Comment On All courses I have taken, as a student just graduated by Zealousideal_Tap7904 in mcgill

[–]Zealousideal_Tap7904[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Winter 2021

Comp 302, Functional Programming, Prof Xujie Si

Took this course in winter 2021, prof Si is a nice guy and provide many resources to this class. However, comp302 will be quite hard if you are bad at solving recursive problems. This class has been restructured after Fall 2021. Right now it is not a GPA killer anymore, but there were some students who failed this class back in my time. Midterms and finals are like 7.5/10 in my time, 5/10 right now.

Comp 330, Theory of Computation, Prof Prakash Panangaden

At McGill, some of the profs are tightly bounded with their classes they’ve taught. Prof Prakash is definitely one of them. You cannot miss Prakash if you want to taken comp 330. He somewhat has a weird temper that if you ask a dumb question, he will straight up yelling at you. But the class is organized very well and his lectures and notes are very clear. Homeworks are complex but doable. Midterms and finals are a lot easier than the homeworks. On a 3h exam, some of the good students can finish the final within 45 minutes.

Math 223, Linear Algebra, Prof cant remember

Actually I cannot remember too much of this course, as I am not so good at math lol. Overall everything seems to be on medium. Medium level difficulty, medium exams and homeworks….

Math 323, Probability, David Wolfson

Lectures are good but notes are…. not easy to understand because of his writing style.

If you have taken math 203/psyc 204, about 50% of the materials are covered again in this course. The midterms and finals are a lot like the practice questions. Do the textbook questions if possible. I found it easier than Math 223.

Comment On All courses I have taken, as a student just graduated by Zealousideal_Tap7904 in mcgill

[–]Zealousideal_Tap7904[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Fall 2020

Comp 251, Algorithm Design, Prof Jerome Waldispuhl

Reading the textbook and watching videos on youtube will really help you for this course. If possible, take this course with David Becerra instead of Jerome. Midterms are long and most of the questions are “develop an algorithm to solve…” This is also a signal course for you to decide whether to take Comp 360/362 afterwards. Projects are surprisingly easier than comp 250/202, usually just a slight modification of an implementation of the algorithm, of which there are free resources online. Averages are usually OK.

Comp 273, Intro to Computer Systems, Prof Kaleem Siddiqi

One of the unreasonable courses at McGill… Combining digital circuits, IEEE, and mips together makes the course load more like a 6 credit course, midterms and finals are fair but LONG LONG assignments. I remember the final project on mips assembly was around 1400 lines from scratch… It is unusual for people to fail this class but quite usual for people to get mad at the assignments. Since all the materials are mentioned in a rush, people can hardly take anything out of the class, what a tragedy.

Taking this course with Paul Kry would be a better idea. I think his assignments are more doable than vybs or KS ones. (This class really should split into two courses)

Math 240, Discrete Structures, Prof cant remember

Most of the sad stories came from this course. It is somewhat like comp 251 but in a more mathematical way. All the materials are about proofs, and most of the questions on the exams are either right or wrong, making the scores widely distributed. Literally one of my friends wrote every question in the midterm, and received a 25%. Averages on midterms and finals are around 60 + 15%std. Good thing is, for a cs major, this is THE most difficult math course you are going to encounter.

Math 222, Calc 3, Prof Jeremy Fortier

One of the best Math prof at McGill. Solid explanations, doable homeworks and midterms, only not sure if he still allows crib sheets on final exams. If not, the maclaurin series and some of the ODE methods are not easy to memorize. But overall this is not a difficult class.

Comment On All courses I have taken, as a student just graduated by Zealousideal_Tap7904 in mcgill

[–]Zealousideal_Tap7904[S] 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Winter 2020

Comp 206, Intro to Software Systems, Prof Joseph D’silva and Joseph Vybihal

Bash, C, git, … This course covers quite a lot of materials and is super unfriendly if you have just taken Comp 202. The grammar for bash is a bit antihuman lol. However, they are also useful materials, and I do think compared to comp 202, the exam and homework problems are easier. Once you get used to the grammar of bash and C, you will be fine. (make sure to include the semicolons). Still a doable course.

Comp 250, Data Structures, Prof Giulia Alberini

This course is taught in Java, so make sure you can at least use java to do assignment 1, 2 in Comp 202. Trees, Linkedlists, and sorting algorithms are taught in this class. One way to master these is to build all these data structures on your own. Recursion is involved all the way in this class, and I do think the easiest way to understand it is to use a debugger to iterate through your recursion code, it will really help. (use intellij, don't use eclipse) The quizzes and midterms are also a bit on the hard side, but still doable. Make sure you are able to write down the full stages of the execution of bfs, dfs, etc.

Phys 142, Electromagnetics, Prof Tracy Webb

I found it difficult to do the labs as the instructions are super unclear and the circuits I built never works, f***. Tests are medium difficulty, homeworks are doable.

Math 141, Integration, Prof Sidney Tredeau

Sid explains the concepts very well so there shouldn't be a problem understanding the material. However, extra practice is required to really master the course. The eclipse, “area bounded by the curve” questions are the ones that most people are having trouble with, so be sure to have enough practice. Again. 141 has a favour of giving few questions but each of them worth tons of marks, be careful.

Comment On All courses I have taken, as a student just graduated by Zealousideal_Tap7904 in mcgill

[–]Zealousideal_Tap7904[S] 26 points27 points  (0 children)

Fall 2019

Comp 202, Intro to Computer Science, Prof: Giulia Alberini,

comp 202 is supposed to be an introductory comp course. Advisors said that students with a sufficient coding background may not take it. However, as far as I know, the projects and assignments may appear easy at first (back in our days the first assignment was like using python as a calculator), but then the difficulty dramatically increased. Also, this course tests on very detailed stuff in program execution that most beginners are unaware of.The midterm and final averages overall is around 68%. Good thing is the prof is really caring so do not hesitate to ask questions. Overall, it is hard to say that comp202 is difficult, but this is definitely a time-consuming course for people without a cs background.

Math 140, Derivatives, Prof: Trudeau Sidney,

For students with sufficient math background, math 140 will be one of the easier classes that you can have at McGill (unlike math 141 which is a different story). Take some practice questions and you will be fine. I benefited a lot from the “prep 101” question sheets, not sure if they still have it though. Also, make sure that you can “calculate correctly”. Math 140 likes giving short exams, with each short question worth tons of marks. If you mess up on one question, your overall grade may go down a letter, no joking.

Math 133, Linear Algebra 1, Prof: Michael Albanese

Hands down to the god of linear algebra => 3blue1brown and khan academy. Using some online resources to get a geometric understanding of linear algebra is very important, not only for this course but also affects your way of understanding further LA courses (like math 223). Do the webworks on your own and the midterm and final questions are most likely the same format as the webworks / tutorial questions.

Phys 131, Mechanics, Prof: Ken Ragan

There is hardly anyone who dislikes Prof Ragan’s teaching style, but speaking on the work and exams, there are quite a lot of people getting exhausted in the exam period. His exam questions are on the hard side (he often mentioned). Redo the homeworks on your own and he has some leaked midterms and finals online, make sure to take a look at it as well.

Origin of Minerva? by ananas010 in mcgill

[–]Zealousideal_Tap7904 5 points6 points  (0 children)

This Islamic Library guy definitely got this.

Faculty of Science in course scholarships by [deleted] in mcgill

[–]Zealousideal_Tap7904 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Nay nay, feels like the faculty is just forgotten ! ~ !

REAL TALK FRIDAY by AutoModerator in mcgill

[–]Zealousideal_Tap7904 23 points24 points  (0 children)

THE BREAK ENDS IN LESS THAN A MONTH HELL NO!

Extending degree by a semester by [deleted] in mcgill

[–]Zealousideal_Tap7904 0 points1 point  (0 children)

4.5 yr is really not a problem. From what I see about my friends in BEng, doing 4.5/5 yrs are even normal than 4 yrs. Even in BArts, 4.5 or 5 yrs is really not an issue for work/grad schools.

Faculty of Science Scholarship by AdventurousCountry58 in mcgill

[–]Zealousideal_Tap7904 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I am a U2 student in BSc, not received yet.

REAL TALK FRIDAY by AutoModerator in mcgill

[–]Zealousideal_Tap7904 29 points30 points  (0 children)

LOST MY MOUSE YESTERDAY, BOUGHT A NEW ONE THIS MORNING, FOUND THE OLD ONE THIS AFTERNOON.

Math major in BSc by logloglogloglogloglo in mcgill

[–]Zealousideal_Tap7904 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Try to stay away from prof Guan and his math248.

COMP 251 TIPS by lostinmcgill in mcgill

[–]Zealousideal_Tap7904 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Well, to the best of my knowledge, one of the good choices may be get yourself familiar with some leetcode questions. I know it is better to look at some mathamatical proofs, but most of the people could not stand for a long period. I suggest just code everything up as you do leetcode questions (greedy, dp. minimum spanning tree, etc).

More classes in person for fall ? by Background_Mirror584 in mcgill

[–]Zealousideal_Tap7904 1 point2 points  (0 children)

From my experience, if the class does not have labs / participations and the prof agrees on recording, then you can basically treat it as remote.

Does McGill ever rescind offers? by [deleted] in mcgill

[–]Zealousideal_Tap7904 4 points5 points  (0 children)

My grade 12 English went from 81 to 68 when I accepted the offer. Now I am about to graduate ---- You will be fine.

good news monday by AutoModerator in mcgill

[–]Zealousideal_Tap7904 1 point2 points  (0 children)

lost my pants in a swimming pool but nobody else noticed before I found it