C

C is evil.

Scheduler

My last project was Scheduler where my program was to take in a starting date of a school quarter, the date a break began, the date it ended, and the days of the week the class met. It was to then print out every class day.

This problem doesn't appear tough but it did give me some problems. I had to rewrite it once in order to take into account certain things I hadn't considered. What ended up giving me the most trouble was when a quarter began in one year and ended the next. I never fully solved this and my program adds one extra day. I ran out of time.

Electron Model

ElectronModel is an idea I have for a small program I am thinking about writing.

Cal

My current assignment is Cal. This is a program that will output a calendar using only formatted text. The user can ask for any year, and also request any square size. That is the months can be formatted to be a grid of 3x4, or 4x3, or 12x1, etc.

I am not allowed to use any array bigger than 12, so pretty much only for month names, and all work is to be done using loops. This will be an interesting project.

Colorize

I have been very busy with homework so I haven't even had time to write about it here. The first project for my Java class was Colorize. It involved reading a Java file and turning it into a colored, formatted html file using a finite state machine. It was due on Tuesday at midnight, and I started Sunday. I spent all afternoon, probably 1pm to 11pm working on it and editing and debugging it was very frustrating. On Monday I decided to rewrite the entire thing. I set up the ground structure Monday and wrote most of it Tuesday afternoon and evening. All programming should g that way. Stuff just worked! Because my design was better I was able to add functionality without messing up anything else and I was able to easily debug because I knew where the problem was. I worked right up until about 11:45pm, but I wasn't rushed.

I am not sure I like programming using finite state machines. It seems a step backwards from using methods and objects. I want to say "here is an algorithm I will run many times, I will put it in a method, but that is not how one uses finite state machines. On the other hand I think it would be very difficult to write this program without using finite state machines.

Programming and Math

So I had an assignment for my math class to decode an affine cipher. This basically means taking each letter, converting it to a number, multiplying that number by a certain value, adding, and then converting back into a letter. I wrote a program to do this and enjoyed it, as opposed to hating the math of converting. I guess it's a good thing I'm a computer science major and not a math major.

Binary Tree Iterator

My last homework assignment was to create an iterator for a binary tree. I had a bit of trouble figuring out how to use a stack in order to remember where the iterator has gone. I finally figured it out. It was quite enjoyable. I implemented it so that it traverses the tree pre-rder. I may, in my free time, go back and add functionality so that it will run in-order and post-order.

Computer Networks

You may or may not know that I have had a difficult time getting the classes I want next quarter. Because of where I am in the curriculum, I am extremely limited in the computer science classes I can take. I am taking CSSE230, which is Fundamentals of Software Development III. The only other class I can take is Computer Networks. Of course this class was full before I could get in. I am also taking Probability and Statistics, a required math course, and a humanities elective. What else could I take? There really wasn't anything else, though I eventually worked my way into Linear Algebra, even though after last quarter I swore I would never take two math classes the same semester. I did however talk to the teacher of the Computer Networks class and he put me on the waiting list.

Yesterday I got an email from him saying a spot opened up and it was mine. I quickly marched down to the registrar's office and signed up. The only problem is that I now have 5 straight hours of class. That is from 10:50am-3:20pm. I would miss lunch entirely. Well I talked to a friend of mine who I knew was in the same class, but in the hour before and he decided it would work better for him to take it during the hour I was. So we are going to switch sections tomorrow.

I am excited I am taking networking instead of linear algebra. I'll have to see how much work it is along with CS230. I haven't had two CS classes the same quarter yet.

New Blog

I already have a blog, Philosophical Ranting of an Engineer is the current title. It is where I post how life is going, what I am thinking about, midnight philosophy (more like two am usually). It is good stuff. This will be different. This will be much more boring. This will be an account of what I am coding. It will include class assignments. It will include my own projects for fun. It will include random programming concepts I come across. In other words, if you are fascinated by coding, this might actually interest you.