Blog 2
What did you do this past week?
This past week I started my new job and I attended classes. I also had my first assignment due for iOS, so I worked on that and created my first Swift program. That was pretty exciting and I’m looking forward to the rest of the course. Other than that, I tried to organize my next week so that assignments don’t pile up.
What’s in your way?
Mentality is standing in my way. Last semester was the first time I hadn’t had a job and my grades were substantially better. Money has been tight though so I went back to work and now I’m feeling stressed about handling work and school. It’s never been an issue, but this is my last semester. There are no do-overs, so the pressure is on.
What will you do next week?
Next week I’ll be focusing on my time management because all of my classes have assignments coming up. I think I’ll spread my CS assignments out over a few days and try to knock my easier assignments out in one sitting so that I can get them out of the way.
If you read it, what did you think of the makefile?
I have not read the makefile. I’m planning on doing the Perusall assignment as soon as I finish this blog. I am intimidated though. I’ve never grasped a good understanding on makefiles so annotating one is making me nervous.
What was your experience of Docker? (this question will vary, week to week)
I haven’t actually worked with Docker yet, but from lectures I’ve gotten the impression that it’s a useful tool. I plan to use it for the first assignment and gain a better understanding of it.
What was your experience of assertions? (this question will vary, week to week)
I’m not actually sure if I’ve used assertions in the past. I know what they are, but I don’t have experience with them yet. Professor Downing made it clear why they’re not great for testing and are prone to user error, so I hope I can take that knowledge and use assertions in a beneficial way.
What was your experience of unit tests? (this question will vary, week to week)
Unit tests — painful but useful. I was the kid in our previous CS classes that would jump for joy when someone would share a testing script in Piazza because I have never been great at writing unit tests. I hope to break that this semester and learn about testing tools because I know there’s no avoiding them in the real world.
What made you happy this week?
I passed my Government placement exam and that made me feel relieved. I was scared I wouldn’t and I would have to take an extra semester and lose my job offer. Also, onigiri. I had some I think 2 or 3 times this week. Any day I have onigiri is a happy day.
What’s your pick-of-the-week or tip-of-the-week?
I’m going to piggyback off Siddhi for this one because I think it’s a great tool. She found a tool called Pynguin, which is a python general unit test generator and generates unit tests automatically. Again, I’m jumping for joy. I haven’t played around with it yet, but I’m looking forward to it. Crossing my fingers that it’ll be useful for us! 🤞🏽