CS 3330

Venkat, a haiku:

exams on steroids |
getting TA help: cheating |
just suffer - Venkat

I was told things as a BACS major would get better after 2150. Spoiler alert: they did not. This class is incredibly frustrating, much due to the fact that we switched professors in the middle of the semester. The two professors have completely different methods of teaching and content. This was very hard to adjust to because the entire course structure changed. Even more so, I've witnessed on more than one occasion one professor coming up to the other to tell him he was wrong about some point and they would argue about it! If the professors themselves can't even agree on a correct answer or method for a problem, how are we expected to know? Furthermore, TAs themselves are not familiar with the new course material that the new professor has brought in and because of this, they often tell us that they do not know the answer or cannot help us. This is not at all their faults but leads to an incredibly frustrating situation where we as students don't know what's going on, can't get help from the TAs because they were never taught this, can't use the textbook as a resource because the new course material does not go off it (though the first half of the course did), and therefore have literally no frame of reference as even the professor himself frequently makes mistakes and only catches them when students point them out! What makes this even more ridiculous is that the professor prefaces every problem with saying "it's so obvious, so easy" which is so patronizing and clearly not the case since pretty much everyone is beyond lost in his class.
tl;dr this class wack

If you love yourself as a person in any way, please do not sign up for this class with Venkat.
#1 - He makes numerous mistakes while going over in-class examples, which is extremely frustrating when rewatching the lectures in attempts to learn the material, because
#2 - he goes through the material insanely quick in class. He breezes through crucial concepts within a minute.
#3 - Assigning problem sets worth 15% of our grade, IN ADDITION to homework AND labs is outrageous. The majority of my week is dedicated to TA office hours, which brings me to
#4 - Venkat has voiced his disapproval that students have been using the TAs for help on the problem sets. Students should not be held accountable for the fact that TAs give them the answers because even the TAs do not know how to solve the problem sets.
I signed up to be taught by Reiss, and am extremely disheartened that this is not the case.

we are given insanely hard problem sets and topics which TA's are unable to help us with, and we are told working with other students on problem sets is cheating. feeling hopeless upset and frustrated.

While I think Professor Venkat is intelligent and is passionate about Computer Architecture, he is a poor lecturer. He moves quickly along complicated topics, just scribbling on his lecture slides in his illegible handwriting. He explains course material in an extremely vague manner. He assigns extremely hard problem sets on top of the labs and homework, which makes this course way more difficult. Venkat also just assumes that the moment he explains it once, you will automatically understand it. This class requires you to teach yourself material which is difficult when you don't have a textbook or TAs for help (since Venkat is teaching material new to the TAs). I definately spent more time teaching myself the material than learning from Venkat, and I attended every lecture, did every assignment and went to every lab. Overall, I think this class is disorganized and has caused more stress than actual learning. I am disappointed in the department for switching the professor and the course material midway through the semester and I think that this did the students a great disservice. If no other sections are open, and you have to choose between dropping the CS major and taking a class with this professor, I would drop the major hands down.

Welcome to the course forum review for AsHiSh VeNkAt. Take a seat and lemme summarize you some things about vEnKaT with a growing list of what this guy really is: .................

1) Apparently asking Teacher ASSISTANTS for ASSISTANCE violated some fucking rule of Venkat's 10 commandments and apparently doesn't know how Office Hours works. Petty the way he is, he docked everyone that asked the TA FIVE POINTS off of a Problem Set which brings the majority of people down to an automatic 83% on what was an already shitty problem set. -----------------

2) His slides itself are already shitty enough, I had to look at Reiss's old slides and lecture to do Memory HW and was able to do it with the help of Reiss's slides. Like other reviews have already said: a) His handwriting is some ass, b) he makes mistakes the majority of the time, c) talks fast so you have no idea what the actual shit he is saying, d) his lecture slides are ass compared to Reiss's who actually shows step by step processes (because apparantely, according to Venkat's words, we can't have our "hands held") -----------------

3) Don't even get me started with the HORRID, ATROCIOUS, DISGUSTING PROBLEM SETS. WHO IN THE RIGHT MIND SAID TRADING THE QUIZZES FOR THE PROBLEM SETS WAS A FAIR TRADE?? Like at least the quizzes were manageable since we actually had the resources with the textbook and the slides to do the quizzes. But these problem sets ... THESE PROBLEM SETS ... I have no words for how absolutely difficult these problem sets are, with the fact that the slides dont do SHIT as a resource for helping you on the problem set. Again, being the petty guy he is, he adds the honor code because he thought asking help from TAs was considered cheating. It's literally like he doesn't want students to do well on his problem set and hurts his egotistical conscience. AND YET, PEOPLE are STILL collaborating on these problem sets and being the oblivious guy he is, he will never get a single hint of it if he himself has never been to office hours in Stacks. -----------------

4) I went to lecture a few times ever since Venkat started teaching because I found myself to be wasting my time. I went to check how many people come to class and I was not surprised at all by the turnout.
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5) The average on the second exam made by his truly was a 48%. Not much to explain with this average that is less than a 50% lmao. Also said the exam would be just like the problem sets we did (CLEARLY, they were not). He also assigned a new problem set saying that part of the problem set that was JUST assigned would also be on the test. I guessed my way through the entire exam and somehow managed to get above the average, kinda goes to show how terribly wrong this exam is. -----------------

6) Terrible lecturer. His lectures are on Panopto and are probably public. If not, ask for someone in this class and you'll understand. -----------------

7) Honestly feel bad for the TA's because they can't even do their job because Venkat won't even help the TA's ... it's quite disappointing. -----------------

8) Venkat started teaching after the drop deadline was passed, so that really shafted a lot of people . -----------------

9) Somebody puts these assignments on Chegg and Venkat either knows, doesnt know, or just ignores it lol, even though he went ham about the honor code ..................... EDIT: I just took the final and , NOT TO MY SURPRISE AT ALL, was devastating

Venkat is getting paid 150k while Charles Reiss is only getting 90K.... Venkat must be on the cusp of winning the Turing Prize then because his teaching and attitude are abysmal. #HORRIBLE