The CS Journey of Quoc Khanh Ho

 The first week of CST338 (Week 0) has already gone by, and it has been quite a ride. I thought Java itself would be my biggest challenge, but I was wrong. Labs 1 and 2 gave me more trouble than I expected. Even though I followed every step of Prof.C’s video tutorials, my code just did not run the way it was supposed to. I tried everything I could think of, even asked ChatGPT for help, but it did not really fix the problem. On the bright side, I actually learned some cool things about Git. I did not run into any major issues with it, and I found it very useful. Version control is something I have always wanted to get better at, and this course has already helped me do that. Even though it is a four-unit course, it definitely feels like it takes more time than that. Lab00 and Lab01 each took me more than half a day to finish, and the CodingBat exercises were another challenge. Since I am more used to Python, Java feels a bit unfamiliar to me, so it is taking more time to get comfort...

This week marks the beginning of my journey in CST338, and wow — it’s been quite an introduction! The first week always feels like a whirlwind, and this one was no exception. There’s a lot to take in — new materials, tools, and expectations — and I’ve spent a good amount of time just getting familiar with everything. One thing that really stood out to me was the CodingBat section. It’s such an interesting way to practice Java problems and brush up on basic concepts. At first, it looked simple, but once I started solving them, I realized it was more challenging than I expected. I think part of that comes from the fact that I’m much more comfortable with Python than Java. The syntax and structure feel different, so it took me some time to switch gears mentally. To get through the exercises, I relied not only on the tutorial videos provided in the course but also spent quite a few hours on YouTube and Google looking up examples and explanations. It was a bit frustrating at first — I’d wri...