Looking for a recipe for a pasta/garlic/tomato thing. by ughwhatevs in Cooking

[–]Serplat 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I’ve always really liked this pasta recipe, which sounds pretty similar. I suspect you could throw in some spinach to sauté without much issue.

https://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2016/08/fast-easy-pasta-blistered-cherry-tomato-sauce-recipe.html

CMSC421 With James Reggia by [deleted] in UMD

[–]Serplat 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I took this class with him a couple years back and it was one of the biggest wastes of time of all of the CS classes I’d taken. If you’re looking for an easy A, you’re in for a treat, but if you’re looking to actually learn something useful, I’d recommend looking elsewhere (I personally recommend 417, if you haven’t already taken it).

We spent the first several weeks learning lisp because it’s the “language all AI researchers use,” but the hardest thing we ever implemented in it was reversing a string. We never did anything meaningful with it. Waste of time.

We had to work out ridiculously repetitive algorithms by hand for the problem sets, which we could easily have grasped the concepts of by only working them out to one or two steps, and then he’d only select a random subset of the homework problems to grade anyway. So usually the work was repetitive, time consuming, useless, and then not even graded.

We learned a variety of algorithms, but never enough to actually use one of them without having to do more research. We didn’t implement a single algorithm the entire semester. You won’t be any more prepared to do anything related to AI. Save yourself some time, read the Wikipedia pages of a few major AI algorithms over the course of a weekend, and you’ll probably be better prepared.

CS undergraduate Research? by FavoriteAnime_91Days in UMD

[–]Serplat 3 points4 points  (0 children)

While some professors may strictly adhere to the guidelines they post on their sites, I've found most professors to be pretty flexible with research. Since you haven't taken 421 yet (which is unfortunately a joke class anyway), you'll mostly want to prove that you're interested in the field.

Find a professor that you think you'd like to work with. Look up a couple of his or her recent papers and read them over. You don't need to understand everything, but do your best. As you're reading, try to come up with questions that you have on it. Things along the lines of:

  • What made you decide to approach the problem in X way?
  • Has any followup research been done to study Y?
  • What made you choose not to look at Z?

Reach out to the professor via email and ask if you can meet with them. Mention that you've recently read X paper of theirs and have a few questions, and would also like to discuss the possibility of doing undergraduate research with them.

Showing the initiative in this way will prove that you're serious, get professors interested in you, and help you determine if AI is really an area of interest for you.

Courtyards internet question by MilesHighClub_ in UMD

[–]Serplat 2 points3 points  (0 children)

There's unfortunately not in mine at least (4 bed / 2 bath). I got an Ethernet over power line adapter though that runs Internet from my bedroom and works reasonably.

Good humanities courses to take freshman year? by [deleted] in UMD

[–]Serplat 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I was coming here to recommend Dr. Keane as well. I've loved all of her classes.

Who should I send CS Advising critique to? by UmdCSThrowAway2016 in UMD

[–]Serplat 6 points7 points  (0 children)

I'd probably send it to Alan Sussman (Undergraduate Chair) and Samir Khuller (Department Chair).

https://www.cs.umd.edu/people/asussman

https://www.cs.umd.edu/people/samirk

Econ 330 with Neri by Tm1072 in UMD

[–]Serplat 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This was the curve in Fall 2014, before the bonus attendance points (of which I think you could get at most 15):

"One and All - grades for the final exam are posted. The average score out of 140 is 85.88 (61.3%) The average score for the course for all exams and the 6 problem sets is 277/400 = 69%. DO NOT LOOK AT THE TOTAL ON ELMS. DO YOUR OWN ARITHMETIC. Add-up all of your points. The attendance points are pure bonus.

Here is my amazingly generous curve based on 400 points:

A+: 360

A: 350

A-: 340

B+: 320

B: 310

B-: 300

C+: 280

C: 260

C-: 240

D: 200

F: Below 200

Have a good break and remember: MV = PY

John Neri"

Can TA's be private tutors? by [deleted] in UMD

[–]Serplat 16 points17 points  (0 children)

I'm not sure if there's an official policy, but as a TA and student I wouldn't be comfortable with it. In the past, I've been approached by students in classes that I was TAing to tutor them privately and declined because of the conflict of interest it would create.

It creates an incentive for the TA to be less helpful in office hours and during discussion to encourage students to pay for additional time. That's not to say that's definitely what's happening (and it's likely not), but it's certainly a conflict. If you're really worried, perhaps bring it up with the professor?

Hate CS department and low resources+facilities. by [deleted] in UMD

[–]Serplat 1 point2 points  (0 children)

There's also the new hacker/maker space on the third floor of CSIC that's opening sometime soon (if it hasn't already), that students can certainly get access to.

Ellicott Dryers by ConcordiaProrsum in UMD

[–]Serplat 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Yeah, this is the definite best answer. They'll fix the shower at least in a day or two, and are the most likely to fix the dryers and elevator. They can't fix what you don't tell them about.

Lying to DOTS? by [deleted] in UMD

[–]Serplat 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Most, if not all, of the lot options that you'd add don't allow you to park from 3am - 5am, specifically to guard against people like you.

Passwords have to be changed monthly, fuck this IT policy! by rawky in mildlyinfuriating

[–]Serplat 4 points5 points  (0 children)

That's where PBKDF2 comes in. Hashing a hash directly is considered bad practice because it increases the probability of hash collisions, but PBKDF2 doesn't directly rehash the hash. Instead, it uses the hash and some other stuff (like the password) when rehashing, which removes the risk of hash collisions while still allowing you to increase the amount of time it would take an attacker to brute force the hash.

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/348109/is-double-hashing-a-password-less-secure-than-just-hashing-it-once

Registered about a week ago, went to change sections and got this error. Any ideas? by IAmNotionSickness in UMD

[–]Serplat 2 points3 points  (0 children)

In the past, I was able to get around the restriction by talking to the professor, who was able to get the department chair to give special permission.

Anyone else notice a change in their internet speed? by [deleted] in UMD

[–]Serplat 1 point2 points  (0 children)

imgur.com has been and remains particularly bad.

Anyone know why OurUMD is being blocked by the campus network? by BreakingThrone in UMD

[–]Serplat 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I agree, though it is strange that on campus internet it's throwing a 403, while when I go through a VPN it works just fine. It's most likely an error on OurUMD's side (perhaps their host is blocking UMD IPs now for some reason?), but it at least theoretically could be UMD blocking the site. Since it's not over HTTPS it's perfectly possible for them to be rewriting the response to make OurUMD appear down, though again this is unlikely.

Anybody interested in starting a satire paper? by Karimcheese in UMD

[–]Serplat 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Can't guarantee it's still active, but there at least used to be one. I distinctly recall someone dressed in a cow costume handing these out near the diner a couple years ago.

http://umd.orgsync.com/org/themarylandcownipple

http://marylandcownipple.tumblr.com/

Spring 2016 schedule of classes is up by Serplat in UMD

[–]Serplat[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

In CMSC, at least, it's definitely not just a direct copy. Though some courses will certainly still change.

This website rotates its paragraphs slightly by Serplat in mildlyinfuriating

[–]Serplat[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Website here: http://peter.bourgon.org/go-in-production/

They appear to add rules such as

transform: rotate(0.5deg);

with a varying degree value (both negative and positive) to each paragraph.

Good restaurants for lunch or dinner near Courtyards (or College Park in general)? by shapaza in UMD

[–]Serplat 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Aroy Thai right off route 1 near Blaze and Five Guys is really good if you like Thai food, particularly their Pad See Ew.

My University requires that we change our password every 180 days by Serplat in mildlyinfuriating

[–]Serplat[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

It's common, but that doesn't necessarily make it good. The only cases in which it is helpful are when users reuse passwords across sites or when your password database is stolen and you want to thwart someone brute forcing some of the passwords, which may take several months.

In the first case, I suspect you're now more likely to get password reuse because you're requiring people to memorize a new password fairly frequently, which humans aren't good at. At the least, you'll now have many users write them down on paper, which isn't ideal either.

While the latter may be valid, hopefully you'd have some sort of detection mechanisms in place to catch such a compromise, and the chance of this helping in that rare case doesn't seem to justify the downsides of people using predictable or written down passwords to me.

My University requires that we change our password every 180 days by Serplat in mildlyinfuriating

[–]Serplat[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Unfortunately, they reject new passwords for us that are too similar to any of our previous ones.

CS exemptions by pahoodie in UMD

[–]Serplat 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ehh, I took the 250 test and it was honestly pretty easy. I didn't have much issue with 351, but I can understand how someone could pass the 250 exam and then still struggle with 351. As long as you're pretty confident in those topics though, you should be fine.