I have done the darwin's world project before except it was called critter world or something. From what I can remember it was almost exactly the same except there were more instructions. I did it in java and our professor provided a skeleton for us so all we had to write was an interpreter. I remember in that class he also provided a graphical simulator where we can actually see all the little critters (species) move around and attack each other. They all had different colors and I think all the critters were shaped as a triangle.
I've been looking around in my free time for a little bit to pick a paper to write a blog about, but I haven't had a chance to find a good that was related to the class. Did anyone have any luck with this?
Now I feel like we are really going deep into the details of c++, I'm not sure how much of it is related object oriented programming as the class name suggests. It seems like we are going more into design tradeoffs between java and c++. I still think it is useful, since I didn't know most of the stuff before. I'm just really looking forward to thanksgiving at this point, and hope everyone had a safe Halloween.
Sunday, October 30, 2011
Sunday, October 23, 2011
Weekly Blog #8
I didn't feel too good about the test at the end. After checking I think I got most of it correct, including the destructors but at the time of the test I didn't feel confident and felt like I was guessing the whole time.
The grades projects I think took a lot longer than I expected, there was a lot of formatting issues and many small changes to make to fit the consensus.
I just read the next project and it seems interesting, I've done a similar project before where the creatures behave in similar ways. I can't believe the semester is almost coming to an end, I definitely did learn a lot from this class and it was worth my time. I honestly picked this class randomly to get another cs upper division and feel like it was a great decision and would recommend others to take it.
I still have not grown an appreciation for unit tests however. I still think the same way as I did before, I don't think they are all that useful. One exception to that might be, when I change code to cover a corner case, I might be changing an important invariant in the code, which can be checked quickly through a unit test. However, I haven't had that problem with the projects in this class as I think they are pretty-small scale, so for this class, I feel like I had to write a lot of units compared to what they are worth.
Acceptance are a little bit better, but it wasn't that enjoyable to do it if we had to write a complex program for it. I thought they were useful if they were quick to write. Usually I didn't find too many bugs after writing the unit tests.
The grades projects I think took a lot longer than I expected, there was a lot of formatting issues and many small changes to make to fit the consensus.
I just read the next project and it seems interesting, I've done a similar project before where the creatures behave in similar ways. I can't believe the semester is almost coming to an end, I definitely did learn a lot from this class and it was worth my time. I honestly picked this class randomly to get another cs upper division and feel like it was a great decision and would recommend others to take it.
I still have not grown an appreciation for unit tests however. I still think the same way as I did before, I don't think they are all that useful. One exception to that might be, when I change code to cover a corner case, I might be changing an important invariant in the code, which can be checked quickly through a unit test. However, I haven't had that problem with the projects in this class as I think they are pretty-small scale, so for this class, I feel like I had to write a lot of units compared to what they are worth.
Acceptance are a little bit better, but it wasn't that enjoyable to do it if we had to write a complex program for it. I thought they were useful if they were quick to write. Usually I didn't find too many bugs after writing the unit tests.
Sunday, October 16, 2011
Weekly Blog #7
Man we are starting pretty late on the project for this one. I think we just had bad schedules that didn't work out this time. We haven't really done much and hoping to get most of it done tomorrow and the following day.
I hope the next test will not have a question like the first question from the last time. But I may need to make more use of my cheat sheet this time in case those random facts appear in the test.
I feel like we are really getting into a lot of the nuances of the languages now, I'm really starting to lose track where I am sometimes. I feel like before much of the behaviors in the language made sense, but some of these, I don't know the reason behind the decisions, so I'm not up to date on all the semantics of the language. Hopefully by the time the exam this Friday I can get everything straightened out.
I just glanced at the calendar and was surprised at how far we are into the semester and I feel like it is almost over. Definitely have learned a lot this semester so far, and I'm looking forward to some other interesting things that we will get to learn.
I also appreciate the fact that are forced to use c++, because that is the language we are not introduced to in this school. I'm the type who wants to learn but won't do it if i don't have do, so I think if we were given the option to choose between java and c++ then I would have picked java. I think there are definitely useful things in c++ and I always wanted to get familiar with the stl containers in c++.
I hope the next test will not have a question like the first question from the last time. But I may need to make more use of my cheat sheet this time in case those random facts appear in the test.
I feel like we are really getting into a lot of the nuances of the languages now, I'm really starting to lose track where I am sometimes. I feel like before much of the behaviors in the language made sense, but some of these, I don't know the reason behind the decisions, so I'm not up to date on all the semantics of the language. Hopefully by the time the exam this Friday I can get everything straightened out.
I just glanced at the calendar and was surprised at how far we are into the semester and I feel like it is almost over. Definitely have learned a lot this semester so far, and I'm looking forward to some other interesting things that we will get to learn.
I also appreciate the fact that are forced to use c++, because that is the language we are not introduced to in this school. I'm the type who wants to learn but won't do it if i don't have do, so I think if we were given the option to choose between java and c++ then I would have picked java. I think there are definitely useful things in c++ and I always wanted to get familiar with the stl containers in c++.
Sunday, October 9, 2011
Weekly Blog #6
The allocator project was pretty simple, but had trouble testing for boundary cases. I just had to manually look into to the a[n] array to make sure that it was working correctly. But besides that it seemed pretty simple, I'm enjoying the book, seems to explain everything pretty well except I don't really care for some of the languages and since I've never seen the syntax for those languages before sometimes its not perfectly clear and I have to stare at it for a while. Even when I eventually figure it out, I don't really get much out of it.
I was looking into some AI algorithm because I'm doing a senior design project on augmented reality checker application for android. I read some articles and found out (this was a while ago) that checkers has been solved and there are AIs which are completely unbeatable (that AI playing against each other will result in draw). I read to more about it recently and read about how chess is still under research for the optimal solution and shogi (a japanese chess) is an even harder problem to solve due to some interesting moves that are possible with some pieces. Then read that one of the most difficult board game problem to solve is go (originated from China). The rules are amazingly simply but room for strategy is humongous. I used to play back in korea, it was pretty big there, but no one really plays here.
Does anyone play? I recently looked around and found a server that hosts go games, let me know if you play :) http://www.gokgs.com/applet.jsp
Sunday, October 2, 2011
Weekly Blog #5
I'm glad we are getting to doing some cool OOP stuff now. I think I'm finally getting used school schedule now after the first round of midterms.
I haven't had a look at the assignment just yet, but I don't think it'll be too difficult, but then again I know there are unit tests and acceptance tests to write, as well as documentation, so it won't be too simple.
I think there has to be more testing this time since we don't have sphere to kind of use as a check this time. So the acceptance tests and unit test from classmates will be more valuable now compared to the previous assignments.
I plan on trying out writing unit tests before the actual testing, I still haven't done this before and it looks like it'll prove to be pretty useful now.
The book is getting into stuff that I didn't know so well before, and class materials are beginning to be completely new stuff. I feel like before I knew most of the stuff and just got reinforced with some new information, but now it seems most of it is new to me, and I'm glad I'm getting a lot out of it.
I haven't had a look at the assignment just yet, but I don't think it'll be too difficult, but then again I know there are unit tests and acceptance tests to write, as well as documentation, so it won't be too simple.
I think there has to be more testing this time since we don't have sphere to kind of use as a check this time. So the acceptance tests and unit test from classmates will be more valuable now compared to the previous assignments.
I plan on trying out writing unit tests before the actual testing, I still haven't done this before and it looks like it'll prove to be pretty useful now.
The book is getting into stuff that I didn't know so well before, and class materials are beginning to be completely new stuff. I feel like before I knew most of the stuff and just got reinforced with some new information, but now it seems most of it is new to me, and I'm glad I'm getting a lot out of it.
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