CS 3240

Don't even get me started with this class! I would rather transfer to Tech, take their software engineering class for 1 semester, and transfer back to complete my degree. I've never been so frustrated with a class in my life. I don't know who started to say this class was another 2110 because I actually learned something in 2110. 3240 is simply ridiculous. Every single aspect of this class sucked and I will talk about everything. LECTURE + MATERIAL: God awful. I've never encountered lectures this useless in my life. This class should really be a 1000 level STS class or something. I don't even know why it has prereqs. To make matters worse, Mary Smith is the worst lecturer in the University. It's not like I can learn anything from the material , so I guess it doesn't really matter who teaches it. EXAMS: Literal regurgitation of the slides. Anyone with the damn time to memorize this shit can pull off an A, but no real CS major has the time! Each exam consists of 5-7 lectures, each with 25-40 slides.... and she'll literally ask you to list the 12 principles of design or the 8 keys to teamwork. it was bullshit. I guarantee you that Mary Smith can't even take her own tests. STRUCTURE: You walk into lecture, she reads off the 100 bullet points on her slides and you go do your Python Data Structures HW. What is so "Advanced Software" about that? Some of them had reports and those were graded extremely arbitrarily. I can't believe the TAs that graded these take this class seriously. Oh, you also don't get ANY of your homework grades back until a month after you turn in your LAST homework... so if you made a recurring mistake, you're screwed. PROJECT: Smith is a fucking hypocrite. Chapter 7, Principles that Guide Practice-"The single overriding goal of software engineering practice is to deliver on-time, high-quality, operational software". DUH FUQ? ON TIME. I still don't know what I got on the final project, but I magically have my course grade on sis. We were promised grades and feedback long ago. Way to be ON TIME. She completely ditched Piazza too (maintenance and customer satisfaction my ass) and doesn't respond to any of our emails. I honestly hope it's because she got fired. The project was alright because I got to learn Django, but it was extremely stressful. If you've never used an MVC Framework, it takes a while to pick up. Teams are random and you'll be surprised how many people don't give a shit about their grades. The textbook is horrific. I don't even know how it got published! Do not buy the book. You don't need it. INSTRUCTOR: Smith can be sweet, but she's the worst. Sometimes, I feel like she can't speak English. She constantly avoids questions and doesn't answer anything properly. It takes a huge Piazza rant and a long chain of emails to get 1 simple answer. (just logistical questions - not CS related) On top of that, she doesn't even have a degree in computer science. (basically, can't really help you with CS either) What was the department thinking when they hired her?!? She doesn't know anything!!!! OVERALL: Smith is a nice person, but this class is just unacceptable. I came to this University to learn and I can't believe I'm paying $30k to deal with this. Everything is given back late. Grading is arbitrary and late. We get magical grades weeks after the end of the semester. The curriculum is complete trash. THERE NEEDS TO BE REAL CHANGES MADE ABOUT THIS CLASS. I would tell you to stay away from this class, but it's unfortunately required for all BSCS and CpE majors. I apologize about some of the unprofessional comments. I've honestly never been so frustrated by a class. Nothing in this class is "Advanced" and everything we learned contradicts "Software Development Techniques". This class ATTEMPTS to teach you common sense, coding, and teamwork; something you should've learned in CS 1110.

So this class is awful, but I think the anger is misguided. Mary is actually an extremely kind professor who is willing to help out if you need it. She's not a fantastic lecturer but I found her engaging enough. I would certainly take a different, more interesting class with her. Where this class falls apart is the material and organization. Frankly, the material is kind of just a waste. The methodology of making good software should be intuitive to anyone far enough in the CS program to take the class, so you won't learn anything useful from the material . Then there's the Django project. I thought the Django project was a huge pain in the butt. Having to deal with a random team was pretty bad. Thinking back, learning how to work with random people was probably the point of the assignment, but it was still frustrating. Learning Django was pretty useful though (Although Django is barely taught in class, you're almost completely on your own). The Django project is worth 40%, so allocate most of your time to it. The rest of your grade is homework (easy), tests (pure memorization), and labs (effort).

Overall, if you're BACS, do not take this class. If you're BSCS, this class will be frustrating but you shouldn't have to put all that much effort in to do well.

Class is actually terrible, basically a worse version of 2110. The Django project is cool but you can't pick your team so it's pretty variable. TA's honestly aren't that helpful, and we got our HW 1 and HW 4 grades back after Thanksgiving... what the heck. I hate this class and everything it stands for. She can't lecture for her life and class attendance is pretty abysmal. So much miscommunication as well... sigh....

This was one of the worst classes I've ever taken. TA's, grading, and expectations were very inconsistent. Lectures were an enormous waste of time and attending lecture had an adverse effect on project progress (since that time could be used for group meetings instead). Django was hardly covered in class even at a high level, so projects seemed hacked together rather than reflecting any sort of I dunno... SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT METHOD!

Test scripts for homeworks were not shared with students and had errors that could have been mitigated they had been shared. For example, I inexplicably received a 40% on a homework before the TA manually graded my work. TA’s on the whole were very understanding and wanted to help make the class better but largely relied on the code they hacked together when they took this miserable excuse for a class. Quizzes and tests were practices in hitting control-F in pdf's and memorizing pointless buzzwords. Absolutely nothing – not even buzzwords for interviews - was gained from them.

It's a big shame that CpE's are required to take this class when much more relevant classes such as algorithms and theory of computation are not required. Instead of frustrations resulting from errors in code, much more of my frustrations came from poor communication from staff and concepts that were never explained.

Where to begin. This is the most bipolar class I've ever taken. On the one hand, the lecture material is dry-as-a-bone lecture slides and Youtube videos (!). Professor Smith seems like a nice person, although clearly she is just going through the motions in lectures. The tests are only passable if you memorize your study guide the hour before the test. Meanwhile, the Django project, which is all the work for half the semester, and the associated tools that are used is actually quite fun and fulfilling. Yes, you are expected to learn the project material on your own, but that is really the whole idea behind CS, right? I can't really recommend this class because of the awful lectures, but it's required in the CS and CpE curricula so I suppose recommendability means very little.

This semester this was taught by both Horton and Smith, and I was assigned to Smith's lecture. I refused to go to her lectures because she is the worst lecturer I've ever encountered, and went to Horton's instead. Eventually, I stopped even going to Horton's. The tests are straight off the slide sets and are about how well you can memorize lists of facts that will never help you in your career. The only interesting part of the course is learning Python, if you haven't already, and learning Django. However, both of those are things you have to teach yourself with absolutely no guidance from the class itself. There was one specifically horrible lab where they didn't tell us ahead of time what we needed to have installed and I spent the whole time trying to troubleshoot installing a library on my computer and didn't even start the lab. There is nothing in this class that you can't learn better on your own or at an internship.

Professor Smith is the worst teacher I have ever had at UVA. I learned nothing from the class. Wait to take it until Professor Horton (or anyone else really) is teaching it.