Week 3: Whew...Collatz was fun

Yay! The first CS 313E project of the semester has been submitted!

It was definitely a learning experience to say the least. Working on Collatz helped to solidify the following two lessons for me:

Lesson 1: Piazza and Study Buddies are Crucial
If you read my post from last week, you already know how I feel about Piazza. I love it! It's usefulness really came into fruition with this first assignment. With a simple search I found discussions and questions based on the same issues I was facing. The Piazza posts were also really helpful in finding a study buddy. As Professor Downing continually stresses, our success in this class is a function of how proactive we are in reaching out for help when necessary and offering help when possible. I'm really happy that I found a classmate to work with during the Collatz storm. I was able to explain bits of the instructions she was not clear on and she helped to refresh my memory on Python and git commands.

Speaking of git....

Lesson 2: Git and GitHub are Crucial
Where have these tools been all my life?! Seriously, it was so helpful to have a log of the changes I made to my code and to be able to 'revert' back to a previous version when a bright idea turned out not so bright in the end. These tools enhance what Software Development is all about: trial and error. Before I knew about these tools (i.e. before Professor Downing's class), I would have to save several copies of my code as I changed it to prevent disastrous events such as a compilation failure due to a syntax error or the blue screen of death. Thankfully, git and GitHub are like software versions of me that create copies of code for safe keeping.

Ahh, Project 1 has been submitted and it's time to move on to Project 2. Be sure to come back next week to see how things go!

Thanks for reading,
--JL