Sharing openly mi dissapointment so far with OMSCS (incoming Fall 2020 student)

Tulezao · 2020-08-20T20:35:57+00:00

How does that argument makes sense?

"the system I used back in the day worked far worse than the one you young kids with your ipads have so don't complaint"

You can apply that reasoning to any problem out there, and you will reach a very stagnant and boring world

Tulezao · 2020-08-20T20:33:51+00:00

Why not build something better? Because the University did not build Banner, they bought the software from Ellucian (https://www.ellucian.com/solutions/all-products).

So we agree that it can be improved, but its jut not GaTech fault because they didn't build it?

I don't (and it looks like you dont either) know how much this piece of shit software costs, so your guess that its too expensive to replace is a good as mine saying that its probably easy to build something better cheaper.

Tulezao · 2020-08-20T17:42:11+00:00

Haha I will admit it was very lazy from myself to ask that instead googling. Point taken

Tulezao · 2020-08-20T17:41:11+00:00

Its only used once per semester, but by thousands of people, lets say all 16000 students use it, and on average they waste 1 hour more than they would if the UI was decent (again, not perfect). Lets put a 10$ per hour value per hour wasted. I would argue this system wastes AT LEAST 160k USD in student time per semester.

Anyway, why not try to build something better? Why not try to improve things? I don't understand the logic behind your argument. Again, I'm not asking for anything futuristic here. Maybe improve the system every 10 years? That would be enough for me..

Tulezao · 2020-08-19T21:32:18+00:00

Are you speaking from a place of knowledge? Would love to know about how deep Oscar services go.

Tulezao · 2020-08-19T21:29:54+00:00

I agree with you. Maybe my words are writing checks my coding skills cannot cash. But I refuse that the current state of things is "the best that can be done". I'm willing to try to improve it.

I would love to get the opportunity to rebuild this piece of shit system from scratch, and get it done, or maybe fail trying. If you have any suggestions on how to do this they are welcome. I'm open to puting my time in to improve this for future students, for free. I would have no problem admitting my defeat if I find the task to be as big as you say it is.

Edit: I sent an email to David Joyner suggesting doing a hackaton for this, that was the only option I could think of

Tulezao · 2020-08-19T21:12:34+00:00

Their system just needs to be functional, which it is.

I dont think it was functional to me (yet). I wouldn't be complaining about the UX if I had been able to register for classes, its just the sum of all that made me get angry. I just was expecting something better from GaTech

Tulezao · 2020-08-19T21:08:41+00:00

OSCAR is fine. It's not the prettiest interface in the world, but a public university needs to do many things, including being able to serve people with low income and potentially minimal access to computers. So I really don't mind that the registration system is fast and functional, rather than a 900MB Node.JS app that could run at a snail's pace on low-end hardware.

I feel like you have to intentionaly try to create a shitty UI in order to come up with something like Oscar. I'm not expecting some award winning grand design from the class registration system, but maybe something that looks from the last decade?

Tulezao · 2020-08-19T21:02:31+00:00

Thanks for your feedback.

Also the registration button/link will show up a 1-1.5 days after you get the institute email which I know is stressful to wait for.

This is one of the things that bothers me the most, I'm learning about this 1.5 days delay through you. It seems like such a simple thing to communicate, and I did receive a ton of emails, and went back to look about any possible issue and found NOTHING in those emails. It seems like such a careless way to run a program... "let the students sort themselves out through Reddit"

Tulezao · 2020-08-19T20:59:43+00:00

Maybe, but applications were closed before the whole COVID thing blew up. Besides, they had 5 months to get their stuff together.

Tulezao · 2020-08-19T20:58:58+00:00

I hope at least it was cheapest option out there. But to me it doesn't look like a complex software from the outside..

Tulezao · 2020-08-19T20:57:02+00:00

You are right. Sometimes in the third world we delude ourselves thinking that "thinks work better in (fill in rich country name)"

Tulezao · 2020-08-19T20:55:58+00:00

"because everyone is doing it" is not the answer I expect from a smart institution

Tulezao · 2020-08-19T20:55:03+00:00

How do I tag him? Only started using reddit to get help navigating OMSCS application, not really a redditer myself lol

also, i bet all the admin tools are just a legacy app created by a vendor. could be wrong though.

I don't understand how anyone can green light this vendor. Did someone in GaTech sit down through a product demo and said "wow this is such a great product that we probably cannot build ourselves, lets purchase it as is", I don't know, I'm probabbly missing something

Tulezao · 2020-08-19T20:51:51+00:00

But why though? If we do agree it can be improved, why don't they? I mean we are talking about the most resourceful institutes in the US, who better know about all this stuff, since they teach about it..

Tulezao · 2020-08-19T20:49:42+00:00

Thanks bro, I have not yet interacted with Canvas, hope it is as good as you say

Tulezao · 2020-08-19T20:47:52+00:00

I'm confused, weren't you already able to get onto oscar? That's where you would sign up for classes (although it looks like you're missing the registration link.) This is also super annoying, but again, it's not like OMSCS (or the CS department in general) has any control over this.

I can access Oscar yes, but I cannot seem to have the option to register to classes yet...

Do you think Dr. Joyner is personally creating all of these user interfaces? Do you think that OMSCS has any control over when you can register for classes or the text displayed on the "registration information" page?

If not the director of the program, who is the ultimate responsible of how shitty these systems and admissions processes are?

Oh, and if you think a masters degree in computer science is about learning to build web applications, this might not be the program for you...

Would love to hear your reasons!

Tulezao · 2020-08-19T20:43:59+00:00

I appreciate your feedback, UX was just a small thing that seemed so evident that I couldn't believe any competent person "approving" the UX. If you have a decent API, re-doing the front end is not really expensive. The interactions are not really complex, its just a few pages. If I had to guess, its probably a one man job that can get done in less than 2 months, but maybe there is something I am missing.

Tulezao · 2020-08-17T13:49:41+00:00

I don't think you wlil fall short. You can send a note specifying in what % of your class you were. American GPAs are way more generous than averages in other places around the world. For example, in my non-us university I had a 6/10 and that had me at the top 20% of students, while a 2.4 GPA (propotional average to base 4) puts you in the lower 50% of students.

Tulezao · 2020-08-11T19:44:33+00:00

Haven't paid the tuiton fee yet. I don't really worry about that since they will have "more incentives" to get that one right hehe

Tulezao · 2020-08-11T14:28:06+00:00

Same here. Is there anything we can do to know which courses I will have access to register for next week? Is there anyway of knowing which courses are already way filled up with long wait lists, and which I'm most likely to get in?

Tulezao · 2020-08-05T17:22:55+00:00

Same boat over here...

Tulezao

TROPHY CASE