roller coaster pattern. It usually goes from really easy to super time consuming/hard, then back to easy. So make sure you don't procrastinate on the some of the labs...
2. I'd probably take notes on his slides. Print them out, take notes on them. Wish I'd done that as it'd help with studying for tests...

Unfortunately Bloomfield is your only option for 2150 most of the time. He seems so pompous and smug in class, I can't stand it. Be prepared to teach yourself everything. I hate this course so much and you will too. Don't be a CS major, that you wont have to deal this guy. Problem solved.

So I have no idea what the person below me is talking about. Bloomfield teaches you everything you need to know in lecture. Yeah, he doesn't completely define things in the lab write-ups often, which is a pain, but that's because he wants you to figure it out and not to just tell you what to do and have you regurgitate what he tells you. Professor Bloomfield is definitely a wonderful professor and I really enjoyed 2150 this semester. It's a tough class and you'll feel like crying all the time (only slightly joking) but it's worth it. You really are going to learn a lot and this class really is where most of your interview questions will come from so don't snooze. There are three parts to each lab/week: prelab, inlab, post lab. They're TIME consuming but you don't have other 'homework' assignments throughout the semester. You "only" have these three weekly assignments. Go to office hours, especially Sunday for the prelab and Wednesday for the in lab, if you don't finish, or the postlab. Those tend to be less crowded. The TAs for this course are SO WONDERFUL, so use them and Bloomfield's office hours are also really great but there are a lot of people and he has a rotation system where he lets everyone ask a question or two for a few minutes and then goes to someone else so you might have to wait a lot of time before you get to ask a question again but that's just because he genuinely wants people to understand what's going on. The only thing that I really disliked about this course was that often, I felt like large parts of the exams didn't reflect what we were learning but rather he was trying to test us on minute details that he touched upon for only a slide or so. Studying for this class is tough because there's a lot of info but if you watch his lectures, go to lectures, review the slides, review old exams (there are like 7 past ones for each exam you take) and ask questions. Go to class because 5% of your grade is based on attendance. And post/answer on piazza because that apparently gives you a couple booster points. This class is worth it, but it's not easy or to be taken lightly.

This is not an easy course. It's the core curriculum of the CS major, so you cover a lot, and it's rough. But Bloomfield is an excellent professor, and paying attention in lecture and going in for help when you need it will go a long way towards success in this class. The learning curve is a bit steep at the beginning, and once you figure it out, he'll throw something new at you, so don't ever think you can slack off. Start on labs early, or you'll be up late a lot. Exams are hard, but fair, and he curves them up to a reasonable average. Expect this course to take up a lot of time, but it's very doable if you apply yourself.

Bloomfield puts a lot of time and energy into the class, as it's intended to prepare you to take almost all of the more advanced CS courses, and his efforts show in the utter organization of the class. Yes, you will be expected to do plenty of work for the class (15 hours per week is not an exaggeration; it's probably the average), and yes, the format of the class forces you to never fall behind, and yes, the exams are hard, but if you are doing some sort of CS major, the skills and information you learn in CS 2150 are invaluable. It's a tough, manageable class. My advice: Go to the TA office hours and study using old tests.