tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4037272814566893607.post1739661994123743671..comments2024-01-09T00:31:21.816-08:00Comments on Upper Harmonics: Star shapesTylerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03197090819217016934noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4037272814566893607.post-17757686734842556892008-05-12T23:38:00.000-07:002008-05-12T23:38:00.000-07:00Yay comments!I know about the codes for < and w...Yay comments!<BR/><BR/>I know about the codes for < and whatnot, I was just feeling lazy. If I remember correctly there was more code I was going to type out, and I left it out. You got my point anyway, though, it seems.<BR/><BR/>I've been meaning to write a long, carefully thought out post about why the class was so badly taught. I'll get to it eventually.<BR/><BR/>They're only called star shapes because they're made with stars. I suppose "asterisk shapes" would be more accurate. Here's a fun one I came across recently which actually has nothing to do with stars or asterisks at all:<BR/><BR/>http://acm.pku.edu.cn/JudgeOnline/problem?id=1941<BR/><BR/>Your site sounds great! I'll check it out.Tylerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03197090819217016934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4037272814566893607.post-14933392091223672562008-05-12T23:30:00.000-07:002008-05-12T23:30:00.000-07:00Rollerblades Kid. Cool nickname.Excellent post. I ...Rollerblades Kid. Cool nickname.<BR/><BR/>Excellent post. I really agree with you.<BR/><BR/>The history of programming languages is fairly complicated. It's good to look into. This semester I learned a lot about how computers work at the hardware level. High level languages like C++ really help to extract tiny operations into code that people can easily write.<BR/><BR/>At the hardware level, computers don't know anything about objects or even functions. Processors sequentially execute operations based on their instruction set, and only the absolute basics exist. Lots of issues have to be accounted for, like memory access, interrupts, exceptions, branching, etc.<BR/><BR/>Still, I don't think C++ goes far enough, which is why you still have to deal with quirky stuff which seems strange until you see what it's really doing. Fortunately that's why languages like Ruby, Python, or PHP are so useful. These allow programming on an even higher level. But it's cool to learn the lower level stuff first. I really appreciated learning Assembly this semester, and I finally have an understanding for what machine code is. Each assembler instruction (unless it's a pseudoinstruction which is handled by the compiler) directly translates into machine code, which literally is just 1s and 0s. It's truly amazing.<BR/><BR/>I would like to hear about your problems with the way the class was taught. I feel the same way. No programming class I've taken has been taught well. EE352 (with assembly and embedded C) is the best I've had so far, and it's not even a CSCI class. That's sad. For this reason, I'm planning to develop a new programming curriculum and independently teach it this summer. I've made a website for the endeavor: <A HREF="http://www.anyonecancode.net/" REL="nofollow">Anyone Can Code.net</A>.<BR/><BR/>Looks like you fixed the << problem. To expand on that, for using special characters, the creators of HTML made up a bunch of character entities. For the < symbol you can use &lt;, and other symbols have similar ones.<BR/><BR/>There is some value in tracing through poorly-written code. It tests that you understand programming syntax. Every programmer needs to know at least the simple fundamentals of how a compiler works, how it takes your code and runs it. If you don't know what existing code does (even if it's ugly and useless), how can you write code?<BR/><BR/>However, it could be taken too far. There are obscure code contests where they make up confusing code just for the sake of it, and that gets dumb.<BR/><BR/>Those star problems are interesting. Why aren't they shaped like actual stars? Or do they just look that way because the leading tabs/spaces were removed since they are considered meaningless in HTML?Elliothttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07956936116734403243noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4037272814566893607.post-28454178061415356232008-04-12T21:31:00.000-07:002008-04-12T21:31:00.000-07:00Wow. Like 80% of that post went over my head.Wow. Like 80% of that post went over my head.Paigehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02346073493439379780noreply@blogger.com